Why Do Men Have Nipples? (5 page)

To begin with, it is important to understand that the delicious artificial strawberry or cherry product that we happily eat in movie theaters is not true licorice. True licorice is black and contains glycyrrhizic acid. Therefore we cannot answer the more important East Coast versus West Coast debate about whether Red Vines are better than Twizzlers.

Medical literature contains a great deal of information about the link between licorice and high blood pressure, and if you happened to be reading the English-language abstract of an article from the Norwegian journal
Tidsskrift for Den Norske Laegeforening
in 2002, you might have found out that “the active component of liqorice is glycyrrhizic acid, which inhibits the enzyme 11-beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase. This enzyme promotes the conversion of cortisol to cortisone and is thereby responsible for the specificity of the mineralocorticoid receptor to aldosterone in the collecting tubules. Inhibition of the enzyme allows cortisol to act as the major endogenous mineralocorticoid producing a marked elevation in mineralocorticoid activity, resulting in hypertension, hypokalemia, and metabolic alkalosis.” I can’t understand why candy companies don’t use this as a slogan. Imagine the catchy jingles, funny commercials, and booming sales of black jelly beans.

CHAPTER 2

BODY ODDITIES

I am
able to finally escape from the torture of Jeremy’s food inquisition, and I look around and can’t find Leyner anywhere. The bottle of Don Julio is missing and there is a trail of shrimp tails that leads to the elevator. I find him sitting in the hallway, playing Chutes and Ladders with the neighbor’s children, and devouring cocktail sauce with a straw. I try to get him back inside and he snarls, “Are you out of your mind? I’m down a hundred and fifty bucks.” His bark is heard inside and several revelers come outside to watch the action. A crowd has formed around the game and Mark is becoming surly with the children as his losses mount. It doesn’t help that the children are mocking him by singing “The Gambler” by Kenny Rogers. The tides turn and Leyner has soon wrestled the weekly allowances and the school lunch money from the kids, who disperse crestfallen while muttering to themselves. Triumphantly, Leyner rises and shouts, “Punk-ass suckers go crying to your mommy. We’re going to bring this party back inside and play some strip Candyland.” He pockets his winnings, swigs the Don Julio, and we are off.

Back inside, Wendy Thurston, a senior editor at Half-a-Dozen Ponds Press, has fallen victim to Leyner’s shrewd, merciless gamesmanship. She is down to her bra, thong, and socks. As Leyner wins another point, she removes her left sock, revealing the most beautiful alabaster-hued foot and immaculately pedicured webbed toes. Teary-eyed, Leyner turns to me and in a choir boy’s piping, soprano weeps, “I have found my Cinderella!”

This romantic outburst leaves the party in stunned silence, and then I’m again besieged by a slew of body-related questions. What is it about sideshow body oddities that awakens our most primal desires and curiosities?

IS IT BAD TO CRACK YOUR KNUCKLES?

As I, Billy, was sitting on the beach, relaxing and leafing through an old copy of the
Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics,
I came across the answer to this age-old question. I also wish my father had known this, because maybe he would have yelled at my brother less. Cracking your knuckles is not as bad as people think. The usual argument is that knuckle popping causes arthritis. This does not happen. Chronic knuckle cracking may cause other types of damage, including stretching of the surrounding ligaments and a decrease in grip strength, but not arthritis.

So what causes the pop? The sound is produced in the joint when bubbles burst in the synovial fluid surrounding the joint. Really interesting, huh?

WHY DO SOME FOLKS HAVE AN “OUTIE”
BELLY BUTTON AND SOME FOLKS HAVE
AN “INNIE”?

I didn’t have the answer to this question until I delivered my first baby. I always believed that you had an “innie” if the doctor tied a good knot, and if he didn’t, you were cursed with that funny-looking “outie.” Well, there is no knot tying at all. We just put on a clip, cut, and wait for the umbilical cord to dry up and fall off. It is all random.

Sometimes someone can develop an “outie” because they have a hernia at this site. This also has nothing to do with the doctor’s Boy Scout skills. I have recently heard of plastic surgeons removing an “outie” for belly beauty. How sad.

One question that cannot be answered, however, is why some belly buttons collect so much lint.

WHAT CAUSES MORNING BREATH?

In Australia, the “poo fairy” comes at night to take a dump in your mouth. In England, they say a long night at the pub leaves your breath “tasting like the vulture’s dinner.” And a Scottish friend with a new Hawaiian bride reports that a late-night fridge-binge of haggis and poi will leave you with the worst morning breath of your life.

So, given all these tales, we should probably start with the anaerobic bacteria, the xerostomia (a fancy word for dry mouth), or the volatile sulfur compounds (which are actually waste products from the bacteria). All these combine to give you that wonderful get-up-in-the-morning feeling of garbage mouth.

Other things also contribute to this oral smorgasbord: medications, alcohol, sugar, smoking, caffeine, and dairy products.

But don’t run off and have your tongue sandblasted; there are simple things that you can do to fight morning breath. Brush regularly (don’t forget the tongue), floss, and drink plenty of water.

Gberg:
I was just thinking that the more chaotic this is, the harder it is for Carrie to edit. It might even induce a seizure.

Leyner:
That’s funny!! I think tormenting her is always a good sort of compass for us when we’re lost and floundering.

Leyner:
What is a seizure, actually?

Gberg:
Is that the way it usually works in the creative process? Is your genius always fueled by torment?

Gberg:
Abnormal electrical activity in the brain, why?

Leyner:
My creative process is fueled by a sense of Nietzschean aristocracy and a simultaneous feeling that I’m an abject fraud.

Gberg:
I think everyone feels like a fraud. What about me, trying to answer these unanswerable questions?

Leyner:
Coupled with torment and an overwhelming need to be loved and liked (even) AND horniness AND creditors calling ALL THE FUCKING DAY LONG. Didn’t you go to medical school in Ingushetia? You are a fraud.

Gberg:
Where the hell is Ingushetia?

Leyner:
Directly east of Chechnya. Check MapQuest.

Gberg:
Enough of your Chechen obsession. Let’s talk about the book.

Leyner:
I told you . . . with the amount of money we’re getting paid for this book, Mercedes and I are getting a time-share summer dacha in Chechnya.

WHY ARE YAWNS CONTAGIOUS?

Here are several things we can be thankful are
not
contagious:

drooling

nosebleeds

itching

seizures

farting

That said, there are several theories for what causes yawns and why they are contagious. It was originally thought that people yawned to get more oxygen, but this appears not to be true.

The most common theory is behavioral. In an article examining contagious yawns, Dr. Steven M. Platek and others state, “Contagious yawning may be associated with empathic aspects of mental state attribution and are negatively affected by increases in schizotypal personality traits much like other self-processing related tasks.”

Huh? I find myself yawning right now.

What they mean is that people are unconsciously imitating others when they yawn. Humans are not the only species that yawn. Yawning is seen in many animals, including cats, fish, and birds, although we don’t know what a yawning fish looks like either.

WHY DO MEN HAVE NIPPLES?

Since our editor thought this question made the best title for this book, we racked our brains to come up with a hilarious, witty, and informative answer to this question. Our attempts proved futile, so, in order to finish this book so another brilliant title wouldn’t go to waste, we went for the boring, straight scientific response. Sorry.

We are mammals and blessed with body hair, three middle ear bones, and the ability to nourish our young with milk that females produce in modified sweat glands called mammary glands. Although females have the mammary glands, we all start out in a similar way in the embryo. During development, the embryo follows a female template until about six weeks, when the male sex chromosome kicks in for a male embryo. The embryo then begins to develop all of its male characteristics. Men are thus left with nipples and also with some breast tissue. Men can even get breast cancer and there are some medical conditions that can cause male breasts to enlarge. Abnormal enlargement of the breasts in a male is known as gynecomastia. Gynecomastia can be caused by using anabolic steroids. So, if Barry Bonds ends up coming to the old-timers game with a pair of sagging 44DD man boobs, then I think we will finally have our answer to the steroid controversy.

CAN YOU LOSE A CONTACT LENS IN THE
BACK OF YOUR HEAD?

It is common for people to come into an emergency room because they can’t find their contact lens. Sometimes it is found folded and tucked beneath the eyelid, but other times it is nowhere to be found. So where is it???

Probably on the bathroom floor at home. A little anatomy lesson: there is nowhere else for it to go.

Other commonly “misplaced” items that lead people to the ER: tampons, condoms, and car keys.

CAN YOU LOSE A TAMPON INSIDE YOUR
BODY IF THE STRING COMES OFF?

This is a surprisingly frequent question, and often a reason women find themselves in the emergency room. Patients often come in either because they cannot remove the tampon or because it has disappeared and they don’t seem to know where it went.

Time for another anatomy lesson. The vagina is a potential space, not a hole or cavity inside the body. The walls of the vagina are normally in contact with each other unless something is inserted between them. When something enters the vagina, the body makes room for it. At the end of this potential space is the cervix. Therefore, there is no place for the tampon to go. It cannot be lost inside that small area and you should be able to remove it, or it can be easily removed by any doctor. Often we find nothing inside, and that means you probably forgot you removed it. Leaving a tampon inside too long can put you at risk for a serious infection, so don’t be embarrassed to ask for help.

IS IT TRUE THAT THE TONGUE IS THE
STRONGEST MUSCLE IN THE BODY
RELATIVE TO ITS SIZE?

Now, we are sure there are many possibilities as to why someone would need the answer to this question. We never asked our friend who asked this question why this was important, but surely she had her reasons.

Some sources do agree that the tongue is the strongest muscle per size, but the tongue is actually made up of four muscles. The heart has also been mentioned, but since it moves involuntarily and is mainly an endurance muscle, it doesn’t really get to the heart of this question (bad pun intended).

The sartorius, which slants across the thigh to the knee, is the longest muscle in the body. As for the strongest, there are two other candidates, the masseter, used for chewing, and the gluteus maximus. By gluteus! Who knew that our asses were so strong!

Another tidbit for you trivia geeks, here are Billy and Leyner’s two favorite ass-vocabulary words:

callipygian: having beautifully proportioned buttocks

steatopygic: an extreme accumulation of fat on the buttocks

WHY DO YOUR TEETH CHATTER WHEN YOU
ARE COLD?

The body usually maintains a constant temperature of 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. At this temperature the cells of the body work best. If there is any significant change in temperature, it is sensed by an area of the brain called the hypothalamus. When the body gets too cold, this center alerts the rest of the body to begin warming up. Shivering, the rapid movement of the muscles to generate heat, then begins. Teeth chattering represents localized shivering.

WHY DO YOU HAVE AN APPENDIX IF YOU
CAN LIVE WITHOUT IT?

The appendix is a small pouch off the large intestine. The wall of the appendix contains lymphatic tissue that is part of the immune system for making antibodies.

Removing the appendix doesn’t cause any harm because there are several other areas in the body that contain similar tissue—the spleen, lymph nodes, and tonsils. The spleen and the tonsils can also be removed.

Gberg:
You were going to give me a little something to add to the appendix question, Why do you have one if you can live without it?

Gberg:
Some expert Leynerisms on vestigial organs.

Leyner:
God put certain internal organs in the human body for purely aesthetic reasons. They just look nice when the forensic pathologist opens you up.