Typing Out Loud

Back in the 1970s, if my memory is up to the task, there was a nationwide advertising campaign that featured an owl exhorting the message “Give a hoot, don’t pollute.” The owl was named Woodsy.

There was also a series of adverts featuring a Native American crying about the way Americans were polluting the land.

Of course today we have the very strongly-worded messages on our McDonald’s waste: “Please dispose of properly.” Who could ignore such a threat from the Hamburgler? Certainly not this fast-food junkie.

For most of my life I didn’t give litter much thought. I came from a family that more or less picked up after itself. When I was a rotten kid it didn’t occur to me to toss my Quarter Pounder foam box out the car window.

Litter as a scourge on society didn’t occupy many of my brain cycles until a little more than a decade ago when I moved from my native Michigan to Norfolk, Virginia. I moved to the steamy swamp of Virginia for a job. A great job, mind you, but up until this past February when I moved to the mountains of Utah, the state of Virginia and I never became close, personal friends. I disapproved of the weather in Virginia (I still do, in fact). But one of the first things I noticed back in the winter of 1999 while in Norfolk for the job interview was the litter. Trash. Everywhere.

Norfolk is purported to be the largest naval port in the world. It sits on the Chesapeake Bay. Ocean. Wildlife everywhere (even though much of it is creepy, crawling, bitey and stingy). And along with all of that nature-ness was paper, trash, bottles, cans and plastic bags. Along the roadways. In the culverts. Blowing across fields. Ankle-deep in parking lots. It was such a contrast from Michigan that it really made an impression.

During my time in Virginia it never improved. I can’t say it got any worse, but it didn’t get better. I talked about this state of affairs with a good friend of mine who was a military veteran (I was one of three non-vets within a 100-mile radius of said Navy base — I am convinced that they let me live out of pity). He had spent much of his military time in Germany, known the world over for public parks that sport picnic tables that are clean enough for light surgery. Certainly the German culture (Germany being where my people originate) is one of control, order and “rightness”, so perhaps it’s simply in the water. But my friend noted that his vision of litter and pollution was perhaps tempered by years in Germany because every place he went compared poorly to his experience of German order and cleanliness. How could it not? Those Germans are some fine people. And they know some amazing things to do with cabbage and sausage.

But back to Virginia. Or, rather, let’s get the hell out of Virginia, which is what I did a few months ago. I am now in Provo, Utah. I am at the base of the Wasatch mountains. It’s a desert climate. It’s mountainous. It’s a dry heat as I oft-say. But today it struck me, while out for a drive, it’s clean. Sure, there’s some litter, but I notice it even more starkly here because it is certainly not common. When I see a Wendy’s bag or a plastic grocery store bag I think “Ooops, someone must have dropped that.” In Virginia I was racking another round into the chamber to deal with the weasel that blatantly tossed their crap into my ecosystem. I’m sure there are weasels here in the mountains, too, but the general state of cleanliness here cuts them a lot of slack from good ole Mr. A.

So what’s the difference? We’re all Americans. We’re all in the melting pot. Perhaps it’s the inherent natural beauty of Utah that makes people think three or four extra times before tossing their crap out the window. But what explains Michigan? Oh, don’t get me wrong, Michigan has its own version of amazing natural beauty, especially the closer you get to Canada.

I think here in Utah the answer is the mountains. They are a visual representation of God looking over everyone’s shoulder. You don’t dare do something too blatant, that mountain’s looking!

In Michigan I think it was bottle laws. A reach you think? Yeah, it is. But in Michigan every consumable “bottle” (Coke, Pepsi, Dew, water, etc.) requires that a deposit of ten cents be paid at time of purchase. Later you return the empty container to the store and you get your dime back. So even if Dudley Dufus tosses his empty bottle of sugar water out the window, some 12-year-old boy is going to come along on his bicycle with visions of getting rich one dime at a time.

I think the general mentality of holding onto those bottles carries over to other waste. People think about their garbage. They’re more likely to hold onto their trash because there might be some money in it.

I’m not advocating that everyone have a bottle law. It’s a huge undertaking. Stores are required to collect the deposit. Stores must accept the dirty, stinky empties. An entire industry has developed to create automated return robots that accept your empty, crush it and give you a receipt good for cash to buy Budweiser on your way out. So it’s expensive for society to do this. (And I’m purposefully ignoring the costs of trucking the empties to some remote villa where they are, if propaganda is to be believed, recycled into artificial heart valves, Cheetos and other fine goods). And who knows, maybe the net result isn’t that great. I imagine that the carbon footprint to create those return-your-empty-here robots is pretty huge. They use electricity. They are broken every other minute. But the green spaces are greener.

The key to keeping our earth all clean and tidy? Grow mountains. Great big snow-capped ones. Do your part — plant a mountain today!

I have been quite fortunate during my lifetime to have had almost no experience with crime. Sure, I’ve set fire to a couple of abandoned warehouses, who hasn’t? But I haven’t been the victim of major theft nor violence.

So perhaps my experience in the area of personal security means I should keep my trap shut on the following observations, but I’m not gonna.

During my formative years (which ended last Tuesday), cars had locks on their doors that required the pushing or pulling of a knob. Rare wealthy folk had locks that were operated by electricity and other forms of witchcraft. But for the most part, when you got out of your car at the Kmart, you pushed the knob down and the door was locked.

And we liked it. It was easy. At a glance you could tell if the door was locked or unlocked. And even if you had the electric locks, the principle was the same.

Seemingly overnight the remote radio-controlled locks came on the scene. One might be tempted to think that they are a frivolous luxury meant to appeal to the blue-hair set, quick to show off their new Pontiac in the hopes that Mabel might mistake it for a Mercedes. But I think these remote controls are terribly useful. If you live in a climate with nasty weather, like my native Michigan, getting the doors unlocked without having to fumble with a key and break the ice that has formed over the key-hole, is more than a mere convenience. The use of the remote control unlock feature has saved countless fingers and noses.

The handy remotes also have the ability to unlock the trunk which is another great advantage to modern life. And finally, these devices have the panic button which sets off the alarms, horns, lights and other annoyances that go totally ignored. Of course, when you set them off accidentally everyone looks your way and thinks “What an idiot.” But when the hoodlum has his machette at your throat everyone goes deaf and dumb in an instant. So the jury remains out on the usefulness of that feature.

But what I fail to understand is the logic, if indeed it exists, behind making the car “chirp” when using the remote to lock the car. Sure, I’ve just pressed this button and I’m not sure if the car “heard” me and actually locked the doors. And since I’m carrying my life savings in small bills, flying around in the back seat, I want to make damn sure those doors are locked. And the fact that I’ve left my two-year-old son in the car to guard the cash isn’t good enough — I want the doors locked!

Of course this irritation isn’t new. It’s been going on for years. But today I was sitting in my truck, in a large mall parking lot, and over the course of 10 minutes, nearly a dozen people parked, got out of their vehicle and started to walk away. They then pointed their remote device (this “pointing” action always amuses me…like they’re afraid they may innadvertently lock the car NEXT to theirs) and press the “lock” button. The car horn sounds off! How are other drivers supposed to nap with all that racket going on? Why? WHY? We have enough pollution, of all kinds, we don’t need the horn to honk to tell us we’ve locked the car. Flash the lights if you need some cue that the task has been accomplished. But don’t alert the mother ship every time you press that button!

And isn’t it interesting that, it would seem, every auto manufacturer on the orb has come up with the same brilliant method? It doesn’t matter if you have a $9,000 Hyundai or a $40,000 Lexus — press that “lock” button on the keyfob and you’re going to be jolted with annoying noise.

Now, I could simply blame the manufacturers for bad design. And I do. But I blame my fellow upright-walkers more. You’re getting out of your car. Your hand is on the “open-the-door-thingy”. What else is RIGHT THERE? What’s the other closest control? The locks! And they’re electric! And they are in the form of a simple button/lever!! Why not just lock the damn doors!? It’s quiet. You can hear and see them function. You can know they’re locked. You pretend to be smart, intelligent and thoughtful.

Oh, yeah, right. Sorry ’bout that. I wasn’t thinking.

I enjoy ketchup.  I don’t go so far as to put it on my eggs at breakfast or use it to restore hair growth, but I like it quite a bit, nonetheless.

I like it with french fries, burgers, hot dogs, burgers and sometimes I even put some on my burger.  Of course Heinz is the best brand.  I say “of course” because I know Heinz is the best and if you disagree, you’re simply wrong.

Being a tomato-based product, I am not a fan of ketchup being saved, stored or marketed in plastic containers.  I’m suspicious enough of the evils that lurk in the Rubbermaid…add the acid of tomatoes and you’re just asking for children with gills.  So I want my sauce in glass.

But this peeve is not about plastic bottles (well, one paragraph of it was), but about how ketchup gets disrespected in public eateries.

Almost any other food item that is not packaged for single-use is protected in the back rooms and/or refrigerated.  Want some A-1 Steak Sauce for your dead bovine?  You have to ask for it and after clearance has been obtained from the proper authorities, and the Condiment Vault has been opened by those two Marines standing in the corner, you are allowed to ruin your steak (it is a free country after all).

Even mustard, ketchup’s yellow cousin who always got picked last for games of Red Rover in the fifth grade, is more often than not in protected territory.

But ketchup?  It’s just sits out on tables.  All the time.  Without refrigeration.  Open to defilement by kids’ plague-dripping fingers, puppies and other close-to-the-ground threats.  I mean, drive by your favorite restaurant at 3 a.m. while making an emergency run to the 7-Eleven for some Ben & Jerry’s, and you’ll be able to see bottles of ketchup standing guard in the lonely dining room.  Bacteria grow.  The sour bite of spoilage swims through the once-divine topping.

It makes me want to cry.

Not only is this excellent and necessary food addition spoiled, causing unknown incidents of jay-walking and improper brushing technique, but it is a tremendous waste.  And I hate to see food wasted…even if it’s going to MY waist.

You’re thinking that must be the end, right?  What more could Mr. Cranky want to whine about on this topic?  Well, I’ll tell you what!!!   It’s the practice of some disreputable public eating establishments to refill ketchup bottles!

Yep, they do!  I hope you didn’t just hurl on your keyboard, because I ain’t cleaning that mess.  In your head you’re probably trying to come to grips with this horrifying concept.  I suspect you’ve created the mental picture of fresh and new bottles of ketchup being poured into nearly-defunct bottles.  But, no surprise here, you’d be wrong.

Here’s what they do:  they gather all of the ketchup bottles that are in danger of being empty and they…CONSOLIDATE them!  Ketchups of varying vintages, some going back as far as the days of the rotary telephone, are mixed, co-mingled and, I can’t go on….  It’s simply too horrific.

I am too lazy to do the research, but I strongly believe that this is against some sort of code, law or proclamation.  I mean, we have laws to protect us from stuff like this, don’t we?  I’m not allowed to sell gasoline labeled as milk, why should my life and happiness be put at risk by this dangerous ketchup cocktail?

But even if there is no law, common sense should prevent such atrocities!  But then on some days, (such as those when I witness the buggered mouth of a refilled ketchup bottle), I believe that I am the only one left with any sense.  Common or otherwise.

When I was a kid I used to watch my dad shave.  I was fascinated by the entire process.  I’m probably not alone in that.

It started with the spreading of Rise shaving cream all over his face.   The smell of the shaving cream, mixing with the steam of the hot water filling the sink is a fond memory of my childhood.  There’s something different about the fragrance of shaving cream.  I can never get enough of it.  The fragrance seems to grow legs and run when I knows my nose is on the prowl.  There was nothing to match dad’s shaving cream.

My earliest memories of dad shaving have him using a safety razor.  That thing scared the bejesus out of me!  My dad was perhaps the most technically skilled people on the planet, in my eyes, because of his ability to wield that razor without leaving a pound of flesh in the bowl of the sink.

Before too long he switched to one of the many disposable models…with, oh boy, twin blades!

The sound of the blade working its way through his whiskers is one that has stuck with me.  It was loud and sounded oh so rugged.  Shaving my own face has never sounded the same.  It was an earthy and elemental sound that compares to nothing else.

When the shaving was done, he would do an inspection in the mirror, using his hands to make sure nothing had been  missed.  It would all be finished off with a splash of Hai Karate.  (Why did they have to stop making that perfect green elixir before I was old enough to smell just like dad?!)

The experience ended when dad drained the water from the sink.  That left a shaving cream and black whisker skin clinging to the porcelain.  A pretty disgusting end to such an elemental experience.

As puberty approached I got that lone, disgusting hair on my chin.  I couldn’t wait to shave that tree trunk off my chin:  my first whisker!   If I’d only known about the lifetime of maintenance, nicks and “Oh, man…can I skip shaving just this one morning?” that lay ahead!

For the past several years I have had a strong preference for the Gillette Fusion Shaving System.  That’s right…it’s a system.  And a fine system it is!   I spent more than a decade with a beard so I was out of the shaving scene for quite some time.  After losing a bet several years ago that sent me back to the blade, I tried a large variety of whisker-shearing implements.  The Fusion has been the clear winner in my book.

Nothing else has felt so good.  The first handle I bought for it was one of those that accepted a battery so that it could vibrate during the shaving process.  A gimmick I admit, but it made the whole boring endeavor a little more interesting and official.  At the risk of having my Geek Card revoked, once that first battery ran out, I never replaced it.  So now I shave without the floor show.

The Fusion cartridge has five blades.  Amazing, isn’t it?  Within a few years we went from a large, naked blade resembling a machete to these multi-bladed devices encased in protective plastic, bounded by lubricating strips and GPS units.  I’ve given the entire thing an awful lot of study and I’ve determined the reason I like the Fusion so much is not so much the number of blades.  Rather, it’s the fact that the blades are exposed — the running water can race in between the blades and clean out the smudge.  That makes each post-rinse pass crisp and clean.  I can feel the sensation!

So, I’m a fan.  These blades are a marvel of modern science and engineering.  But the price!  Is it worth it?  I mean, I just bought four cartridges for $15!!!  That’s totally insane!  Is a clean-shaven Aaron really worth that much?  I’m not sure.  So given the high price, I tend to use each cartridge way too long.  They have a guilt-inducing throw-me-away-and-buy-a-new-one strip on them that indicates when replacement is “suggested” … which in my experience is after two swipes over my chin.  I manage to get almost a month out of each one, sometimes it ain’t pretty…but then I’m not a pretty-boy.

Which is why I’m thinking of writing about this today because this morning, I loaded a fresh cartridge!  Oh, I’m sure you’re with me here!  So smooth!  So comfortable!!!  So clean!!!!  I wish I had a fresh cartridge for every shave.  But until those huge royalty checks start to roll in, I’ll be milking each cartridge until the level of rust resembles a ’76 Pontiac on a Detroit side street.

So this morning while I was prepping for the joy of the new blade, I noticed something on the package.  I purchased the new blades at Albertson’s.  Very expensive blades though they are, notice the warning message!  This scares me more than the “…without express written consent of Major League Baseball…” warnings!  What’s with this?

My first thought is that something has happened to cause this grocery chain to add these stickers.  I mean, there’s got to be some cost, labor and effort involved in getting these labels on the packages.  So apparently energetic individuals are making a business of stealing shaving blades from stores and…egad…SELLING THEM ON THE BLACK MARKET!

It makes perfect sense that they would bypass the booze, the drugs, the toe-nail polish (perfect for sniffing) and the chocolate to steal the much-sought-after shaving blades!    I know when I’m down on my luck and looking for a thrill, I say “If only I had some hot blades!”

I guess I can rest easy tonight knowing that the really accomplished thieves are scoping out Walgreens and my neighborhood is safe for terror and mayhem.

If you’ve been out of your cell recently, I’m guessing that you have.  I believe the generic name for this marvel of mechanized paper dispensary is motion-activated hand towel dispenser.  What an interesting development in the field of bathroom science (my university catalog didn’t list this science as a major…state schools).

But a thought occurred to me recently whilst arguing with one of these wall-mounted boxes of paper pulp.  Where did they come from?  Now, I know they’re comprised of plastic and metal bits — I’m not looking for a stork-based answer here.  But did you notice how quickly these things appeared almost everywhere?  It was fast I tell you, FAST!  One day public facilities were being served by decades-old classic models and the next we needed technical training to dry our hands.

Some classic models required the user to grasp a piece of the next sheet and pull, often resulting in useless  torn sheets and great piles of paper on your toes.  Other models were equipped with some sort of handle or lever that needed to be depressed or cranked to make more paper available.  I’m happy to voice dissatisfaction over a variety of things that don’t meet with my approval, but I honestly never had an issue with the old dispensers.  Granted, sometimes I was forced to use the jacket of the guy ahead of me to dry my hands, but that was rare.

I suspect these rampant changes have something to do with the swine flu.  Or perhaps fear of some other worldwide calamity such as an outbreak of common sense or large incidents of parents controlling their children.  I will say that almost any workable device is better than those porcelain-clad gizmos that blow air, stirring up myriad bacteria, odors and dislodged toe-jamb from the floors of public facilities.  These motion-activated models easily beat the blow-and-hope method.

But I wonder about the net effect here.  Let’s say you’re Clyde and you own Clyde’s Croissants And Bird Baths.  You’re a small business person, struggling to break even in a very tough economy.  One has to imagine that you, Clyde, have several things you’d like to do with a little extra coin in your pocket.  So let’s imagine for a moment that your cousin Reginald who runs the local donut shop takes a week of vacation to visit the Wisconsin Dells.  What is the local constabulary to do without their daily dose of donuts?  Of course they turn to you, maker of flaky and buttery goodness.  This causes you to dramatically increase your Cop Croissant Capacity, or C.C.C.  This in turn increases your profit for the month.  Next thing you know you’re sitting there with a cup of hot bean water and wondering what to do with the additional $500.

New carpet?  A new sign?  Some fresh advertising in the local newspaper?  A radio spot?  A new cash register?  A bonus for the pimple-faced punks mixing dough in the back room?  A new mixer?  More chairs?  No…you, Clyde, buy a couple of motion-activated hand towel dispensers!!!!

Now you have not only spent money on the devices, you need to hire someone to remove the old ones and install the new ones (you’re far too busy and inept to attempt this on your own).  And now you must buy batteries to power the units.  Multiplied by the tens of thousands of units sold and, well, let’s just say that I think there’s a big bunny with a drum at work here.  And we all know landfills are starving for more batteries, so that’s a good thing, too.

And paper.  You didn’t think about that, did you, Clyde!  No, you didn’t.  You had a swelling supply of paper for the old machines.  These new ones use a special kind of paper, a special size, on a special spindle.   And they don’t absorb worth crap — Saran Wrap would work just as well.  You’re going to have to stock up on this new paper.  And I’m sure you’ll find something really useful to do with the old paper, like staunching those shaving nicks on your chin.

So all in all, this is a pretty involved and expensive proposition.

But why?  I don’t think even Oprah, on her best day, could get this level of national compliance (sorry Steadman, don’t hurt me).  And this change came about during the Bush #2 administration…and since nobody was listening, I doubt he had anything to do with it.  I keep coming back to fear of disease…perhaps the makers of these devices employ the best sales professionals on this orb — weazels who are able to instill great levels of ridiculous fear.  They were able to somehow get all these people to replace stuff that didn’t need replacing.

When I think of a public bathroom I see a room swimming with bacteria, germs and plague.  All kinds of nasties spread by other creatures live on the door handles into and out of the bathroom and stalls, on the flushing levers, on the water faucets.  I’d be willing to bet that the push-levers on those old dispensers were the CLEANEST part of a public bathroom because, IN THEORY, they only got touched by hands AFTER some minimal effort at washing.

So I’m totally dubious that these boxes are helping to prevent the spread of germs nor have they saved the life of the next great humanitarian.    And I’ve come very close to destroying numerous models for not giving me the next sheet fast enough, or turning out too dainty a piece of paper or being totally empty.   And that whirring noise…I don’t need that right after I’ve done some serious thinking, I just don’t.

I think their ubiquitous presence is evidence of a great marketing and sales job that is perhaps one of the biggest, yet most silent, successes in the business world since the invention of the hedge fund.  I’d like to get some of this sales mojo in MY business.   What a waste of…everything.

Now, an automatic Purel dispenser…THAT would be revolutionary!