Self-Aggrandizement: Adjudication

This weekend, the first I'd spent in New York in over a month, I set out to wade through the pile of home errands accumulated in my absence. One was a run through Duane Reade, our local drug store, to replace toothpaste and detergent and light bulbs and a basket-and-a-half of other odds and ends.

One item on the list: a new head for my Braun electric toothbrush.

For years, electric toothbrushes, like driving to the gym, struck me as pointlessly lazy. But after my mother forwarded a handful of studies demonstrating how much better electric brushing works than its manual counterpart, I broke down and bought one.

I bought the Braun in June; by July, it was broken. Or, at least, partially broken. While the on/off switch no longer worked, I inadvertently discovered that whacking the thing into the side of the sink still did. Whack once to turn it on; whack again, and it's back off.

Thrilled as I was by this discovery, I soon realized the turn-on whack also sent toothbrush-top paste flying, usually directly onto the bathroom mirror.

So, obviously, I took to applying the toothpaste directly to my teeth. A nearly flawless solution.

Still, walking down the toothbrush aisle in Duane Reade, I couldn't help but notice, next to the $9.99 replacement head, a $24.99 replacement of the entire toothbrush - head included. And, for a moment at least, I took the new Braun off the shelf, and considered leaving my sink-whacking, teeth-toothpasting days behind.

Then I realized the $15 difference also just happened to be the precise cost of two six packs of Brooklyn Lager. So, obviously, I put the new Braun back, grabbed the replacement head instead, and headed off to the liquor aisle.

It was the only rational choice.

Adjudication Filed Monday, September 19 2005.

Adjudication
Filed Monday, September 19 2005.