I’m amazed at how quickly the week goes by. It seems like I just blogged and I see it’s been nearly a week since I posted anything.

In a recent Wall Street Journal, I spied this headline: "The Battle Over Toilet Testing," with a subtitle of "Industry is Divided Over How to Measure Flushing Power: Miso Versus Plastic Balls." You may remember my post about shopping for a toilet and having fun with the toilet industry’s odd ways of marketing, including making claims of being able to flush two dozen golf balls with one fell swoop.

Here’s the industry’s dirty little secret (yes, pun intended): "Toilets that are fantastic at flushing down 3/4 inch plastic balls sometimes falter under real world conditions." So quoteth the WSJ, a reliable source of information for all things in business, big and small. Enter miso, which is made primarily of cooked soybeans. Not surprisingly, the miso manufacturers are happy to sell their product to the toilet manufacturers but to also keep a low profile with the public on their contribution to better flushing toilets. After all, who wants to know that they are consuming a food that closely resembles the consistency of, well, need I say more?

Here’s another secret: "Since 1978, toilet makers had been using the plastic-ball test, which involved dropping 100 balls into the toilet: the toilet had to dispose of at least 75 in one flush. " Makes those claims of 2 dozen golf balls seem downright puny. Maybe the marketing guys got it wrong. Maybe they meant to say that 2 dozen didn’t get flushed.

So at this point, you might be wondering, what is the point of all this? I suppose this is my way of saying, there is always a story behind the story, a joke behind the joke. Look for it and I guarantee you’ll be fascinated. Even when it involves something as mundane as toilets.