The last time purchasing toilet paper, Joyful Hermit went for a grocery store sale.  A major brand touted an alluring discount from its regular price.  Usually, JH gets bargain tp, single ply, but this time lovingly considered guests’ comfort.  Hermits are historically quite hospitable.

The toilet paper on sale was two-ply and advertised as so-o-o soft, and promised more for the money.  Figuring the sheets per roll, how many rolls, checking the size of sheets is a good way to analyze costs.  However, Joyful noticed the store brand at regular price, claiming to have just the softness and yet fewer sheets per roll.  It got confusing….

Then an epiphany struck Joyful Hermit right there in the toilet paper aisle.  With a younger and older shopper on either side, and a couple looking on, the insight took form into action.  Lifting each package of toilet paper rolls, the regular store-priced package was noticeably heavier.  Of course, part of the joy of shopping is to engage other shoppers to everyone’s benefit.  “Just feel how much more we really get on the regular-priced grocery brand compared to the price-slashed package of the major brand product!”

So the shoppers each started lifting the toilet paper packages, one in each hand, to feel the weight differences.  And in toilet paper, the weight of the package truly makes all the difference.  We were better off purchasing toilet paper that had more substance and weight than the one that had more sheets and even appeared larger.  Aw, they fluff it to fool us.

As to Holy Stones, these are sold by weight.  Someone questioned what was that eerie thing in the upper right of The Joyful Hermit header?  It looked to them like a skeleton with eyes peering out.  No, it is a Holy Stone.  JH purchased several for decorative purposes in the hermitage gardens.  Make good bug houses, too.

But a skeletal reminder is helpful to a hermit who strives for detachment and ponders life’s purpose in light of our earthly end.  The temporal is always passing away. Hermits of yore who lived in stone caves often had a skull to ponder. Eyes peering out is also a good thought for a hermit.  We ought always search the inner crannies of the soul and rout the vices so as to love God more dearly and see Him more clearly.

The Holy Stones evoked immediate appeal in The Joyful Hermit when on an outing to a nearby stonery.  How can we not love their unique visibility and imaginative function for the many temporal-spiritual allusions?  In a garden, their holy mystique is unending.

Stones are sold by weight, and price is also affected by transport distance from where the stone was quarried. Holy stones are thus lightweight, as stones go, and quarried not too far away. For a hermit, anything “holy” appeals; but price was the determining purchase factor. All those holes meant less weight, meant more stones, meant more garden decor options, per the price.  Just the opposite, we now know, is the case when toilet paper shopping: more weight provides for more usable product, regardless number of sheets or rolls.