Yes, it’s annoying when someone asks you to take off your shoes before you’re allowed to step inside their home. But it’s also annoying (and painful and embarrassing) to contract some form of explosive diarrhea, which is something that can happen when germs from the street are...
First, the anecdotal evidence: Many dentists are noticing an increase in teeth grinding and clenching as a result of the general stress that most of us are currently feeling. “There’s always a high number of patients in my practice with bruxism [the technical name for teeth grinding]...
“Are you okay?” asks the acupuncturist, hovering in front of my taint — spread before her like the world’s least appetizing open-face sandwich — needle in hand. “You look tense.” “Well, yes.” I can’t help suspecting that this isn’t an uncommon sentiment among patients undergoing the procedure, but it seems rude...
We recently received a press release for a supplement claiming to be an all-natural alternative to Viagra. When listing the benefits, the press release mentioned something called “alcohol penis impairment syndrome.” Over Slack, we concluded that this must be the clinical definition of whiskey dick, though we...
Binge eating: It starts badly; it ends badly. Whether it’s because you’re drunk or you just ordered way too much of something that’s destined to never experience becoming leftovers, sometimes we just like to stuff ourselves. You can blame those devious food scientists who deliberately design junk...
When you’re hungry, you’re hungry, and sometimes that means tearing off the patch of green mold growing on a slice of bread in order to make yourself a sandwich. But is this really getting rid of the mold, or should you consider the entire slice a goner...
The Latest Smartphone App Will Count Your Sperm For You If anyone’s ever walked in on you with your phone in one hand and your, well, you-know-what in the other, now you’ve finally got a good excuse. This gadget—which was developed at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in...
Don’t have three hours a day to spend at the gym? Not interested in bulging like a bodybuilder? Unmoved by promises of “fat-blasting, ab-chiseling monster workouts”? This is the column for you, fellow regular human with very little free time. … The Man Mick, Ilford, England Age:...
We live in an age where just about any science-related question can be answered (mostly accurately) by the internet, and yet many of us still believe a bunch of old wives’ tales about our health: The number of people who still believe that cold weather causes sickness...
Last Easter, one popular candy surprised people by turning their poop from brown to a vibrant pink. Fun! While color variance in your stool might normally be the sign of life-threatening internal bleeding, it can also be something much more benign — you just ate the wrong thing. Or better...
When we’re in a pinch, expiration dates oftentimes become recommendations, rather than rules. After all, what’s the worst that could happen? We asked nutritionist Carolyn Dean, who has extensive experience treating irritable bowel syndrome and other bowel diseases, to find out what happens when you eat that...
What do Donald Trump, Napoleon, Leonardo da Vinci and a giraffe have in common? Aside from having friends in high places, they’ve also each been reported as requiring less than five hours sleep a night. In fact, according to this infographic from Delayed Gratification magazine, America’s current...