There is an episode of Corner Gas where Oscar and Emma are forced into a new ‘wine bracket’ when Lacey brings them a higher quality wine than the cheap stuff to which they are accustomed. We have recently come into a similar situation with respect to toilet paper.
When Amy and I got married, we each selected a luxury item. This is something that we get to have pretty much all the time that is a bit nicer than the cheapest stuff. It was a relatively inexpensive way to feel like we weren’t the poorest newlyweds ever because no matter how much Kraft Dinner we were eating (and we ate a whole lot), we had these couple of nice things. Amy chose freshly squeezed orange juice as opposed to stuff mixed up from concentrate. Every time we go grocery shopping, we toss a jug of Tropicana or similar into the cart. It is so much better than the mixed stuff. If you have fresh squeeze it is very hard to go back to the processed stuff. My luxury item (chosen over six years ago) was two-ply toilet paper.
Amy grew up in a house where single ply was the norm. I am okay with using single ply when I am out at somebody’s house, or at work, or in a public restroom, but at home, I wanted something rather cushier. I use the washroom at home significantly more often than anywhere else and I expect a certain level of comfort. In addition to being sandpaperish at best, single ply tends to disintegrate with very little provocation and to describe it as ‘unabsorptive’ is to significantly understate the issue.
We were at Zehr’s on Saturday and grabbed a package of Charmin because it was a) on sale and b) convenient to where we were standing at the time. We have now pushed ourselves into a new toilet paper bracket. On my first use of the magical tissue, I exclaimed “it’s like wiping my butt with your pillow†to which Amy made a face and asked if that was a common practice of mine. Rest assured that it is not. This stuff is pretty great, though, honestly. Normally we buy the ‘green’ recycled stuff (as a bit of a sidebar, recycled toilet paper is a pretty disgusting concept. I know intellectually that it is comprised of shredded up newspaper but I think it probably needs a better name, one with less disturbing connotations) which tends toward the sandpapery itself but this is almost like fluffy cotton. Suffice to say Charmin/Zehr’s strategy of dropping the price this one time has probably made a convert for at least the next couple of t.p.p.c.’s (toilet paper purchase cycles).