Friday, September 18, 2009

*****




It was a couple of months ago that my wife, Anna, decided that we should start purchasing Dean’s® brand milk over the store brand, because she heard somewhere that, unlike store brands, Dean’s contains no hormones. As luck would have it, about a week later, CVS started having sales on Dean’s milk, pretty much every week—sales so good that it’s now actually less expensive than the store brand—so we started taking advantage.

This morning, I was sitting at the table, innocently eating my breakfast, when I noticed that Dean’s has actually begun advertising this rumored fact. You probably can’t read it in the photo, but that golden, rounded fourteen-point star contains the following words:

Our Farmers Pledge Not to Use Artificial Growth Hormones*

So I’m thinking, “Cool! Anna was right! There’s no artificial growth hormones! How consumer-conscious of them!” But then I notice the asterisk. “Hmmm…” I think, using those exact words. “What could that be for?”

I look around the label—it really isn’t that large—and find the other asterisk. (At least it’s there; have you ever had that experience where there’s an asterisk in one place, but no asterisk anywhere else? You just know the designers are still laughing themselves silly over that little joke.) But back to this asterisk: it refers me to a series of tiny, probably four-point letters that state:

* NO SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCE HAS BEEN SHOWN IN MILK FROM COWS TREATED WITH THE ARTIFICIAL GROWTH HORMONE rBST AND NON rBST TREATED COWS.

Did you get that? In short, what they’re saying is:

We’re Doing Something Politically Correct!
that doesn’t matter anyway.

It actually reminds me of a time, about a year ago, when I was visiting my parents and noticed a nice, big label on their mouthwash:

24-Hour Protection!*
Now, don’t get me wrong: 24-hour protection is a great thing to receive, from a mouthwash. Nobody wants to gargle at 7:30 AM and have their morning breath mysteriously return, just in time for the big business meeting. But again, what does that asterisk mean? Well, in this case:
* WHEN USED EVERY 12 HOURS.


Ha! Those kooky label designers! Can you imagine if we applied this to everything? How about a new women’s razor?

Eliminates Unwanted Hair Forever!*
*must shave every hour, on the hour.


…or perhaps a new Presidential Candidate?

I’ll Eliminate the National Debt without Increasing Taxes!*
*if every man, woman, and child in America sends a check to our creditors.


The bottom line is that I think we’ve reached a new level of enlightenment here, folks. The possibilities are endless. In fact, using my patented system, you too can use the hidden power of asterisks to become a billionaire in only five days!*

*Plan requires $1,000,000,000.00 investment. Results not typical. See some other blog for details.

4 comments:

  1. What a fun post. What makes it better for me is that I had already noticed this notation on a gallon of milk from some other brand out here within the past four months or so.

    I'm just left wondering what the insignificant differences are between milk from hormone-treated cows and non-hormone-treated cows.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hormone-treated cows can still moo soprano.

    ReplyDelete
  3. So, do you still buy Dean's, or have you gone back to whatever-is-cheapest-today?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Personally, I’m happy to buy whatever is cheapest (which as of our last shopping trip, still happened to be Dean’s; thanks, CVS!). I think Anna would prefer to stick with Dean’s, though. As she put it, “All things being equal, no artificial hormones is better than artificial hormones.” And all things being equal, she’s right. ;-)

    ReplyDelete