A Bit of Fun for a Friday January 21, 2011
Posted by cshannon in General, Humor, Weird & Interesting.1 comment so far
The Symphony of Science is a musical project headed by John Boswell, designed to deliver scientific knowledge and philosophy in musical form. Watch Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan, Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Tara Shears and Neil deGrasse Tyson sing their lectures. Check it out!
Hat tip to The Bubble Chamber for this link.
Garrett Scott on Flossing January 8, 2009
Posted by pfanderson in Humor.add a comment
What sort of man is Garrett Scott of Ann Arbor? An eccentric antiquarian bookseller (is there any other sort?) who describes his place of work as “central Washtenaw county’s most semi-pleasant conditions for the casual browser of uncommon 19th century material.”
An exorbitant gourmand of social media and microblogging who shares such pungent observations as “John Evelyn notes that macerating a pine nut three days in a child’s urine “is of wonderful Effect” in getting it to sprout.”
Why do we care? Well, Garrett Scott of Ann Arbor has just begun a one year meditation on oral hygiene, specifically the flossing of teeth.
Please, join us in following his amusing and erudite exploration of flossing at:
My year of flossing: http://interdental.wordpress.com/
Entry #200!: International Women's Day & Exhibit: Women & Children First March 8, 2007
Posted by pfanderson in Dental Public Health, History, Humor, News and Announcements, Pediatric Dentistry.add a comment
In honor of International Women’s Day, the Dentistry Library would like to direct your attention to our current exhibit:
Women and Children First: The Origins of Hygiene and Preventive Care in Dentistry.
- Did you know that the first known mention of preventive care in oral health was from St. Hildegarde von Bingen in the 11th Century in Germany?
- Did you know that the first organized outreach of dental hygiene education was directer to schoolchildren during World War I? And that the dentists and hygienists in those schools saw patients in the hallways and on stairway landings?
- Early instruction in preventive care was often in the form of nursery rhymes?
Preventive care in dentistry was inspired in large part by the needs of children and through the determination and inspiration of women. In short, dentistry would not be what it is today without women and children.
If you haven’t had a chance to see it yet, please stop by the library to see our exhibit. If you can’t make it to the library, you can find a selection of some of the images here.
Women and Children First: The Origins of Hygiene and Preventive Care in Dentistry: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosefirerising/sets/72157594577380706/
International Women’s Day: http://www.internationalwomensday.com/
“Celebrated on 8 March, International Women’s Day (IWD) is the global day connecting all women around the world and inspiring them to achieve their full potential. IWD celebrates the collective power of women past, present and future.”
My thanks to Valentina G. for bringing this event to my attention.
Heavy Metal Dentistry – Or Is It Rock and Roll? January 12, 2007
Posted by pfanderson in Humor, Weird & Interesting.1 comment so far
Ever heard of the band “Dentistry the Metal Chapter, an eight-piece, hard-rock cover band that includes seven students from the UMKC School of Dentistry and, for the moment, a fledgling professional baseball player”?
Kansas City Star: Brush Up On Driller Metal: http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/entertainment/music/16428102.htm
Excerpt to appreciate:
âA dental student is one of the more stressed-out lifestyles,â? Johnson said. âYouâve got tests, classes, exams. When we get together and turn up the amps, itâs the ultimate release.â?
NOTE to the world — I want a band t-shirt! Really, and will pay the list price plus USPS shipping.
High Tech Toothbrushing September 12, 2006
Posted by pfanderson in General, Humor, Other.add a comment
Today at WordSpy, they highlighted a new phrase for the techno-weary — “feature fatigue”. This means, in short, that customers and patients are burned out by too many options, choices, and gizmos.
Word Spy: Feature Fatigue: http://www.wordspy.com/words/featurefatigue.asp
What captured my attention was that the primary example given is that of a toothbrush that is so complicated it is sold with a DVD to give instructions on how to use it. Was it really true? It must be, or they wouldn’t say so, would they? So I looked, and I found it.
Goodman, Ellen. The complexification of the toothbrush: Technologies for making life more difficult. Washington Post Writers Group, 05.26.06: http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=20870
This entertaining article ends with a great couple lines: “Now I am sure that somewhere there is an engineer creating a toothbrush with an LCD, an MP3 player and the capacity to instant message from my mouth to yours. Beware, the feature creep is coming to a molar near you.”
For the curious, the toothbrush in question is the Intelliclean System, www.intellicleansystem.com/
Now while I was searching for a toothbrush with its own DVD, I found a lot more about toothbrushes and DVDs, mostly old classic movie snips with some newer films. I had no idea there were so many films with toothbrushes as prominent aspects of the plot or title. Here are a few for your entertainment, and you can find more at IMDB (over 4,000 pages were listed).
The Toothbrush (1918)
The Old Family Toothbrush (1925)
The Toothbrush Family (1999)
Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush (1994, 1995 and 2000)
The Brothers Grunt (1994) has a toothbrush-obsessed criminal; Mr. Robinson Crusoe (1932) has a young man stranded on a deserted island with a toothbrush and a young woman; Boogeyman II has death by toothbrush; Goldie Hawn cleans the bathroom with an electric toothbrush in Private Benjamin (1980); and who can forget the great toothbrushing scene in Home Alone (1990)? There is even a movie called toothbrush in Slovenian — Scetka (1999). Who’d have thought …
