Friday, June 1, 2012

Fun Friday Facts #38: Penis Edition


I must apologize for not having blogged in like, three weeks. I hope you guys still love me.

Who am I kidding, I know you do.

The penis is a wonderful thing. Not as great as boobs, of course, but only because there's two of those.

Normally.

No one's actually complained about my ignoring the penis, or anything, mostly because I don't, ha ha ha.

I just thought it would make a good topic, you know, since I haven't thought of anything good in a while now. Also, I'm tired.

1) A New Jersey woman, Kasia Rivera, has been charged with manslaughter after the 22-year-old man whose penis she injected with silicone died.

I'll go ahead and let you read that again.

22-year-old Justin Street elected to receive back-alley penis-enhancement surgery at the home of Ms. Rivera, 34, on 5 May 2011. Just one day later, Street died when a chunk of the silicone traveled to his lung, causing an embolism. Rivera was also charged with unlicensed medical practice.

Apparently, the black-market use of cosmetic silicone injections takes place in “pumping parties,” which are totally a thing (a bad thing) and not as sexy as they sound (at all). Another jailhouse surgeon, Oneal Ron Morris, was charged last year with injecting a blend of Fix-a-Flat, superglue, mineral oil and cement into her “patients.” But that was into other parts of the body, not the penis, so it doesn't belong in this blog post.

2) In a victory for the private parts of men in Papua New Guinea, 53-year-old fisherman and host of TV's River Monsters captured a local terror known as The Ball Cutter. The Ball Cutter was 40-lb Pacu fish. These fish, which are native to the Amazon, normally eat (regular) nuts and seeds. In Papua New Guinea, where the species was introduced about 15 years ago, they eat human nuts and seeds. At least two men have died from having their testicles bitten off by a huge fish with powerful jaws and razor-sharp teeth. Turns out, I was right to be afraid of fish.

Look at it, with those beady little eyes, watching you for any signs of vulnerability.

3) Scientists have recently discovered that the ostrich, a member of the rattite family of birds,has “bloodless” erections. Most birds do not have penises or vaginas, but reproduce by rubbing their cloaca, or “piss sh*t and semen holes,” together until the magic happens. The ostrich though, it totally has a penis.

Don't worry, it's not going to get bitten or injected with cement. ~ A Kniesel

Some other birds, like swans, geese, and ducks, also have penises. Unlike humans and mammals, bird erections don't happen when the penis becomes engorged with blood, but with lymph fluid. It would seem that 19th century researchers reported that the ostrich penis operated on blood, so to speak, creating what news outlets refer to as “a centuries long mystery,” since this flew in the face of everything science knew about penis-having birds.

It has become apparent now that those researchers were wrong, and that ostrich penises work in the same way that other bird penises do, so the puzzle that has baffled mankind for centuries (centuries!!) has now been solved.

At last.

4) According to researchers in Flagstaff, AZ, the penis is home to 42 kinds of bacteria, and I don't mean syphilis, I mean normal flora. Drs. Cindy Liu and Lance Price found that circumcision reduces the normal bacteria population of the surface of the penis by some unspecified number.

Dr. Price hilariously explains, "I liken it to clear-cutting a forest. You're going to get a lot more sunlight and you're going to drastically change the environment."

Pictured: circumcision. ~ Tero Laakso

5) That same WebMD article claims that only 30% of the world's men over 15 are circumcised. Various dodgy online sources report that the foreskins of circumcised baby boys are used to grow new skin for burn victims. A single foreskin is reputed to be capable of producing 9,000 square inches (23,000 square centimeters) of new skin. Also, the World Health Organization believes that circumcision may reduce the chance of HIV infection during heterosexual sex by as much as 60%. All the more reason to go and get one, then, I guess.