Bless my fangs

Have you looked at toothpaste lately? I mean really looked? I was at the grocer yesterday doing a little shopping and remembered I was getting low in the tube at home. I wandered over to the pharmacy section and found the toothpaste section. About 15 feet long and 4-5 feet high. When I was a kid and Crest was fighting the Cavity Creeps with their tooth walled city there were roughly three kinds of toothpaste, Crest, Colgate and Aim (?). I'm sure Pepsodent has been around awhile, but Arm & Hammer didn't make toothpaste back then. Nor did half the other name brands I saw.

OK, so getting past the major manufacturers, then you have the sub brands. Whitening this, cavity that and flavors. Vanilla toothpaste? WTF? I'm gonna wanna eat every time I brush my teeth. Isn't that kind of self defeating? I mean seriously, I'd spend the day between the kitchen feeding my face and the bathroom brushing my fangs. (No Bufffalo, I didn't steal this from you, but I was delighted to hear you say fangs instead of teeth).

Back to sub brands, the Crest website shows 12 categories of toothpaste and each category then has sub brands. The liquid Gels Category has 12 brands listed including Spiderman. Then at the bottom, there is a link to the actual Gel Toothpastes which has 11 more brands. How am I supposed to choose the right toothpaste for me?

I don't have a lot of brand loyalty when it comes to toothpaste, I generally like something with a swirl of gel in it, but I couldn't find one yesterday. The basics seem to have disappeared from the shelves. I think I ended up with something with Listerine added to it. Great, now I don't need the mouthwash step anymore. Can we get any lazier as a society? Gimme some basic toothpaste that fights cavities and keeps my occasional cigar smoking, wine drinking teeth semi white without the need for invasive dental efforts and I'm good. Anyone else with me on this bandwagon?