Top 10 Amazing-But-True Facts about the 2007 Holiday Season

During the recent holiday season, alert Internet readers sent us amazing-but-true facts they have learned about the 2007 Christmas season.

We present the top 10 herewith:

1. For the first time in history, Santa Claus is being forced to relocate his North Pole headquarters. The reason? Global warming. The irony is that global warming is rapidly accelerating due to a small percentage of Americans who insist on decorating their homes with tens of thousands of Christmas lights.

2. The Norwegian word for "fruitcake" translates literally to "delicacy of questionable sensibilities."

3. The only human to ever be awarded honorary status by Santa's elves is film composer and former Oingo Boingo front man Danny Elfman.

4. In 2006, three shopping-mall Santas suffered severe facial lacerations while using cats as beards. (The toll for 2007 hasn’t been tallied yet.)

5. Santa's Christmas Eve schedule now takes into account his mandatory TSA inspection upon entering the U.S., as well as airspace congestion over New York La Guardia, Chicago O'Hare and London Heathrow airports.

6. Played in reverse, the opening line of "A Christmas Song" ("Chestnuts roasting on an open fire...") eerily predicts John Lennon's untimely demise.

7. Working for the Allies during World War II, Santa Claus lifted sensitive documents from the homes of Nazi officials each Christmas Eve.

8. Seventy-five percent of holiday plane crashes are caused by pilots mistaking for overly decorated neighborhood streets for airport runways.

9. "The Twelve Days of Christmas" was originally thirteen days. Superstition resulted in the modern version leaving off the verse about "thirteen broken mirrors."

10. During the long, cold Decembers of the Great Depression, many parents encouraged their kids to misbehave because they needed the coal.

(Source: Chris White, TopFive.com)

Top 10 Reasons Women Undergo Rejuvenation Surgery:

1. Smooth Facial Wrinkles.
Botox did the job over four million times in 2006.

2. Remove Unwanted Hair.
Lasers took it off for 887,000 people. More

3. Increase Breast Size.
329,396 women opted for breast augmentation. More think silicone implants rule!

4. Suction fat from the stomach, butt, hips, and thighs.
302,000 people had liposuction in 2006 to reduce problems fatty spots that just will not go away.

5. Remove a bump from the nose.
307,302 people had nose surgery during ’06. Some removed a bump.

6. Fix a Crooked Nose.
Others straightened the schnozzola. Yet others corrected impaired breathing, narrowed the nostrils or fixed a botched rhinoplasty.

7. Remove bags from around the eyes.
233,000 people in 2006 removed the bags under the eyes or nipped drooping eyelids. Some did both.

8. Remove extra skin from the stomach area.
Thanks to the growing acceptance of “Mommy makeovers,” 146,240 tummy tuck cases were done. It’s a big surgery. More.

9. Plump up lips.
At least 25,626 people fattened up their kissers. The trend is growing as more facial injectables are approved for the lips. Lip implants are also available.

10. Improve the appearance of sun-damaged skin.

Isn’t payback a bear? People who spent too much time in the sun include:

• 69,300 dermabrasion patients


• 1,063,423 chemical peel cases


• 816,774 microdermabrasions

(SOURCE: American Society of Plastic Surgeons. Figures represent both men and women. Statistics for 2007 will be released sometimes around March, 2008.)

Botox Injections -- Fast, Fast Relief!

Remedies Writer’s Cramp, Scars, Sweaty Palms and Bladder Woes.



Ironing out facial wrinkles with Botox is only one of its actual uses.

Medical researchers continue finding new uses for Botox -- which leads the pack of noninvasive procedures with 3.9 million uses in 2006. It’s now a good treatment for relieving writers’ cramp. According to the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, three to seven of every 100,000 people suffer from writer’s cramp. Read more. Besides the cramping, if your fingers and hands ever become wrinkled, you’ve got that covered, too!

Plastic Surgery Incisions

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic found that treating a facial wound --like a plastic surgery incision -- early in the healing phase with Botox improves the appearance of a scar later. More. Al Capone shoulda been alive for this, huh?

Salesmen and others are handicapped if they have sweaty palms. It’s bad enough listening to a sales pitch but who wants to shake hands with a glad handing sales person whose paw feels like a wet washcloth?



One woman sufferer had drops of perspiration dripping from one hand. She usually suffered five sweaty palm outbreaks a day, with each lasting about half an hour. Just try selling a Lexus or a beachfront condo with water pouring off your hands! Stress, exercise, coffee or alcohol brought on her damp palm attacks. Read more.

Botox Injections


Again, Botox rode to the rescue and stopped the wet palms.

Researchers at UT Southwestern University in Dallas wanted to treat overactive bladder victims to help them regain control. Some were spinal cord injury victims whose injured nerves sent the bladder the wrong message at the wrong time. Like in church, at weddings, giving a major speech, while asking for a raise and so on. Others were MS patients, spina bifida and interstitial cystitis sufferers who, well, hey, you’ve got the idea by now. An associate professor of urology uses Botox to stop the leaks and embarrassing incidents. More.

Top 10 Saving Banks for Cosmetic Plastic Surgery

While there are many payment plans available to consumers of plastic surgery -- even the Royal Bank of Scotland takes part through a plastic surgery loan program -- people are finding ever more clever ways to fork over for that long awaited surgical rejuvenation.

Some forget about making a down payment on a new car and keep the old family bus for another year; others take a part-time job and still others dump it all onto a credit card while yet others do it the hard way, saving up week by excruciating week.

That must be why there has been such an explosion of piggy banks on the Internet.

Here are the top 10:

1. Exploding Bank



The most recent is a special Japanese savings bank -- although it doesn’t have anything to do with a pig. The clever bank induces you to save by shaking and beeping hourly to remind you it needs to be fed some coins.

If you don’t feed it, the bank blows up and throws what few coins you have saved all over the floor. Well, O.K., it doesn’t explode explode; it just slams open a trap door and scatters your coins all over the floor. Seems like an explosion.

Japanese Toy Maker Tomy Co, Ltd. offers it for about $27.00

2.Coins Stop the Alarm Bank



Another savings device from the Land of the Rising Sun:

TokyoMango offers an alarm clock that won’t shut off unless you put coins in it. Want to sleep another 15 minutes or half hour? Yeah? What’s it worth to you?

3. Money Eating Monsters



O.K., no more Mr. Nice Guy Piggy Bank! Some banks are literal monsters that demand to be fed! Or else!

The Money Monster Bank gobbles up both coins and bills, then follows with 20 more-or-less age-appropriate comments (“Money, money in my tummy!”) while their eyes flash and ears wiggle. After the money is consumed, the saving monsters let out a mighty belch, letting you know your funds are secure and probably tasted good, too. Available soon for about $24.00 from Firebox via Pocket-lint. The Monster banks even heckle passers-by if they walk by without giving up some cash.

4. The Face Bank Robotic Piggy Bank.

This bank also eats money but with realistic munching motions. Just don’t get your fingers too close or you’ll need a plastic surgeon who specializes in hand reconstruction! Watch the Face Bank in action on YouTube. Go to:

http://weirdscience.ca/2007/06/10/coin-eating-piggy-bank/

How does it work? The Face Bank has motion sensors embedded in its eyes. The sensors detect your approaching hand, then latch onto the money, (hopefully!) gobble it up and swallow it for safekeeping. Depending on where you find them, the bank will deplete your plastic surgery savings by at least $14.95.

5. Digital Piggy Banks



According to the Chinese calendar, it’s the year of the pig. So that's another reason we're seeing so many piggy banks. The DigiBank from Keian takes piggy banking another step into geekdom.

You can program the bank just by showing it a coin, be it a dime or a Drachma, a half a buck or a Hallalah. After that, the bank is smart enough to recognize what type of coin it’s getting and how many coins are dropped in. It tallies your savings and displays a running total on its LCD display.
It costs around $15.00 at better piggy bank stores everywhere. (Chinese and more astute readers will note the middle bank is not a pig at all but a Panda.)

6. Economy Model Coin Counter



No programming is necessary -- or possible -- on this model. Just attach it to the top of a glass jar and let it track the amount you’re socking away for that upper eyelid surgery. The bank only costs $8.00 but, then it only recognizes Japanese Yen. (1 Yen is just about $.01.) Hey, we did say it was the economy model. Leaves more for your surgery. MORE »

7. Gold-plated piggy bank.



If you are headed to Beverly Hills for your surgical rejuvenation, here’s a bank that’s more appropriate to where you are: a gold-plated piggy bank from Jonathan Adler for $130.00. Or not. Maybe just stash 130 clams in an old sock toward your surgery?

8. Bankabank piggy banks



No, these are not the lastest iPods. They are just round, soft, supremely low-tech banks which don’t require batteries. The bank can hold $75.00 in U.S. quarters. Part with 48 of those quarters and one can be yours. From Gizmodoa.com.


9. Upscale Bank



This device also has not a shred of porcine influence and is a saving bank meant to resemble, well, a bank. Or, at least an ATM machine at a bank. But get out of the habit of withdrawing money -- it’s designed for inserting loose change. And just like its grownup, real life counterpart, you have to have an access card and a pass code.

10. Bank of Life



The Jinsei Ginkou (Bank of Life) from Takara Tomy is also called the “Tamagotchi Bank” because it has a console screen that shows the virtual lifestyle of a virtual man. When the bank is empty, the man lives in a tiny, unkempt hovel. But as you add more money, the character on the screen starts upgrading his environment all the way to a virtual fancy digs and a more lavish lifestyle. (He is also looking so much better after his surgery in this stage.) It’s designed to save $850 (real time, not virtual bucks!) but you have to save with 500 Yen coins.

BONUS BANK: Because you’re reading this on a computer screen, the last of the top saving devices hardly resembles anything else. But we’re sure you’ll appreciate having it next to your computer.



This cleverly designed piggy bank looks like a giant key from a computer keyboard, emblazoned with word “Save.”

The oversize plastic computer key (4.5″ x 4.5″ x 2.25″) serves as a constant reminder to save those spare coins you found under your desk or the couch cushions. The Auto Save Bank is just $10 from Uncommon Goods.

(While you’re recovering from surgery, here’s a head start on your next round of Trivial Pursuit: Why are many coin banks shaped like, and named after, pigs? (Hint: Doesn’t have a thing to do with hogging money.) Give up? Here’s the story, dug from the dustbin of history:

Long ago in Europe, dishes and cookware were made of a dense orange clay known as “pygg.” When people saved coins in jars made of the clay, the containers became known as “pygg” banks. An English potter misunderstood the word and made a bank that looked like a pig.

The rest, as they say, is history. Anyhow, good luck with your savings plan. Here’s more about financing your plastic surgery.

Researchers: Caffeine Reduces Thighs!

Don’t you just hate it when you’re holding a full cup of coffee and the driver zooms away from a stop light, spilling the coffee all over your lap? Can’t you sue the seller of the coffee or the car manufacturer for something like that?

Sure, the coffee is scorching and makes you look funny when you get to work but that spilled coffee -- or at least the caffeine in the coffee -- just could be a blessing in disguise

Here’s why: Brazilian researchers studied a type of cream containing seven percent caffeine rubbed onto the thighs of 99 women twice daily for 30 days. At the end of the test, the researchers measured the womens’ thighs and found 80 percent had reduced their upper and lowers thighs. An unexpected bonus finding: 68 percent also reduced their hips.

(We are not making this up! Read the scientific article in the Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology.)

This has to be truly groundbreaking research! The high-priced coffees we drink in the United States must be somewhere around 75 or 80 percent caffeine. So the obvious no-brainer application is to let the coffee cool, ask your friend to pull over, get out and apply the coffee directly to your thighs. U.S. coffee sales will skyrocket once the word gets out!



Meanwhile, Professor Omar Lupi, M.D., Ph.D. of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro had some bad news we must unfortunately deliver, much as we dislike bearing woeful tidings: Alas, the cream did not work on cellulite. “The caffeine cream may help women who want to look thinner, but exercise is still the best way to go,” says Professor Lupi.

Until more people pick up on the caffeine thing, read what plastic surgeons can do for thighs.

Got a Bald Patch? See Your Dentist!

Researchers at the University of Granada in Spain have found the bald patches on both women and men might be because of bad dental health.

Known to doctors as Alopecia, the hairless spots usually occur on the scalp, beard or eyebrows. The malady affects one of every 1000 people.

Wrote Professors Jose Antonio Gil Montoya: “The typical pattern is one or more round bald patches appearing on the scalp, beard or in the eyebrows or to undergo loss of eyelashes.”

Researchers say this is the first time a relationship between dental disease and hair loss has been established. Read more.

One of the least known -- but very popular -- plastic surgery procedures is hairline lowering for women. It happens when a woman’s hair line recedes and shows too much forehead. Read more.

Many plastic surgery patients are also concerned with their eyelashes. Some are transplanted. Read more about eyelash transplants.

Top 10 Hospital Chart Goofs

Taken from Actual Hospital Charts Entries
Physicians have a lot to do and make the occasional mistake. Besides, unless you have a Ph.D. in deciphering doctors’ handwriting, how are you supposed to know for sure what notes they have entered onto charts?



Anyhow, here are a few gems pulled from various hospital charts, as best as we could make them out, anyhow.

10. She is numb from her toes down.

9. While in E.R., she was examined, X-rated and sent home.

8. Patient’s medical history has been remarkably insignificant with only a 40 pound weight gain in the past three days.

7. Discharge status: Alive but without my permission.

6. She has no rigors or shaking chills, but her husband states she was very hot in bed last night.



5. The patient refused autopsy.

4. Patient has two teenage children, but no other abnormalities.

3. Skin: somewhat pale but present.

2. The patient has no previous history of suicides.

1. Lab tests indicated abnormal lover function.

(Courtesy of Alex Denes, M.D.)


Quote of the day: “You may not be able to read a doctor's handwriting and prescription, but you'll notice his bills are neatly typewritten.” Earl Wilson.

Can “Miracle” Plastic Surgery Tape Beat Actual Surgery?

We recently found a likely alternative to expensive and time-consuming plastic surgery in the form of inexpensive beauty tape. For only $14.95 a roll, (plus a small charge for delivery right to your doorstep) the smart consumer can him-or-herself apply a secret formula tape that literally strips away the years, according to information about the tape.

To scientifically test it for our readers, Chas., chief correspondent for your humble blog, was volunteered for the experiment.
Chas. has a 28-year-old son going on about, oh, 11 or 12, so there are considerable, deep worry lines on his, Chas.’s, forehead. Lots of tape there.

He is also an editor who reads and writes tiny lines of print all day so he squints all the time. More tape on and near the eyes.
Chas. has additionally -- and unwisely -- spent far too much time in the sun, so lots and lots of tape goes on his mid face. And just in case anything else threatens to droop or sag, we carefully followed the instructions and put generous amounts of the plastic surgery tape everywhere else to insure a completely positive patient outcome.

Before.
Chas. as he normally looks.



During.
Our subject has been instructed to keep the special tape in precisely determined positions for exactly 20 minutes to obtain the maximum possible cosmetic results. He reported little to no pain while wearing the tape.



After.
Voila! Look at the difference! The tape has magically swept away 25 years! Is not life in a highly technological society a wondrous, amazing thing?

Outcome

So, does the plastic surgery tape really work? Should we recommend it to our many readers who are also interested in surgical rejuvenation? As well as saving time and money? Of course, we would not be so bold as to skew the outcome by judging our own test.

So we organized a panel of 10 highly placed expert plastic surgeons -- representing almost 300 years of higher education and a combined I.Q. of 14,000 -- to study all the data in question, analyze the pictures and draft a carefully considered and worded analysis to officially judge our test.

They wrote: “Would you people also buy the Brooklyn Bridge on the Internet?”

(O.K., time to ‘fess up. You’ve been had! Thanks for bearing with us, but the “after” picture was actually taken 25 years ago when our subject was a junior in college. I know it’s hard to believe, but the tape did not do a thing except slim down our wallet.)

Top Five Clubs for People who Want Cheap Plastic Surgery

On almost a daily basis, wannabe plastic surgery patients are told to check the credentials of a cosmetic plastic surgeon BEFORE the operation.

A carefully conducted, highly scientific nation-wide survey done at these cut-rate surgery offices has revealed many of these bargain hunting patients also belong to the same social clubs. Imagine the coincidence!

Below are the top five clubs for people who pick the cheapest surgeon.

Club Number 5: The Oxford Dangerous Sports Clubs

Club members are the people who started extreme sports in the 1980s and 1990s by skiing down Swiss ski slopes in bathtubs, stepladders and, in one case, a grand piano, all attached to skis. These club members could generously be described as “action junkies.”



Club Number 4: The Dallas Bonehead Club

For the last 86 years, the Dallas Bonehead Club makes an annual award to the person who most clearly lives up to the ideals of the club.

The most famous award was to Larry Walters, the California man who attached an aluminum lawn chair to 43 helium balloons and sailed the contraption to 16,000 feet. Read more.

The Bonehead Club is a good choice for anybody who ever picked a plastic surgeon because he once did a wonderful boob job on your girl friend’s cousin’s aunt. Or maybe it was one of the aunt’s friends. Whatever.


Club Number 3: The Flat Earth Society

Members of this club claim to have solid scientific evidence that the world is flat as a board. They can also prove Columbus used mirrors to convince his sponsors about the round earth myth.

Most Flat Earthers believe that cosmetic surgery is only for the vain, selfish and super ego-centered and that rejuvenation surgery will never catch on with the general public.



Club Number 2: The Procrastinator’s Club of America

Its four thousand members celebrate Christmas in July and protested the War of 1812 in 1970. Membership is open to anybody who does not fill out and return their application too quickly.

(Motto: if procrastination were bad, they would not have the “pro” before the “crastination.”)

The Procrastinator’s Club is perfect for people who look at their faces in the mirror and then say “ouch!” Next, they think about going to a plastic surgeon for an initial consultation for at least ten years. If they do put money down on the procedure, they back out at the last moment.



Club Number 1: DENSA

The top club for people who want the cheapest plastic surgery possible is DENSA (It stands for “Diversely Educated, not Seriously Affected”) Society.

DENSA takes anybody with any I.Q., especially people who have been rejected by MENSA, the organization for very bright people.

People who join this club do what you would expect from a low I.Q. club: they pick any old cosmetic surgeon from the T.V. or radio, skip the part about reading the surgeon’s medical credentials and just hope they will look better afterwards.

The usual procedure is to flip open the yellow pages, find Dr. Catch M. Cheatem, the local credit cosmetic surgeon, and jawbone him down on the price

O.K., so why should anybody go to all the trouble of looking up credentials? For one, it takes a long time to learn this stuff. Like at least 10 to 14 years. While plastic surgery is as complicated as rocket science, any med school grad can hang out a shingle that says “Cosmetic Surgeon.”

Learn more about better ways to choose plastic surgeons.

NEXT: We perform a special experiment with the “secret plastic surgery tape” that claims it will do everything surgery will do -- at a fraction the price!

English Women Paint Plates with Bare Breasts

Ha! And you thought that breast plates were something that Roman soldiers wore on their chests. Not any more.

There’s a new way to make a breast plate. And some of the proceeds go to charity. In Country Durham, England, women at Buttercups Ceramic Studio splash paint on their breasts, press an ordinary plate to their chests and then design some type of figure around the imprint.

Actually, it’s all innocent because the bare breast plate pressing is made in private -- the studio is a family centered facility with lots of kids around. A finished plate costs 12 pounds ($24.80) with three pounds being donated to the fight against beast cancer.

Common plate designs include Pandas, owls, the front of cars, twin cherries, bumble bees, well, you get the idea -- anything that seems to have a pair of wide set eyes.

Here is an entirely G-rated video showing how a breast plate is created: http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/audiovideo/news/index.var.10153.0.0.php


Intrepid Northern Echo reporter Lauren Pyrah
with her finished breast plate.

Study: Wireless Gizmo Helps You Lose 3 Times More Weight

One of the fastest growing surgeries is the body shaping procedure that removes excess skin because the patient has lost some serious weight -- often, 100, 150 or more pounds. Doctors know it as MWL -- Massive Weight Loss.

MWL patients lost so much because each had his or her stomach stapled into a smaller pouch that holds very little food. The procedure reduces a stomach from the size of a football to the size of a tennis ball.

But a new wireless gadget could make both those operations passé.

A new study at Germany’s Magdeburg University reveals that subjects who wore an
ApierMotion activity sensor tripled their weight loss. Read more.

The device records the subjects’ movements, calories and weight and wirelessly sends the vital information to the professor overseeing the test.

If the professor sees too much sloth or mindless eating, he calls the subject and gets him or her back on the straight and narrow. And don’t forget -- this professor is a no-nonsense German. Ein-Zwei! Ein-Zwei! Ein-Zwei! Watch Sunday Football? Nein!! Eat Deserts? Verboten!! Beer? Niemals!! Choo will work-work-work.!!

The three-month study observed seventy-one families; 20 wore the monitoring device and enjoyed the weight loss so much they forgot all about catching up with the professor in a dark alley somewhere.



ApierMotion activity sensor tells your workout guru exactly how much, when where and if you are getting exercise.

New Mirror Shows Your Future Look (Probably!)

The mirror has probably driven more people to the offices of plastic surgeons than anything else except reunions and weddings.

But if you hate looking in the mirror now, just wait a few years.

Soon, you can see what your reflection looks like a quarter or half century into the future. So, maybe you can use the mirror to get an idea when to schedule some cosmetic plastic surgery. After all, you never know how far in advance your favorite plastic surgeon is going to be booked!

It works like this: cameras are mounted all through your home. They see you when you’re naughty and nice and while you are:

• puffing away on cigarettes


• pigging out on twinkles, cookies and colas


• having beer and chips for dinner


• living on the couch

(Remember, we make up nothing around here! Read the report for yourself.)

Next, the high-tech gizmos process all that information through special computers, add what your parents look like and plaster a picture of what you are very likely to look like on your mirror, given known aging patterns and your current habits.

Say, you haven’t quite dropped the cigarette habit. You get up one day and say “Mirror, mirror on the wall,…” or whatever and presto! There, before your unbelieving eyes is you, 30 years later, gray and haggard from smoking and coughing.



On the other hand, those cameras also see you eating well, getting proper sleep, lacing up your running shoes and carrying your gym bag out the door four or five times a week.

In that case, when you go to the mirror, the future image popping up next to your current self is slim and trim, has rosy cheeks and just a little gray hair. Older, but probably kinda distinguished and very, very healthy.

Stop and think. What will your reflection show in 2032? If you have unhealthy habits or choose the wrong plastic surgeon, it could be something like the picture below! Yes, be afraid! Very afraid!



Do you suppose we will still say YIKES! then?

Top Ten U.S. Cities for Plastic Surgery

A recent Forbes Magazine recently counted the number of top plastic surgeons in large U.S. cities and compared them to the population. Read more.

The survey turned out differently than what you are probably thinking. Beverly Hills, often consider the Mecca of global plastic surgery, does not lead the list.

The only surgeons counted in the article are board certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery. So cosmetic surgeons were not included. What’s the difference between the two types of surgeons and the work they do? Read about it here.

Here are the top ten:
1. Salt Lake City

There are six plastic surgeons per 100,000 people there. 45 plastic surgeons live in Salt Lake City.

2. San Francisco

The city by the Bay has 5.4 plastic surgeons per 100,000 population. That means 175 surgeons do the work.

3. San Diego,

With 115 plastic surgeons in San Diego, the numbers crunch to 5.2 surgeons per 100,000 citizens.

4. San Jose, California

The silicone valley town has 5.2 plastic surgeons per 100,000 people. 70 plastic surgeons handle the rejuvenations.

5. Miami, Florida

Even though the wacky T.V. show Nip/Tuck started in Miami, there are 5.2 board- certified, very non-wacky surgeons per 100,000 citizens. 218 plastic surgeons live in Miami.

6. Louisville, Kentucky

Forty one plastic surgeons live in Louisville which boils down to 4.4 surgeons for every 100,000 people.

7. Nashville, Tennessee

Same again. With 48 plastic surgeons in and around Nashville, there are 4,4 surgeons per 100,000 population.

8. Virginia Beach, Virginia.

With 51 plastic surgeons, the population of Virginia Beach offers 4.1 surgeons to every 100,000 people.

9. New York, N.Y.
A whopping 591 plastic surgeons have set up shop in the Big Apple but The City is so big, it boils down to 4.1 plastic surgeons for every 100,000 New Yorkers.

10. Los Angeles

Gotcha! You probably thought fad crazy Los Angeles would lead the list! Actually, the 384 plastic surgeons living and working there creates a ratio of 4.1 surgeons to do the heavy lifting for every 100,000 Angelinos.

The White Smile Diet

An English study is something you can use daily, according to The British Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry which has developed an eating regime known as The While Smile Diet. The routine promises to keep your pearly whites more pearly. The Academy claims eating more of the foods listed below can keep your “gnashes” (British slang for “teeth”) gleaming instead of gray.

Thus, just consume more of the following:

• More raw veggies. They help remove surface stains on your teeth. (Besides, no cooking is involved!)


• Strawberries also help whiten your gnashes.


• Avoid stain producing foods and drink, most notably:




• Coffee and tea


• Red wines


• Cola soft drinks


• Blueberries




• Drink from a straw and let liquids bypass your teeth.
  (Does that mean you can have coffee, tea, red wine and cola drinks after all? They wouldn’t say. But, hey, if you don’t feel silly in a restaurant drinking wine or coffee through a straw, go for it. As for the blueberries, I imagine they would be hard to fit through the straw. Just use your own best judgment on that one.)


• Use sugarless chewing gum. It stimulates saliva which cleans the surface of your teeth.


• Don’t smoke. If you didn’t already know, smoking stains your teeth and is hard on your gums and everything else in and around your body. Even your plants and pets will give up the ghost. Termites have been known to succumb to second hand smoke.

For more on what cosmetic dentistry is all about on this side of the big pond, check out this section.

Also, we here in the Colonies can offer something in dentistry you don’t find very often in Merrie Olde England. You can get a facelift via dentistry !

Tattoo Removal Docs Barely Keep Up!

Newer Tats are in Braille, on Eyes and Even Used on
Fingers to Create Instant Moustaches

Many plastic, cosmetic and dermatological surgeons offer tattoo removal for those times when people regret ever getting the body art in the first place. (READ: Grew up and got a job!)



Laser tattoo removal. It usually requires three to five or more
appointments to completely vaporize the tattoo ink.

If you’re in the market, read more about tattoo removal. (HINT: You’ll burn far more time and money taking it off than that mad, crazy moment back in the day when you first got it!)

Despite that booming trade in removal, more tats are being applied and in more creative areas of the body. No longer restricted to bulging biceps or on a lady’s trim ankle, tattoos are starting to appear on eyeballs and in Braille, too. Yet another trend is tattooing moustaches on fingers.

Hey, I know what you’re thinking. What’s that part about Braille tattoos? How does that work?

Well, say, you want “Mom” inked onto your bulging bicep. Or your best gal or guy’s name delicately inscribed onto your ankle.

It’s done with a series of raised dots, just like in regular Braille. Only no ink is used. The surgeon (if you can find one) just inserts implantable surgical steel, titanium or medical plastic under the skin.


“Mom” in Braille

And that naturally leads to another one of those “Why-did-nobody-ever-think-of-this-before!” moments.

If you have Braille tats on your hand like in the picture below, you can instantly learn the name of the person with whom you are shaking hands. Just don’t assume everybody is named “Mom.!”



Can’t you win some sort of prize for outside-the-box thinking like that?

And here’s another thought:
You gotta admit writing a “Mom” tattoo in dots, saying “This is mom’s name in a red heart with a wavy wreath and an arrow through it” in Braille is going to take up a lot of arm or ankle space. Not to mention all those hands feeling your biceps and ankles.

It probably would look something like this:



But, hey, more power to them. The sightless have enough challenges in life so if they want Braille tattoos, bring ‘em on!

Removal of Braille tattoos: top scientists have carefully analyzed the issues and ramifications involved and have announced they will think of something soon.

One of the hottest new trends in Tattoos is for men and women who want a moustache -- but only some of the time.

It works like this: just ask your favorite skin ink artist to tattoo your choice of moustaches onto your index finger.

Then, say, you want a disguise or you’re at the guest of honor at the annual Moustache Convention. Why, just hold your finger over your lip.
Presto! Instant soup strainer! How easy could things be?


Removal: Put your hand down.

Tattoos on your eyeball probably would not be your doctor’s favorite choice of body art for you. Besides, it gets unsettling with the needle in the eye and all so we’ll just skip that part.



One guy getting an eyeball Tat, concluded his description about creating a tattoo on his eyeball with the following words of wisdom:

“Now that this experiment has been started, please wait for us to either heal or go blind before trying it!”

Removal of eye tattoos? No known method. Start by crying a lot.

Speaking of dots: at least one tattoo aficionado and artist had inked, numbered dots on the length of her lower leg, below. If you connect all 16,581 dots from the lowest to the highest number, the outline of a giraffe appears. Reason? She’s absolutely nuts about giraffes and has been since childhood. Plus, artists do things entirely for reasons of their own.

Unfortunately, the dots are not raised so the artwork is not accessible to readers of Braille. But with legs like that…..whoops! Never mind! Gee, I almost let loose with some highly politically incorrect male chauvinist pig sexism there. But you get the general concept, I’m sure.


Removal? Basic tattoo removal.

Top Five Weird Things that Happen to Doctors

The lives of doctors aren’t all yachts, golf courses, winter vacations in Monaco, Bentleys and high end dressing rooms for their own T.V. shows.

They actually go to work to work every day and interact with other people. So the occasional weird, embarrassing or you-won’t-believe-what-happened-to-me-today moments occur in their lives, too.

Here are the top five weird things that have happened to doctors, sent in by the physicians themselves!

1. A man comes into the ER and yells, "My wife's going to have her baby in the cab!" I grabbed my stuff, rushed out to the cab, lifted the lady's dress, and began to take off her underwear. Suddenly I noticed that there were several cabs -and I was in the wrong one.
Submitted by Dr. Mark MacDonald



2. At the beginning of my shift I placed a stethoscope on an elderly and slightly deaf female patient's anterior chest wall. "Big breaths," I instructed. "Yes, they used to be," replied the patient.
Submitted by Dr. Richard Byrnes

3. During a patient's two week follow-up appointment with his cardiologist, he informed me, his doctor, that he was having trouble with one of his medications. "Which one?” I asked. "The patch. The nurse told me to put on a new one every six hours and now I'm running out of places to put it!" I had him quickly undress and discovered what I hoped I wouldn't see. Yes, the man had over fifty patches on his body! Now, the instructions include removal of the old patch before applying a new one.
Submitted by Dr. Rebecca St. Clair

4. While acquainting myself with a new elderly patient, I asked, "How long have you been bedridden?" After a look of complete confusion, she answered..."Why, not for about twenty years - when my husband was alive."
Submitted by Dr. Steven Swanson



5. As a new, young MD doing his residency in obstetrics, I was quite embarrassed when performing female pelvic exams. To cover my embarrassment I had unconsciously formed a habit of whistling softly. The middle-aged lady upon whom I was performing this exam suddenly burst out laughing and further embarrassing me. I looked up from my work and sheepishly said, "I'm sorry. Was I tickling you?"
She replied, "No doctor, but the song you were whistling was, 'I wish I was an Oscar Meyer Wiener'!"
Dr. wouldn't submit his name

Scalpel! Clamp! Crochet hook!

To develop a new technique, Peter Lawrence, M.D., chief of vascular surgery at University of California, Los Angeles, bought a size 7 crochet hook.

However, Dr. Lawrence wasn’t knitting; he saw a way to use a crochet hook as a new surgical tool to remove varicose veins.

The old surgical methods involve some pain, stitches and time off for recovery. Lasers and radio frequency, using heat and energy are also employed along with vein stripping, tying off the vein or injecting a solution that would make the varicose vein whither and die.



This crochet hook is for knitting,
not surgery.

Using the crochet hook method, Dr. Lawrence has done 268 cases in the last two years. He makes a very small incision, reaches in with the crochet hook (which has been adapted for surgery) and snags and pulls out the vein. The incision is so small, no stitches are needed and the resulting scar looks like a freckle. Read more.

Some English doctors are using the same method to pull large veins out of aging hands but Dr. Lawrence advises against it. Many other plastic surgeons routinely make older hands look younger.

“The day may come when you will very much need those veins in your hands to insert I.V. needles,” says the doctor.

Internet Plastic Surgery Giveaways

Ever hear of “owning a piece of the rock?” Well, the same concept is being applied to plastic surgery.

Back in 2004, Linda Peacegrove, a Swedish model, suffered a personal and professional loss when medical treatments following a thyroid gland surgery left her, well, let’s just say, severely bosom challenged.



So she put up a website, asking for donations toward a breast augmentation. We would love to tell you the name of the now-404 website but it currently redirects to an XXX-explicit Web site you would not want your ten-year-old to see. (Hey, you would not want your 40-year-old husband to see this site!) And the Web site is in Sweden. Enough said?

Anyhow, Linda tossed in the towel when she only received $808 from a tight-fisted public toward the $6000 needed for surgery.

Help a Girl Fill a Sweater!”

The next Internet donation request for plastic surgery came from the United States where a 23-year-old student -- who identifies herself only as “Michel” with a 34A bosom -- bemoaned her lot and asked computer users to “help a girl fill a sweater!” and pass the electronic hat for her breast enhancement fund.

Results? The milk of human kindness never flowed so abundantly!

In about a year, total strangers donated the required $4500. After the procedure, Michel posted tasteful (READ: with clothes) before-and-after pictures on her website as an all-purpose thank you. (We would also love to mention the name of her website but in the last two years, nasty, nasty X-rated ads have been added to this site, too!) However, we have posted pictures of Michel (below) that give you an idea of the, er, full impact that random acts of kindness can achieve.

Michel shows the results wrought by her adoring public:

The bottom picture shows Michel before she started asking for donations. She’s wearing the same top in both pictures.


before

after

You may think a 23-year-old having rejuvenation surgery is pretty unusual. However, somebody as young as Michel having plastic surgery is becoming more of a trend. For a closer look at people in their 20s having plastic surgery, take a look at our CosmeticSurgery.com article, Restylane & Juvederm: New Accessories for 20-Somethings.

(By the way, we did not crop her pictures. Michel may be bold about asking for help but she’s also shy about showing her whole face on the Internet.)

After that, Nicole, another student, then 26, noted Michel’s success and publicly decried her own bony haunches by putting up a now-defunct website. Her purpose? Nicole wanted $6,000 for a buttocks augmentation, declaring her rear end was as thin as a Jenny Craig instructor in Bangladesh during famine. But Nicole called it quits after the milk of human kindness could only squeeze out a paltry $155.

Breast Implants: No Charge!

The latest and largest Internet attempt to draw on the kindness of total strangers is MyFreeImplants.com.

Here’s how it works: Women over 18 post their clothed head-and-body shots along with a two or three line bio and plea for donations while identifying themselves by first name only.

Guys -- known on this site as “benefactors” -- chip in with whatever they can afford. But first, they must shell out for “message credits” priced at $1.20 each. To send the women emails, benefactors pay with the message credits. When the donations beyond message credits are sufficient, the woman has a breast enhancement surgery and then posts thank you notes, along with more-or-less clothed, before-and-after pictures. (They aren’t X-rated but they are also pretty far from PG13!)

Eight women are posted on the home page with the amounts they claim to have raised, from $145 to $5765.

And why would guys make donations to a total stranger? Even if it is a lovely stranger? Who becomes a very well-endowed stranger? Guys being guys, don’t they ask for something tangible in return for their money?

“There are a million different reasons why men donate,” says co-founder Jay Moore, an M.B.A. who helped put up the website as a hobby. “Some expect sexy pictures, others just want to chat, establish a friendship, talk about problems and some are just philanthropists.”
The site claims five million page views monthly.


Rita Rudner

But before contributing anything, it might be a good idea to mention one of comedienne Rita Rudner’s on-point observations about human nature. She said: “Some people think having large breasts makes a woman stupid. Actually, it’s quite the opposite: A woman with large breasts makes men stupid.”

Top Five Plastic Surgeries Your Insurance Will Cover (Maybe!!)

There are at least five. Here are the most commonly done.

1.Eyelid surgery

With more baby boomers -- the largest percentage of our population -- passing the half century mark every day, legions of upper and lower eyelids are starting to sag like fleets of Mac trucks crossing rope bridges.

What your insurance company doesn’t want you to know: if your upper eyelids are starting to fall over your eyeballs so that your vision is obscured, they should cover the procedure. Average cost of eyelid surgery in the United States: $3825.

Number of blepharoplasties done in 2006: 210,000 according to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ASAPS).

Sagging eyelid

2.Breast reduction

Extremely large breasts cause back and other health woes and
will eventually cost your insurance company even more money if left
untreated.

The magic words that cause even the stingiest insurers to let their cash
flow like fountains: “I have back, neck and shoulder pain due to my
extremely large breasts.” But don’t try to bluff. You may have
to show a doctor’s report, proving the condition exists.

Some breasts are so large, the weight on the woman’s bra straps have
worn notches into her shoulder bones. Medically, the condition is known
as shoulder grooving.

The total cost of breast reduction surgery averages about $8500 in the United States. That usually covers the surgeons’ fees, facility costs, the anesthesiologist, post-op visits and medicines.

In 2006, plastic surgeons performed 104,455 breast reduction procedures, according to the ASPS.

3. Breast reconstruction

That is a four-to-six hour procedure that is usually done in one of
four ways to rebuild the female breast, or breasts, after a mastectomy.

The procedure can keep you off your feet for one to six
weeks, depending on the reconstruction method used.

As far as your medical coverage is concerned, there is simply no wiggle room for the insurance company. Current law requires them to cover the operation. Be sure and say you’ve read the Women's Health and Cancer Rights Act.

Fees vary widely depending on whether mastectomy is included.
Number performed in the United States in 2006? 56,176, according to the ASPS.

4. Hand Surgery

Plastic surgeons are highly skilled in operating on tiny bodily structures so many also perform hand surgery, usually to relieve carpal tunnel syndrome. But the surgeons may also rejoin amputated fingers or even move a toe to a hand so a person can work again.

Hand surgery rejoins nerves, muscles, tendons and bones to bring back normal function and feeling. The various types of hand surgery vary so much in costs, an average cost can’t be pinned down.

What does your insurance company need to know? Easy! You can’t work without your hands functioning properly. (That way, you can continue writing checks to your insurers!)

2006 saw 155,810 hand surgeries, according to experts.



A 57-year-old English woman shows the difference cosmetic hand surgery can make. The age revealing veins in her left hand have been removed by plastic surgery. Compare the treated hand to her other hand for a sense of before and after. We hope she likes it because a U.S. insurance company would not pay for it.

5. Facial tumor removal.

A plastic or dermatological surgeon may have to take off a dangerous facial growth -- like basal cell carcinoma -- and then transplant some donor skin over the wound.

Your insurance company needs to know the plastic or dermatological surgeon is preventing a much more, expensive condition, something that will cost them even more money in the long run.

Removing a facial growth by electrodessication and curettage runs from $250 to $500.
By excision with a scalpel, about $1200.
By Mohs surgery from $2000 to 2500.
If you have a Mohs surgery in an operating room as an outpatient, plan on about $4000.

The American Academy of Dermatology says about one million cases of facial skin cancer crop up yearly. Overall, 3.9 million tumor removals were done in 2006, says the ASPS.

HINT: Most insurance companies routinely reject the first request for coverage on almost any procedure. It’s because most people then forget about it all together.

Those in the know send a second request which is often approved, especially if you show the procedure is not to make you look better but for serious medical reasons.

Changing Your Appearance -- Japanese Style

After your plastic surgery, you expect to look younger, more rested, more refreshed and just better.

But would you want to look like, oh, say, a vending machine?

That’s doable in Japan. A top designer of women’s clothes has created a fold up camouflage sheet for wear under skirts. When you are alone at night on a dark street and feel threatened, you just pull out the camo sheet, turn your back to a wall and hold the sheet up over your head.

Presto! You’re a vending machine! Well, you look like one, anyhow. The creep goes sauntering on by, thinking you’ve vanished into thin air. The deluxe version (pictured below) has four sides for a more complete camouflaging experience.

Let’s just hope street creeps are not thirsty and try to stick coins in your eye!



The vending machine closest to the camera is a woman waiting for danger to pass. Maybe next time she should pull her toes in under cover, too! Oh, and by the way, never, never rock these machines -- even the camouflage models are top heavy and can topple over, causing injury! (DISCLAIMER: Trembling might give you away. Most vending machines stand as still as a statue.)

Club of the Month: Italy’s Ugly Club

Sounds like a plastic surgeon’s dream, doesn’t it? An entire club of people whose looks could use more than the average amount of professional nipping and tucking.



Actually, the club was started by Telesforo Iacobelli, a man with a small nose. He is considered less attractive because Italians really dig a big schnozzle.

So, every year, the Ugly Club in Piobbico, Italy, holds the Festival of the Ugly and picks a new president. Want to guess who wins? You got it, ‘ol Telesforo himself. It’s because he has spent his entire adult life fighting for the recognition of the ugly in a world that prizes physical beauty.

But here’s the secret the Ugly Club does not want you to know: the club was originally started 40 years ago for the town’s single women who felt they could not find mates because they, the women, were not lovely enough.
That might have something to do with the choosing of the club’s motto: “Ugliness is a virtue, beauty is a slave.”


Actually, the only absolute, mud-fence ugly thing about the club is the clubhouse door, pictured, below.



The sign above the door reads, “Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Here Enter!”

Whoops, that’s Dante. Wrong Italian! The sign really says, “National Association of the Ugly.”

Nip Tuck Nation? No, PhotoShop Nation!

Elf Ears = Better Hearing?

Hungarian plastic surgeon, Dr. Lajos Nagy, (now allegedly working in NYC) says on his website he surgically creates elf-like ears for people like these two supposed patients, below.

Plastic Surgery Before Birth?

Next, we read in the plastic surgery news that the latest trend in rejuvenation surgery is prenatal plastic surgery.

Surgeons are now allegedly repairing body parts before birth as evidenced by this sonogram of an unfortunate fetus with a long, unattractive nose in the picture, below.

But miracle of miracles, look at the nice nose job in the after picture. And performed while the patient is still in the womb!



What these two items really have in common is not plastic surgery but PhotoShop. All the above before and after plastic surgery pictures are “100 percent PhotoShopped,” according to Beverly Hills Plastic Surgeon Jason Diamond, M.D., F.A.C.S., a Dr. 90210 plastic surgery star in Beverly Hills.

The amazing thing is how many blogs first fell for Dr. Nagy’s hoax. Swallowing it hook, line and sinker were Plasticized; skepticalcommunity.com; boingboing.net; trendhunter.net; speeple.com; geekologie.com and metafilter.com, among others.

But eagle-eyed blog Meisters seeing right through the stunts -- in addition to your humble scribe at CosmeticSurgery.com blog -- include blogskinny.com and health.propeller.com.

Say, I’ve got a nice bridge in Brooklyn for sale and it’s real cheap, too! Any takers?