Learn Something New Every Day
Interesting facts and things you never knew you wanted to know posted daily for your education and enjoyment!
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Tag Archives: your body
Tastebuds: the fingers of your tongue
In one of my mind wandering moments I got to wondering about tastebuds. The sense of taste evolved to protect us from poisons. As a rule of thumb, anything that tastes bitter is poisonous… given you eat enough of it. (pure cocoa is very poisonous to a dog but we would have to eat several [...]
Brainfreeze! Why do ice cream and slushies cause headaches?
After reading all about the depressed freezing point of the sugar solution in ice cream, you just had to get a closer look, right? There you were, happily shoveling ice cream into your face when all of a sudden… brainfreeze! Arrrgh! Also called ice cream headaches, these sudden pains can be triggered by any excessively [...]
FACT: a runny nose is for your own good
Many of my lessons here at LSNED are inspired by random curiosity. Yesterday the thought came to me, as I was standing outside in my wool jacket, scarf, mittens, and toque… why does my nose run when it’s cold? Being that November is an ideal month for general nose awareness, I thought it appropriate to [...]
FACT: vitamin C has no affect on the common cold
As I sit here, all sniffly, clinging to a tall glass of orange juice, I am somewhat surprised to discover that there is no evidence to support vitamin C as an effective protector against colds. Whether you take it as a regular supplement, or just pack it in after the cold hits, it doesn’t help [...]
FACT: goosebumps are a remnant of our hairy past
At one point, we were all pretty hairy. Completely hairy. While most of us have lost the bulk of our body hair, the internal wiring is still present, as evidenced by goosebumps. (or goosepimples as I’ve heard some folks say) Goosebumps are an automatic reaction of the nervous system that flexes the piloerector muscle found [...]
HOW-TO: five ways to remove the worry and stress from your life
Tomorrow morning I vanish off the face of the earth, technologically speaking, for eight days. I’m leaving and I’ll be totally un-wired. I was planning on writing eight extra LSNED facts this weekend, and scheduling them to trickle out while I was gone. Eight. That’s a lot. Each one takes over an hour to uncover, [...]
The History of Human Height