The Toothbrush

So I happened to need a new toothbrush, but what type of toothbrush do I buy? The cheapest in the shop, one size fits all, three brushes for a pound and a lifetime guarantee straight from the heart of China? Or do I buy something by Crest, Colgate, or Aquafresh after booking a holiday to give me time to decide?

I mean do I need a large head or medium head? And what if I want a small head? Do I buy kiddy sized? Only they all look like they’d fit in my mouth. What happens if I buy the wrong one? Won’t they do the job or will they damage my teeth? Are they like shoes? Will they rub my molars the wrong way? Will I develop oral bunions? Will they give me a limp or a lisp?

Big decisions. So, before I match the head to my mouth, I perhaps need to think about the neck. Do I buy one with an angled head, a flexible head, or a three way head? A neck that goes click when I press too hard? Or one for hard-to-reach places? But what exactly is a hard-to-reach place? How far down my throat do I want to scrub? At what point does brushing my teeth become a colonic?

Perhaps I shouldn’t think about the neck until I’ve decided on the bristles. Bristles? What’s difficult about bristles? Well, do I want criss-cross bristles? Rounded bristles? Interdental bristles? Bristles with paddles? Gum massaging bristles or outer angled bristles? Do I want a single big rubber bristle on the tip or do I want bristles that fade to tell me when I need to buy a new brush? Should pay extra for ‘vibrating micropulse bristles’? But what is a micropulse? Do I want something micropulsing away in my mouth? Do I need a toothbrush with a soft gum stimulator or polishing cups? What are polishing cups? And what happens if I do decide to stimulate my gums? Is there a danger I might over-stimulate them? Could my gums embarrass me in public? They know all my secrets.

So perhaps I should just go for normal bristles. But is that multi-height bristles or extra-long bristles? What about bristles that can clean my tongue? They can also clean my gums. They can even clean my cheeks while they clean my gums. Only then do they clean my teeth. But what about the top of my mouth? There’s a toothbrush for that too? So how about a toothbrush that cleans the house before it cleans my teeth, my cheeks, my tongue, my gums, the top of my mouth? I’d pay extra for a brush that could that.

I still have to decide…

Before I decide on bristles and select a neck to go with the right head, I should perhaps consider the toothbrush that flashes until I’m supposed to stop brushing. But what happens if I don’t stop? What happens if I can’t see it flashing in my mouth? Would it work for the blind? Can’t I buy one with some kind of air horn? And do I really need one with a laser sight to help me find my mouth or to keep my elbows level?

So is it a narrow head with a power tip or a cushioned head with soft-grip handle? But is the handle that important? Is it likely to fly out of my hand while I’m brushing? So do I buy a control grip or a stabilized handle? I like comfort so do I buy a comfort grip? But what about a toothbrush that pivots and pulses? What if it pivots too much and pulses right out of my hand? Can’t I buy one that I can strap to my wrist?

I was standing in Boots for nearly an hour. I still couldn’t decide. Even the shop assistant didn’t have any answers.

I was about to leave without buying my new toothbrush when she leapt out from behind the counter and blocked the exit. She reminded me that dentists recommend that we buy a new toothbrush every thee months. I told her that is was going to take me three months to choose the bloody thing.

That’s when she suggested I buy an electric toothbrush.

‘What do you recommend?’ I asked wearily.

‘Well,’ she said, pulling me across to a vast stand of electric enamel polishers. ‘How about a rechargeable professional pulsar plaque control floss action dual clean microsonic brush with a pack of six replacement rotating 3D heads?’

‘Will it clean my teeth?’ I asked.

She smiled at me, her teeth glistening with a white malevolence.

‘They absolutely guarantee it!’

Slip-on Shoes

Believe it or not but The Chipster’s not known for his fashion sense. To be fair, it’s not called for in my line of work. It’s a bit like asking a bus driver if he has good cufflinks. It doesn’t help him drive a bus. Well, the same’s true of me and my clothes. Some say I’m scruffy and some prefer not to t say anything at all. I draw the line at wearing tracksuits but I never go so far as to wear a suit if I can help it. I suppose that I’m conservative in my choice of clothes, like a poor college lecturer, until we reach my thong. When we get down there, thongs usually get interesting. The rest usually end up thrown on the floor somewhere.

Yet the one place where I do insist on buying quality is in my choice of shoes. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ll soon be jetting off to Washington. I’ll be on my heels most of the time when I get there so I thought it was about time I bought myself a pair of shoes. A good pair of shoes. I skimped when it came to buying my last pair. I bought them from eBay. Worst bargain I’ve ever made. For the last couple of months, my hips have been aching whenever I walk more than a mile. And when shoes start to affect a man’s capacity for hip thrusts then you know it is time to act.

I’d been putting it off too long but when I found myself hobbling through Bangor today I made a snap decision. I walked straight into Clarks, which happened to be the closest shoe shop. They may not be known for being at the forefront of fashion but fashion had led me to buy the black leather boots with the narrow steel toe caps that have been crippling me for too long. Today was the day when I gave up trying to ‘wear them in’ and I bought myself a plain pair of black slip-ons.

It was a world of difference and I’ve been jaunty ever since. I gave my boots to homeless guy I met in town. So if you ever see a bum hobbling around Bangor in a very impressive pair of boots, you’ll know I’m telling the truth.

The odd thing about this whole event, and the reason I’m telling you this, is that I’ve never bought slip-on shoes before. It’s like the world has suddenly started to revolve the other way on its axis. With boots, you come to expect them to be easy to put on and take off. But I’ve always bought shoes with laces. I don’t know. They always seemed to give me sense of reassurance. By buying slip-ons today, I overcome a psychological block I’ve been suffering all these years.

Why have I always bought shoes with laces? What do laces symbolise? There’s a part of my brain that likes the comfort of laces. But then another part of me is attracted to the freedom of the slip-on. It’s one of those struggles between reason and passion, between fate and chance.

I bought slip-ons today and the world suddenly seemed to open up to many more possibilities.