The tingling feeling you get when you bang your elbow against something hard is actually not caused by a bone at all! It is caused by a nerve which runs from the neck and shoulder, over the elbow to the hand. That’s why you feel the tingling in part of your hand, the third and fourth finger and the pinkie when you hit your elbow. The nerve in your elbow is not well protected as it lies just under the skin in a groove at the elbow end of the arm bone between the shoulder and the forearm. If the nerve is pinched against the bone when you bang your elbow….,tingle, tingle, tingle!
Like all the other body parts, the arm bone between the shoulder and elbow has a Latin name. Latin used to be the language of scientists in the Middle Ages in Europe. The name of the arm bone is humerus. Today English speaking people call it funny bone. I don’t see any humor or anything humorous in this. Get it?
Soap is made up of very small particles named molecules. Each molecule has one side that attracts water, while the other side likes oil and dirt particles found on your body. When the "dirt end" of the soap molecule comes in contact with dirt or oil, it breaks them apart into tiny globules that cling to the soap particles suspended in the water. In other words, soap acts as some kind of a "glue" between the water and the dirt particles.
To make soap, you need tallow, fish oils or vegetable oils and add alkali (a biting, dangerous chemical). Strange how you can get something good out of two bad things: good soap out of a messy fat or oil and a dangerous alkali chemical.
The third molars are the last teeth to appear in our mouth. They usually grow when we are between 17 and 25 years of age. That’s when we supposedly have gathered enough wisdom to adventure into the world. However, when I look around and see people ride a bike without wearing a helmet, drive a car after drinking alcohol, play with guns or extinct animal species, then I think perhaps we should have given wisdom teeth another name: stupidity teeth.
We are not entirely sure, and we can only guess. The going theory, and it changes quite frequently, is that yawning is a primitive, evolutionary holdover. Yawning increases the arousal level in animals, trying to make them more awake at times they are not allowed to fall asleep yet, perhaps because they are still in an unsafe place. It is also a defense mechanism, a way to say "stay away from me". By yawning, and baring their teeth, animals are able to protect their territory and intimidate other animals into backing off.
We humans often yawn when we are bored or tired. When we yawn out of sleepiness, we are trying to mark our territory, telling others to stay away. This is probably an subconscious defense against the vulnerability we feel as we fall asleep. Yawning is highly contagious; when you see somebody yawning, you just can’t hold those yawns back. Or just thinking about yawning can also trigger a few yawns. Tell me about it, I am almost falling off my chair yawning just typing this paragraph! I bet you are creating quite a few ones yourself right now. According to the defense theory, the response yawn is an automatic answer to the implied threat of the first person’s yawn. For example, among the chimpanzees, the individual monkey who yawns back at the leader is most likely to stand up against the leader’s authority. The individual who yawns the least is the most submissive.
But these all remain theories, nothing has been proven so far. I really don’t care right now, I am tired from all the yawning. Time for a little snooze.
Ann, Eric, Peter and Ed each win a prize. Keep those questions coming and send them to: The Question and Answer Man, Children’s Health Center, 3A3 WMKenzie Health Sciences Center, T6G7B2 Edmonton.