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Illustration: Thomas Pitilli

TP
Since moving in with my partner, I have learned that he has a sacred ritual when it’s time for number two. First, he must bring enough reading material for a two-week beach vacation. Second, he will use only Charmin Ultra Soft ($4.29 for four rolls)—apparently, his delicate cheeks accept nothing less. Despite the fact that the luxurious pillowiness occasionally clogs the crapper, he swears that a less-velvety brand would not only cause chafing, but also further deplete the earth’s resources on account of he’d need a whole roll. Time for a change: Enter Krasdale’s 99¢-for-four two-ply. I slipped the thinner, raspier substitute (c’mon, at least it was two-ply!) into the tissue holder and waited. The next day I came home from work and found my man tapping furiously on his MacBook. Obviously traumatized, he told me he was writing a strongly worded letter of complaint to Charmin because they’d manufactured a dud batch. “My hand,” he said, pausing dramatically, upper lip curling as he recalled the horror, “went right through that piece-of-shit toilet paper.” At that moment I realized that my crime was too heinous to confess. “Must have been a factory error,” I agreed, and crept off to hide the three remaining rolls of damning evidence. Sorry, Charmin!—Philip Taylor

COFFEE
My boyfriend has high java standards. Starbucks doesn’t cut it for this kid—it’s gotta be the $10-per-14-ounce namesake grounds from Mud. I was curious to see how his palate responded to the cheapo off-brand I had swapped with his usual grounds (hello, Folgers—$5.49 for 13 ounces!). When he woke up on switch day and turned on the coffeemaker, I was sure he’d notice the difference in the smell and texture right away, but he said nothing. I watched slyly in the mirror as he took his first unsuspecting sip, and I detected the slightest hint of a grimace as the aftertaste hit his tongue, but he didn’t spit the joe out. I went to pour myself a cup. “I wouldn’t do that,” he said. “I made bad coffee. Don’t know if I burned it or what, but it’s bad.” What happened? “Well, the grounds looked like they were freezer-burned. They were all crystallized.” (So he had noticed!) After taking another gulp, he proclaimed it tasted like “bad gas-station coffee that had been sitting out all day.” The guy was so genuinely dismayed by the rotten start to his weekend that I didn’t have the heart to tell him it was also decaf.—Lindsey Unterberger

WINE
My roommate likes her wine—Nathanson Creek sauvignon blanc ($10.99 for 1.5 liters), to be exact. It’s not a particularly great wine, but she’s very particular about drinking it—which she does a lot, and only out of a magnum. (To be fair, I’m usually helping her drink it.) So I brought home a bottle of generic white from our corner bodega—you know, the one sitting next to the register that you’re not even sure is actually wine? Yep, Frizze white (750ml for $5.99)—apparently it is from the lost vineyards of Argentina and it has added natural fruit flavors. Classy. My roomie was sitting on the couch, wineglass in hand, watching TV. Perfect. I slipped into the kitchen, poured the rest of the Nathanson Creek into my wineglass and replaced it with the bodega white. I refilled her glass, took a seat and waited. Maybe it was the fact that Nathanson Creek isn’t the most distinctly nuanced wine, or that she’d already had a few pours, but whatever the reason, she took her first sip and… I waited in anticipation for a reaction to the ruse, but I got nothing. Not even a flinch. She might have cast a suspicious glance at her glass, but that was most likely my imagination. At least we can score our vino at the bodega from now on.—Katharine Rust

FACIAL CLEANSER
My husband doesn’t mind generic products—he’ll happily purchase store-name shampoo or ibuprofen if it saves him a few bones. But there are some items for which only the posh stuff will do, like his facial cleanser. He uses Cetaphil—it’s dermatologist-recommended and gentle on the face, but not on our budget: One eight-ounce bottle costs $8.79. So how does the CVS brand—at just $6.29—measure up? I switched the wash (which is thinner and sour-smelling) into a regular Cetaphil bottle and made up weird reasons he should wash his face more often (“You need to wear sunscreen, and it’ll adhere better to a clean face…”). Yet after five days, he didn’t notice a thing. My husband even found the CVS bottle under our sink, but asked no questions. Perhaps the generic chemicals make one clueless.—Amy Plitt