Happy Birthday to—eww!

Via and photo.

“Bacterial Transfer by Blowing Out Birthday Cake Candles,” poster presented at Clemson University’s 5th Annual Focus on Creative Inquiry Poster Forum April 12, 2010. Mentors: Paul Dawson and Inyee Han, Department of Food Science & Human Nutrition Students: Danielle Lynn, Jenevieve Lackey, Johnson Baker, Sutton Fainschwartz, Aaron Pietzyk “Bacteria are an unavoidable element of life, present in the environment and other living organisms. Whether benign or pathogenic, it is important to understand how bacteria is transferred and become familiar with measures for avoiding contamination. As such, this research project focused on the potential spread of bacteria when blowing out candles on a birthday cake. Our first procedure involved blowing on Petri dishes containing nutrient agar. A second procedure consisted of blowing on lit candles placed over a layer of icing. In a third procedure, we tested whether salivating before blowing out the candles over icing would affect the outcome. To simulate a realistic party atmosphere, this procedure included consuming a slice of fresh pizza prior to blowing on the candles. We determined that a higher level of bacteria was transferred with this procedure than the previous testing. These results led us to conclude that bacteria expelled from the mouth can, in fact, contaminate birthday cakes and other potential food samples.”

Let’s Go Kiss a Spit-Covered Rock!

Hey, I almost forgot to tell you the MOST germy tourist attraction in the world! That would be a big rock in Ireland called the Blarney Stone.

Supposedly, if you kiss the Blarney Stone you will be granted the gift of gab. That is, you will be able to flatter and entertain people while you suck all the air out of a room because you NEVER STOP TALKING.

But since about 300,000 people line up every year to kiss the Blarney Stone in pretty much the same spot, that means that millions of lips have been on that rock! So here’s another magical gift the Blarney Stone can give you: CONTAGIOUS DISEASES! The Blarney Stone is so germy, it’s one of the sites in Catherine Price’s book, 101 Places Not to See Before You Die.

And now let me share with you a truly lame CNN video in which two people talk about germy tourist attractions!

Woman preparing to kiss the Blarney Stone from Irish Times.com.

Someone Pooped in the Pool! (Or did they?)

In the movie Caddyshack, someone throws a candybar into a swimming pool as a joke. Naturally, everyone freaks out because they think someone has pooped in the pool!

And this sort of thing does happen in real life. (And not with a candy bar!) Why do people panic when this happens? If the pool has chlorine in it, the chemicals almost certainly kill the bad germs in the poop. But that doesn’t really matter…somehow, one poop in the pool turns the whole thing into a toilet bowl, and who wants to swim in a toilet bowl? Anyway, this all comes to mind because of this article:

Wow, a hundred people ran screaming to the exit! (Or swam screaming to the ladder.) The pool itself is in England, and I salute the reporter for using the following words in it: poo, faeces (what Americans call “feces”), material, human waste, small solid item, matter. Here’s the most astounding thing about the whole thing:

“A member of staff retrieved a small solid item from the shallow end of the pool and following an inspection of the entire facility nothing else was found, meaning the pool then re-opened for business as usual. The Observer [the name of the newspaper] understands that the solidity of the matter dictates procedure.”

In other words, if the poo is rock hard, the pool operators fish it out…but if it’s more like diarrhea, they drain the pool. I guess that makes sense. It’s hard to clean diarrhea out of the pool with a net!

BTW, in Caddyshack, Bill Murray fishes the candy bar out of the pool, stares at it, and then takes a bite. This causes more screaming...and fainting!

"Swimming Poo" photo by killaclause.

Shopping Alert: Beware of Butt Organisms!

Brand new clothes are awesome! Because you get to be the FIRST person who’s EVER worn them.

But that doesn’t explain the “butt organisms” that are in them!

”New” clothes have actually often been worn before. People buy clothes, wear them, and return them. People try clothes on in the store. And they leave their germs behind!

To test this, the show Good Morning America purchased 14 “brand new” clothing items and had a scientist test them for germs. And they were there, especially in the butt and armpit areas! The scientist called these germs things like “fecal flora”… which is a fancy way of saying “organisms that live in your butt”!

Here’s my favorite quote from the scientist: “Some garments were grossly contaminated with many organisms and indicating that either many people tried it or ... someone tried it on with heavy contamination. [So if you wear these], in a sense, you are touching somebody's arm pit or groin.”

Okay, I’m always washing my new clothes from now on!