Activi....ugh!

I blame Jamie Lee Curtis for the whole thing.

I see her all the time on TV, all bubbles and puppy dogs and smiles on her little green couch, just daring anybody to speak ill of their digestion. That's when she strikes. She's so effervescent about her digestive health that you actually believe she divides her life into pre- and post-Activia eras. And even though all she did pre-Activia was star in several blockbusters and garner multiple award nominations, and all she's done post-Activia is land a role in commercials selling Activia, we're led to believe that our lives are somehow unfulfilled unless we've tried this magic yogurt. Like if we haven't pooped with Activia, we just haven't pooped. Add to this a series of digestive health conversations between anonymous relatives which I had the misfortune of overhearing, and I guess you'll see why when Laura brought home a case of Activia from Costco, I didn't laugh her right out of the house.

(In the interest of a harmonious marriage, I will point out that Laura bought the Activia only because Costco was out of Yoplait, and that Laura was not one of the participants of the TMI digestive health conversations I overheard.)

I didn't have the slightest idea whether my bowels were good bowels or bad bowels. I didn't know if they needed anything from me, or if they were doing just fine on their own. The only thing I new about "regular" and "irregular" was that "regular" are the clothes I buy at Target, and "irregular" are the clothes I buy at Ross. But I kept getting these mental images of Jamie Lee wagging her finger at me, like I was somehow letting my colon down if I didn't start eating that Activia...and fast. In fact, Jamie Lee had me so brainwashed that I didn't even notice when Laura stopped eating the Activia due to some adverse effects on her innards. I just kept eating that yogurt and waiting for my world to change for the better. Darned if I was going to throw that yogurt away. It was a whole case! And since Laura dropped out of the Activia challenge, and we didn't think it would be a good idea to give a yogurt with some made-up substance in it to a toddler, it was up to me to eat the rest of it on my own.

After a few days of eating the yogurt, I didn't feel any different, and I kind of walked around with a smirk. "That's right, my bowels don't need any artificial enhancement." Especially anything called bifidis regularis. No way is that a real thing. Like Chevron with Techron, Certs with Retsin, or The O'Reilly Factor with Bill O'Reilly, it's just a made-up thing that can't possibly do anything, right? I mean, anybody can give something a fancy name. Computora keyboardicus. There. I just did it.

After awhile, though, the effects of the Activia were unmistakable. It started with a few ominous rumbles, but before I knew it, my small intestine had declared war on my large intestine. I thought for sure that this was just the "shock and awe" portion of the campaign for inner health, and that surely within a few days, my insides would sign some kind of intestinal peace accords, draw their boundaries at the Ileocecal sphincter, and exist again in the spirit of peace and harmony. But no! I felt like a washing machine on a permanant spin cycle. And as I ran (or, more accurately, kind of slid with my knees together) towards the bathroom at work, at home, at 7-11, or wherever else I was when my lunch decided to yell CHARGE!, I picture Jamie Lee Curtis again. Sitting there, with her legs tucked back, rapping with her friends. I too, was sitting quite a bit, with my legs tucked back. But I wasn't rapping, I was...well, I wasn't rapping. And there were certainly were no friends, unless you count the Super Friends. I did do a lot of comic book reading during this time.

That's when my image of Jamie Lee Curtis began to change. She was no longer effervescent, sitting on a comfy couch. She was standing in front of a background of flames, with red light cast on her, her head thrown back by her maniacal laughter. And she paused only to look at me and call me a sucker. Then more laughing.

If THAT'S what it's like to be regular, then call me irregular any day.

One day I noticed the rest of the Activia in the garbage can. I called Laura to formally protest her throwing out food like that, only to find that I'd been eating expired Activia for 2 weeks.

Now let's never talk of this again. And curse you, Jamie Lee Curtis!