On Anti-Bacterial Soap

Though popularized by the dramatic writings of Sir Peirce Noël Coward, the origins of unscented anti-bacterial soap can be traced back to 19th century Finland and the prodigious work of the noted astrobiologist and Arctic theologian, Heinz Carlsbad.

Carlsbad, whose lifelong dream of becoming the first amateur sous-chef to reach the Northern Pole of Inaccessibility was shattered by a freak dogsled accident in the summer of 1892, was experimenting with the thermal properties of common legumes when he stumbled across a startling paradox: When pressurized to 98.0665 kilopascals and combined with paraffin wax, peanut oil separates into two compounds — arginine, an amino acid that the body uses to produce nitric oxide, and hydrojuglone, a sweet-smelling bio-toxin which kills approximately 99 percent of all household germs.

Blinded by love and crippled with a rare form of social anxiety disorder, Carlsbad misjudged the cultural significance of his discovery and poured his lifesavings into the development, manufacture and distribution of the wildly unpopular, arginine-based soft drink of his own design, Virvoitusjuoma.

Carlsbad died penniless and alone at the age of 52.