The Law Of Averages

The other day I went looking for a band-aid to cover a medium-sized cut. I found one without a problem and continued on about my day. However, as often happens, the next day the cut hadn't healed enough so I had to replace the band-aid. I went back to the same box, only to discover that I couldn't find the same sized band-aid as the day before. Apparently I had lucked out in finding the perfect-sized band-aid the first time and that had given me a false sense of confidence. I even went so far as to empty out the entire box on the counter and look for one that way, like some kind of terrible 'Where's Waldo?' rip-off. Unfortunately, that still didn't work. My only remaining options were either a giant band-aid which would essentially wrap around my entire finger or one of the small dot-sized band-aids which wouldn't come close to covering up the cut. Since when it comes to open wounds I have a policy that it is always better to have too much coverage than not not enough I went with the giant-sized one. It has made typing a bit of a problem, but I am managing. Still, I'm annoyed at having to make the choice in the first place.

Adding to my annoyance is that it wasn't like I didn't have several boxes of band-aids to go through. Like most houses in America I keep a box of band-aids in every bathroom, and the lack of adequately-sized band-aids occurred in both locations. Actually, I have multiple boxes in my bathrooms and every box was exactly the same - each one had a couple of the massive band-aids, none of the regular-sized and then handfuls upon handfuls of the dot-sized ones. This happens because each box comes from the store with the same number of each size band-aid. This is a ridiculous notion because it goes against the very idea of medium. When you call a product medium it implies that it is the average of the large and the small sizes. If you follow that logic, then it would stand to reason that you should include more of that size because they would be the ones needed the most, as they would cover the widest range of cut sizes. When companies are ordering t-shirts for their retreats they don't order the same amount of small and XXLs, do they? No, they order a bunch of larges and if they don't fit a few people on the extremes of the chart, that is too bad. (As you can tell, I have won my fair share of free shirts which have then not fit.) If radio stations can figure this out, why not companies who sell band-aids? All of which leads me to believe there needs to be a change in the rations of band-aids put in every box.

However, what I really think needs to change is including the mini, dot-sized band-aids in the first place. Seriously, does anyone every use those dot-sized band-aids? If you have a cut that small I'm guessing you don't even need a band-aid to begin with. They are only good for shaving cuts which makes them twice as useless because few people shave with razors anymore and even if they do the cuts close quickly. I hardly think I am alone in questioning this, because I bet if you went into most medicine cabinets across the country and opened up the band-aid boxes it would be 90% small band-aids and they would have been in there so long that the paper around them would no longer be stuck together. I'm starting to think this is all part of some master plan by the band-aid industry in which they give you all the mini band-aids as a way to fill out the box and making it look like a good bargain, but the reality is they know all you really need are the normal-sized band-aids so they give you fewer of those to make you buy a new box sooner. This is why I have multiple boxes of band-aids in every bathroom - one is a new box which includes a few remaining medium sized band-aids and another box which came with the house 30 years ago full of useless small band-aids. We should just tell the band-aid companies they can keep those for themselves.

It is all part of the general annoyance which comes from companies giving us a whole lot the things we don't need while shorting us the kind we actually want. This happens in all kinds of industries, especially food. Ask yourself how many times you had popsicles as a kid and after a couple days the only color left was yellow, because yellow popsicles sucked. The same goes for licorice gumdrops. If you ever went to your grandparents house and they had gumdrops in a candy dish, they would have been picked through until what remained was 75% black licorice drops and they will have been in that dish since the day you were born. Fortunately, it appears customization is the next big thing on the internet. Soon you will be able to custom-order things like popsicles and tell them exactly what kind of flavors you want left out. Some experts worry if people today have been given too many choices and it has made us demand everything to be done exactly how we want it done. Considering big corporations have proven they can't be left to make these kinds of decision for us, I really don't see a problem with it. It certainly has to be better than having one finger look like a mummy just because you get a paper cut.