The Big Book of Gross Stuff

by Bart King

  That’s what we call “Not Very Silent and Pretty Darned Deadly.”

  Whatever the source, if you feel the need to let some gas out, be careful. Very careful! You see, your sphincter is in charge of both pooping and letting gas out. So it’s very important that your sphincter doesn’t confuse one for the other!

  The Seven Commandments of Farting

  He who smelt it, dealt it.

  He who hot boxed it should detox it.

  He who rejected it, ejected it.

  He who denied it, refried it.

  He who contradicts it made the butt bongo mix for it.

  He who disowned it should atone for it.

  He who declined it, land-mined it.

  Good News!

  Your sphincter is pretty good at telling the difference between solid poop and gas. Without it, you’d potentially poop your pants every time you passed gas.

  Bad News!

  Your sphincter is not very good at telling the difference between liquid poop and gas. So if you have diarrhea, and you think you need to pass gas, you might want to go to the bathroom. Do not tempt fate! You’ve heard the old expression “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire”? Well, where there’s gas, there’s feces. And if you gamble and lose, you’re going to be REALLY unhappy!

  Any way you look at it, you’re going to have gas. If you prefer to hold it in, that’s fine, but it will come out eventually. And then it will reek even more! How big, long, and stinky your bombs are depends on how long you’ve been holding them in and what you’ve been eating. While everyone’s body reacts to food in different ways, there are definitely some choice items that will get your bacteria percolating:

  If you want to decrease your own gas, try to avoid eating large amounts of these foods. Another possibility is making use of commercial products like the one named “Subtle Butt.” This comes in the form of two adhesive strips that you stick inside your underwear. Subtle Butt will then trap and eliminate the odor from any pongs or butt bongos. (It will not muffle sound, however.) Three cheers for “discreet antimicrobial carbon technology”! (Okay, how about two?)

  FoodSoundReaction from Others

  red meat Flubbety “Why? Why? Why?”

  beans Plbbp! “Now do you feel at home?”

  bell peppers Flomp “I think you just sat on a chair rat.”

  broccoli Pooooot “Are you okay?”

  Brussels sprouts Phlunk “Something seems to have crawled into your colon and died.”

  cabbage Schlank! “Did an outhouse just explode?”

  cauliflower Proodle-proodle “Sniff lightly and let it get around.”

  cheese Shlufferj “Your voice has changed, but your breath remains the same.”

  eggs Tup-tup-blert! “Bring it up again and we’ll vote on it.”

  garlic Gwaack! “Huh?”

  greasy, fried foods Ffffffffft! “Is something on the stove?”

  mushrooms Weeee-ohhh-whip “There appear to be gnomes underfoot.”

  onions Herrrrkle “Are you wearing bug spray?”

  pears Pop-pop . . . uh-oh “Where’s my inhaler?”

  prunes Shiggety burple “Oh yeah?”

  raisins Tut-tuttle-toop! “Mommy!”

  whole wheat Freep “Home-brewed!”

  Flatulists and Fartistes

  In the 1770s, a Japanese performer known as the Mist-Descending Flower-Blossom Man entertained audiences by imitating dog barks, a water mill, and fireworks. He did this by passing gas! Yep, the Mist-Descending Flower-Blossom Man bombed loudly, and he achieved different sounds and notes while doing so. Incredible!

  But there has never been a “fartiste” quite like French stage performer Joseph Pujol (1857–1945), otherwise known as Le Pétomane: the Fart-o-maniac. As a child, Pujol found that he had the rare ability to bring in air through his rear end. He could then let the air back out and make sounds while doing so. (This meant he had to be careful swimming. The problem was that the water would go into his back end, and he would begin to sink!)

  In other words, Pujol could make butt bongos any time he wanted to, and they didn’t smell! He began working on a nightclub act. Pujol could bomb in many different sounds and for incredible lengths of time. Some of his imitations included cannons, thunder, dogs, birds (including ducks and owls), bees, frogs, and pigs. He could also use his bombs to imitate the sound of someone talking or playing a flute. To close his show, he would blow out a candle!

  Flatulence Solves Another Crime!

  In 2009, Danish police traced a criminal to a house in Jutland. Police officers entered the house, but they had difficulty finding the elusive criminal. Finally, a horrible smell led them to a closet, where they found the man hiding under a pile of clothes. “It was probably the excitement that caused him to pass wind, and it was the smell that led us to the man,” said the chief inspector.

  To offset his earthy performance, Pujol wore an elegant suit onstage. Maybe that was the important touch! People laughed so hard that they sometimes had to be carried out by nurses. Pujol almost always got a standing ovation. During his peak, he earned more money per performance than any other entertainer in Paris.

  Pujol’s modern successor is Paul Oldfied, aka, The Prince of Poots, aka, Mr. Methane. Gifted with the ability to bring air in and out of his backdoor, he’s able to play a number of tunes, including “Smoke on the Water” and “Flight of the Bumblebee.” (Legal trouble stopped him from performing the Phil Collins song “In the Air Tonight.”) At six feet and seven inches in height, Oldfield “cuts” a commanding figure onstage!

  Leave It to the Pros

  Maybe it’s just because they’re bigger and as a result produce more gas, but professional athletes are legendary for having bad bombs. When basketball player Zach Randolph was a member of the Portland Trailblazers, his flatulence was so horrible that it could stop practice. And Raef LaFrentz was even worse. The crimes he committed while the team flew to road games led Trailblazer star Brandon Roy to claim he was about ready to “jump out of that plane.”

  Animal Performances

  Herring have been around for ages, but it wasn’t until recently that anyone noticed these fish pass gas—in the form of bubbles! Researchers found that herring apparently only bomb in darkened water, and they do so to communicate their positions with each other. Passing gas keeps a school of herring together!

  Gas serves an opposite use for coral snakes in the American Southwest. The Sonoran coral snake can release compressed air in loud pops to warn away other animals. It’s sort of like a flatulent rattlesnake, without the rattle!

  Unsurprisingly, whales have the most gigantic bombs of any animal. But if you compare the size of the animal with its gas output, termites take the cake. Termite gas is actually impacting global warming! (For every human on the planet, there are more than a thousand pounds of termites.)

  Turtles usually get the nod for having the stinkiest bombs, and the loudest bomber in the animal kingdom is the donkey. The donkey’s relative, the horse, got saddled with one of the worst names related to this subject. You see, a number of racehorses have been named “Hoof-Hearted” (say it fast!) by their owners. (That is sooo immature.)

  The Power of Technology

  Back in the Middle Ages, court jesters were known to inflate pig bladders to make farting sounds. But times have changed, and today we use iPhones instead. That’s progress!

  As you know, the iPhone can be loaded up with all sorts of mini-applications. And some of the most popular mini-apps are the ones that use the iPhone to make farting sounds. As of this writing, there are seventy-five of these programs. There are no doubt a number of people who’ve bought an iPhone just to have a high-tech Whoopee cushion.

  The application called the iFart Mobile makes sounds called Burrito Maximo, Jack the Ripper, and Brown Mosquito. It was the number-one selling iPhone application for a long time!

  During that time, the second-best-selling fart application was called Pull My Finger (made by a company called Air-
O-Matic). Since Air-O-Matic thought it had the copyright on the phrase “pull my finger,” it took legal action against the makers of iFart when they used the phrase in a marketing campaign.

  I’m not pulling your leg. Air-O-Matic thinks it owns “pull my finger”! In protest over this stupidity, I’m going to hold out for a mini-application that is REALLY realistic, like the iStink.

  The Nose that Knows

  Many household appliances run on something called natural gas. This type of gas has no smell at all! But that can be dangerous. What if the gas to the oven was turned on without a flame? Natural gas would fill the house, which could lead to explosions, deaths, and mayhem. (And it might make someone spill his prune juice.)

  To avoid this problem, the gas company adds a tiny amount of a certain odor to natural gas. The smell is called methyl mercaptan, which is a fancy way of saying it smells like rotting meat. And that definitely gets people’s attention!

  If you don’t want to hassle with mini-applications, get a balloon instead. Now get out a funnel, some vinegar, and a box of baking soda. Since you’re finding all these supplies in the kitchen, set up by the sink. Using the funnel, get about a quarter cup of baking soda in the balloon. Now pour a bit of vinegar in and squeeze the balloon’s neck closed. Let the gas build up inside, and then gently open the balloon’s neck a bit. Experiment for optimal disgustingness.

  borborygmus: The rumbling, gurgling noise that gas and fluids make in your intestines. “Dude, I didn’t bomb. That was merely borborygmus.”

  Burping, Belching, and Eructation

  Your skin can burp. Criss Angel told me so!

  The magician had eight giant fish hooks embedded in the skin on his back and legs. The hooks were attached to cords. These were then lifted up, and Angel hung from the hooks for a few hours.

  Don’t ask me why he did this. It’s entertainment! (I guess.)

  Anyway, after Angel finished the stunt, the hooks had to come back out of his skin. But since the skin had been pulled pretty hard, there were air pockets below the eight spots where he’d been hooked. These spots had to be massaged until the air “burped” out, often with a nice little explosion of blood to go with it!

  But the burping that most of us are familiar with comes from excess gas in the stomach rising through the esophagus and mouth. (This is also known as eructation and aerophagia.) How can air make all that noise? Ah, that’s the epiglottis—the flap of skin and cartilage that covers your windpipe so that you don’t breathe in food or liquids. (It’s also responsible for making the “hiccup” sound when you hiccup.) So, when rising air makes your epiglottis start flopping around, the sound effect can be impressive!

  Free Fallin’

  One good thing to have when you burp is gravity. This allows only air to come up from your stomach. Astronauts in zero gravity NEVER burp. Since there’s no gravity, if they burp, everything in their stomach might come up at once!

  People consider belches gross because nobody wants to hear a flapping epiglottis. And some animals feel the same way. Orangutans use loud belches to warn away intruders. These apes know that when you belch, you’re often bringing up some nasty smells from your guts. And it’s even possible for you to burp too violently and then barf your guts up!

  Okay, I guess that last one is pretty unlikely.

  Monsters!

  You know, I’ve seen quite a few gross monster movies in my time. But there is one particular film that sticks out in my mind like an amputated thumb. It was a zombie movie that I stayed up late to watch.

  By myself.

  The house was dark and silent, except for the screams coming from the television and the whimpers coming from me. (Admittedly, I was probably too young to be watching this film.[8]) The worst part was when one of the zombies leaned forward and took a bite out of someone’s neck like it was a calzone.

  Man, that was nasty! But while I was thoroughly disgusted, I was also able to laugh a little, both at myself for being such a coward and also because I remembered some of my favorite zombie jokes.

  What do zombies eat?

  Braaaains.

  What do vegetarian zombies eat?

  Graaaains.

  Why did the zombie cross the road?

  Braaaains.

  Zombies at a protest:

  “What do we want?”

  “Braaaains!”

  “When do we want it?”

  “Braaaains!”

  How many zombies does it take to change a lightbulb?

  Braaaains.

  “Knock knock.”

  “Who’s there?”

  “Zombie.”

  “Zombie who?”

  “Braaaains!”

  A zombie, a priest, and a rabbi are in a rowboat—

  Braaaaaaains!

  Of course, humans invented (and discovered!) all sorts of monsters before movies came out. These creatures ranged from uncanny (banshees) to creepy (vampires) to old-school gruesome (werewolves). And then there are the creatures of the night that seem to get most of their power just from being gross.

  The Japanese have a monster tradition that goes way back. Together, these old-time Japanese monsters are known as the yokai—“the otherworldly.” One of the more disgusting yokai is the akaname, or “filth licker.” He eats bathtub scum. Yep, he shows up in the bathroom and licks mildew. That’s his “monstrous” behavior! But if an akaname shows up in a Japanese house to feast, it really is horrible. That’s because people in Japan take clean bathrooms very seriously!

  Another member of the yokai is the onibaba, or “demon hag.” She’s a horrible old woman who collects baby livers. Talk about bad habits! Today, there’s a theme park in Japan near the ancestral “home” of the onibaba. And one of the park’s mascots is Bappy-chan, who seems to be a cute little-kid version of the onibaba! (“Welcome to our theme park! Admission is two thousand yen, or one baby liver.”)

  But don’t get the idea that the Japanese have a gross monster monopoly. From the icy forests of Finland comes the legend of the ovda. This creature only approaches people in the deep woods. It looks just like a human; the only clue that it’s a monster is its feet, which point backward. After the dreadful monster gets to you, it will start tickling you. To death! This may be a weird way of tenderizing your meat, because then the ovda eats you. (To death![9])

  Another creepily human-like monster, known as the chonchón, comes to us from Peru. This fiend looks like a person, but at dusk, its head separates from its body and the chonchón starts flying around using its ears as wings. (They beat really fast, okay?) Then the chonchón swoops down and attacks people, biting them and sucking their blood. So it’s a vampire with a detachable head. (Hmmm, that makes me wonder where its stomach is!)

  And then there are the gross beasties that don’t look human at all. Let’s travel to the South Pacific, where a delicious monster called the taua can be found. According to the legends of New Guinea, the taua is a fish that looks like it would be good eating. But if you eat the taua, the taua will eat you! The unfortunate person who makes a meal of this fish will hear sinister laughter coming from inside him! That’s the taua, which has magically reassembled in the human’s stomach, and will begin chowing down in there immediately. (I guess a considerate human would then swallow tartar sauce to help him taste better to his dinner guest!)

  Since it lives in the neighborhood, let me tell you about my favorite monster. Its name is the sigbin, and it comes from the Philippines. At first, the sigbin doesn’t seem all that scary. It’s about the size and shape of a medium-size dog. But it has a number of interesting abilities. For example, it can suck blood from shadows, and it can also clap its ears together like hands. But what makes this creature special is its flatulence. The tiniest whiff of one of these monster farts is fatal. (Hey, just like my dog!)

  The sigbin attacks!

  And that brings me back to Japan again, because one of its most famous monsters is a water goblin called the kappa. If a human swimmer makes the kapp
a angry, the goblin will come up beneath the paddler and pull his intestines out through his—uh—poop chute.

  Ouch! What might annoy the kappa enough to do this? Let’s just say you should never pee while swimming.

  As you can guess, the kappa is strongly associated with poop. After all, this monster is known for its horrible gas, as well as the fact that it has three anuses. Now that’s almost as scary as a zombie eating a calzone!

  * * *

  [8] I had just celebrated my 31st birthday.

  [9] Note: If you touch the ovda’s left armpit, it will leave you alone. (This also works on some humans.)