If you are in Boston’s South Station and suddenly realize you need a T-shirt from a vending machine, you are in luck.

I had not seen a T-hsirt vending machine before and had T-shirts on my mind today because I had just read a very strange story about T-shirts in Germany. It seems like one of those great ideas that, once it has been tried, can never work again. No one at a skinhead concert will ever accept a free skull and crossbones T-shirt now. (Although I suppose the technique could be tried against other political groups who don’t read Der Spiegel. Ideas, Anyone?)

Here’s the story: “With a skull-and-crossbones logo and the message ‘Hardcore Rebels – National and Free,’ some 250 black T-shirts given away at a recent right-wing extremist rock festival were quickly snapped up. But there was more to the tough-looking image than met the eye.

“Once the rightist rockers washed their new shirts, they were dismayed to find an entirely different message: ‘If your T-shirt can do it, so can you. We’ll help to free you from right-wing extremism.’ The offer, complete with contact information, came from a group called Exit Deutschland, which helps people get out of the neo-Nazi scene.” Read more.

Of course, this all assumes that recipients sometimes do a laundry.