I decided to use Lunesta for exactly one reason: they're adept with metaphor.

Yeah, I kind of have trouble sleeping. Maybe I'd like to get a deeper sleep. But when they showed that Giant Yellow Butterfly of Slumber alighting on that troubled woman's forehead, I thought, "Hey, I have gotta get me some of that shit."

Before I had a chance to buy it, though, I noticed the fine print at the bottom of the TV screen. It said, "The exact way Lunesta works is unknown."

You know, this is a little troubling. Nobody'd even think of admitting this in another industry. You wouldn't go to the Chevy dealership and hear a salesman saying, "This baby'll do eighty in four seconds. We think it's got something to do with the engine, but frankly we're still scratching our heads."

When you see a commercial for blenders, they don't say, "It turns solids into liquids! It's unbelievable! Somehow we've stumbled upon a vortex of dematerialization that still puzzles specialists!"

You'd never buy something where the manufacturer can't explain how it works. Yet this is a pill, that works on your brain, and you're taking it because you trust them.

And apparently all they can say is, "Maybe it's got something to do with the tides?"

It makes me wonder how they developed this stuff. I mean, if they don't know how it works, they couldn't have set out to make it, right? Say you're making windchimes. You know that hard things hitting against each other make pretty noise, so you find hard things that sound pretty and string them together. You take it outside, it sounds pretty, and you go, "Wow, that's neat."

You aren't just randomly stringing stuff together, unsure if you'll end up with a bookcase, a guitar, or a chicken, and then when the wind comes up and it tinkles you scream, "What the FUCK is THAT?"

That smal print makes me picture a scientist making a pill out of some chemicals he had lying around, swallowing it with a glass of water, and eight hours later waking up and going, "Hey, cool!" Maybe you see this as a breakthrough, but I'm understanding exactly why it comes with eight pages of disclaimer.

So, sorry, Lunesta. I'm not buying. The elusive Hairy Ochre Wolverine of Reason has perched upon my forehead. Give me a call when you've discovered a pill for that.