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Unitasker Wednesday: MySneezee
All Unitasker Wednesday posts are jokes — we don’t want you to buy these items, we want you to laugh at their ridiculousness. Enjoy!
When I hear the phrase “sneeze guard,” I think of the glass shield that sits above the food on a buffet line:
Thanks to dozens of our readers, I am now aware I am mistaken. A “sneeze guard” is NOT a piece of glass, it is an overpriced decorative sock with its toe cut out of it — MySneezee!
If you go to the MySneezee site, you’ll see in the video that instead of spreading germs with your hands, you can now spread germs with your arm, just like Jimmy!
Notice how Jimmy is touching his sneeze guard to the teddy bear immediately after he sneezed? Not cool, Jimmy. Not cool.
more sharing
27 comments posted
Posted by Gina - 10/13/2010
Hilarious! Things the world does not need – how did generations of kids survive seasonal sneeze epidemics without this “Sneezee”? It rather looks like a cast cover for children with a broken arm. Or it prevents arthritis since it keeps your elbow warm (not a unitasker after all?) The ‘device’ teaches proper etiquette? How about using a tissue or washing your hands right after the sneeze attack?
Posted by Jacquie - 10/13/2010
What is the CDC? Apparently they recommend sneezing “into your sleeve”! YUK
Obviously from the same genetic line who wiped their snotty noses on their cuff.
Posted by Dawn F - 10/13/2010
@Mario – Is there any way Little Pepitto could have been saved by MySneeze?! Oh, how I miss Little Pepitto.
LOL!!!
I guess parents need to be TWO MySneeze shields – just to be sure they cover both arms! Ick!
Posted by Cathy W - 10/13/2010
The CDC is the Center for Disease Control, the federal public health agency in the U.S.
Ideally, I suppose, sneezing into a tissue or handkerchief is the preferred method – but my daughter was taught to “elbow sneeze” in elementary school as a way of cutting down disease transmission, on the premise that small children are unlikely to either pause mid-sneeze to run for a tissue or wash their hands afterwards, and elbows are less likely to carry germs to the whole class than hands are.
Posted by Alex - 10/13/2010
Sneezing into your arm elbow / sleeve is DEFINITELY the preferred method to prevent germ transmission, as is listed in many hospitals and doctors offices. Covering your cough is important, but when most people would cough into their hands, they would spread those germs with everything they used their hands for. Sneezing into your arm/ sleeve keeps those germs away from others (as how often do you have your inner elbow interacting with things?)
I don’t see the need for this sleeve at all, when a normal elbow or shirt works fine.
Posted by Splomo - 10/13/2010
This sneeze sleeve is a perfect partner for the anti-nose-picking gloves with giant geckoesque fingertips.
Hold on, was I only dreaming those? Darn.
Posted by WilliamB - 10/13/2010
Sneezing into one’s elbow is less unsanitary than into one’s hands, because the elbow has less frequent contact with other surfaces.
Which does NOT excuse the existence of this item. Sheesh. Use your sleeve or, as Erin suggests, an attractive sock with the foot cut out. Hey – add that idea to the recent post on how to reuse and recycle!
Posted by Ash - 10/13/2010
MySneezee, why use your shirt sleeve when you can buy our sleeve?
)
Posted by George - 10/13/2010
In Tanzania mothers safety pin rag squares to the chests of children who have colds – free sleeve equivalent!
Posted by Julie - 10/13/2010
While I appreciate everyone who says sneezing into your sleeve is preferred to sneezing into your hand (and I understand the reasoning why), there is nothing quite so disgusting as getting a booger on your shirt sleeve and trying to figure out how to get it off.
Posted by Celeste - 10/13/2010
Most disgusting UniTasker ever! At least bare skin can be washed or wiped down.
Posted by Alex - 10/13/2010
Julie, do you suppose you could think a tad bigger than “OMG boogers”? Spreading the flu is a far larger concern, and the CDC is absolutely right on this one.
For a fun (and cringe-worthy!) video, go watch “why don’t we do it in our sleeves?” on YouTube or coughsafe.com.
Besides, the snot comes off with a tissue.
Posted by Nana - 10/13/2010
The Tanzania note reminded me that, when I was in Kindergarten (and dinosaurs roamed the earth), all the girls had to have a hankie safety-pinned to our dress fronts. Since it was very difficult to actually use it (unpin? Ask the teacher to unpin? Use the edge that one could pull toward one’s nose?), I remember leaning down and wiping my nose on the hem of my slip. Oh, if only I’d had a MySneezee!
Posted by Derp - 10/13/2010
… and you get a really weird farmer’s tan to boot!
Posted by Jen - 10/13/2010
i’m trying to think what the likelihood is that a small child will actually WEAR this ridiculous device on a regular basis (and for longer than 10 seconds). i can’t imagine my son wearing it for any length of time. i’d get complaints that it’s itchy or something like that. crazy.
Posted by Nicole : Three By Sea - 10/13/2010
Oh.my.god. This is crackin’ me up. My two-year-old had a cold the week before last and I was half-joking on Twitter that Kleenex needed to make a disposable “snot sleeve”, if you will, for the little ones since they’re constantly using their arm to wipe their nose if you don’t follow them around.
I had no idea somebody had taken the idea even further and gone the “eco-friendly”, reusable route! LOL!
Posted by Nat - 10/13/2010
Yeah, I agree that a regular long sleeve will work fine, and if it’s warm enough for short sleeves, the kid’s probably not going to want anything on his/her arms. Having said that, a lot of parents already have BabyLegs around from the baby & tot years. I’d probably just re-task ours if I really felt the need to protect my child’s arm from her snot.
Posted by Aslaug - 10/13/2010
Stupid product, agreed.
Hankies are out, unless you wash them after each use, since otherwise, well, ew. Disposable tissue is fine (as long as you don’t stick it up your sleeve afterwards).
I see the problem with the elbow thing, both in getting *stuff* on your top there and also, in company it allows germs to spread during the sneeze almost as much as using your hands.
My weird solution (and ok, I’m not a frequent sneezer): I turn away from people if possible, discreetly (if possible) lift the left neckline part of my top and sneeze into there. Then any transfer is at least on the inside and not the outside, and my shoulder is, of course, washable (and not likely to be spreading germs around by contact).
Go ahead and copy my method if you want to try, but please don’t tell me it’s any grosser than anything else people do (unless they always carry a stack of disposables that they can grab before the sneeze hits and throw away immediately).
Posted by Sarah - 10/13/2010
Personally, I say go ahead and let kids sneeze. Sure, try to teach them to sneeze into their elbows (it is a good idea,) but don’t freak out about it. That’s what immune systems are for. They catch a virus from Billy down the street and next time they have antibodies for that virus. We feel that way about chicken pox, (although now apparently it is no longer a rite-of-passage due to the vaccine,) so why not feel that way about cold viruses? I don’t use anything with the word “antibacterial” in it, and I get sick for about three days once every 1.5 to 2 years. I also volunteer in a hospital and still don’t get sick. Let your kids spread a moderate amount of germs… it keeps us healthy.
Posted by RebeccaL - 10/13/2010
Jimmy is just asking to get his %^& kicked if he wears this to school…
Posted by jbeany - 10/14/2010
So that’s that’s what they did with all the leftover leg-warmers from the 80′s.
Posted by John - 10/14/2010
Sneezing into your elbow is preferable to sneezing into your hands…think of the number of things you touch with your hands on a daily basis and then think how many people have touched that very same item or surface…door handles, stair rails, money… Sadly, most people don’t wash their hand properly or thoroughly enough to remove such germs either. Whilst I don’t really see the need for this special sleeve, I’d recommend everyone to start adopting this practice and stop spreading germs and disease.
On a lighter note…these aren’t unitaskers…they can also be used by triathletes, cyclists and the like as arm-warmers or calf-warmers:
http://www.impsport.com/produc.....tcatid=109
Who knew that all us sporting folk were actually also helping curb the spread of disease?!
Posted by Viv - 10/14/2010
I wonder how you quickly you can pull the sleeve on when you feel a sneeze coming on?
Posted by Erin - 10/14/2010
ok, here’s a crazy idea. If your kid is so sick that you would brand them as such with a polka dot arm warmer, how about you KEEP THEM AT HOME. If more people would just take a day off when they are sick they would do a lot more to stop the spread of colds, flu, etc.
That said, I keep tissues handy and use my sleeve in a pinch. Snot on your shirt is better than all over your coworker! I also wash my hands every time I have a chance. Working with college students all day is like working in a petri dish.
Posted by Tiffany - 10/14/2010
I’ll also point out that in addition to this being more sanitary than sneezing into your hands, cold and flu viruses die much faster on soft, porous surfaces like fabric than they do on other kinds of surfaces. You’re actually better off sneezing into this thing than into your bare elbow.
Posted by JessieJack - 10/14/2010
@ jbeany Hilarious!!
Posted by Granny - 10/27/2010
I think you are all missing the point. I think this is an educational tool to train our children to sneeze and cough correctly. While all the things mentioned above are great ideas, I remember many times having my children and not being able to stay home with them when they had a little cold or repeatedly telling them to wash their hands and sneeze into a Kleenex. While it is all good in theory, it rarely works, so if we can at least train our children to do this and hopefully keep everyone else from getting sick, I’m all for it. Besides, when I’m done training them and they have it down, I won’t have to carry jackets anymore, I’ll just throw a couple of MySneezees in my purse and out the door we’ll go.
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