Bears with Dingleberries

I saw a commercial the other night that made me question evolution. Not the argument between Darwin’s ideas and the Creationists. No I’m talking about something much less volatile though of vital importance to each and everyone one of us. What set my mind adrift in the sea of contemplative nonsense was the evolution in the marketing of toilet paper.  This is big, we all use it many of us have our own special names for it. Some of you know it simply as TP, others are more self -conscious and whisper the words bath issue like they trying to avoid anyone knowing they use it.  Sometime the direct approach can work best so I imagine the words shit paper causes anyone a moments doubt about its use.  Then there are the odd family monikers that are borne from simply sharing space year after year. Often no one knows why it was given its household name, and becomes similar to that crazy aunt who lives in the attic and can only be talked about in code when company is around.  Growing up in my house we called it sheet music, the origin of its birth name lost in the pages of time, though the name still stands as a testament to tradition if nothing else.

I remember my mom telling stories about being the 9^th of 10 kids a in small Connecticut town in the decades after World War I. “We had 14 rooms and a path with the Sears Catalog hanging from a nail inside the door of the outhouse.  When only the shiny pages were left us kids would race to the mailbox when the mailman came hoping the new catalog had come in the mail and then fight over who would get it first.” Living through that period of severe lack during the 30’s she developed an appreciation for “modern” things like automatic washers and soft toilet paper.  

After watching toilet paper commercials for many years I ‘m still surprised that it’s never called that on TV, instead it’s always bath tissue, which to me has always been odd because it implies it’s tissue you use for a bath.  Anyone who has ever had the misfortune of dunking an entire roll knows that you are left with a big wet useless wad of gloppy mess. I’m sure there are some of us who remember how well wet balls of toilet paper stuck to anything and everything in junior high, the only drawback of course was getting caught flinging it. I grew up watching Mr. Whipple feeding his toilet paper squeezing fetish and shooing away anyone else that tried to satisfy theirs.  After many moons of trial and error for softer, fluffier and more absorbent sheets we have finally graduated.  Now to hawk those sheets of softness we have bears with dingleberries. One shudders to think, what would Mr. Whipple say?