by Cary McNeal
CHAPTER 3
Totally
Gross
Anatomy
The Human
Body Exposed
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101
FACT : If you sneeze hard enough, you can fracture a rib. But try to suppress a sneeze and you might rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and drop dead. If you try to suppress a fart and a sneeze at the same time, you could blow your head off like a champagne cork.
Cameron Tuttle, The Paranoid’s Pocket Guide (Chronicle Books, 1997).
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102
FACT : While pubic lice primarily infect pubic hair, they can also be found in thigh, chest, and facial hair, including eyelashes. How pubic lice might end up on one’s face I will leave to you to deduce.
James G.H. Dinulos, MD, “Lice,” Merck Manuals Online Medical Library, September 2008, www.merck.com.
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103
FACT : The human stomach must produce a new lining every day to protect itself from its own acid. Which somehow reminds me of Groucho Marx’s quote, “I don’t care to belong to any club that would have me as a member.”
Matthew Fox, The A.W.E. Project: Reinventing Education, Reinventing the Human (Wood Lake Publishing, 2006).
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104
FACT : The acid in your stomach is so powerful that it can dissolve a razor blade in less than a week. You should still be careful when eating them, though.
Matthew Fox, The A.W.E. Project: Reinventing Education, Reinventing the Human (Wood Lake Publishing, 2006).
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105
FACT : If a boy is born without testosterone, his genitalia will mimic that of a female: the scrotum forms labia majora—the outer lips of a vagina—and the penis becomes a sort of clitoris. That’s the guy you don’t want to tell to go fuck himself, because he might try.
Ruth K. Westheimer, Sex for Dummies, 3rd ed. (For Dummies, 2006).
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106
FACT : The skin is the largest organ in the human body, covering about twenty square feet in an adult male. It also constantly regenerates; a person sheds around forty pounds of skin in his lifetime. Some people can shed it all at once by just shaking their dandruff-ridden heads.
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
Mitchell Symons, That Book: . . . of Perfectly Useless Information (HarperCollins, 2004).
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107
FACT : We grow in our sleep, and wake up every morning about eight millimeters taller than the night before. However, we return to our former height as gravity compresses our cartilage discs back into place throughout the next day. It’s like “morning wood” for the entire body.
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
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108
FACT : The pressure exerted by a pumping human heart can squirt blood thirty feet. Research is limited, though, so if you ever lose a limb unexpectedly, grab a tape measure and see how far your blood squirts before you pass out and die. Don’t forget to write it down, too.
Mitchell Symons, That Book: . . . of Perfectly Useless Information (HarperCollins, 2004).
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109
FACT : You can find 20 million microscopic animals living on a square inch of human skin. Skin sounds like Tokyo.
Mitchell Symons, That Book: . . . of Perfectly Useless Information (HarperCollins, 2004).
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110
FACT : The average human body radiates enough heat in thirty minutes to boil two pints of water. But only if you’re not looking. A watched body won’t boil.
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
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111
FACT : The postage stamp-sized foreskin from a circumcised baby takes just twenty-one days to grow enough skin to cover three basketball courts. Such laboratory-grown skin is used to treat burn patients. This is why you should never call a burn victim “dickhead.” You could be right.
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
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112
FACT : Though female ovaries generate almost half a million eggs, only about 400 of them will ever get the chance to be fertilized. It’s like being called for jury duty, except the eggs probably don’t sit there whispering to themselves, “Please don’t pick me, please don’t pick me.”
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
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113
FACT : Human saliva helps keep the mouth’s pH balance slightly alkaline.
If it didn’t, the mouth would create an acidic environment that would rot away your teeth. If the acid is that strong, you won’t need teeth.
Kathleen McGowan, “The Biology of . . . Saliva,” Discover, October 2005, www.discovermagazine.com.
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114
FACT : There are over 700 species of bacteria that thrive in the thirty-three square inches of the average mouth, making it the most unsanitary part of your entire body. Surely the rectum runs a close second.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
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115
FACT : The types of bacteria in the human mouth vary among the world’s population. North Americans, South Americans, and Swedes harbor different bacteria. I think I need to swap spit with a Swedish woman so we can compare bacteria.
Kathleen McGowan, “The Biology of . . . Saliva,” Discover, October 2005, www.discovermagazine.com.
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116
FACT : When full, the bladder expands to roughly the same size as a softball. But it feels like a basketball. Made of lead.
Truman Hedding, “Nineteen Things You Didn’t Know About The Human Body,” www.trumanhedding.com.
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117
FACT : By the time you’re an adult, you’re likely to have about 5 million hairs growing out of your skin—the same number as a gorilla. Or Robin Williams.
“Human Hair,” Discovery Channel, http://.yucky.discovery.com.
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118
FACT : Male testicles create 10 million new sperm cells every day, enough to repopulate the planet in just six months. Some men try, too.
Robert Dolezal, Reader’s Digest Book of Facts (Readers Digest, 1987).
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119
FACT : Being “scared to death” can happen. The body’s protective mechanism, the fight-or-flight response, pumps adrenaline into the blood, causing the nervous system to increase blood flow to muscles, dilate the pupils and, in some cases, evacuate the bowels. But adrenaline is toxic in large amounts and can cause death if it floods the heart unchecked. So being “scared shitless” isn’t just hyperbole, either.
Coco Ballantyne, “Can a person be scared to death?” Scientific American, January 30, 2009, www.sciam.com.
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120
FACT : Strong positive or negative emotions— ecstasy, grief, excitement—can lead to sudden cardiac death via ventricular fibrillation (irregular heartbeat), as in the case of people who have died during sexual intercourse or when frightened. Or when frightened during sexual intercourse, which happens more often than you might think. At least it does to me.
Coco Ballantyne, “Can a person be scared to death?” Scientific American, January 30, 2009, www.sciam.com.
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121
FACT : A study in Germany found an increase in sudden cardiac death on days that the German soccer team was playing in the World Cup championship. If they ever win one, that number will go up, as thousands more Germans will die of shock.
Coco Ballantyne, “Can a person be scared to death?” Scientific American, January 30, 2009, www.sciam.com.
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122
FACT : Some people are born with
extra nipples (polythelia) or even extra breasts (polymastia). Extra or “accessory” breasts are most commonly found in the armpits, but can develop anywhere along mammary ridges, which extend from the armpits to the upper thighs. And, by the way, we still don’t know why men have a mammary ridge, just that they do. “I have nipples, Focker. Are you gonna milk me?”—Meet the Parents.
Leonard V. Crowley, An Introduction to Human Disease: Pathology and Pathophysiology Correlations, 7th ed.(Jones &Bartlett, 2006).
Susan Van Houten, “Accessory nipples (polythelia) and breast tissue (polymastia),” University Health Systems Of Eastern Carolina, March 21, 2003, www.uhseast.com.
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123
FACT : Breast cancer isn’t just a women’s disease. Men can get it, too, though they do so much less frequently, about one man for every 100 women. Also, unlike women, men typically only get the disease after age fifty. Sounds to me like a good excuse to go into the mobile mammography bus and scope out some bare boobs.
Gerard M. Doherty and Lawrence W. Way, Current Surgical Diagnosis & Treatment, 12th ed. (McGraw-Hill, 2005).
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124
FACT : More than 90 percent of women have asymmetrical breasts. While most asymmetry is slight and inconspicuous, women with significantly mismatched breasts can suffer mental and emotional anguish. Especially if you call them “Feldmans” or ask if one breast is adopted.
Dimitrije E. Panfilov, Cosmetic Surgery Today, trans. Grahame Larkin (Thieme, 2005).
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125
FACT : Humans shed about 1.5 million skin flakes every hour. Bath sponges and washcloths can be filled with these flakes and their accompanying staphylococcus aureus, a common skin bacteria that can cause infection if it ends up in the wrong part of the body. In other words, don’t wash your crack with someone else’s loofa unless you want to spend the next six months scratching it.
Philip M. Tierno, The Secret Life of Germs: What They Are, Why We Need Them, and How We Can Protect Ourselves against Them (Simon & Schuster, 2004).
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126
FACT : Only 10 percent of the cells in our bodies are actually human. The rest are the 90 trillion bacteria that live on or in us, covering our bodies from head to toe. Only 5 percent of the cells in Christopher Walken’s body are actually human. The rest are from an alien world.
Rose George, The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters (St. Martin’s Press, 2008).
Garry Hamilton, “Insider Trading,” New Scientist, June 26, 1999, www.newscientist.com.
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127
FACT : Less sleep disturbs normal metabolism, which contributes to obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. People who averaged just five hours of sleep a night also showed a higher level of ghrelin, a hormone the stomach releases to signal hunger. People who average just five hours of sleep a night also show a higher level of ghrouch, a hormone that makes you want to kick someone’s ass when they say, “You look tired.”
Rick Nauert, PhD, “Childhood Obesity from Lack of Sleep?” PsychCentral, October 24, 2006, http://psychcentral.com.
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128
FACT : All humans exist for half an hour as a single cell at conception. Some of us stay that way.
Truman Hedding, “Nineteen Things You Didn’t Know About The Human Body,” www.trumanhedding.com.
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129
FACT : The British Medical Journal has estimated that smoking one cigarette takes eleven minutes off the life of an average person. Too bad those eleven minutes don’t disappear right as you’re smoking, say, during The English Patient.
Mary Shaw, Richard Mitchell, and Danny Dorling, “Time for a smoke? One cigarette reduces your life by 11 minutes,” British Medical Journal, January 1, 2000, www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov.
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130
FACT : The 250,000 pores that exist on the soles of the feet secrete almost ¼ cup of sweat every day. Oh, is that all? No wonder they smell so good.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
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131
FACT : Continuous farting for six years and nine months would create energy equal to that of an atomic bomb. I need to hook my child up with the Defense Department.
Mitchell Symons, That Book: . . . of Perfectly Useless Information (HarperCollins, 2004).
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132
FACT : Your body produces enough saliva during your lifetime to fill two swimming pools. Luckily, most swimming pools are already filled with saliva, so yours isn’t needed.
Mary M. Bauer, The Truth About You: Things You Don’t Know You Know (VanderWyk & Burnham, 2006).
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133
FACT : An “Extreme Gulp” drink sold at 7-11 convenience stores has twice as much liquid as the average human stomach can hold. Which is why no one holds it. And why I sit on the end of the row at the movies.
James Bevan, Handbook of Anatomy and Physiology (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1978) 45.
Peter Strupp and Alan Dingman, Fat, Dumb, and Ugly: The Decline of the Average American (Simon & Schuster, 2004).
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134
FACT : The human liver performs no fewer than 500 different functions. If a portion of it were removed, the liver would continue to work and would rapidly grow back to its normal size. Well, depending on the size of the portion. Don’t go lopping off huge chunks of your liver to give away, okay?
Mary M. Bauer, The Truth About You: Things You Don’t Know You Know (VanderWyk &Burnham, 2006).
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135
FACT : The average human swallows about a quart of snot every day. What’s really cool is when you can hear people sucking it out of their sinuses and swallowing. I love that sound, especially in restaurants.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
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136
FACT : Seventy percent of people admit to picking their nose; 30 percent of those confess to eating what they picked. 100 percent of people admit to puking when they read that.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
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137
FACT : People who live in big cities make more ear wax. Ah, okay. No wonder big city folks never stop when I try to ask them for directions. They can’t hear me. Whew! I was starting to think maybe they were just assholes.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
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138
FACT : Believe it or not, fresh urine is cleaner than saliva or your facial skin. Healthy urine is sterile and contains little or no bacteria when it leaves your body. Being cleaner than spit isn’t really a bragging point.
“Grossology Gross Facts,” Denver Museum of Natural Science, www.dmns.org.
“Bacteria in Urine, No Symptoms,” University Of Michigan Health System, www.med.umich.edu.
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139
FACT : Research suggests that marital discord makes wounds heal more slowly. A recent study showed that couples with consistently hostile behaviors healed at a 40 percent slower rate than low-hostility couples. Which means you’re gonna have that shoe mark on your forehead for a while, bud.