ANY TRUTH TO ‘FEED A COLD, STARVE A FEVER’? _ The website Straight Dope dates the practice of fasting to combat fever to a 1574 dictionary. A 2002 article from New Scientist cites a Dutch research team that ran an experiment and came to the conclusion that “eating a meal boosts the type of immune response that destroys the viruses responsible for colds, while fasting stimulates the response that tackles the bacterial infections responsible for most fevers.”
… But the evidence is far from conclusive. Colds and flus are caused by viruses, and your body needs energy to fight them. Stay at home, eat light, healthy food when you’re hungry, and drink lots of fluids.
WILL EATING TURKEY MAKE YOU SLEEPY? _ Sorry to say that if you’re looking for the sedative effect, it’s unlikely you’ll get it from eating meats like turkey. L-tryptophan doesn’t act on the brain unless you take it on an empty stomach with no protein present. Additionally, the levels found in a turkey dinner are far too low to have such an effect. So, even though the media like to hype it and blame post holiday meal sleepiness on the turkey dinner, that’s just a catchy sound-bite. It’s more likely due to the combination of drinking alcohol and overeating — not just turkey, but also mashed potatoes, ham, creamed onions, cranberries, sweet potatoes, peas, stuffing, carrots, bread, pies, and whipped cream — all of which have the effect of pulling the blood away from your brain to help your digestive tract do it’s work, and the sugar/insulin effect.
OBSOLETE WORDS THAT SHOULD MAKE A COMEBACK _ We really need to recycle some of these.
• Freck – To move swiftly or nimbly. Example: “I hate it when I’m frecking through the airport and other people are going so slow.”
• Brannigan – A drinking bout; a spree or binge. Example: “Shall we go for a brannigan on Friday?”
• Quagswagging – The action of shaking to and fro. Example: “I wouldn’t call what he was doing dancing. It was more like quagswagging.”
• Hoddypeak – A fool, simpleton, noodle, blockhead. Example: “Lois’ latest marketing idea was her lamest yet. That woman’s suck a hoddypeak.”
