Yummy

Last weekend I attended a wedding in California.  Then came the 12 hours of tedium as I flew back home.  I really think that only crossing the country in a yellow school bus could be worse than what airlines put us through.  American Airlines doesn't even hand out peanuts.

I amused myself on the endless flight by reading "Gulp" by Mary Roach: 
"Gulp" is a tour of the alimentary canal. That long tube between the hole at one end of your body and the hole at the other end.  Any physiologist will tell you that humans really are a container for an intestine.  A worm with arms and legs.

The book explains cool stuff such as what probiotics do for us ("I asked Khoruts what exactly is in the “probiotic” products seen in stores now. “Marketing,” he replied. "With one exception, the bacteria (if they even exist) in probiotics are aerobic;") and the bacteria that live in our intestines die in the presence of oxygen.

We do need to take care of those bacteria.  They outnumber us 10 to one, and control most of our lives.

The book also explains why the stomach doesn’t digest itself, how constipation killed Elvis, how pet foods that are marketed towards humans are tested in a pet-food taste-test lab, and the latest and probably best cure for all sorts of diseases, the fecal transplant.

"Know thyself" takes on a new dimension in this book.