How the Snuffleupagus helped me come up with 10 questions logical people would ask about Fictional Worlds. (Gifs Included)

So I was talking with my girlfriend last night and somehow the great muppet from Sesame Street, Mr. Snuffleupagus, was brought up. I came up with the question, how in the world does this species reproduce? The only known creatures of this species are family members of Snuffy.  He has no one to marry and so on.  He stays in a cave with his family, and according to Muppet Wiki, he is eternally 4 1/2 years old. The snuffleupagus is very similar to the elephant in size so I looked up some facts about elephants just for comparisons sake.

• According to allaboutwildlife.com , an elephant can live up to 60 and 70 years (if all goes well for the beast, which is rare). 
• According to elephanttag.org, male elephants begin producing sperm at 10-15 years of age.  

Reading about this and knowing Snuffy will stay 4 1/2 years old forever, he can never reproduce, which is a shame, but knowing he is technically immortal, it is safe to say that Snuggleupagi (I guess that is the plural) will never go extinct in the Muppet world. 

Mr. Snuffleupagus

This gave me an idea.  Why don't I do 10 questions logical people would ask about fictional worlds?

1. In Toy Story, how do the toys know exactly when Andy is coming?  Every time he says something when he walks in while the toys are all gathered together or something, which gives them a clue to get back to where they go.  But he can't always tip them off.  He had to have opened the door once or twice without them knowing when he's coming.  Just saying.

2. Speaking of Toy Story, why does Buzz play a toy when he feels like he is a real space ranger?  This makes no sense.  He talks all this smack when he's with the toys about being a real space ranger yet when a human walks in, BAM! He plays a toy.

3. In Rookie of the year, how in the world is Henry Rowengartner able to play in the Major Leagues?  As a baseball fan in Cincinnati, I know that the great Joe Nuxhall was the youngest player to play Major League Baseball at 15.  This was in 1944 (The record still stands today). Rowengartner is 12 in the movie.  When Rowengartner made his debut, it was long after MLB made a rule that no one younger than 16 can sign with a team.  So how did he get on the team legally?  Let's just not talk about it Hollywood.  No one will wonder. 

4. In Hey Arnold!can someone explain to me how he puts his shirt on?  His head is clearly larger than the collar allows to stretch. His shirt is not a button up.  This is just impossible. And how was he delivered at birth?  He can't possibly come natural out of the vagina; he must have been c-sectioned.

5. Why does Winnie the Pooh wear a shirt but no pants?  I'd rather him be topless than bottomless.  If there is a need in a fictional world of Pooh's existence to wear clothes, why give him a shirt with no pants. What the hell?

6. Why is it that no one can tell Clark Kent and Superman are the same dude?  It seems clear to me that all he does as a disguise is put glasses on.  When I take my glasses off everyone can still tell it's me, yet in his world, nope.  Everyone is clueless.

7. In Orange is the New Black, why are there never any officers in the chapel?  That's the place the characters like to get busy. No one is ever there to catch them in the act.  How can this be?  Low security or not, someone would be there.

8. In Breaking Bad, how does it take an amazing DEA agent like Hank to get suspicious about Walt being Heisenberg?  I love the show but Walt changed his appearance.  He always made lame excuses.  He started getting a temper.  A good DEA agent would notice this especially with Walt M.I.A. just plain missing for long periods of time.

9. In the Walking Dead, why do they insist on not covering themselves up with zombie odor to keep the zombies from noticing them?  This was a strategy that worked early on in season one, and they hardly use it anymore.  Why?  It keeps you from getting killed.  I don't care how bad it smells.  If your life is on the line, cover up.

10. How in the world do mermaids mate?  I know some of you out there think they are real which is absurd, but how are they mating?  They have human bodies but fish bottoms, with no reproductive organs.  How do they even urinate?

Diabetes Awareness Month, No Shave November, Least Favorite Local Athlete Commercials (2 athletes make it twice)

No Shave November

We are in the month of November and nothing says November like not shaving.  I happened to shave both my face and head on November because I was Freddie Mercury for Halloween (In the second picture I'm the one on the right in case you couldn't tell).

I dyed my hair and facial hair black and with my skin being so pale, it was best for me to shave my head and face.  Unfortunately this was on the first day of a tradition I have done for years which is to participate in "No Shave November."  I am a day behind but each day I will be taking a picture of myself, then placing all of the pictures in a video to show you all the progress of my hopefully beautiful beard.  My head hair is slow growing nowadays so I do not anticipate very much hair by the end of the month.  I know what you're thinking: "Yes! More David selfies."  You are welcome.  

Diabetes Awareness Month

November, on a more serious note, is also Diabetes Awareness Month.  Of course this is something near and dear to my heart as if you don't know by now, I have Type 1 Diabetes which is a very different disease than Type 2.  My girlfriend, Amy, brought to my attention two pictures that perfectly explain to people how different they are:

I heard this in one of the billions of Spiderman movies once or maybe even in the cartoon back in the day, "With great power comes great responsibility."  Well, my power is being diabetic.  I have this disease for a reason.  I believe in God, and God gave me this for a reason.  It taught me to be disciplined and patient.  It taught me that some things are just out of your control, but you can still contain.  I am also given this disease because I have a voice.  This will be my 142nd entry on this blog site and I have over 17,000 views so someone out there must be reading.  My responsibility is to reach out to you guys and let you know some facts about this disease.  I will start with some my sister posted yesterday:

Diabetes follows Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and yes breast cancer is an awful disease, and it kills an alarming number of people a year.  Type 1 Diabetes is a different kind of killer.  I look normal.  If I didn't tell you I had diabetes and you didn't see my pump connected to my body, you wouldn't know.  Every day though, this disease attacks me.  There have been no off days since I was first diagnosed at the age of 12.  It's there on the best and worst days of your life.  It makes its presence felt too.  If you are stressed, your blood sugar rises.  If you take certain medicines, your blood sugar rises.  Sometimes it rises for reasons you don't even know.  So what, you are thinking?  What's the big deal about high blood sugars?  Here are the effects:

High Blood Sugars

• You can get DKA, which is described below from the Diabetes.org website:

What if it Goes Untreated?

Hyperglycemia can be a serious problem if you don't treat it, so it's important to treat as soon as you detect it. If you fail to treat hyperglycemia, a condition called ketoacidosis (diabetic coma) could occur. Ketoacidosis develops when your body doesn't have enough insulin. Without insulin, your body can't use glucose for fuel, so your body breaks down fats to use for energy.

When your body breaks down fats, waste products called ketones are produced. Your body cannot tolerate large amounts of ketones and will try to get rid of them through the urine. Unfortunately, the body cannot release all the ketones and they build up in your blood, which can lead to ketoacidosis.

Ketoacidosis is life-threatening and needs immediate treatment. Symptoms include:

• Shortness of breath
• Breath that smells fruity
• Nausea and vomiting
• Very dry mouth

Talk to your doctor about how to handle this condition.

- See more at: http://www.diabetes.org/living-with-diabetes/treatment-and-care/blood-glucose-control/hyperglycemia.html#sthash.Cs2G96DJ.dpuf

• You can develop neuropathy, which is something that has happened to me.  You begin to get numbness in your hands and mostly feet.  They begin to tingle and also very sensitive to heat or cold.  In severe cases, it can attack your organs.
• It can cause a coma.
• Kidneys can shut down or begin to not work properly.

These are just a few of the many effects high blood sugars can cause, especially over time.  Doctors moderate your blood sugar levels through a blood test called a hemoglobin A1C which shows basically an average number your blood sugar was over a 3 month span.  Speaking of blood sugar levels, a normal person's blood is between 60 and 120.  I diabetic person's levels would come in higher than that.  High blood sugars have a long term effect on you and in Lehman's terms, eventually kill you.  Low blood sugars also can have a very negative effect on you short term.  If you over correct with insulin, your body could get sweaty and shaky.  I know I sweat like a monster when I'm low.  My eyes also have trouble seeing things in real time.  I have also passed out twice from low blood sugars.  Many people go into seizures from extremely low blood sugar levels.  

This is why it is so difficult for us diabetics.  There are consequences if you go too high or low, but we are human.  There are good days and bad days.  Sometimes we don't feel like doing it that day, or sometimes we forget to program in a meal or we don't feel good, but we suffer consequences for those days.  Diabetes is a serious and fatal disease that needs just as much awareness as any cancer or AIDS or any other disease.

My favorite charity for Type 1 Diabetes is JDRF and here is their website: http://jdrf.org/.  You can show your support by making a video on their site which I will be participating in and also changing your profile pic on any social media site to this below:

Read more about my struggles with diabetes at the below links:

• http://davidbrooks1985.blogspot.com/2014/09/20-things-only-juvenile-diabetics-will.html
• http://davidbrooks1985.blogspot.com/2014/05/diabetes-my-battles-please-donate-to.html
• http://davidbrooks1985.blogspot.com/2013/11/i-have-peripheral-neuropathy-and.html
• http://davidbrooks1985.blogspot.com/2013/01/my-first-week-with-diabetes-and-price.html
• http://davidbrooks1985.blogspot.com/2011/11/patrice-oneal-his-battle-with-diabetes.html

Least Favorite Local Athlete Commercials

Now that all the serious stuff is out of the way, here are my top 5 least favorite local athlete commercials...this list was compiled after talking with a coworker about how horrible the local Elk and Elk commercials were and it spawned into talking about Carson Palmer's John Morrell commercial which, in turned, made me come up with this list, but first here are father and son, Elk and Elk and their famous comb-overs:

5. Carson Palmer//John Morrell-Carson may have left us in Cincinnati for greener pastures in his eyes, but Carson left us this gem of a commercial that will live in this city forever.  Check out the referees.

4. Pete Rose// Kool-Aid- There terribleness of this commercial was saved by the Kool-Aid man (I have a soft spot in my heart for him) when he bursts through the wall.  Pete is ridiculous in it though.

3. Bronson Arroyo//Champion Ford- Bronson makes cheesy comments but even worse, he cusses in the commercial.  Did this actually air?

2. Pete Rose//Muenchens- Pete and his trophy wife try to help sell some furniture.  His acting and hat....both bad.

1. Bronson Arroyo and Chris Welsh//J.T.M.-The lyrics are bad; the acting is worse.  I actually like both Arroyo and Welsh but when you are first of all promoting J.T.M. which is awful with a bad song, and an awkward mustached sad man, you get to be my least favorite commercial.

20 things a new Bengals fan should know....

Well everyone, we are in the heart of the NFL season, and we are also two days away from Halloween, so I figured I would do a fun little blog about the orange and black Cincinnati Bengals (that's the closest I could get to a Halloween theme on this one). The gif blog I posted last time about diabetes was such a big hit, I decided to do, the 20 things a new Bengal fan should know.  I was only 5 when the Bengals last won a playoff game in 1990.  I hardly remember it.  Most of my years as a fan, I've encountered very few ups before the Marvin Lewis era.   The 1990's and early 2000's were a disaster.  We suffered through the bad draft picks of Kijana Carter, David Klingler, and Akili Smith.

We had fun with Shake n Blake and the return of Boomer.

Even the bright spots, however, were still bad years. Until Marvin arrived, most of the years were rough. Marvin was a savior when he first arrived he could do no wrong in the eyes of most Bengals fans.  He would be the sports equivalent to a messiah if he could just get the team to 8-8, and I'll be damned if he didn't do that.

He flirted with making the playoffs in his debut year of 2003, but ultimately fell short.  That year, he did draft Carson Palmer, who learned on the sidelines, and in 2005, Marvin took the Bengals back to the playoffs.  That became the Kimo Von Oelhoffen game where the 3 seed Bengals were upset by their rival, and ultimately the Super Bowl champions, Pittsburgh Steelers.  Von Oelhoffen, a former Bengal, actually rolled over the the leg of Palmer, tearing up his knee after he completed a 60+ yard pass to the late Chris Henry.  The Bengals since that game, have gone back to the playoffs in 2009, 2011, 2012, and 2013 losing in their first game each time.  During the Marvin era, we again had fun with Chad Johnson's celebrations, and TJ's tds, but that faded into disappointing seasons and Carson decided to leave.

With Dalton and Green drafted in the lockout year of 2011, their luck turned right back around where they made the playoffs for three straight years, but still as I stated earlier, lost each time. Sorry about this long intro to the list.  I could have actually written for hours longer, but I'd like to get to my list, so without further adieu, here are the 20 things, in gif form, a new Bengals fans should know:

20. Your team will draft superb athletes (sarcasm), like Andre Smith in the 2009 draft.

19. Your team will get used to left handed throws from their quarterbacks, like Gus Frerotte's left handed interception (he's right handed) to the rival Browns.

18. When you finally have hope a former teammate, playing for the hated Steelers, will come and crush your dreams of winning a playoff game.

17. Don't ever get used to your team getting a big-name free agent.

16. Get used to players showing up more on your police scanners and arrest sheets than in the stat sheets, unless of course, it's missed tackles.

15. Don't watch games when Bengals play in prime time, because we all know they don't show up for big games. Just ask Kevin Huber, who got his collarbone broken in a 2013 Sunday Night Football game where the Bengals got routed by the Steelers.

14. Speaking of punters, you better have a good one, because when your team isn't turning the ball over they will be punting, especially in the late 90's.  Field position baby.

13. Plan on your team disguising how bad they are by proposing to cheerleaders after scoring.

12. Be ready for your most famous fan to be the legendary Bootsy Collins.

11. Be ready for heart break season.  Some say it's before Christmas.  Not in Cincinnati, they break your hearts on Wildcard Weekend in January.

10. Get ready for everyone to refer to your team as the Bungles. Yes it's old, yet people still think it's funny and original.

 
9. Especially in the 90's this one was the case.  Expect to do something else when the Bengals' play at home on Sundays.  The game will be blacked out.

8. Expect that they will never fire the messiah, Marvin Lewis. No matter how bad he does, he is still better than before--- on the bright side.

7. Expect gray hair....trust me on this one.

6. If your like me, expect to be angry all week after a tough loss (one of the many problems with there only being one game a week, you sweat a loss wayyyy too long).

5. You will be excited when you realize they at least aren't the Browns or Steelers (sorry for the cliche piss on Browns image).

4. You will have glimpses of glory when players like Corey Dillon break records (and then they leave angry at the organization, but we are only focusing on positives).

3. Get used to players quitting on your team.

2. Your team will ruin superstar athletes' careers like Bo Jackson, and ignite other superstars like Brett Favre.

1. When all else fails, we have to rely on a ginger to attempt to lead us to the promised land.

Those are my 20.  And I know over the years there will be more, and after all of this, I am still a fan and I root for my team through thick and then and I love the Bengals.  They do frustrate me from time to time but I wouldn't want to be a fan of any other team.

20 Things Only Juvenile Diabetics Will Understand

Hello everybody, I've seen a few of these types of lists floating around the internet, so I thought I'd do my own.  This is for only diabetics to understand, specifically type 1 diabetics.  If you are not one, maybe this will help you understand our frustrations better.

1. When your blood sugar is feeling low.

2. When your blood sugar is high.

3. When someone tells you what you can or can't eat.

4.When putting in your site hurts.

5. When someone doesn't know the difference between type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

6. When you need sugar bad.

7. When others stare at you while changing insulin in public.

8. When you are happy your blood sugar is in range.

10. The lazy days where you don't feel like being diabetic.

11. When people say diabetes isn't that severe of a disease.

12. The day you are diagnosed with juvenile diabetes.

13. When you forget to set your bolus.

14. When it's time to see the doctor and you know you will get yelled at for not checking your blood enough.

15. When your blood is high and you are dying of thirst.

16. When you don't feel well but want to act normal.

17. When people tell you repeatedly to check your blood and you don't feel like it.

18. When someone acts to be an expert on diabetes when they are not.

19. Every morning you wake up after having diabetes for a long time.

20. When people say Diabeetus instead of Diabetes.