Know why babies drool?

1. No teeth! (Teeth are great for restraining drool.)

2. Since babies can't chew, their saliva has to break down food better than with older humans. So baby drool has extra lipase. That's an enzyme that breaks down fats. 

3. In case you need me to point this out, breast milk is high-fat.

Photo via.

Why do we drool before we barf?

Via.

You feel like you’re going to barf. And all of the sudden you find yourself drooling with excess spit. WHY?

I just read the answer here! 

“The body is attempting to solve the problem of whatever is causing the nausea and (in a sense) digest it,” said Dr. Isaac Eliaz . . . “Our digestive process starts in the mouth with the saliva, which is high in amylase, an important digestive enzyme that helps break down carbohydrates. So as part of the digestive process triggered by whatever may be causing the nausea, we have increased salivation.”

So what should the would-be barfer do? One guy says, “Whenever I start to salivate excessively and feel like I am going to vomit, I start spitting the excess saliva. Swallowing the saliva actually makes you vomit. Spitting it out until the saliva stops filling your mouth will help you not vomit.”

Apparently, this does sort of work. It’s weird, but whenever I’ve felt like barfing, I’ve done the same things as Beckstead, but I never thought about it. I just started drooling and spitting!

Spit killed the cigar!

Cigars used to be the cool thing for men to smoke. But back in the 1920s, the cigar industry ran into a problem: Spit!

You see, many fine cigars were hand-rolled by men like the guy above. And to get the cigar to hold together, they ran a bit of spit along the edge of the paper. This history lays it out:

The cigar industry faced a crisis when American Tobacco began promoting new, machine-rolled cigars. Its advertising asked: "Why run the risk of cigars made by dirty yellowed fingers and tipped in spit?" The image proved disastrous for the cigar industry . . . cigar sales plunged through the 1930s [and never recovered.]" (Thanks to Weird Universe for the tip!)

Spit seals the deal!

In 1922, a man named Sir James George Frazer wrote a book called The Golden Bough. It was full of notes about magic and mythology. Here's an interesting section on spit:

Spit is part of the man, and whatever is done to the spit will have a corresponding effect on him. A Chilote Indian, who has gathered up the spit of an enemy, will put it in a potato, and hang the potato in the smoke, uttering certain spells as he does so in the belief that his foe will waste away as the potato dries in the smoke.

In the Sandwich Islands, chiefs were followed by a servant with a spittoon. All day, the chief would spit into it, and the total amount was carefully buried every morning to put it out of the reach of sorcerers.

When the Wajagga of East Africa desire to make a deal, the two parties will sit down with a bowl of milk between them. Then they each take a mouthful of the milk or beer and spit it into the other’s mouth. This seals the deal.

Who wants Saliva Noodles?

By Johnny Haslam

I was just reading this odd article about a Chinese dish called saliva noodles (a.k.a. xian shui mian). Apparently, a Chinese government bureau is paying people NOT to eat saliva noodles. Why?

It's disgusting!

As best as I can figure, the idea is that when there's a pot of soup, everyone eats out of it. If there is any soup left over, it's just used for the NEXT pot of soup. In this way, one pot of soup can live for years, and it contains the saliva of, er, many ancestors. (And the bacteria from their mouths!)

George Washington is disgusted by your behavior.

By DonkeyHotey

Over at The Edge, I was reminded that as a teenager, George Washington wrote down over a hundred “Rules of Civility & Decent Behaviour In Company and Conversation.”

Many of these rules have to do with spit (a.k.a. spittle, looches, saliva, etc.). I’ve slightly updated their spelling:

• Spit not in the fire, nor stoop low before it [lest we see your butt!].
• Bedew no man’s face with your spittle, by approaching too near him when you speak.
• Kill no vermin as fleas, lice, or ticks in the sight of others. If you see any filth or thick spittle [on the ground], put your foot upon it...
• If you soak bread in the sauce, let it be no more than what you put in your mouth at a time. 
• Neither spit forth the stones of any fruit upon a dish nor cast anything under the table.
• Put not another bit into your mouth till the last one be swallowed. Let not your morsels be too big for the gowls [jowels? mouth?].
• Cleanse not your teeth with the table cloth, napkin, fork or knife, but if others do it let it be done with a pick tooth. [And watch out for the spittle!]

What happened to that dog?!

Oh, it's just shaking itself. Whew!

Photographer Carli Davidson (from Portland!) took these shots.

Man, Fido never looked so gross... (Photo via the Telegraph.)

Simon Says, “Spit!”

Did you know there is a Saint Simon? There is!

And if I go to the Temple of San Simon in Guatemala City on Saint Simon’s Day, I can be “cleansed” by having someone spit special water on me!

Wait— what’s that I hear in the distance? It sounds like a voice: “Simon says, ‘Stay home.’”

Photo from the Telegraph.

Say It. Don't Spray It!

Your gross word of the day:

sialoquent (adjective): Spraying saliva when speaking.

My Trombone Tried to Kill Me!

Did I ever tell you that I used to play trombone? Of course not! That’s about the most boring thing a person could say:

Me: I used to play trombone.

Other Person: Zzzzzzzz.

There was something disgusting I used to do with my trombone, though. After blowing into it for a while, the spit would start to build up in its pipes. So when I could hear the spit clogging the instrument (“Brrr-ppppp-brrr-pppp”) I would open the spit valve (right) on the trombone and watch the brassy saliva pour out…usually onto the band room floor!

I never thought about all the germs in that spit, but I SHOULD have. Because I just heard a disturbing NPR report about how those germs can give a player something called “trombone player’s lung.” This is basically a mold that gets in your lungs and tries to kill you.

A doctor named Mark Metersky got some trumpets and trombones from musicians to study and see if they had similar germs. What happened?

“Things plopped out," Metersky says. “It was disgusting. Imagine the worst thing you've found in your refrigerator in food that you've left for a few months, and that was coming out of these instruments.”

Oh. Yuck.

Photo of trombonist Scott Bean from NPR.

The Gum Wall: ALMOST the Most Germy Spot in the World!

The Market Theater Gum Wall (aka, the Wall of Gum) was chosen by CNN as the second-most germy tourist attraction in the world. Disgusting!

So of course, you must see it. Go to Seattle —specifically, Pike Place Market— and look around for a multi-colored wall covered with dried spit and chewing gum.

That's the one!

It’s about 15 feet high and runs 50 feet long, and man, is it colorful! The Gum Wall got its start in 1993. As a film-goer stood in line, he or she stuck his or her gum on the wall. This inspired another gum chewer to stick gum on the wall…and now here we are with a LOT OF GUM STUCK TO THE WALL!

Today, the Wall of Gum is home to perhaps millions of wadded, chewed, rubbery bits of saliva-soaked gumminess. It’s nasty and it’s beautiful…kind of like this blog!

Photos from NPR and SeattleTales.com.

The Most Dangerous Loogies in the World!

Do you know what gutkha is? It’s just spit. Gross, gross spit that can eat through steel! To explain, many people in Asia like to chew betel leaves, areca nuts, and lime all together in their mouths. Together, these chew-toys are called paan.

A person chewing paan has to spit out the combined juices. This stream of brown spit-juice is called gutkha. And not only is gutkha nasty, it’s also destroying a steel bridge in Calcutta! You see, people crossing the Howrah bridge just spit when they have too much gutkha in their mouths.

Bridge officials noticed that the corroding spit of gutkha has eaten away up to half of the Howrah bridge’s steel covers in just the last three years! Yep, that spit can eat away steel…so what is it doing in people’s MOUTHS?!

Story here, more on paan here.