Ask Dr. Snee: Snowed in with your letters

Why, hello there, patient readers. Like everyone else in the DC area, I’ve been pretending to be snowed in by rain and two very wet inches of snow.

You know how they started naming winter storms this year? We called ours the Snowquester. Get it? Because people who live within 100 miles of the nation’s capitol only exist from one political event to another.

So, while I try to remember that, essentially, man is good (even when they name everything with puns based on terms from Civics class), I figured I’d answer a few letters. As always, thanks for emailing instead of licking envelopes during the cold and flu season.

It's not like I'm going anywhere in this pretend snow car.
It’s not like I’m going anywhere in this pretend snow car.

According to the Pauly Shore-Sean Astin-Brendan Fraser vehicle, Encino Man, a neanderthal should be able to blend into our world unnoticed except for some hilarious hijinks. Do you believe this would hold true if science clones one, or does he have to be raised in the Paleolithic and frozen for us to become best buuuuuuuuddies?
Future pool-owner/prom king

Normally, this is where I would warn you that, dammit, I’m a doctor,* not a geneticist. Fortunately for everyone in the world with an Internet connection, I wrote my pre-med thesis on Stone Age cryonics and the psychological ramifications, so I believe I am more than qualified to answer your question.

First of all, Brendan Fraser’s tour de force performance in Encino Man is what many paleocryobiologists regard as the most accurate portrayal of a thawed caveman in a high school movie, not a thawed neanderthal. Linkovich “Link” Chomovsky is as human as you or I would be if portrayed by the star of the 1999 historical action-comedy, The Mummy.

See how closely he mimics our human emotions? That’s because — believe it or not — Brendan Fraser is a modern human, or Homo sapiens sapiens.
See how closely he mimics our human emotions? That’s because — believe it or not — Brendan Fraser is a modern human, or Homo sapiens sapiens.

But you nevertheless raise an interesting question: is our capacity to form manly, yet affectionate bonds a trait inherent to all humans, or is it something that must be learned through the patient guidance of The Weasel?

My professional opinion is that the cloned neanderthal will kill us all, starting in the medical waste facility in which he has been mistakenly discarded and ending with the geneticist responsible for growing him in the first place after a years long quest to correct his egregious ethical sins.


Mayor Gloomberg is at it again. This time, he’s after my tunes. Why’s he got to be such a dick?
What’s that? I couldn’t hear the next field on this form

You can’t diminish the damage that air buds cause. What? Sorry, I can’t hear very well, which has affected how I read, write or discern humor.
You can’t diminish the damage that air buds cause. What? Sorry, I can’t hear very well, which has affected how I read, write or discern humor.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and I rarely see eye-to-eye on anything. Not because he’s an itty-bitty dollop of a man, but because he hasn’t banned wearing sunglasses at night, and that’s when I always drive through New York.

Maybe. I can’t read the signs, but I’m pretty sure it’s New York. I just drive in a straight line up what I think is I-95 and know to straighten out whenever I hear a car horn. If that’s not supposed to be how you drive, then why do they have those save points every couple of miles?

So what if listening to your music through ear buds is causing deafness? Or that, thanks to trans fats and super-sized Cokes, your average New Yorker can’t fit into their standard studio apartment? (They’re still Alabama thin.) Or that cigarette smoke is killing bartenders, servers and exotic dancers?

If the government was supposed to be in the health and safety game, it’d be written in the Constitution. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a couple of DUI charges to argue my way out of. (Why, yes, ladies: I am also an attorney.**)


There are more antibiotic-resistant superbugs than ever! How’s a new mom supposed to keep her baby safe and healthy in a world that is teetering towards annihilation?
Ripley

OK, let’s take deeeeep breeeeeeaths, Ripley. That’s it. Just caaaalm doooooown.

Chances are that you’re experiencing a little postpartum OCD, which was recently discovered to be more than just a sitcom device. Some of this is due to hormonal changes, and the rest is because being responsible for a future heavy-machinery operator is understandably daunting.

Also, yes, your baby will probably host an incurable, microscopic parasite that will reproduce and wreak havoc until all of his or her tiny organs are accidentally thrown into the diaper genie.

You are the only hope for Earth’s future, Kal-El. You, Trans-Thor? Not so much.
You are the only hope for Earth’s future, Kal-El. You, Trans-Thor? Not so much.

That’s right, not only are there more antibiotic-resistant pathogens than ever, but they’re also lurking in all the places where we look for cures:

  • Hospitals: The new one is carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, or CRE, but there’s also methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and the Magnificent Sicks — Enterococcus, Staphylococcus, Klebsiella, Acinetobacter, Pseudomonas and Enterobacter (ESKAPE).
  • The gym: Besides eating disorders and bunk science mixed in water bottles, your fitness center also hosts MRSA. So, there’s another reason to shame-glower at people who don’t wipe the seats.
  • Chicken soup: Chickens have been discovered hosting E. coli and salmonella antibiotic-resistant strains.
  • Our sex parts: If you practice the ancient healing art of pretending you’re not sick while boning, then you’re also practicing the even ancienter art of killing people with gonorrhea and syphilis, both of which are increasingly — you guessed it — resistant to antibiotics.

So what can you do? Nothing, except turn the lights on and off three more times. That’s because flesh-eating bacteria are antibiotic-resistant and epileptic. Probably.

And on that note, if I don’t see you next time here at Ask Dr. Snee, it’s probably because you didn’t wipe properly.


*Rick Snee is not, in any way, a licensed medical professional or an actor that plays one on television. His only qualifications are high school and college biology (101 and 102), reading Men’s Health (2001-2003), and a systematic exposure to almost all health hazards (1981-present), but no medical training whatsoever. He’s just really opinionated, which is good enough for blogging. To submit yer own questions to Dr. Snee, Guynecologist, post comments below or email the good doctor.

**Rick Snee is not an attorney, did not attend law school and is not licensed to practice the law anywhere.

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