health

Keep the Jesus Posters, Ban the Football Team

Hamilton Nolan · 10/24/12 10:05AM

In Kountze, Texas, high school cheerleaders had a habit of writing Bible verses on banners for school football games. The superintendent, cognizant of our pesky "separation of church and state," ordered them to stop. A district judge disagreed, and has (temporarily) allowed the Bible banners to continue, throwing editorial writers across America into a tizzy over the various abuses of law and the American way by one of the world's easiest targets: insular middle American Christians.

This Guy's Scalp Looks Like the Surface of a Brain

Max Read · 10/18/12 12:36PM

This Brazilian gentleman's scalp, NBC News informs us, is not "neither a funky new look nor a hipster trend" — that is, unless medical conditions that create folds and creases on the surface of your scalp are a hipster trend! (They're not.) The condition is called "cutis verticis gyrata":

NYC Puts at Least One Restriction on Mohels Sucking Freshly Circumcised Baby Penises

Cord Jefferson · 09/28/12 06:55PM

Call me crazy, but I don't think it should be legal for adults to suck the blood from freshly circumcised baby penises. Alas, doing just that is a very important ritual for some Orthodox Jews. Called metzitzah b'peh, the process involves the mohel snipping away the foreskin and then sucking the blood from the penis to "cleanse" the wound. Obviously putting saliva on an open wound isn't considered an antiseptic practice in any realm of modern medicine, especially when that open wound belongs to an infant with a barely there immune system. Indeed, since 2002, metzitzah b'peh has been responsible for spreading Type 1 herpes, a very common condition in American adults, to 11 different babies, killing two of them and giving two others brain damage, according to ABC News.

The Hardcore Heart

Hamilton Nolan · 09/21/12 09:30AM

There comes a time, in every man's life, when he's gotta handle shit up on his own. Can't depend on friends to help you in a squeeze. Please—they got problems of their own. These words are just as true now as they were minutes ago, when I stole them from a Pharcyde song.

Ab Circle Pro? More Like Fat, Gurgle, Slow

Hamilton Nolan · 08/24/12 08:55AM

It seems damn hard to get in shape these days. First, Americans were devastated to learn that LapBandVip.com billboards would not turn them into fitness models; now, in another crushing blow to people who want to exercise in their living rooms with a bare minimum of effort and subsequently bear a strong resemblance to John Basedow, it seems the Ab Circle Pro is not the magical device that was promised.

Your Toilet Might Explode Soon

Taylor Berman · 08/16/12 11:33PM

If your toilet was made by American Standard, Crane, Kohler, Eljer, Mansfield, St. Thomas or Gerber between 1997 and 2008, there's at least some chance it could randomly explode and cause "laceration injuries." So far at least 304 toilets have burst, resulting in 14 reported injuries.

P90X Is a Fascist Workout

Hamilton Nolan · 08/15/12 10:15AM

Here at "I of the Tiger" Fitness Reportage Inc., we don't know much about "politics" or "economics" or "stealthy plans to decimate the social safety net while funneling untold sums to the rich." But we do know about fitness fads, exercise trends, and workout crapola. So when we heard that hokey-doke dreamboat Paul Ryan, Washington DC's most famous adherent of the P90X workout, could be the next VP, we immediately knew that it was time to exploit this fact for profit.

Die, Ego

Hamilton Nolan · 08/10/12 09:00AM

Here is a true story ripped directly from the pages of real life: at the gym, on a crowded week night, there was some dude, just as proud as he could be, doing yoga in front of the weight rack. The weight rack that I needed to use. Stone-cold down on one knee, neck twisted, hand aloft, in the "Can You Believe I'm Actually Doing This Right Here" pose. Can you believe this dude? You know?