This weekend, the first I’d spent in New York in over a month, I set out to wade through the pile of home errands accumulated in my absence. One was a run through Duane Reade, our local drug store, to replace toothpaste and detergent and light bulbs and a basket-and-a-half of other odds and ends.

One item on the list: a new head for my Braun electric toothbrush.

For years, electric toothbrushes, like driving to the gym, struck me as pointlessly lazy. But after my mother forwarded a handful of studies demonstrating how much better electric brushing works than its manual counterpart, I broke down and bought one.

I bought the Braun in June; by July, it was broken. Or, at least, partially broken. While the on/off switch no longer worked, I inadvertently discovered that whacking the thing into the side of the sink still did. Whack once to turn it on; whack again, and it’s back off.

Thrilled as I was by this discovery, I soon realized the turn-on whack also sent toothbrush-top paste flying, usually directly onto the bathroom mirror.

So, obviously, I took to applying the toothpaste directly to my teeth. A nearly flawless solution.

Still, walking down the toothbrush aisle in Duane Reade, I couldn’t help but notice, next to the $9.99 replacement head, a $24.99 replacement of the entire toothbrush – head included. And, for a moment at least, I took the new Braun off the shelf, and considered leaving my sink-whacking, teeth-toothpasting days behind.

Then I realized the $15 difference also just happened to be the precise cost of two six packs of Brooklyn Lager. So, obviously, I put the new Braun back, grabbed the replacement head instead, and headed off to the liquor aisle.

It was the only rational choice.