on climbing the great hill of products

some self-help for stupid people

Earlier this year, I realized I had (mostly) reached the end of “products.”¹ What I mean is, I knew the face wash I liked, the moisturizer I liked, the sunscreen I liked, the retinol I liked,² the hair products I liked, the shaving cream I liked, and so on. There wasn’t a reason to buy anything new ever again. I could just buy these products forever. I had triumphed—over Product. They said it couldn’t be done,³ but I had done it.⁴

Or had I? Despite this state being, in theory, my heart’s desire, there was also something about it I resisted. In my head, I framed this as “the travel size problem” most of the time. That is, most of my beloved Products did not come in travel sizes… so I needed to keep trying things, to find out what would work in travel sizes, in case I had to travel someplace, as it would be a shame not to feel I was failing to look my best because of a lack of one Product or another. Suppose for instance I was off in a library doing archival research somewhere, Miskatonic Un…