There is some danger in brushing your teeth. I know this isn’t probably widely talked about, but your toothbrush and toothpaste container may have it out for you if you’re not careful.

I was brushing my teeth a couple days back (yes, I brush them every day. Gross. Don’t make it sound like it is an occasional thing…) and I had something happen to me that I haven’t had happen in 48+ years. It was surprising to say the least and it STUNG LIKE HELL (like heat cream in the jock strap kind of sting!).

Here’s how it went down:

Minding my own business and going through my morning routine. Picked up the toothbrush, picked up the tube of toothpaste, and proceeded to carefully apply said paste to brush. I have done this a lot, so I don’t take a lot of particular care in application but I always try to make sure there isn’t a bunch of leftover hanging out of the tube when I close the lid (no one like the toothpaste crust on the outside of the nozzle). As the toothpaste reached the last few bristles of the brush, the bristles caught the edge of the tube opening…

Catapult!

Picture the films of back in the day when they used catapults to throw big rocks over the walls of castles and forts and whatnot. Only this time the catapult was flinging toothpaste.

In less than the blink of an eye (I literally watched the white glob fly at me) minty-fresh, teeth-whitening Colgate landed in the corner of my eye.

There was no Matrix effect for me to dodge it. There was no time to blink. There was no time to flinch.

“Eye, meet toothpaste. It’ll be staying for a while, and it will be uncomfortable, so buckle up for this ride.”

Stinging, blinking profusely, scrunched face, I tried to complete the job of brushing my teeth. It was tough. It took 23 minutes for the stinging to go away.

So yeah, if you want to sniff my minty eye some time let me know.

Wink wink, blink blink, wink wink.