Say, for example, my swimming pool is cloudy. I’ve already checked the acid, chlorinator, etc. so I surmise that the problem is that the pool is full of a little suspended particles – underwater dust, as’t were. Lots of Gautrain construction in my area, so that’s no wonder.

No problem. I know exactly what I need and what it’s called: a flocculent. The particles are so fine that they never settles to the bottom of the pool, where the Barracuda can suck it up. But a flocculent is a chemical that will make them stick together into larger clumps, that will sink and be caught by the filter.

Off to the shops, then.

I innocently and straightforwardly ask the shop assistant “where do you keep your flocculents?”, and I get punched in the face almost as hard as that time I told the petrol attendant “I want ethylene glycol” and he yelled at me: “I don’t care where you want her, pervert, you stay the HELL away from my wife!”

No, I lie. Today is a good day, the shop assistant just gives me a blank stare. For some reason they often give me blank stares when I ask for things.

So I just tackle the shelves myself. There’s rows and rows of Sparkle-Brites, and WonderBlues, and SuperClears – and SuperClear Plusses. Hmmm. On closer inspection, none are subtitled “WONDERBLUE flocculent” or the like, so a deeper inspection is warranted.

I turn the bottles round, expecting to find some marketing shpiel to the effect that “SuperClear is a superior flocculent that has been lovingly developed in our high tech labs in order to…”. Nothing. Nada.

What I do find is lots of promises that WonderBlue will make my pool wonderfully blue and clear, or that SparkleBrite is an essential part of every pool-owners poolcare regimen. Of course, I read the exact same statement on all the chlorine, all the Hydrochloric acid (pardon me, Pool Acid), Cyanuric Acid (oops, I mean Stabiliser), and algaecide (sorry, that would be “underwater disinfectant – kills blue-green pool-germs DEAD!”).

What to do?

If I’m lucky, the back of the product will at least say “… cleans the pool by making tiny particles that cloud your water sink to the bottom, where they can be sucked up by the automatic pool cleaner”. Then I can reasonably safely guess they mean “flocculent”.

If I’m less lucky, the back will read “…helps your pool filter clean the water better”. Then I can make a somewhat more cautious guess that they mean “flocculent”.

Alas, I’m left trying to guess whether a flocculent is most likely to be a powder, or a liquid, or a gel. Why can’t they just label their products with a description of what they actually are?

As it stands, I can just buy the damn things and see if they act like what I hope they are.

Which is, I guess, what the average consumer does, anyway: buy lots of stuff until they find something that works (because it complements their particular habits for neglecting certain pool chemicals), and then swear by that as the be-all and end-all of ultimate poolcare.

In a future installment, I shall relate my adventures when trying to purchase vulcanizing glue for a hobby project, and how the helpful shop assistant pointed me to “a theatre make-up shop where other that can help Star Trek fans like you”.