Find a more compelling TikTok video caption than this, we dare you: “ive spent two hours trying to get grimace shake out of the concrete.” Charles Dickens, who?
TikTok creator Cami (@kirillkaprizovstan) recently posted a video about the hazards of cleaning up the internet’s current favorite dessert. The video has 2.1 million views and almost 160,000 likes.
@kirillkaprizovstan Help im just a seasonal and ive spent two hours trying to get grimace shake out of the concrete
♬ origineel geluid – gnglovely
In the video, Cami sprayed a water hose onto the ground to wash a purple substance off of the concrete.
“Please stop with the Grimace shakes the city doesn’t have power washers,” Cami wrote in the video’s on-screen text.
One person commented, “I contemplated researching what this means but then I thought ‘This is just a part of the culture I’m not going to understand ‘and I’m ok with that.’”
We can help. The Grimace Shake, in case you’ve somehow avoided all the memes, is a McDonald’s menu item meant to celebrate the birthday of the burger chain’s big purple character. Grimace, who usually pals around with Ronald McDonald and the gang, was introduced in 1971. He’s, um, well, he’s whatever you want him to be, as a McDonald’s spokesperson recently told Insider: “Whether he’s a taste bud, a milkshake, or just your favorite purple blob — the best part about Grimace is that he means different things to different people.”
The Grimace Shake is made with vanilla ice cream and a special syrup that tastes like boysenberry. Purple Grimace, purple shake. Easy.
Perhaps because of its fluorescent purple color, and perhaps because the internet is gonna do what the internet does, the Grimace Shake has taken on a social media life far beyond the drive-thru. It has inspired a series of videos where creators dramatically die or are otherwise transformed after drinking the shake, usually leaving a splatter or purple dairy in their wake.
So. That’s what’s up the shake. And apparently, cleaning up after them is a chore.
One commenter on Cami’s video wrote, “i know i’m such a killjoy but i always get annoyed with trends like the grimace shake or the bathroom stealing bc i think abt who has to clean it up.”
“I’m all for the grimace shake but if you make a mess clean up the mess,” someone commented.
Another joked, “grimace will provide power washers.”
“If parks and rec were still going this would be an episode easily,” a viewer chimed in.
“The hallway outside my apt is covered in grimace shakes,” another wrote.
Some commenters leaned into the meme of it all. One wrote, “don’t get rid of it. it will be a relic of a time of mass extinction. you don’t see people trying to fill in the crater that the asteroid hit.”
Another commented, “Just wait until six weeks later when the spores begin to sprout. The shake was just the beginning.”
The Daily Dot reached out to Cami via TikTok and McDonald’s via email.
