I could try to pass this week’s topic off as having to do with spring! and nature! and rebirth! but it actually started with the Ped Egg. I don’t watch TV, so apparently this phenomenon has already been rockin’ the airwaves when it hit me in the form of a computer popup that I could not resist clicking. For those of you not in the know, the Ped Egg is a pretty horrifying contraption with a pretty hilarious commercial. Essentially a cheese grater for your feet, it sloughs off dead skin and smoothes calluses. The special “ergonomically designed” egg shape fits the “contours of your hand” perfectly. Also, it stores the “filings,” so that you can use it anywhere! Even your bedroom! Without worrying about making a mess! The fact that this foot-scraping device had to be made into an egg baffled me; mostly, it works like a phone, with the bottom half just cradling the top. Why is it an egg? What do eggs have to do with dead foot skin? Why is that such an important element of this device that it is part of the name, when it actually has no bearing on what the damn thing does? This curiosity, combined with absolutely no desire to do any art-history reading, resulted in finding the following: Things that are shaped like eggs for no reason, but are not actually eggs.
1. Here is a thing that has no reason to be shaped like an egg, and for that matter, has no reason at all. The Grobag Egg is an egg-shaped thermometer with a color-coded system to tell you the temperature of the room you are currently standing in. Intended to help caregivers maintain a comfortable temperature in their baby’s room, the color changes correspond to climate changes in the egg’s surrounding environment. What baffles me here is how much difficulty anyone could have judging the temperature of a room when they have the distinct advantage of being present and having skin that detects temperature. Which came first: the human ability to feel or the egg?
2. Finally giving a voice to the plight of non-egg ellipsoids, this next one is a tribute song to a mysterious egg-shaped man named Fred. Prog-influenced and ’80s-sounding British band Mansun hasn’t given a lot to the music world since it started in 1995. Between such quintessentially not-rock-’n'-roll moments as having to change its band name due to copyright issues (originally deriving its name from Charles Manson), changing costumes and looks more often than their music styles, and a remixed appearance on the soundtrack of the “adult animation” film Spawn, there are a million reasons why they would never have ever been mentioned anywhere in this column. Except for this little gem about the “queen of all shops” and “king of the scene.” I have no idea why Fred is egg-shaped or what about him warrants an illogical song tribute, but cut the guy some slack. All he wants is some tea and to get in your pants, after all.
3. I have always had, and will always have, a soft spot in my heart for Weebles. Looking back, however, having a Weeble was like keeping the plastic bubble that contained the toy you actually wanted from a gumball machine. It was by no means unnecessary for Weebles to be egg-shaped (that was pretty much their thing), but it was unnecessary for Weebles to exist at all. Don’t ask me how the catchphrase “Weebles wobble, but they don’t fall down!” sounded so much more exciting when I was a wee one, but I remember going apeshit with the kids on my block over little eggs with faces rolling around and defying the laws of physics and stuff. Kudos, Hasbro. Kudos.
4. Turning the tables now, here is actually a device to make eggs into something shaped like not-eggs. While in total defiance of the theme, I can’t have a clear conscience without sharing these molds for your frying pan to cook eggs into the shape of replicas of very specific guns. How do I like my eggs in the morning? Fully loaded.
5. Finally, the be-all, end-all of egg-shaped, non-egg things, the one and only Tamagotchi. Barring a very creative Bonsai kitten, this is likely your only shot to get an egg-shaped gadget capable of love (or hunger, or thirst, or drowning in its own feces). This one is at least moderately logical: Your little digital alien creature hatched out of an egg or something. I’ll buy that. (And in fourth grade, I sure did.) No list of egg shapes would be complete without this baby rounding it off. I dedicate this post to every elementary student who has ever been hit, kicked, pinched or bitten over a Tamagotchi. Your suffering shall not be forgotten.