Pet Please #13: Finding Your Chapstick

I’m gearing up for my annual Festivus party, at which many a grievance will be raised, so I thought it might be a good time to balance the negativity with a positive pet please.

I carry exactly four things in my pockets all day: phone and chapstick in my left pocket, wallet and keys in my right. I put all those items in my pants at the same time, and I remove them at the same time. At least, that’s what’s supposed to happen.

What actually happens is that I remove my wallet and keys and cell phone, and I forget about the chapstick. I hang up my pants, and hours later I need to unchap my lips, but I can’t find my chapstick.

Do you ever have that moment of panic that you lost your chapstick? It could be anywhere–bed, couch, pushed under the bed or couch by the cat. But the first place I always check is my pants, which are now hanging upside down in the closet.

If the laws of physics affected chapstick, it would fall out of your pants and roll to some dark corner of the closet. But somehow, miraculously, it doesn’t. What an amazing feeling of relief when you find that precious plastic stick in your pocket where you left it, defying gravity, ready to moisten your lips.

A toast to finding your chapstick in your pants. Such an amazing feeling.

All other pet pleases can be found on the bottom half of this page.

13 thoughts on “Pet Please #13: Finding Your Chapstick”

    • Admittedly, I rarely carry around a tube of chapstick, so I could only peripherally relate to this post. (Occasionally I leave a credit card in my pocket and then realize it’s in my pants after a long time of looking for it.)

      However, the video post by J.J.J.H. Schmidt completely elevated this blog entry from OK to one of the most amusing of all time. That was absolutely worth my 1 minute and 55 seconds.

      (By the way, I always thought “Jingleheimer” was one word…but you’d know I guess, since it’s you posting.)

      Reply
      • elevating this post to one of the most amusing of all time is a small victory for me. but it has already gone to my head.
        also, whenever i go out, people always tell me (sometimes, they shout) that my name is spelled wrong. it’s just spelled differently then my more famous counterpart. i don’t want to go into the etymology of jingle or heimer (that would be very long and unnecessary) but i do want to say this: just because he spells his name that way doesn’t mean mine is spelled wrong. that’s my name too.

        Reply
  1. Jamey,

    Clever piece. But sometimes when we examine things too closely, it might reveal things that might be, um,, gross??? I would guess the reason your chapstick defies gravity, by staying in your pants, is because of the chapstick FILM that the tube and cap always end up covered in. At least it is keeping the inside of your pocket totally safe from windburn and nice and moist….And really, isn’t that all we can hope to ask for? lol
    Keep writing…good stuff

    Reply
  2. Coins, mints, and Kleenex do the same thing! BTW, is that you in the picture, or did you happen to find someone else who was also wearing a blue oxford shirt, like you are in your headshot? 🙂

    Reply
  3. Interesting…my chapstick goes in my right front pocket.

    But even more interesting, you put your wallet in your front pocket?! Why not the back pocket? I’d like to see a blog post about this. (Though it will have to be outside the Mars v Venus series, no doubt.)

    Reply
  4. I love this post! I feel like it was written about me. Being a woman, chapstick is the only thing I carry in my pocket, the rest of it being in my purse. I’ve got an actual physical addiction to it and not having it feels like having to go to the bathroom: I can’t concentrate on anything else until the situation is rectified. For this reason, I try to keep an extra stick in my purse just in case.

    It’s true about chapstick being immune to the laws of gravity. Very strange. I’ve lost a few of them to the washing machine 🙁

    Reply
    • Which brand do you use? I’ve found that Blistex leads to that physical addiction, while Chapstick brand chapstick is much better.

      Reply

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