Dear Colgate Corporation,

You’ve been in business since 1806, you’ve been making tooth brushes for over 100 years, and basically invented toothpaste. I understand it must get boring making toothbrushes for a whole century. The desire to spice things up is undoubtedly great. But seriously, get this wacky ass crap off my toothbrush.

Tongue Freshener (AKA pointy rubber things on back of head for scraping junk off your tongue): Seriously guys? Did no one during the entire design process actually bother to use this toothbrush? The addition of a spiky surface to the back of the head means that while brushing the outside of your molars you’re simultaneously treated to the removal of the inside of your cheeks… I don’t enjoy feeling like someone is rubbing a miniature hedgehog around my mouth while brushing. If I actually wanted to “freshen” my tongue, I’ll just brush the thing, you know, with the bristles.

Mint scented brush handle: I assume toothpaste makes up a big portion of your business so it’s surprising to me that you think adding more fresh scent to the brushing process is necessary. I’ve got a mouth full of toothpaste (cinnamon in my case, which is a class act of a toothpaste, thanks for making it) so my ability to pick up the delicate minty scent rising from my toothbrush handle is considerably dampened. I suppose I could get a waft of it but really, do I need this? Do I want this? No.

The color: This particular brush seems to have a killer whale thing going on. I wanted a brush that was all black… But apparently the trend in brush design these days is inspired more by 80′s BMX attire than subtle elegance. If there’s one thing I want to live to see, it’s the return of an all black toothbrush (and flying cars).

I’m not writing you for a refund or to return the brush. I already fixed the “tongue freshner” issue by scraping the spikes off with an open pair of scissors, It’s mangled looking but functions… I just want you to know that you’re pushing it, trying a little to hard and you’re product is suffering.

Sincerely,
Collin R Tiegs

Thank you for contacting the Colgate-Palmolive Company with your feedback or question. We have received your e-mail and it is being forwarded to the appropriate parties. You can expect a reply from us within one business day.

Sincerely,
Colgate-Palmolive

The next day:

Dear Mr. Tiegs:

Thank you for contacting us over the Internet about Colgate Max Fresh Toothbrush.  Your interest in our products and company is greatly appreciated.

Our goal is to manufacture and market products that meet consumer needs for convenience, value and outstanding performance. Our Product Development Team is constantly striving to formulate a wide variety of products in the hopes that, with a varied marketplace, there will be an adequate selection of products from which to choose.

Your response involved material we wanted to send you, therefore the response has been sent via regular (postal) mail and should reach you within three weeks.

If you do not receive this response through regular mail, or have any questions about this, please contact us again by email, or by calling us at 1-800-468-6502, and provide the number appearing after my name below.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to contact us. We hope this information is helpful.

Sincerely,
Gena Jordan
Consumer Affairs Representative
Consumer Affairs

I’m thinking I’ll probably be receiving a prototype all black toothbrush from them for reviewing purposes. Perhaps Ms. Jordan will take the time to write me a little hand written note as well. Only time will tell!

Share With Internet

Fiscally my life is constantly oscillating between having some money and having no money. I’m on my way back down to the having no money side of things so it seemed fitting to cash in a bowl full of coinage I’ve been saving for my return back to poverty-vile.

My sister and I went to the local Vons to do this. They have a machine there created by elves that’s called a “Coin Master” which automatically counts your coinage. However, just like the elves that run the world’s richest investment banks, they take a cut. In this case 8.9%. That’s a lot but I’m a lazy, lazy man, and even when money gets tight I’m usually willing to pay for something that makes life easier in the near term (like booze for example) even if it ends up costing me down the road (like booze for example).

So we start dumping in the coins, my total comes out to roughly $12.00. Blah, whatever – print – the machine spits out my receipt. Then tells me on it’s crappy little calculator like LCD screen (Coinstar machines are leaps and bounds nicer to look at than Coin Masters. That’s because pixies are responsible for their creation.) to check the coin return. I reach in to find a god damned PILE OF MONEY IN THERE. The sister and I begin to dump this money back into the machine, it spits out about 50% of what I put back in but seems to be reading 100% of it… So we spend the next 10 minutes feeding the machine it’s own excrement until my total reaches $23-ish and change. HOT DAMN! We repeat the process and my sister get’s $25 from it…

Now I know you’re thinking “this is dishonest and evil, and fucking with elves is a bad idea!”, you’re right it is. But I’m not a bad person. A bad person would have gone to his bank and pulled out $1000 in quarters and fed this thing for hours. Wait no, I mean I’m not a smart person because I just thought of that now and I’m too lazy to actually go do it… I guess I’m more afraid of those elves than I thought.

To conclude. If you can find a coinmaster machine that’s fucking up horribly you should probably go and use it. In fact, from here on out I think I’ll probably only use the coinmaster machines, they’re really poorly built (the tray that the coins go into was broken loose when we got there, plus it’s ugly) which means maybe this flaw is systemic. Go forth and pillage, just watch out for elves.

Share With Internet

Bejewled Blitz is a game created by the Chinese Government in order to reduce American Worker productivity to absolute zero. The game is so unmercifully effective that upon completion it was placed in a sealed metal briefcase and carried by hand to the United States in order to be distributed via Facebook (which is a CIA creation designed to harvest information about the nations youth, namely drunken party pictures). The entire effort was codenamed Project Sapphire and its very existence is still not formally recognized by the Chinese.

I was infected by Bejeweled Blitz two days ago and have spent roughly 8 hours “playing” the game. I quote playing, because unlike traditional things that are played for enjoyment and leisure, Bejeweled is played strictly out of sick necessity. The creators have tailored the game in such a way as to sync perfectly with the portion of the human brain dedicated to repetitive tasks of matching and coordinating. The result is a type of stimulation that can be misconstrued by the brain as something akin to problem solving, or work. The stimulation of this specific area has a curious effect, eventually the individual begins to play without consciously acting. The nagging problem of upper level thought vanishes and the player transcends into a machine like state, that is surprisingly, oddly comforting.This is reinforced by the addition of a reward hierarchy that fills the player with a false sense of accomplishment as each new level is reached.

Initially the developers feared that players who so completely indentured, so fully engrossed themselves in the mechanical state, would eventually be coaxed away from the game by their peers, either by force or shaming. The easy solution is to continually reassure the player that they’re not alone, everyone is playing. This is accomplished by creating a “community” around the game in which players can see how their friends are doing, and attempt to best their scores. The competitive element is a remarkably effective way to falsely legitimize hours spent clicking a mouse on colored jewels.

The Chinese have created a near perfect tool for destroying the American workforce from within. Ultimately we will see entire corporations rot from the inside as workers spend copious hours clicking madly in search of fulfillment that is always just another star badge away. The effect on the capitalist system will certainly be profound. My advice to our government is to strike back at the Chinese immediatley. We must send a wave of internet pornography so great that the Chinese people, starved of it by years of censorship, will spend months at a time masturbating.

Let the games begin!

Share With Internet