This is a chess set - maybe more like a collection of mismatched objects rather than a single object, but I think of it as a single item. The pieces are lightweight, hollow plastic, hailing from 2 or 3 different original sets. One of the pawns has had its top broken off, and several pieces are chipped. The board is made of worn wood, the paint on its surface scratched from a long life of many games. A small brass hook on one side keeps it clasped shut when it's not in use, storing the mismatched pieces. Boards like this are a dime a dozen in Russia.

My object is an electric toothbrush.  It is around eight inches tall, I think, with a pulsing blue light near its base.  It comes with a holder and charger that can hold a few brush-heads, but I only have the one that you will see perched atop the base itself -- each head is expensive!

I bought this toothbrush when I was in Washington DC, working for a nonprofit, trying to live under a strict austerity regime.  I lived in small room with a thin secondhand mattress.  The job paid poorly but the health care was good, and I was able to afford this fancy toothbrush under the dental plan.  I remember justifying the purchase to myself, saying that if I was going to indulge any vanity it should be a vanity related to teeth, because tooth care is fundamentally practical and wholesome. 

A dish cloth is an inexpensive cloth, the size of a washcloth, but thinner and usually made of a more synthetic material, with a waffle texture.  It is designed for no purpose other than washing dishes, and often comes with the word dish printed onto it in large writing to make this clear.

I spend a lot of time thinking about dishwashing utensils, not unlike the way other people become fixated on utensils for brewing coffee or shaving.  We spend no less time washing dishes than brewing coffee or shaving, and I find it extraordinary that so few others seem to spend as much time thinking about dishcloths.

Grapefruits are amazing. They have this epic size, the "king" of citrus fruits, if you will. Thick skin that's smooth and soft and the most amazing fleshy interior...ruby red or champagne white (take your pick, california or florida), they're pulpy and massive, and tart, and sweet all in one. Interesting that the fruit impresses me in this way, since I absolutely detest grapefruit juice, but that's another story altogether.

My object is a powder compact. I´m not sure what brand is, something you could by at any drugstore in 1999.

It´s about the size of your palm, maybe a little smaller and on the outside, before you open it, it´s brown and pretty dingy. when you open the compact, there is a cloudy mirror on one side. The mirror is covered in compacted powder and it´s hard to see much, except towards the very center of the mirror. On the opposite side of the mirror is where the powder lives. Even though the compact is 10 years old, there is still some of that compacted powder around the edges. There is also a thin, well used powder puff.