Author: Liz Dawes
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I am annoyingly tidy.

Think Monica (of Friends fame) only a little more neurotic and you are some of the way there. Since we moved into our new house I have blitzed the kitchen and indexed the sitting room and now it’s the turn of the bathroom.  Which is tiny and very messy.

The main clutter culprit is our collection of electronic toothbrushes.  They lurk around the sink looking clinically ugly, and require far too many add-ons (plugs, rechargers, extra brushes).  I cannot be the only manically neat woman in the world, so I figured someone had solved this washroom wrangle and typed “accessories for electric toothbrush” into a search engine.

The first link I clicked did not reveal a useful storage solution, but rather like all insane inventions, it is aimed at a problem I did not know existed. Marketed under the name “Tingle Tip” it: “replaces the brush head of the leading brands of electronic toothbrush”.  But instead of gleaming your gnashers this: “small, powerful, discreet clitoral stimulator is developed specifically for women to help achieve and enhance orgasm”.

Now I’m not a prude, so if electronic gadgetry is your thing, so be it. Whatever blows your hair back, as my Great Aunt Gertrude would have said. That said I do have a few questions not adequately dealt with by the manufacturers FAQ page:

First, whilst I can see the benefits of discretion, if you are so horny you can’t get from the bathroom to the bedroom without a quick flick of the starter button you are surely beyond caring whether room service finds you out. Just saying. Secondly, and whichever way you look at it, this extraordinary experience begins with oral hygiene. Last time I checked this was not within the range of typical foreplay, making the aforementioned urges a little implausible. I’m not saying impossible, but I wouldn’t project a five year business plan based on it.

Claims are also made that this particular device addresses a fault in all other vibrators – that of wasted energy. This vibrator only buzzes at the very tip. All other models, we are told, vibrate the entire device, as well as ones hand. Some to the point of unruliness (is this the root cause of vibration white finger, I wonder?) I am left with a mental image of women the world over grasping for their vibrators as they leap into the air like so many bars of slippery soap……and cannot help but think that if this were true we would surely have heard of it before now.

Last, but in no way least in my list of worries, is the sales strap line.  The simple yet bemusing: “As seen on the Alan Titchmarsh Show”. We must assume that the marketing department has undertaken sufficient research to show that Uncle Alan has a positive effect on sales, although the how and the why may never be answered; a sort of Lady Chatterley’s Lover meets the flip-top-head, perhaps? Not the kind of garden he’s usually linked to, but I feel unqualified to argue.  Twitter responses to a question on this point revealed equal amounts of enthusiasm and revulsion.

Naughty girl that she is, our lovely Tracey offered to get me a free sample of the Tingle Tip to see if I could work through my concerns. Dear reader, I declined. You can promise me as many “Meg Ryan in the Café” moments as you like, I will never get past this very basic point: I am still a Monica at heart, and will always believe that everything has its place.

And nothing, nothing, is going to persuade me to put my toothbrush in my toot-toot…….