Free Republic

Epileptic seizures sparked by tooth brushing 09:00 06 March 2007 NewScientist.com news service Rachel Nowak “Brushing your teeth is very rhythmic. Our idea is that it causes a rhythmic over-activity in the brain, which feeds back on itself – similar to the effect of strobe lighting on people with photosensitive epilepsy,” says neurologist Wendyl D’Souza of St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, one of the team reporting the cases. Epilepsy occurs when nerve cells in an area of the brain fire more rapidly than usual and in synchrony with one another. This causes seizures that range from “grand mal” seizures...

Women accused of hogging the mirror before a night out can finally silence their critics - they are quicker at getting ready than ever before. It takes an average of 23 minutes for the modern woman to put on her "face", compared with an average of 90 minutes a decade ago. Point of order. It may not take forever, but it certainly feels like forever - Ivan Furthermore, today's men are more patient than their counterparts of the early Nineties, and are prepared to wait for the results of the transformation. The survey of 1,000 men from across the UK,...

If you ever visit South Dakota, be sure to bring some breath mints -- it's the state where people go the longest between tooth brushings. According to a poll by Mentadent toothpaste, 67 percent of the folks in South Dakota admit they've gone up to three days without brushing their teeth. It isn't much better in Utah, where 66 percent confess to the same oral oversight. Other toothbrush-challenged states include: Oklahoma, where 60 percent of folks have gone without brushing for up to three days; and Indiana and Rhode Island, where 57 percent of the population admit they've kept their...