“If I Had a Million Dollars” by Barenaked Ladies… “If I had a million dollars (If I had a million dollars) I’d buy you a house (I would buy you a house). If I had a million dollars (If I had a million dollars) I’d buy you furniture for your house (Maybe a nice Chesterfield or an Ottoman). And if I had a million dollars (If I had a million dollars) well, I’d buy you a K-Car (A nice Reliant automobile). If I had a million dollars I’d buy your love…”

I don’t understand some vegetarians. I understand the ones that abstain from meat completely due to religion and I understand those who avoid it due to their love for the humanity of animals. What I don’t understand are the ones who will have a go at meat eaters and preach vegetarianism like it was biblical and then when we’re not looking, would chow down on a meat substitute hot dog.

I’m not sure why there is such thing as meat substitutes (e.g. Quorn) anyway. It seems to provide an alternative for people who eat meat moreso than people who don’t eat meat. For me, it’s kind of like a taste of the best food that life would have to offer if we didn’t slay animals, which makes me appreciate (the stuffing of my face with) meat even more. I believe when they set out to create a substitute, they meant to design it with vegetarians in mind so that they would have something substantial to feast upon alongside the carnivores. But somehow along the way this experiment went wrong and what happened was they ended up tasting so artificially meaty to the point that I wonder why anyone who had respect for animals would eat it. Having cooked and sampled meat substitutes, I’ve found that they even smell meatier than their bona fide meat counterparts! I’m not sure that other animals would be doing cartwheels for a plate of the stuff either. The soya burgers would probably taste so meaty that it would freak out, say the lions, who would turn their noses up and instead make chase after that gazelle they saw beside a brook before they got distracted.

Ever wondered about the snack that is “meat flavoured crisps?” What we’ve taken is essentially a vegetable cajoled by non-meat-eaters and garnished it with barbaric artificial enhancements. Salted crisps were obviously the first flavoured type of crisp when it was first invented by a flustered cook and I’m not sure what flavour came next, maybe cheese and onion or salt and vinegar, but I bet it didn’t take long for meat flavoured crisps to hit the market. I mean, a snack is technically a gap between meals, and at times a timely substitute for a much delayed meal. What better than to have a snack that recreates a traditional carnivore’s typical meal? We’ve got a main course meal packed into a packet of roast chicken flavoured crisps right there. We’ve got the meat dish (chicken) in there and the side dish (potatoes) in there. Squint hard enough with your tongue and you could perhaps trick yourself into tasting some gravy and vegetables somewhere in there too.

I’ve tried going vegetarian for a while just to see what it was like, but fish and cheese can only hold off the need to ingest a good steak for so long. Being vegetarian must only really be easy for people who’ve never eaten meat, because once you eat meat it provokes a chemical response in your brain that will make you want to revisit meat again. I sometimes crave a particular type of meat, but I’ve never craved a particular type of vegetable. There’s got to be a drug element embedded in the flesh to get us meat-eaters hooked. Anyway, all of this surely goes to show that we cannot run away from the taste of meat. Deep down inside, we’re programmed to deliver meat into our mouths and this is as sure as the canine teeth we bare and the acids in our stomach that whistle when they’re breaking down animal corpse amino acids.

Going down the opposed biological route, strict collar vegetarians would say that we humans aren’t even designed to digest meat. They will tell us that the hydrochloric acid in our stomachs are a tiny fraction of the strength of acidity found in other carnivores and in fact resemble the levels found in herbivores. They will tell us that our intestinal tracts are crucially longer and that our alimentary canals are over ten times our body length, which makes elimination of bodily waste from meat take longer. They will also tell us that the prolonged retention of toxins produced puts a strain on our kidneys, whose job it is to remove poisonous waste from the blood. But I clap my hands and tell them that no matter what we do, we’re going to die from doing it anyway, so we might as well enjoy and indulge ourselves often-ish in the things deemed legal that we love.

I caught an advert for the new Schick Quattro razor blade the other day. I’d first read about this type of razor with (as the name implies) four blades when I read a couple of months ago of the lawsuit that Gillette were clamping on Energizer. The lawsuit alleged that the Quattro violates Gillette’s patent for “Progressive blade geometry” technology, which was used in Gillette’s three-bladed Mach 3 and that additional blades would only be efficient if they were aligned according to Gillette’s design. Hmmm, “Progressive blade geometry.” That’s the same as saying “We own the multiple razor blade market forever, so pay up. You saps” or “The future’s bright, the future’s orange.” Well, Energizer got the last laugh because it was one of their companies (Schick) who have first come out with the first four-blade razor.

I’m currently using the Mach 3 Turbo system with its badass three blades that give me baby-smooth skin (especially on the upstroke). At the beginning I used to use single bladed Bic disposables, which were great until Mr Testosterone kicked in and gave the fluff on my face the backbone of a sumo wrestler. I once tried an electric razor but stopped immediately. It would never get close enough to the skin and at best would leave me with a stubbly face. What a surprise now that they have electric razors that enable one to also have a wet shave. Get with the times! Electric razors should only be used by barbers and people who shear sheep.

So along with all the other men on the planet in search for the perfect shave, I’m naturally intrigued by the Quattro. With three blades I get a really close shave, but I wonder what miracles four blades would bring. The Quattro also makes me wonder how far they’ll go with additional blade technology. Will we one day soon be graced with the presence of a five-blade system? And then what after that, a new system that incorporates a sixth blade? How many blades do they think we’ll need until we’re truly satisfied that our hairy regions are getting their money’s worth? The contours of my face are not exactly a Picasso painting so I’m sure three blades would suffice indefinitely, but one day I see myself being brainwashed by a baby-faced friend with his shiny skin and diary obese with telephone numbers for hot dates. I’ll want to be just like him and confused by the propaganda, will ditch my loyal three-blade for a four-blade system that will grant me the same success with my career and love-life. Yeah, right.

Me, I will hold out on the Quattro till they either start giving them away or till my Mach 3 Turbo conks out, followed by a moment of concentrated curiosity and fickleness at the drugstore’s cash register. At the end of the day it’s just buying into a system to be part of the status quo and helping razor manufacturers line their mansions with more green quilts. Maybe I should hold out till they bring out a razor that has scientifically been absolutely proven to give the perfect shave. Or maybe wait till they make the instant jump from four-blades to eight-blades. What on Earth is stopping them from bringing out an eight-blade system anyway? Any old person could jury rig such a razor with a pack of Mach 3s and a glue-gun so what’s keeping them? Surely the razor blade industry isn’t like the computing industry where you have to wait for technology to advance and components to become cheaper! What are the brainiacs over at Gillette and Energizer waiting for? Are they waiting for their animal tests to come back? “Dr Hobbs, our research has become really delayed because one of the chimpanzees called in sick again.”

Maybe they should draw the line at four blades. Just think how lazy we’d get if there was such a multi-blade system that was so big that it covered the entire side of our face? All we’d need is a single one inch stroke downwards and we’d be good to go. One blade for each square inch of skin and one blade for each dermal layer, leaving one lucky bugger with the smoothest, blotchiest skin in town.