Your eyes do not deceive you, that is indeed a partially melted down AAA battery by Duracell. It was taken out of a new pack of batteries recently purchased by my husband.

Sometimes I succumb to cooking gadgets and I had bought us a pair of electronic salt and pepper shakers. I had taken the housing apart on the salt and pepper shakers to insert the batteries. Each shaker takes six AAA batteries.

I had just put the batteries in one of the shakers and was going to close up the housing of the unit and I accidentally touched the side of the battery and burnt the side of my hand a little. It wasn’t a bad burn by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s not what you expect when you put fresh batteries into something. I am just grateful that the damn thing didn’t explode and get battery acid in my eyes.

Duracell likes to advertise they are the most trusted brand of battery. Not so much for me anymore.