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It’s time for another edition of Treat Your Body Nicely Plztyty!

I found some tips on saving the ol’ hip and knee joints from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette back in June of ‘09 and never posted. Dr. Brett Smith of the Center for Restorative Joint Diseases at Allegheny General Hospital explained some ways to help keep joints working well and avoiding surgery, essentially trying to find himself out of a job. He’s an adult reconstructive surgeon who is used to making older folks’ parts work again.

• Stay active and exercise. “It’s well-documented, and the Arthritis Foundation has said this: ‘If you decrease activities, your arthritis will get worse faster.’ ” Dr. Smith cautions the activities you engage in be noncontact, nonimpact activities. “Running is out; swimming is best; cycling is second best; and elliptical training is third best,” he says. “Lifting is fine, not excessive weight, but lifting for endurance.”

• Lose weight. “Just for the hip and knee,” Dr. Smith says, “these are the biomechanics: They support three times your weight with each step. If you weigh 300 pounds and lose 100 pounds, that’s 300 less pounds on your joints.”

• Control inflammation. “Take anti-inflammatories like Advil or Aleve and take them consistently.”

• Try glucosamine. Dr. Smith also suggests taking the supplement called glucosamine. “There was a recent article published on glucosamine that says there is a benefit if taken for an extended period of time. If you take it for one or two months, no. You need to take it on a continuous basis for numerous months to find its full benefits. PP-G

I’ve seen glucosamine in the supplement department of different stores and pharmacies, and I think the target user is for people over 40. Being under 30 I would feel a little silly taking a joint cartilage helper. The way my hips and feet feel in winter, however, tells my pride to shove it and try it out. That plus swimming is probably the optimal care for a body like mine. Swimming pools are a bit harder to find out here in the winter. Time to move to southern California!

Staying active and losing weight keeps knees and hips healthy PP-G
Vitamin D has a long list of benefits PP-G

What prom translates into for dudes: it’s time to get laid!

It isn’t so cute anymore, and it hasn’t been for some time. With pornography being so readily available — thanks, internet! — and adults still embarrassed to talk about sexual relations, even in the most obscure sense, eg. “Jimmy, wear a condom so you don’t get any diseases or get the girl pregnant” or “Jennifer, you can say no and he’ll still like you. If he doesn’t then maybe he isn’t interested in you as a person,” kids start to get some idealized views of sexy time. There are websites available for educational purposes, even in livejournal land, and can be found through a simple internet search with your favorite engine. Just being told “DON’T DO IT” doesn’t seem to be working towards a positive morale when, even when they don’t do it, they’re looking at pornographic videos, unwittingly gathering information for a later date.

Consultant and all-around smart talker Cindy Gallop (woman, what can I label you?!) tells us who’s who and what’s what with boys being raised with early access to hardcore porn. Without sex education in the classroom or parents talking about the birds and the bees or having any type of counselor to take an objective, instructional role on health, emotional and physical safety, and other things typical of a caring sexual relationship it can get a little weird. To get some realistic ideas on porn ideas, check out her cute nsfw website, Make Love Not Porn. To the nsfw video!

I am icked out at the thought of my father telling my little brother, “Son, ask the girl if she wants to get splooge on her face before you moneyshot her,” and don’t know if he is even capable of using that sort of language. With this in mind, I believe the proper resources need to be allocated in a better advertised way to reach the masses of horny teenagers before they turn into masses of misogynists.

Prom Garters: Blatant Objectification…in Your School Colors” the american virgin
Porn is Not Real Sex, and Everyone’s Getting Dumped: the KSK Sex/Fantasy Football Mailbag ksk
Cindy Gallop

“SPECIAL EDITION” NEW YORK POST from The Yes Men on Vimeo.

The Yes Men made a mock special edition of the New York Post reporting true facts about environmental changes. This video interviews people who have read it and their reaction to it. My favorite part is the “obama socialist environmentalist agenda,” and the guy almost gets schwinned while returning to his giant building.

Breaking: The Yes Men’s “New York Post” Special Edition
wooster

Oh, The Temptation from Steve V on Vimeo.

A study published in 1990 by Yuichi Shoda, Walter Mischel, and Philip K. Peake tested the ability to understand delayed gratification. This video is a recreation of the beginning of the test in the 1960s. The study focused on the participants from childhood to adulthood, and those with the ability to wait would tend to fair better in avoiding peer pressure and drug abuse. Michel recorded that those who waited were more dependable in general.

The little kid that mushes his nose against the marshmallow looks like a baby Ryan Kwanten aka Jason Stackhouse.

Testing delayed gratification tywkiwdbi
Oh, the Temptation! neatorama
Predicting adolescent cognitive and self-regulatory competencies from preschool delay of gratification: Identifying diagnostic conditions. PyscNET

it’s going to be okay.

Kris Letang Tyler Kennedy get a humility check while the news people get giggly and starstruck.

PART ONE: ZEE WEATHAIR IZ AWKWAARD, NON?

PART ATWO: FOURTEEN DAY WEATHAIR REPORT IN TRENDS

ohhhhh you guys.

sid + cup = bffs

Kris Letang And Tyler Kennedy Do The Weather psamp
pic from deadspin

Gangsta #1: Yo, before meiosis shit’s gotta do DNA replication.
Gangsta #2: What you talkin about? It just splits in fuckin half.
Gangsta #1: Nigga, you dumb.

–Downtown 4 Train

Why You Gotta Be Ignorant All Your Life?
overheard in new york

Gogo Taylor Rideout!

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has a five minute video interview with the baby’s parents (Brittany Rideout and Adam Bouchat) and doctors. She’s been in the hospital 80 days because she was born at only 26 weeks of gestation — that’s 14 weeks, or 3.5 months premature. She was ten inches long.

Her mother, Brittany, had strokes and other complications from the the pregnancy, forcing an early birth or face the deaths of the mom and baby. Brittany has lupus.

Taylor’s survival is a milestone for the hospital. She’s the tiniest ever to survive in its history. She’s at two pounds now and will be allowed to go home in a week or so.

the video PP-G doesn’t ~do~ embedding
the article PP-G

Spiders come back to life after drowning in water. Marsh-dwelling French-type wolf spiders do, that is.

In an experiment at the University of Rennes testing how long it takes spiders to drown, a surprise happened while they were letting the dead spiders dry out for dissection and whatever it is they do to dead arachnids. The original plan was to poke different types of wolf spiders while immersed in water to see if they responded. The types that responded the longest won the Stay Alive The Longest Contest — two marsh-dwelling types stayed alive longest (28 and 36 hours), over the 24 hours for the forest-dwelling types. All of them DIED so no real winners in that race.

Until.

Hours later, the spiders began twitching and were soon back on their eight feet.

“This is the first time we know of arthropods returning to life from comas after submersion,” said lead researcher Julien Pétillon, an arachnologist now at Ghent University in Belgium.

Marsh-dwelling [Arctosa] fulvolineata, which took longest to “die,” typically requires about two hours to recover, the researchers discovered.

In the wild, the species doesn’t avoid water during flooding, while the other salt marsh species generally climbs onto vegetation to avoid advancing water.

The spiders’ survival trick depends on a switch to metabolic processes—the processes that provide energy for vital functions in the body—that do not require air, the researchers speculate.

dun dun DUNNNNNN

Spider “Resurrections” Take Scientists by Surprise National Geographic
Spider “Resurrections” Take Scientists by Surprise wtf_nature

Since senior year of high school, I’ve almost always had some form of fungal infection on my tumtum. I noticed the hyperpigmentated spot around my bra line when I got into college. When the laser hair removal technician saw it, she dismissed it as discoloration due to my light use of tanning beds. I didn’t feel comfortable with the explanation. Somehow I found out about skin fungus, and I saw the family doctor during the summer. His response to seeing the spot twice the size of a quarter was, “God-damn!”

It is awesome when a professional is wowed by your issue.

He prescribed some regular-type topical cream, but it didn’t really work. Round two a month later was super expensive topical cream. It went away! And it left for a good while, coming back a few years later in a couple spots around my belly button, so to the student health center I went. I showed my primary doc and we went with the super strength right away rather than going through the bullshit of the weak-ass crap. Success yet again!

Wellllll it came back again. I have little spots scattered across my abdomen.

The hyperpigmentation can easily be dismissed as birth marks — maybe cute? This latest incarnation was first given the wussy-cream used for a month with no change. I finally got to see my primary, and she prescribed a body shampoo as well as a pill to take before I work out. I did the pill before running today and hung out in my sweat for half the day. Hopefully that plus the body shampoo will finally kick my skin back into clearsville.

Whenever I talk about it to people, they have an auto-jerk move backward. It never itched me, and I never gave it to anyone else that I’m aware of, and I don’t quite know why it’s considered dirty as it’s been a recurring part of my life for seven years. LET’S LEARN TOGETHER. I was never explained what type of fungus it exactly was or is.

The simplest, best explanation I’ve found so far on my type of fungus:

Tinea Versicolor. This fungus actually changes the color of the skin it infects; the patches may be lighter or darker than your normal surrounding skin. This spotted pattern and the fine scaly flakes at the margins make this fungal infection the easiest to identify. Since itching and irritation are mild, it’s also the least bothersome.

Prevention

Don’t share towels or clothes.

Wear thongs or other footwear in public locker rooms, pools, and showers.

Always wear a thick T-shirt or sweatshirt and long shorts or sweat pants while sharing exercise equipment.

Wipe off vinyl surfaces with a dry towel before using exercise equipment. quickcare

This type of fungus is the annoying sort. It isn’t itchy and I don’t get flaky skin. This is actually a yeast who wanted to party. The bacteria is normally present on the surface of the human body, but it will explode in population from time to time for… reasons. They are mystical. Diagnosis is made with a skin sample. Hmmm never got one of those done. Treatment takes 2-4 weeks, with skin pigmentation returning to normal much later. The skin has to shed the layers with the dead yeast before normal skin can make an appearance.

The only bad things I’ve been able to find involve itching. End of list.

Okay when it gets bad the spots are pretty huge.

All the articles I’ve been reading mention preventative measures to keep it from coming back: using a body shampoo a couple times each month is supposed to do the trick. For us body building types *cough* we’ll be using towels more when using benches in the gyms. Avoiding tight clothes is an extra help.

Some sources say it isn’t contagious, but they may be focusing on different types? Others emphasize keeping shared surfaces dry. They all say it’s normal fungus that went out of wack and to avoid leaving sweaty clothes on. I don’t know. It’s 3am. I’m done.

Fungus Infections Quick Care
Tinea Versicolor American Academy of Dermatology
Tinea Versicolor American Osteopathic College of Dermatology
Tinea Versicolor Mayo Clinic
Tinea versicolor is harmless but can recur the honolulu advertiser