Lipovitan D Challenge Cup

Brand: Taisho Medicine

Cost: 157 yen

Found at: Family Mart

A biologist friend is doing research on seasonal effective disorder on fish. She told me about it over dinner – how the summer fish cluster together and socialize together in one tank, and the winter fish flee to their separate sides to avoid their marine social obligations. And this got me worrying. In these cold, grumpy, winter months, I’m certainly becoming a winter fish.

So, I went out and bought a vitamin D supplement because I have the vague recollection that it is supposed to help. And I hope it does, because otherwise, I’ve had to drink this horrible vitamin supplement for nothing – and that’s a chilling thought. First, it’s neon green – similar, and possibly even more artificial, than Mountain Dew. Second, it tastes like Flinstones’ vitamins in liquid form. Third, it’s advertising the Rugby World Cup – a sport I don’t follow – supporting a New Zealand team – a place I’ve never been. (I’m not casting aspersions on Rugby or New Zealand – I wouldn’t dare –  I just don’t understand the connection between them and vitamin deficiency.) And fourth, the ingredients list reads like the inventory list of an overfunded chemistry lab. Maybe this is the winter fish in me, but I’m fairly sure that I will either end up with a unusual form of neon cancer or with Rugby-related super powers.

But I guess if it makes me more social, I can’t complain.