The Polynesian Goddess Blog

Added on 20 June 2011

Today I smell like a Polynesian goddess. I know, I should be walking through life, ballsy and spunky and full of the kind of face-crushing confidence that only smelling like a Polynesian goddess can give you, yet somehow it's not quite working for me.

Yesterday I picked up a bottle of Imperial Leather Hawaiian Spa shower gel on offer in the Co-Op. Those fellas aren't just Good with Food, they're Swell with Gel. [Really, any Co-Op marketing type people reading this; you can have that one. For free.] It was only when I got it home that I realised that it wasn't shower gel, but was in fact bath foam. Or "Moisturising Bath". Bath foam must be too downmarket. But that doesn't matter. The only thing that separates shower gel from bath foam or shampoo or ice cream topping or diluting fruit juice, is the size of the nozzle.

This is what's written on the back of the bottle. (Now I make a lot of shit up on this page, but I'm not making this shit up.)

Lie back and take a trip to paradise with this Idyllic blend of exotic Tiare Flower and delicious, caring coconut milk inspired by Hawaiian spa rituals. Indulge and nourish your skin with the luxurious rich, creamy bubbles and breathtaking fragrance to emerge a serene, Polynesian goddess.

I suspect it helps if you imagine that being read by Dervla Kirwan. Or a Hawaiian porn actress.

When I first read it, I thought, lie back? What the fuck kind of shower do they think I'm going to have? That was when I realised it was the kind of shower where you filled the bath up with water and immersed yourself in it.

Exotic Tiare flower? Really, they could have made that up, couldn't they? Is anybody reading that and thinking, Holy mother of fuck, tiare flower? I want to smell of that!! How many people shopping in a British supermarket know what a tiare flower smells like? Less than 85% I reckon.

Delicious caring coconut milk. Just, you know, go and take a gigantic, throbbing nuclear weapon and ram it up your preposterous, marketing arsehole for that one. Delicious? Is that so they can write, on the warning part of the label, If swallowed, add lime juice, soy sauce and honey and serve with noodles and prawns?

And caring? Coconut milk doesn't care. It just doesn't! You can't anthropomorphise coconut milk! That's stupider than everything Sarah Palin's ever said put together.

And so it goes on, and on. It's only 46 words, but by God, they squeezed in a tremendous amount of pretentious pish into such a short passage. And when I say passage, obviously I mean of the rectal variety. Breathtaking fragrance stands out as a monumentally gigantic cock of a phrase, and then we get to the downright, men-hating sexism of the finale. Frankly I don't want to smell like a Polynesian goddess, thank you very much; I'd rather be a god if you don't mind, you marketing wanker.

This afternoon I shall be calling my lawyer, and Imperial Leather and I shall meet in court. This kind of misandry should not be allowed to dominate the world of affected and pompous fragrances.

They're not finished with their marketing tosh either. Furthermore, we're informed, coconut milk is conditioning and softening, while tiare flower is delicate and caring.

Holy crap, there we go again. It's not just the bloody coconut milk that cares about you and wants to give you a hug, send you a Christmas card and let you shag it for under a tenner when you're feeling a bit stressed, the flippin' tiare flower's at it as well. What a wonderful collection of botanical Samaritans.

The front of the bottle contains the magic words, Limited Edition. Who'd have thought? It ended up in my shower because it had been reduced to £1.20. Presumably the limited edition hasn't sold as well as they'd hoped and now they're practically giving it away. I suspect this morning that I'm not the only man, woman or child in these blighted islands stinking of wonderfully compassionate Hawaiian plants.

The replacement limited edition shower gel/shampoo/bath fornicator which cannot be too far off, will likely be the Hawaiian Spa, Distilled Essence of Obama Gel. We'll be queueing up for that one 'n all.