Nail Biters, cheek biters, skin biters: Beware

So a little birdie told me that biting my nails isn't just a bad habit but a condition. Psychologists actually consider this a disorder combing self image, stress, and even OCD.

I know....Crazy Right?

Then I looked it up. Here's what I found:

More problematic is chronic cheek biting, usually due to some sort of misalignment in your teeth, or perhaps due to TMJ (temporomandibular joint disorder)

Which btw I have TMJ so that's great for me but for people without TMJ it also says

Onychophagia (also onychophagy) or nail biting, is an oral compulsive habit (sometimes described as a parafunctional activity) in children and adults.

Nail biting is considered an impulse control disorder in the DSM-IV-R, and is classified under obsessive-compulsive and related disorders in the DSM-5.

I knew I wasn't supposed to be biting my nails this bad (they end up bleeding sometimes). Biting my nails has always been a problem. I used to, in high school, have my friends slap my hands when I started biting my nails because I didn't even realize I was doing it.

High school is over and now the only one on "nail bite duty" is moi. It sucks because if I bite my nails too bad then I stop and I catch myself biting my lips. If I catch myself biting my lips I stop and randomly catch myself biting the inside of my cheeks. If I catch myself doing that then I stop and catch myself biting the skin around my nails. and then that's all sore and red and bleeding that I try to stop and suddenly my nails, lips, and cheeks are all sore and I'm left wondering when I was doing this all.

All the people that have the same problem as I do are being told to get a psychologist because they have a serious disorder.....So maybe that means I do to.

It feels like I have a problem with this too. My dad keeps saying that "mind over matter" and "the mind is a powerful thing" oh and my favorite "just stop biting your nails. just don't do it"....and I'm just siting here like "uh, it's not that easy"

I don't think to myself "hey lets bite my nails now" I don't sit around thinking about the perfect oppertunity to bite my nails. I don't even realize I am doing it, or that I did it. I will get done watching a movie and all my nails are gone. I have tried the crapy tasting nail polish and easy ways to stop biting nails and they never work. I have biting my nails and my cheek, and my lips, and my skin around my nails. I hate it. I have enough body image issues regularly without having to deal with the fact that my hands are ugly because I have no nails.

I know it has something to do with stress too. Today I just found out that I somehow have to buy 600.00 worth of school books for this semester of college. My nails are considerably shorter than they were this morning. Which is saying something because they were pretty bad this morning.

Seems like the little birdie was right. I probably do have a disorder where biting my nails is concerned.

Is it the same with you?

Google is a powerful thing. Go find out if you have a problem.

I'm going to go try putting band-aids on all of my nails.

Misleading Mythological National Animal?

So a little birdie told me to look up what Scotland's national animal was and I couldn't believe what I found....

It's a UNICORN!!!

Why?

Actually, that title is slightly misleading. The unicorn is one of the two national animals, along with the Red Lion. The unicorn, despite being fictional, was already being shown as a symbol of the Scottish royal family in the 1400s.

Examples of early royal connections are a shield carved into Rothesay Castle and some coins dating back to as early as 1466. Scottish mythology, as well as having magical tales of unicorns, is full of mysterious and fascinating creatures.

One you may have heard of is the Loch Ness monster. Since the 5th century the story of a giant ‘water beast’ that has dragged many a fisherman to their death.

Lesser known folklore includes the tale of Tam O'Shanter, which was immortalised by poet Robert Burns in the 1800s.

The story tells of witches and ghosts and perfectly captures the essence of being curled up around the fire on a windy night in the highlands, listening to a scary story.

Weird Weird World

So a little birdie has been telling me a lot of stuff lately and I checked every one of these.....maybe all of them. I don't know....yeah most of them are completely correct. OK so I didn't have time to check ALL of them.....but, hey! I'm in class. It's OK, I trust this little birdie to be telling me the truth. I'll check ALL of them at a later date.

1. Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.

2. Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite.

3. There are 293 ways to make change for a dollar.

4. The average person's left hand does 56% of the typing.

5. A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.

6. There are more chickens than people in the world.

7. Two-thirds of the world's eggplant is grown in New Jersey.

8. The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched."

9. On a Canadian two dollar bill, the flag flying over the Parliament building is an American flag.

10. All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.

11. No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, or purple.

12. "Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".

13. All 50 States are listed across the top of the Lincoln Memorial on the back of the $5 bill.

14. Almonds are a member of the peach family.

15. Winston Churchill was born in a ladies' room during a dance.

16. Maine is the only State whose name is just one syllable.

17. There are only four words in the English language which end in "dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.

18. The characters "Bert" and "Ernie" on Sesame Street were named after "Bert the cop" and "Ernie the taxi driver" in Frank Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life."

19. A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.

20. An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

21. Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.

22. In most advertisements, the time displayed on a watch is 10:10.

23. Al Capone's business card said he was a used furniture dealer.

24. Los Angeles' full name is "El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciuncula."

25. A dragonfly has a life span of 24 hours.

26. A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.

27. A dime has 118 ridges around the edge.

28. It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

29. The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.

30. In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to speak.

31. The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

32. Mr. Rogers is an ordained minister.

33. The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

34. There are 336 dimples on a regulation golf ball.

35. "Stewardesses" is the longest word that is typed with only the left hand.

It's so funny it's going to make me pea

So a little birdie told me that if you inhale a pea into your lungs it can actually sprout into a pea plant!

I was like "yeah right. that's gotta be fake!.....right?"

Then I found these case:

It happened to 75-year-old Ron Sveden, who had a half-inch-long sprout removed from his lung, which was first reported by a 20-year-old news intern at the Cape Cod Times on August 8.“I was told that I had a pea seed in my lung that had split and had sprouted.”

and I was like "WHAT?!"

because the information isn't just on some random website that took ages to find. instead it was really easy to find because it was all over BBC news .com and CNN . com and crap like that.

So what happened to Sveden?

Ron Sveden had been battling emphysema for months when his condition deteriorated.

He was steeling himself for a cancer diagnosis when X-rays revealed the growth in his lung.

Doctors believe that Mr Sveden ate the pea at some point, but it "went down the wrong way" and sprouted.

"One of the first meals I had in the hospital after the surgery had peas for the vegetable. I laughed to myself and ate them," Mr Sveden told a local Boston TV reporter.

Mr Sveden said the plant was about half an inch (1.25cm) in size.

"Whether this would have gone full-term and I'd be working for the Jolly Green Giant, I don't know. I think the thing that finally dawned on me is that it wasn't the cancer," Mr Sveden said.

So...

in this case Sveden took the saying "you are what you eat" and turned it into "you are what you inhale"

Green thumb but not a planter?

So, a little birdie told me that the dirtiest part of the body was one of your thumbs.....what? Surly that's not the DIRTIEST parts of your body! Well...I had to find out.

NO!!! The dirtiest part of your body isn't the thumb but it's not what you think it is either because it's not the butt! I repeat, it is NOT the butt!

It's the belly button!!!

What's so bad about the belly button? I think the main issue is, for being such a prominent and easily accessible body part, people rarely seem to wash it with the same care they use for other areas of the body.

Ok, this might be disguting, but you gotta try it!

Put your finger in your belly button, swirl it around..........now smell it!

I know disgusting right? Now you'll learn to clean that nasty smelling thing better.

Evil Santa!

So A Little Birdie Told Me that the reason we get coal in our stockings is because the evil Santa is giving us a death threat saying we've been bad and he's going to burn us to death.....This seams far fetched doesn't it? but I was curious so.... TADA!!! I'm researching it.

What does the research say about coal in stockings?

It started in Holland. When a child was bad they got a lump of coal, but if they were good they got a small toy, cookies or candy.

a fire was built and santa didnt expect it late.. So he became ashes… And all is left is coal in the fireplace. So a stocking is hung in memory of him…with coal..to remind the family of the fateful night..... I think this one is a joke lol that's great

In Italy, there is a rock candy called “Carbone Dolce,” which looks like coal and is often slipped into Christmas stockings as a joke....this one is kinda cool lol

Looking for that didn't go so well....

But I did find something! all hope is not lost!!!

The Anti-Claus!!!!!!

Santa Claus is the joyful fat man, so who the hell is the anti-Claus? Well, similarly to Christ versus the anti-Christ… Anti-Claus is one evil bastard. What you also might not know is that we’ve actually celebrated one of the anti-Claus’ on a yearly basis! There’s this ancient fire god named Nimrod (teehee Nimrod, sorry) throughout Asia Minor who often went by the name “Santa”; well this fire god demanded infant sacrifices to be burned and eaten! Oh, Nimrod’s coming to town, you better watch out because he might burn your baby and eat it!

oh....my.....GOD!!!! but there's more!!!!

There have been many various takes on the anti-Claus legends as well, particularly Krampus, Black Peter, Knech Rupecht, and Père Fouettard.

I'm not going to bore you with all the bad ones but I'll put down my favorite

Knech Rupecht began as a wild foundling whom St. Nicholas raised from childhood. Knech often walks with a limp because of a childhood injury. He is notable for his black clothes and dirty face attained from the soot he collects as he goes down the chimneys. According to some traditions, children would be summoned to perform tricks, a dance or a song to impress Santa and Knech; those who performed badly enough were not just booed off the stage- they and the misbehaved would be put into Ruprecht’s sack and taken away to either Ruprecht’s home in the Black Forest or tossed into a river, never to be heard from again

The French’s evil Santa Claus is a little more bizarre and disturbing from the rest, Père Fouettard, was said to the butcher of three children. St. Nicholas discovered the murderer and resurrected the three children. He repented Pére and took him on his travels where he would punish the naughty children by whipping them. So, not only was Santa accompanied by an evil anti-Claus, a child murderer was the one summoned to do his dirty work!

Black Peter was Santa’s menacing assistant who would often dole out coal and knock misbehaved children on the head. He is notable for being the complete physical opposite of Santa Claus, tall and extremely thin with dark beard and hair.

Krampus is an evil fertility demon that is often represented as having a long tail, fur, scary goat-faced mask, and a long red tongue… Krampus carries a wooden stick, birch branch or switches to threaten the children who have misbehaved. He is also known to bring bad dreams to all the bad children.

Ok so I thought a lot of the stories were cool. lol But there they are. The Anti-Claus, Evil Santa, Krampus.....might not want to tell this to children though. I think it's enough to just get coal....Wouldn't be so good to tell some kid that if they're bad they'll be burned to death.....lol yeah that wouldn't go so well.

Satan's Mark

Ok so a little birdie told me that tri freckles are supposed to be signs of the devil. This concerned me, of course, because I have them all over.

What?

Tri freckles are three freckles in the shape of a triangle. I have tri freckles on my right shoulder, my right arm, and my right cheek.

Now I looked it up and was relieved to find no religious meaning of tri freckles at all. Well except for the occational hogwash about them meaning good fortune. Nothing saying that the devil is upon us or anything like that.

I do not have a satan's mark.

but hey, now I know what a tri freckle is. lol much more fun to say.