A Post for Future Colon Cancer Patients: Learn from My Mistake

I've always been fascinated by the social science research that looks at choice and decision-making, particularly within our extremely commercial environment. I wish I could remember where I saw it, but I have the distinct recollection of a theory/argument/hypothesis/whatever that took the position that in some ways habits were a defense mechanism.

The idea was that a person who goes into a typical American grocery store is now in an environment where they're being overwhelmed by choices. Which one of the scores of different toothpastes do you want? Which one of the scores of cereals do you want? Chips, veggies, yogurt, pasta, soup -- you name it, and there's a zillion options to choose from.

And if you actually considered the full range of options for each one of those choices, you'd basically go crazy. Your brain isn't capable of making that many choices. So we develop habits. We go in the store and pick-up the Crest, the Cheerios, the Lays bar-b-que chips, the broccoli and the Campbell's chicken soup, and then we stand and contemplate our options in the yogurt and pasta aisles. 

I wish I could remember the number of choices it was theorized we could manage. But in any case...

Dear fellow colon cancer patient, 

The next time you are in the paper products aisle as the grocery store and you pick up a package of bathroom tissue, STOP! Now look at the package. Is it your habit to buy the cheapo, store brand stuff, or the really expensive name brand stuff that if you found a piece on the floor you might think it was a bath towel if it wasn't for the fact that it's only four inches square? If it's the latter, you're fine. Stick with your habit. But if it's the former, PUT IT BACK. You now need to redirect one of your limited number of choices from the wine aisle -- just ask the clerk to recommend something -- to the toilet paper aisle. Examine each and every one of the options, and then buy the most expensive, heaviest, absolute best toilet paper you can possibly afford. (Give up the wine if you must.) And when you come back to buy more, keep buying that expensive stuff until it becomes a habit. Then you can go back to mulling over the wine options.

Oh, and if you're the sort of person that travels with a bag or a very large pocket, may I suggest carrying a roll of your new brand of upscale bathroom tissue? That way, if you're out and about and you've got to use a public restroom (pretty much an inevitability for the colon cancer patient), you can avoid the cheap sandpaper most of those places stock.  
Trust me on this.