The other day I noticed that my box of cotton swabs has some kind of strange and confusing imagery on it.

I get the keyboard one, for sure. Cotton swabs are super good for cleaning the accumulated finger-filth and manky crusties off keyboards and from around the keys themselves. Although, having said that, I now fear slightly that I’ve given you the impression that my computer keyboard is a cesspool of smeg and horror. It’s not, I promise. Well, except for that one time when my husband dropped a sandwich HP-sauce-side-down on our laptop and we had super sticky keys for a month despite many wipe-downs and I eventually ended up prying the keys off and cleaning under them with the point of a very sharp knife in order to restore functionality and reduce overall grossness. Other than that my keyboards are all maintained to an acceptable level of hygiene, I assure you.

ANYWAY.

The baby one, I kind of vaguely understand as well…although the scale is messed up so it totally looks like someone drying a baby’s head off with a GIGANTIC cotton-wrapped wand. Or maybe it’s not a baby at all, maybe it’s a doll and they’re cleaning it? I don’t know, whatever. Point is, I can see how cotton swabs might come in handy with regard to tiny human maintenance. In theory. Having seen the size of mess most babies can make themselves with bodily functions in literally a split second, I think cotton swab manufacturers might be overplaying this angle somewhat.

The eye thing is a definite yes comprehension-wise for me. Fully half of the cotton swabs that enter my home end up getting used to fix or remove eye make-up. Cotton swabs and coconut oil have saved me from many an embarrassing eyeliner smudge.

I think the middle one on the bottom row there is maybe supposed to be a suggestion that you use your cotton swabs to apply glue? Or paint, maybe? I’m pretty crafty but not so much in either the gluing-shit-together sense or the applying-paint-to-shit sense, so I’m just kind of spit-balling here. Those two options seem more feasible than my original thought, anyway…which was “that looks like a tube of hemorrhoid cream. Would someone really be so grossed out by their own ass that they’d refuse to apply medication to it without using an implement like a cotton swab?”  Because, you know, that’s something a totally normal and sane person thinks about on a Thursday morning while getting ready for work.

Ahem.

The one that truly boggles me though, is the bathtub faucet one. What is this trying to say? Do they think I should be cleaning my grout with cotton swabs, or be so meticulous about cleaning my faucet that I use cotton swabs to…I don’t know, clean it? Because, no. NEVER going to happen. That’s what chemicals are for. And, if I made more money, cleaning ladies.

Are you the clean-the-grout-with-cotton-swab type, or do you just ram them in your ears until they make your toes curl and you maybe cough a little, like everyone else?