Doing My Part

It's good to know that in these trying times of hamdemics, there are those who are out there fighting the good fight and trying not to spread the dreaded Swine Flu.

I like to think I'm doing my part. Keeping my hands washed. Keeping my finger out of my nose. Spraying anyone in the face with hand sanitizer who dares to sneeze in my direction.

Yesterday, however, I did a bad, bad thing. I may have single-handedly created my own disease vector. Here is what happened:

My co-worker had told me that Sheba Cat Food no longer comes in the little square plastic cans that I found so handy as soap molds. She said they are made of tin, now. I could hardly believe her and since getting a few 'cans' of cat food for Mackie (so I can use them as soap molds later after he rejects the contents because he doesn't like wet food) was on my shopping list, I found myself standing in front of the cat food at Safeway on Alhambra yesterday, pondering the display.

My last batch of soap had to be poured into a big plastic tub. And when it came time to cut it into bars, for some reason my mind switched off the mainline and into a derelict sidetrack, and I ended up cutting the soap into brownie sized into larger soap bars. And thus we have the 40,000 wee snack sized bars of soap in this picture:

Hey, you couldn't possibly be taking a photo without ME, could you?

Back at the Safeway, I could clearly see that Sheba had indeed changed it's cans. Instead of flat and square, they now resembled little round one-serving pudding cups. I could see that they appeared to be made of tin now, too, rather than plastic.

But just to make sure, I picked up a can and tapped it with my fingernail. Maybe it was still plastic that had been painted metallic to make it look more expensive.

But it was hard to tell. I tapped again. I know how these merchandisers like to mess with us consumers. It could still be plastic.

If the tap and scratch method doesn't work, there is always the tooth test. You can always tell what something is made of if you bite it. People have done that with gold coins since time immemorial. And the only sure fire way to tell a pearl from a plastic bead is to run it across your teeth to feel if it's grainy or not. So why not chomp down on a can of cat food standing in the middle of the aisle at Safeway in front of God and everybody?

It was then that I realized I was sucking on a can of cat food that had probably been touched by at least a dozen other people. Dirty, germy, disease bearing people. Including the grubby mitts of the entire third world, depending on where the stuff was made, canned and packaged. It's not like they sterilize them right before they put them on the shelves or anything.

Think about it! Manufactured in vats and poured into the cans in China where they regularly poison products just because it's amusing. Tossed into bins with rats and human body parts for storage. Transported to the coast in the back of filthy trucks that double as chicken carriers and not cleaned EVER. Loaded into the bowels of Merchant Ships where they mingle with the bilge water for months as they navigate past pirates. Sent to distribution warehouses, trucking centers, the back room of the local grocery store, the store shelf and finally coming to rest upon my lips.

I yanked that can out of my mouth and put it back on the shelf, looking surreptitiously around to see if anybody saw that. And then I fled the premises in embarrassment and disgust.

I am so much prettier than those old cards you make, admit it!

Yes, that's correct. I didn't buy the one I tasted. I was too traumatized and besides, it IS made of tin and therefore cannot be used as a soap mold.

It was when I was sitting in my car in the parking lot, after having washed my mouth out with hand sanitizer, scrubbed my hands and the steering wheel, my keys and my purse handles with an antibacterial wet wipe, that I realized I had just done a bad, bad thing.

I had possibly started the spread of an even deadlier virus than the Swine Flu.

I have single-mouthedly spawned the new pandemic that will wipe out the entire human world.

Beware the Idiot Flu!