I have a whole lot of questions about whole-body deodorants, to which I admit I have not tried whatsoever to find answers. I prefer to come at this issue utilizing my usual method of asking silly questions whilst remaining, ah, untainted by factual information.

“Taint,” by the way, is a term at the very bottom of all this.

I was recently alerted by a sudden onslaught of television commercials to a previously unknown need for the American public to purchase whole-body deodorants. If you have escaped from commercially sponsored television by acquiring some kind of streaming video service (WARNING: I may be using terms such as “streaming” in this article without the least idea what they mean), or if you have abandoned television altogether and have become, as Dave Barry would say, a bark-eating hermit, you may not have seen these whole-body deodorant commercials.

They feature people, mostly women, mostly sweaty, of a wide range of body type and ethnicity, wearing skimpy, tight-fitting clothing, expressing their relief that FINALLY someone recognized the need for a deodorant made for parts of their bodies other than armpits. Close-ups of different body areas are vaguely illustrative. “From my pits to my (something),” one says gratefully, setting up but not finishing the rhyme. I think you can sniff out the right word.

These vague references to target body areas don’t stop with the upper torso. They allude to parts farther down, and I’m not talking about feet. (Though we cannot exclude feet, since they are part of the body politic, and often stink. Mine certainly do.)

How to come at the real usage area of this product without being vulgar? Hmm. Let me tell a little story.

Like millions of Americans, I hated the first edition of the song-and-dance commercial selling Jardiance, a drug to lower blood sugar in people with Type 2 diabetes. As a glib announcer rattled off a long list of potential side effects, one stood out: gangrene of the peritoneum.

Searching “I hate the Jardiance commercial,” I found a website of fellow haters venting their spleens. Several mentioned the gangrene warning, saying the drug’s benefits were not worth “having your taint rot off.”

I didn’t know what “taint” meant in this context. Neither did my wife. I consulted an online slang dictionary to find out, then asked around to see if we were the only ones ignorant of the usage. When my son-in-law said he knew, I assumed it was a generational thing. But my sister Col. Peggy also knew, so obviously the term has been around for awhile. I asked Peg where it came from.

Her guess was, “T’aint this and t’aint that, but the place in-between.”

Who came up with the idea of whole body-deodorant, anyway? Where was the demand? I don’t remember any Congressional hearings about an alarming uptick in body odor. Trump didn’t ask Elon Musk to find a cure for whole-body stink, though I’ll bet those stuck astronauts could have used it. By the way, “Elon Musk” would be a great brand name for whole-body deodorant. Gives it panache.

Does whole-body deodorant come as a roll-on? A gel? A spray, like Right Guard? Though we have identified some of the likely target areas for application, from the name we should assume the intention is to apply it everywhere, and, since we are being thorough, every day. That would add considerable time to one’s morning toilet. And, how, exactly? There are places I can’t reach.

Is it okay to ask for help, like, from friends in the locker room after a workout?

“Hey buddy, gimme a little help with my whole-body deodorant, willya? Here, let me bend over.”

Don’t be surprised if they come out with an Australian brand, advertising that it’s made “For the Stink Down Under.” Or, for those who have despaired of ever finding an effective deodorant, the “Porgy and Bess” brand could reassure them that “T’aint necessarily so.”

Whew, I gotta quit. I’m stinkin’ out the joint.