Monday, February 20, 2017

Pucker up! Eight reasons why KISSING is so good for your health - from burning calories to slowing aging

Scientists have proven that kissing can be beneficial for your health
Experts say that a kiss can be a a hormone releaser and a mood relaxer
We take you through eight reasons why a smooch could be good for you

PUBLISHED: 14:29 EST, 20 February 2017 | UPDATED: 14:29 EST, 20 February 2017

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Kissing can be many things: sweet, loving, intense, passionate.

But did you know it could also benefit your health? Kissing can also be a hormone releaser, a mini-workout and a mood relaxer.

Scientists have proven that smooching can trigger a whole spectrum of physiological processes to boost your immunity and improve your connection with your partner.

We take you through each one and explain just how beneficial a lip lock can be.

Scientists have proven that smooching can trigger a whole spectrum of physiological processes to boost your immunity and improve your connection with your partner

1. IT'S GOOD FOR YOUR TEETH

According to dentist Dr Heidi Hausauer, kissing increases saliva flow. This in turn keeps the mouth, teeth and gums healthy by removing food particles.

The extra saliva helps to wash bacteria off the teeth and reduce plaque buildup.

Some experts even claims that the mineral ions in saliva can promote repair of small lesions in tooth enamel.

2. GIVES IMMUNE SYSTEM A BOOST

Just as saliva can help oral hygiene, it can also give your immune system a boost.

There are more than 700 types of bacteria inside a human mouth - with no two alike.

Therefore, exchanging saliva can introduce the body to new bacteria.

Studies have shown that having a diverse amount of bacteria in our bodies correlates with better health - specifically when it comes to our microbiota, or the collection of microorganisms living inside us.

A 2014 Dutch study found that a 10-second French kiss can exchange up to 80 million bacteria between us and our partner.

And while a single kiss isn't enough to change a person's microbiota, the researchers found that couples who kissed longer had similar microbiota, meaning that they would be better prepared to fight off similar infections and digest similar foods.

3. LOWERS ANXIETY

Kissing has been shown to decrease the stress hormone cortisol and increase serotonin - a chemical responsible for maintaining mood balance - levels in the brain.

It has also been shown to have similar benefits to meditation, mainly from its ability to release oxytocin, also known as the 'love' hormone.

Oxytocin can act like a psychological buffer and induces a sense of calm and bonding in humans.

Experts say we experience a surge of the hormone during orgasm but kind words or a gentle touch can also drive oxytocin levels up. This enhances the experience of what we identify as love and trust.

4. LESSENS ALLERGIC REACTIONS

Dr Hajime Kimata, who specializes in allergology at a clinic in Japan, won an Ig Nobel Prize for revealing how 30 minutes of kissing can reduce the effect of allergic reactions.

In 2006, his team studied 24 patients with two types of allergies: mild atopic eczema (a skin allergy) and mild allergic rhinitis (a nasal allergy). The patients were looked at before and after kissing their partners for 30 minutes while listening to soft music.

Specifically, they smooched along to Celine Dion's My Heart Will Go On with the belief that the soft ballad would set a romantic mood.

The researchers found that kissing reduced the body's production of IgE, which is the body's way of reacting to an allergen.

5. LOWERS BLOOD PRESSURE

Because our lips are made up of blood vessels, kissing can lower blood pressure by dilating them and therefore allowing blood to flow to the vital organs.

Plastic surgeon Dr Ryan Neinstein told Glamour: 'The blood is then directed toward the face and away from the rest of the body so the demand on the heart goes down, resulting in lower blood pressure.'

As explained above, kissing lowers cortisol levels, which not only lowers anxiety, but also blood pressure.

6. DELAYS SIGNS OF AGING

Because kissing increases blood flow to the face, it stimulates the production of collagen - an abundant and important protein found in our bodies, according to Dr Neinstein.

'In order to move your lips, your whole face has to get involved, which increases elasticity,' he said.

'Have you seen face yoga, or facercises? There are yogis, estheticians and dermatologists training women to do exercises for their face to stimulate collagen and reduce the need for a face lift.

'Passionate kissing can lead to firming the face, especially the bottom half of the face.'

Kissing with tongue - which uses all the muscles in your face - can burn up to 26 calories per minute, experts say

7. BURNS CALORIES

Depending on which study you look at, kissing can burn anywhere between two and six calories per minute. However, kissing with tongue - which uses all the muscles in your face - can burn up to 26 calories per minute.

Andréa Demirjian, author of Kissing: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about One of Life's Sweetest Pleasures, told CNN it wouldn't compare to a workout session at the gym, but it would still do its job.

'Kissing and lovemaking can be a vigorous exercise if you're fully engaged.You need to have a passionate kiss [in order to burn those calories], but it doesn't have to be a 10-hour makeout session,' she said.

Researchers also say we use 30 muscles while kissing, which helps keep your cheeks tight.

8. INCREASES SEX DRIVE

Kissing prompts your brain to release a happy elixir of feel-good chemicals like serotonin, dopamine, and oxytocin.

Additionally, testosterone - the hormone responsible for sex drive in both women and men - is released into saliva during prolonged kissing.

'Male saliva has trace amounts of testosterone - and testosterone is an aphrodisiac,' Gallup says. 'So passing saliva during open-mouth kissing over extended periods might help raise her testosterone levels and affect her sex drive,' Dr Gordon Gallup, a psychologist at the University at Albany, told Men's Health.

Friday, February 17, 2017

Why UPS trucks (almost) never turn left

By Jacopo Prisco, CNN

Updated 5:17 AM ET, Thu February 16, 2017

By avoiding left-hand turns, among other route optimizations, UPS says it saves 10 million gallons of fuel a year.

(CNN)UPS trucks almost never take left-hand turns.

By favoring right-hand turns at all times -- unless a left is unavoidable -- the carrier saves millions of gallons of fuel each year, and avoids emissions equivalent to over 20,000 passenger cars.

The practice started decades ago, before computers and GPS, and is now managed by a software that conjures the most efficient route for each truck.

What's wrong with turning left?

Left-hand turns are generally considered unsafe and wasteful on right-hand driving roads, such as those in the US.

"Left-turning traffic typically has to turn against a flow of oncoming vehicles," explains Tom Vanderbilt, author of the book "Traffic: Why we drive the way we do."

"This can not only be dangerous, but makes traffic build up, unless you install a dedicated left-turn 'phase,' which is fine but basically adds 30 or 45 seconds to everyone else's single time," he said.

A study on crash factors in intersection-related accidents from the US National Highway Traffic Safety Association shows that turning left is one of the leading "critical pre-crash events" (an event that made a collision inevitable), occurring in 22.2 percent of crashes, as opposed to 1.2 percent for right turns. About 61 percent of crashes that occur while turning or crossing an intersection involve left turns, as opposed to just 3.1 percent involving right turns.

Left turns are also three times more likely to kill pedestrians than right ones, according to data collected by New York City's transportation planners.

The right way to save fuel

"A left-hand turn is also less fuel efficient," said Jack Levis, UPS Senior Director of Process Management, "because your car's idling longer, which is also not good for your vehicle."

UPS does not ban left turns outright, says Levis: "We will make left hand turns, but not ones that are unnecessary. We don't need to go in circles all day long by making only right hand turns. We have tools analyze the number of left hand turns for each route, and we can work out which ones are avoidable."

The procedure is now incorporated in most countries around the world.

To this end, the carrier created its own maps, which it says are more accurate that commercially available ones: "We can differentiate more important left-hand turns from unimportant ones. Google Maps has no concept of not making a left-hand turn, it just shows the most direct way to reach your destination. We have the ability to penalize some of those," Levis told CNN.

The system knows about parking lots, private driveways, variable speed limits and roads that are inaccessible for a truck.

The software can give an undesirable left turn a penalty that adds 20 seconds to the estimated route time. In that case, going around the block and turning always right might offset that 20-second penalty: "We were able to turn off left hand turns," said Levis.

Taking a longer route while still saving time and fuel might sound confusing, even to UPS drivers, according to Vanderbilt: "I've actually been to UPS's logistics center and discussed this with their lead engineers," he said.

"A lot of individual drivers felt the new routing software was making their trips longer, but they were later proven wrong. This is the thing about traffic, it's such a complex system that often the individual cannot get a sense of the overall efficiency of the system, and optimize accordingly. It's also one of the counterintuitive, 'slower-is-faster' effects you often see in traffic."

The rule, says Levis, can also be applied to left-hand driving countries, such as Australia and the UK, where it discourages right-hand turns.

Loop dispatch

UPS started avoiding left turns in the 1970s, when it came up with a method called "loop dispatch," plotting deliveries in a right-turning loop and starting with one side of the street first.

This hand-held computer provides the order of delivery to the driver.

In 2008, it launched a routing software to calculate the best possible route for each truck while favoring right-hand turns, called Orion: "It took 10 years to get it right. The hardest part was making it think more like a driver and less like a computer," said Levis.

UPS, which makes 18 million deliveries a day in the US, says that Orion analyzes 250 million address points a day and performs 30,000 route optimizations per minute. This saves the company $300 to $400 million annually in fuel, wages and vehicle running costs: "Our basic routines were already good, and allowed us to save about 85 million miles a year. When we put Orion on top of those, it shaved off an extra 100 million miles, and the savings got up to 185 million miles a year."

Should you do it too?

"This no left hand turn discussion came out of a conversation about what regular consumers can do to be more fuel efficient," explains Levis.

Examples would be consolidating trips, parking in a central location to walk to several nearby destinations, and using the right vehicle for the job.

But would an avoidance of left-hand turns help save fuel, or time, in everyday driving?

How 'hypermiling' can save you a lot of fuel

"The method works well for pre-planned deliveries, but in daily driving, our routes are usually far less random," said Wayne Gerdes, who holds world records for fuel-efficient driving and is an advocate of a technique called "Hypermiling."

Most of us are not going to multiple different addresses, but faced with the challenge of optimizing a daily commute that may not have changed for years, says Gerdes: "Eliminating left turns cannot in many cases be incorporated into our own more ridged daily routing, so my suggestion is to map multiple routes and work them into your commute.

"Do not stop the optimization as traffic, roads and conditions change year over year for many of us. If one route has a new roundabout for example, try it! When I experience a new roundabout on a road I have discarded for decades because of stop signs or non-priority lights, I will prioritize this new route over others, while saving both fuel and time.

CNN's Anastasia Beltyukova contributed to this report.

Monday, February 6, 2017

Are these the most annoying spouses EVER? Hilarious photos show the ingenious pranks played by people who aren't afraid to test their partner's patience

BoredPanda has compiled snaps of pranks people have played on their partner
Whether they are crafty or cruel you can't deny they're creative
One woman covered everything in the fridge with tiny eyes
A man created a fake bottom for the sink to pretend he'd washed up

By Martha Cliff for MailOnline

PUBLISHED: 03:10 EST, 6 February 2017 | UPDATED: 06:25 EST, 6 February 2017

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There are many ways in which married couples try to spice up their relationship - but these ways may be slightly more unconventional.

A series of hilarious photographs showcase the inventive pranks that partners have played on one another.

Compiled by BoredPanda, the photographs show the ingenious pranks played by the very brave husbands and wives who aren't afraid to test their partners' patience.

From taking requests a little too literally - such as filling the bathroom with bread when their partner said they wanted a 'toasty shower' - to hiding a picture of Bruce Willis in an air vent, these couples clearly believe laughter is the key to lasting love.

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A hilarious new collection of photos on BoredPanda reveal the pranks that brave husbands and wives have pulled on each other

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This decided to get inventive when his wife asked her sandwich cut in half - pointing out she didn't specify how she wanted it cut

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This man couldn't figure out why his wife kept on giggling when she told him to check the air vents until he spotted Bruce Willis hiding in them

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This man's wife had asked for jewellery for Christmas - something that he interpreted as the perfect opportunity for a prank

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A man admitted that his pregnant wife had begun trolling him at breakfast

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One woman was given the fright of her life when she went to take a shower

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When his wife suggested they get a guard dog this man came up with an alternate solution

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When this woman asked her husband to take photos of the expression on her face when their daughter was born, it's unlikely she had this in mind

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The person who witnessed this cheeky spouse says that the woman in the photo got on and off the scales for seven minutes

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This woman's boyfriend wasn't amused when she revealed that she was a Pepsi fan, and staged this crime scene for her to find

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His wife had asked for laser hair removal for Christmas, however it seems that this man was on a budget

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His girlfriend instructed him to wear a plain tie to dinner but this man chose to misinterpret the dress code

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After his girlfriend vowed not to fart in front of him when she finally let one slip this man decided to mark the occasion

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This woman was extremely proud of the work that she had done to her husband's shampoo bottle

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This man's pregnant wife said that she wanted a really toasty shower so he gave her exactly that

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This man's wife said that she had picked up 50 shades of grey - and she wasn't kidding

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For reasons unknown one woman covered everything in the fridge with eyes as a surprise for her husband

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This man made a feeble attempt at fooling his wife into thinking he had done the dishes

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This wife followed her husband's trail of notes around the house leading to a stinky end

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This man revealed that his wife asked for a 'generic birthday party' so he gave her exactly that

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This man didn't exactly follow the instructions when his wife asked for a family portrait for her Christmas present

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This man could hardly contain his hilarity after giving his wife an empty book on sex after 40