Universities and other "not-for-profit-but quite-willing-to-badger-alumni-into-contributing" institutions have funded some amazing research projects. The results of these studies on animals and humans have produced answers to questions that no one or very few people ever asked and then only sotto voce after a few beers. The fact that some researchers actually wanted to conduct such studies could have been reason for the funding institutions to question the granting of tenure or even attendance to those researchers, but no. Somehow the studies received money and candidates were engaged and data was gathered and statistics were produced and results were published. And now all of us can read about such things as these:
The journal Ergonomics published “Impact of wet underwear on thermoregulatory responses and thermal comfort in the cold.”
In answer, no doubt, to the ongoing question in northern nations especially on ski-hill chair lifts of those nations, "Should I go pee now or wait 'til I get to the top of the run and how long will it take to get out of this ski outfit anyway?"
Researchers from the École Nationale Vétérinaire de Toulouse, France published in 2000, the paper, “A comparison of jump performances of the dog flea, Ctenocephalides canis, and the cat flea, Ctenocephalides felis felis.
Because? Well, bragging rights of pet owners were likely involved. Either that or there was a late-night argument at a bar next to that École Nationale Vétérinaire de Toulouse building.
Published in 2007 in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, was this gem: “Ovulatory cycle effects on tip earnings by lap dancers: economic evidence for human estrus?” Don't ask. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do if the dumb oaf is willing to pay.
Published in The Lancet, a most prestigious British medical journalart was the 1996 research, “On human odor, malaria mosquitoes, and Limburger cheese.”
At last, a piece of significant research into an important question. Can I keep the damn bugs away if I eat enough Limburger? How about Stilton? Roquefort anyone? Can I have a beer with that?
A professor in the department of biological sciences at Brock University in Ont. Canada detailed in 2009: “Optimizing the sensory characteristics and acceptance of canned cat food: use of a human taste panel”
OK, so there really are some seniors whose pensions simply do not keep pace with the cost of shelter. They're more to be pitied than censured.
Published in 2009 in the British Medical Journal, research into, “Sword swallowing and its side effects,” found that performers had a heightened chance of injury when “distracted or adding embellishments”.
Of course I want to know about those embellishments, specifically did any of them involve lap dancing, or ski outfits?
Researchers from the University of Bern wrote a paper, “Are full or empty beer bottles sturdier and does their fracture-threshold suffice to break the human skull?” Now, where did they get the subjects for that research? I'm betting those lap dance recipients again.
Published in 2003, “Pressures produced when penguins pooh – calculations on avian defecation”.
Yes, and although a rather indelicate subject, there is a (pardon the term) target audience for just such a study in the cruise ship industry with their increase in Antarctic travel. Fortunately penguins are flightless.
A chemist and researcher at the Vienna University of Technology, published a research paper entitled “The nature of navel fluff.”
Completely unnecessary. Anyone over the age of six knows exactly the nature of navel fluff, having excavated heaps of the stuff every bath time.
A group of researchers from China and the U.K. chose to explore the phenomenon whereby “Fellatio by fruit bats prolongs copulation time”.
All right, so it stretches the bounds of good taste (sorry about that), but fruit bats may have something to contribute here to the human relationship paradigm on an international scale.
In a probe into “The Effect of Country Music on Suicide,” Wayne State University and Auburn University‘s researchers discovered a strong link between the amount of country music radio airplay in any particular city and the suicide rate among the white population in that area.
Was it just the white population and was it more frequently evidenced in men or in women? Questions, questions, questions. And what songs for heavens sake? I'm sure someone knows some lap dancers who would like the answers.
Published in 2000, the study, “Navigation-related structural change in the hippocampi of taxi drivers,” discovered that cabbies had physically larger posterior hippocampi – the areas of the brain responsible for spatial memory.
True. I once climbed into a cab in Sidney, Australia and only had to give the address once before that cabbie zipped away and in spite of my protestations that we had passed the location twice, he knew exactly where the airport and train stations were and made sure to include both of them in his route. I was too shaken by the size of the tab to even get his cab number and I didn't have an empty (or full) beer bottle available to debate the issue.
A 2005 paper from Charak Palika Hospital in New Delhi, India studied “Safe and painless manipulation of penile zipper entrapment”.
I want it. Every male person over the age of ten wants it. Some lap dancers may also want it. Why has it not been published in the Globe & Mail?
Published in the journal Surgery in 1986, “Rectal foreign bodies: case reports and a comprehensive review of the world’s literature” by doctors of Madison, Wisconsin, who looked at two cases of patients with “apparently self-inserted” anal objects.
Only two cases in all of the world's literature, you say. Were either of them recipients of lap dancing? Were any fruit bats involved? Were either of the objects case study proposals for such research as has been listed above?
So, whatchagot dear reader? Let's see where the money is.