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6 Lost Works That Finally Turned Up

Adrienne Crezo — Sun, 31 May 2009 04:55:38 +0000

While specific events in history have played a major part in the disappearance of many classical works of art, literature and music (the burning of the Library at Alexandria, for instance), sometimes these things are lost to time, poor preservation or deliberate destruction. And sometimes, they show up in unexpected places or under interesting circumstances, like these six.

1. The Royal House of Savoy

Alexandre Dumas, like many authors, was sometimes pressed to write something quickly for money. This seems to be the case with The Royal House of Savoy, a 2500-page story that was serialized in Le Constitutionnel in 1854. It was so good, in fact, that neither the National Library of France nor the Alexandre Dumas Museum had any knowledge of it. Two historians browsing an antique bookstore in Turin, Italy, discovered it in 1998; since then, it has been published again in France, but an English version isn’t in the works.

2. Profile of a Young Fiancée

Attributed to an anonymous 19th-century German artist, Profile of a Young Fiancée sold for a surprising $21,850 at a 1998 Christie’s New York auction. The amount seemed unbelievably high at the time, but over the next ten years, Nicholas Turner (formerly the Curator of Drawings at the J. Paul Getty Museum) and a team of respected experts determined that the chalk-and-watercolor portrait was probably drawn by Leonardo da Vinci in (or around) 1485—making $21,850 a relative pittance. However, the attribution to da Vinci is not exactly universally accepted, and despite evidence from multi-spectral photographic analysis and the work’s inclusion in a 2008 publication titled Leonardo Infinito, many scholars still doubt the portrait was drawn by da Vinci.

3. “War Thoughts at Home”

This poem by Robert Frost is a 35-line story of a woman, set during World War I. Unknown to all but Frederic Melcher, the work remained unpublished for 88 years until its happenstance discovery in 2006. Melcher—a book dealer who was a friend of Frost—donated his collection of the poet’s letters and books to the University of Virginia; the items were newly acquired and hadn’t even been cataloged when Robert Stilling, a graduate student, heard about them. While skimming through the stacks, Stilling came across a correspondence from 1947 describing an unpublished poem written by Frost. Curious, Stilling began looking through the collection and, within minutes, found “War Thoughts at Home” scrawled inside a copy of North of Boston, an inscription Melcher had deemed “really not important” in his letter to a museum asking for interesting items.

4. Trio in E Flat

Composed by Ludwig van Beethoven for violin, viola and cello in 1792, this untitled trio was partially arranged for piano, violin and cello by the composer around 1800. With only the first movement and 43 measures of the second movement completed, the project was abandoned and subsequently lost for over 100 years. German musicologist Willy Hess published the handwritten manuscript in a scholarly review in 1920, garnering almost no attention from working musicians. The first known performance of the 12-minute piece was on March 1, 2009—almost 182 years after Beethoven’s death. For the occasion, the Beethoven Project Trio were lent a 1703 Stradivarius violin and 1739 Guarnerius cello, both made long before Beethoven was born in 1770.

5. In the Hammock

In May of 1882, Swedish artist Anders Zorn took a trip to England to work; there he met Mary Smith, who would become his favorite model. Smith is the subject of Zorn’s In the Hammock, a watercolor depicting a young woman in a white dress resting in a hammock. The painting was thought to be lost or destroyed, and was known only from a photograph until it was discovered in 2006 at a Bonham & Butterfields valuation day (something like an Antiques Roadshow event). The painting was auctioned for just over ₤250,000, well above the predicted sale price.

6. With Custer on the Little Bighorn

William O. Taylor was 21 years old when he left Fort Abraham Lincoln in Dakota Territory; it was 1876, and the men in Troop A of the 7th United States Cavalry Regiment were on their way to an ill-fated battle with a large encampment of Sioux, Lakota, and Northern Cheyenne warriors. Taylor’s troop was one of three involved in the initial attack at the Little Bighorn, after which they promptly retreated. Taylor escaped and was discharged in 1877, never having seen another battle. He wrote his story and stored it in a black tin box that, following his death in 1923, was passed along and eventually forgotten. It wasn’t found until editor and artifact collector Greg Martin purchased an uncataloged lot of Custer-related items; he assembled the manuscript, wrote a forward and published the book in 1996, 73 years after Taylor’s death. It is the only eyewitness account of the Battle of Little Bighorn ever written.

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The Quick 10: 10 Ways to Boost Your Brain

Adrienne Crezo — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 19:10:12 +0000

Everyone knows that sleeping well, exercise and playing sudoku can keep your brain in shape. But there are lots of ways you can flex your cerebral cortex, and these ten are pretty easy.

1. Chase the rainbow. Eating foods with naturally high color intensity (an indication of high antioxidant content) can inhibit the progression of age-related cognitive disorders in addition to lowering blood sugar, which also improves brain function. Common recommendations include blueberries, cranberries, red wine, and foods containing turmeric, like curry dishes.

2. Go hungry—at least for a day. Research has shown that routine fasting (one day a month) activates a unique form of glucose that helps the brain efficiently transmit information.

3. Read mental_floss. Gathering facts on a regular basis keeps your brain in shape by building new circuits and strengthening neural pathways. See, you did it just then. Don’t you just love the _floss?

4. Ask Jeeves. Language, reading, and visual interpretation control centers show increased function during simple web searches in Internet-users aged 55-76. In those with more online experience, decision-making and complex-reasoning activity also experienced a boost.

5. Play along. Whether it’s Cash Cab, Jeopardy!, or Don’t Forget the Lyrics, recalling information you don’t normally use improves long-term memory, recall and reasoning skills, so shout the answers out if you know them. (I do this; everyone hates it, but I rock at Trivial Pursuit.)

6. Brush the wrong way. Doing any routine activity with the non-dominant hand triggers parts of the brain responsible for learning, memorization, and motor control. You can make your brain smarter by switching up your tooth-brushing technique or practicing your penmanship with the wrong hand.

7. Turn up the Top 40. It isn’t just classical music that can relieve stress hormones and ramp up production of feel-good serotonin (both of which improve your brain’s ability to process and store information), so listen to whatever you like and know that your brain is benefiting.

8. Ooooohhhmm. Studies of meditating monks’ brains show massive gamma wave activity (the signature of brain circuit connections being created); the study also showed increased activity in the left prefrontal cortex, the area associated with compassion, altruism and generosity.

9. Put some clothes on… in the dark; use your hands to choose your clothes without looking. Using a different sense (touch instead of sight) as your primary source of information amps up your synaptic activity, which helps you think faster. (Dress via FredFlare)

10. Get jiggy with it. Sensory integration is paramount to brain development, and no activity uses all the senses quite like sex does. As an added bonus, you’ll get a boost in serotonin, which relieves stress, increases feelings of happiness and well-being, and confidence—all of which increase brain efficiency.

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The Quick 10: 10 Celebrity Children’s Book Authors

Adrienne Crezo — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 22:02:00 +0000

Today is Hans Christian Andersen’s birthday; in his honor, IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People) has organized International Children’s Book Day to celebrate childhood reading and note the importance of children’s books and literacy. By now we all know that Madonna has her own children’s book series, but here are ten more celebrity authors you may not have known about:

1. John Travolta’s book, Propeller One-Way Night Coach: a Fable for All Ages was written for Travolta’s late son, Jett, just after his birth; it is being made into a movie, reportedly directed by Rob Morrow.

2. Terrell Owens, yes, that T.O., has a book titled Little T Learns to Share, in which a young boy struggles with being fair and sharing his new football. In the end, he decides football is no fun when played all alone.
3. Steve Martin has written a couple of very readable novellas, but I had no idea he had written a children’s book. The Alphabet from A to Y with Bonus Letter Z! is a collection of alliterative couplets. From the letter A: “Amiable Amy, Alice and Andie / Ate all the anchovy sandwiches handy.” That is so cute.

4. Gloria Estefan has a series based on her bulldog, Noelle, in which the pet goes on “magically mysterious” adventures, available in English or Spanish. She covers themes such as fitting in, self-image, and discovering the things that really matter.
5. Tim McGraw’s My Little Girl won the prestigious Mom’s Choice Award® in February, chosen by a panel of judges including the founder of Reading Rainbow and creator of Baby Einstein. Not too shabby.
6. Dionne Warwick’s Say a Little Prayer is a semi-autobiographical story about “Little D,” who one day discovers her secret talent and is encouraged by her grandfather to embrace it. The book comes with an audio CD of Ms. Warwick singing “Jesus Loves Me.”

7. Julianne Moore’s freckles obviously taught her a few things about feeling different and getting over it. Her heroine, Freckleface Strawberry, is the star of her own series.
8. Jamie Lee Curtis has co-authored, with Laura Cornell, eight books for children, covering every topic from empowerment (Big Words for Little People) to self-control (It’s Hard to Be Five) to imagination and loss (Where do Balloons Go?).
9. Anyone with siblings can relate to Ray Romano’s Raymie, Dickie and the Bean: Why I Love and Hate My Brothers. Except maybe the part where they’re called Raymie, Dickie and the Bean, I mean.

10. A-Rod may be taking a cue from his, uh, friend, Madonna. His book, Out of the Ballpark, is autobiographical, telling the story of a young A-Rod who just wanted to play ball.

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The Quick 10: 10 Ways to Celebrate the Spring Equinox

Adrienne Crezo — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 19:26:10 +0000

Twice a year the Sun sits vertically above the Equator, giving us nearly equal day and night everywhere on the planet. Today is the Vernal Equinox, or to be fair to the Southern Hemisphere, the March Equinox. Here are ten ways to celebrate with your (roughly) 12 hours of daylight:

1. Stand an egg on end. I remember trying this in fourth grade; I’m sure none of us got it to work. You can try it out, though, any day of the year. This guy can do it pretty well, and he briefly explains the origins of the myth:

2. Honor Dionysus with an altar and bread phallus. Gotta love Dionysus, god of fertility, wine, flowering plants, poetry and theater. To celebrate the coming of spring, modern Pagans offer up tables of wine, flowers, and phallic symbols made of food.

3. Watch the ball drop with Dwight Shrute. Iran, Albania, Crimea and Kosovo, among many other areas of Asia, observe the New Year on the Vernal Equinox, generally in observance of Nowruz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nowruz). Specific religions also adhere to the holy day, including the Bahá’í Faith, which Rainn Wilson discusses here in all seriousness.

4. Have a family reunion. That’s what they do in Japan for Vernal Equinox Day, in addition to visiting family graves.

5. Tell a story. Today is World Storytelling Day in the Northern Hemisphere, so take this opportunity to share stories of your family, childhood, or this years’ theme, neighbors. Bonus points for hearing stories in more than one language and at more than one location.

6. Demonstrate your postmodern views on national citizenship. It’s World Citizen Day; Superman is the only Citizen of the World that I’m aware of, but it probably wouldn’t hurt most of us to try and bridge a cultural divide or two.
7. Give your mom some love. Many Arab countries celebrate Mother’s Day today.
8. Visit a megalithic monument. You know, like Stonehenge. On the summer and winter solstices and spring and autumn equinoxes, Stonehenge is open to visitors.

9. Finally understand why the Easter bunny lays eggs. This springs (bah haha, pun intended) from an ancient Saxon tale about their lunar (or spring/summer) goddess, Eostre. The story has many variations, but generally the idea is that Eostre found an injured bird and transformed it into a hare to save its life; the transformation was incomplete, and in gratitude for saving her, the hare laid eggs and decorated them as gifts to Eostre. Alternately, the hare found an egg and decorated it for the goddess. Parts of the myth were absorbed into the modern Easter celebration.
10. Take a trip to Mexico. That’s where you’ll find Chichen Itza (one of the new Wonders of the World) and the ancient Mayan pyramid, El Castillo, where the Return of the Sun Serpent occurs on the northern balastraud every Equinox.

Quick 10: 10 Alternative Uses for Tea

Adrienne Crezo — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:40:13 +0000

Today marks the 235th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, but this list has nothing to do with that event. Where I come from, tea comes one way: sweet and iced. It serves primarily as a substitute for water (get eight glasses a day!). But there’s more to tea than that. I’ve assembled a list of ten alternative uses for tea—none of which include sugaring it up and drinking it by the gallon.

1. Make new things look old
Matcha green tea has been used to dye fabrics in China, Korea and Japan for centuries. More familiar stateside is the brown Oolong version, the tea stain or tea dye. Fabric or paper is stained with a strongly brewed tea to make it appear antique (or otherwise old and brown). You can even buy a tea-stained Betsy Ross flag for next year’s Boston Tea Party anniversary.

2. Make old things look young
In the same way tea stains your clothes, teeth and the tablecloth, black tea can be used to tint graying hair. Just brew up a few cups of really strong tea and run it through clean, damp hair; you’ll probably have to do it several times. Thearubigin formed during the oxidizing process binds to proteins in the hair, giving it a semi-permanent dye job.

3. Analyze Your Personality
This website seeks to update the old tradition of reading someone’s fortune in tea leaves by defining a person’s character by their teabag. Are you a Left to Dry, Pull-String Diva, or a Drip-Trail?

4. Feed the Flowers
Acid-loving plants (such as azaleas and citrus trees) get a big boost when watered with brewed tea. Or mix tea leaves in with the soil or simply bury teabags around the base of the plant.

5. Cool stuff off
Back in 1925, EC Davidson developed a way to use tannic acid for cutaneous burns that both soothed and cooled the skin, while the astringent properties helped prevent infection. The tannins present in black tea can help similarly with superficial burn injuries and sunburns. Just apply a cool, damp cloth soaked in tea (or a damp teabag) where it hurts. If you need full-body therapy, steep teabags in the bathtub, let it cool, and climb in.

6. Make an Old-Fashioned Eye Mask
You’ve seen it in movies and maybe at home; two warm tea bags placed over the eyes is thought to reduce puffiness and lighten dark circles. These claims have yet to be proven, but it certainly won’t hurt to try.

7. De-funk your feet
One of my worst food-related pet peeves is when I eat something bitter and, suddenly, my mouth feels dry. Pecans are notorious for doing that to me. Anyway, it turns out that the tannins in the lining of nut shells are the same as those in tea, and that dry feeling is actually an astringent effect. Using a strong tea solution to soak your feet will help eliminate odors and may reduce sweat production for a short time.

8. Do the windows (finally!)
Astringent tea is great at removing greasy fingerprints from glass. Use a damp teabag or a spray bottle filled with tea instead of your regular household cleaner.

9. Make art
In 1992, Tiny van der Plas developed a new form of origami using squares cut from decorated teabag wrappers. The papers are folded into interlocking pieces to form pinwheels and rosettes. Mrs. Van der Plas used her designs to decorate greeting cards, but creative math teachers are using the craft to illustrate basic geometry problems.

10. Give it to People who Make Art
Original T-Bag Designs in Hout Bay, South Africa is a group of artist who paint on teabag “canvas”, then turn the paintings into various gifts (like cards, mugs, and jewelry). They rely on donated used teabags to make their paintings, the profits from which support nearly 100 people. For more information, visit The Teahouse Times.

7 Historic (and Seriously Unhealthy) Beauty Practices

Adrienne Crezo — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 19:52:00 +0000

While our modern beauty regimens certainly don’t lack weird ingredients, by tradition our good looks have often been achieved at the cost of good taste and health. What deadly and disgusting things have people used to stay young and pretty? Here are a few of the truly disturbing used throughout history.

1. Bathing in Crocodile Excrement

For some reason, the ancient Greeks thought crocodile excrement had restorative and beautifying properties. It was mixed into natural mud holes or baths full of warmed mud, and Grecian lovelies hung about in it until they felt restored and beautiful (I’m guessing that took quite a while.) We don’t know how they collected it (or why they decided it was a good idea in the first place) but it was all the rage in the wealthy and youth-seeking circles. Thankfully, bathing with water was also in vogue and there are no official reports of reptile-poo poisoning.

2. Sticking Bird Droppings Up Your Nose

In the early days of the geisha, Japanese women used a whitening paste on their faces made mostly of rice flour and bird droppings. It was applied over the entire face, including the ears, inside the nostrils, on the eyelids and lips.

3. Dyeing Hair With Cow’s Blood

Hair dye has long been a staple of modern women, but ancient Iranian women also enjoyed a good dye-job. They compounded a nasty mix of henna, tadpoles, and the blood of black cows, which they applied liberally to darken and condition their hair. It was thought that the blood gave the cows their dark coloring and would do the same for human hair. Although henna is used as a natural dye to this day, the inclusion of tadpoles still confounds me.

4. Wearing Wigs That Caused Nosebleeds

The women of England have been famous throughout history for their elaborate and strange beauty routines. In the era of Queen Elizabeth, when red hair was in fashion, women used a powder made of sulfur and safflower petals to color their hair and wigs. The blend caused headaches, nausea, and frequent nosebleeds.

5. Wearing Poisonous Eye Makeup

When it comes to heavy metal poisoning, no one trumps the ancient Egyptians. Men and women painted their eyes almost daily with a mixture called mesdemet, made from a dark gray lead, among other things. Also, a green paint called udju was used, made from a copper ore. Although neither product could be considered healthy, the eyepaint that Egyptians wore is credited with repelling insects and preventing infections due to the high antimicrobial activity of copper ore.

6. Liberally Applying Arsenic Powder

In a medieval version of today’s CoverGirl compact, European women used a powder (pressed into cakes or small jars) to whiten their skin. The fashionable pallor was created by using white lead ore and arsenic, among other unhealthy-but-white ingredients.

7. Gargling With (Portuguese) Urine

Dental care was a little lax throughout most of history, but Romans in the time of Jupiter appreciated white teeth nearly as much as we do today. To improve the color of their teeth and freshen their breath, Romans imported Portuguese urine (believed to be stronger than their own) to rinse their mouths. While obviously unpleasant, urine contains several compounds like ammonia and urea that actually kill germs and help fight the gum disease gingivitis.

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The Quick 10: 10 Crazes, Obsessions and Pathological Afflictions

Adrienne Crezo — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 19:35:36 +0000

We’re all familiar with kleptomania, egomania, and maybe even a little nymphomania. Personally, I’ve run into quite a few pseudomaniacs (pathological liars) and at least three people afflicted with theomania (belief that one is a god). I’m a self-admitted bibliomaniac (book fanatic) and phaneromaniac (obsessive nail biter). But there are countless manic predilections that most people haven’t encountered. Here are 10 to sate your infomaniacal (flossy) tendencies.

1. Aboulomania: Of all the maniacs I meet, I definitely hope none of them are pathologically indecisive. There’s nothing worse than that. Then again, maybe there is. I’m just not sure. At any rate, aboulomania is a known symptom of bipolar disorder, major depressive episodes, brain damage or tumors, and mercury toxicity… I think. Yes, that’s right. Well, probably.

2. Clinomania: In the 19th century, women were being diagnosed with the catchall condition hysteria like nobody’s business; more often than not, the cure involved extended periods of bed rest in addition to any number of ridiculous treatments. This practice created a society rife with women obsessed with staying in bed, most of whom remained bedridden for months without any physical symptoms of illness. While it may sound appealing to some, long-term bed rest can cause blood clots, bedsores, kidney stones, muscular atrophy and pretty intense boredom.

3. Doramania: I used to tell everyone about my little girl’s insatiable Dora-mania. Thank goodness PETA didn’t hear me; she is not obsessed with owning furs, she just loves that super-cool exploradora. To their credit, PETA has outed many a suspected celebrity doramaniac in their annual Worst Dressed List, including 2008’s winners losers Aretha Franklin, Lindsay Lohan, and Kate Moss.

4. Empleomania: This year the empleomaniacs are running loose in the streets, campaigning night and day to ease the fixation on holding a public office. Ralph Nader is a familiar candidate for an empleomania diagnosis; his first shot at the White House was in 1972 and he has campaigned every four years since 1990, bringing his total number of attempts for the presidency to a whopping seven failures.

5. Macromania: This sounds like some kind of techno-geek babble involving things I don’t understand. Apparently, it’s the delusion that objects are larger than actual size, which I understand perfectly every time I have to try on jeans. Also known as subjective macropsia, macromania can be caused by damage to the retinas, epilepsy, and migraine headaches or by using certain hallucinogenic drugs, Alice in Wonderland-style.

6. Metromania: You may know a friend with an addiction to writing poetry that you’re hoping will either be cured soon or get a sweet publishing deal. Rumor has it that Edgar Allen Poe suffered periods of metromania, and look how he turned out. In 1849, Poe was found in Baltimore on the street, incoherent and wearing clothes that didn’t belong to him. He died in a hospital four days later (October 7, 1849) of undetermined causes, without ever regaining full lucidity. I hope your friend gets better.

7. Opsomania: The desire to eat only one kind of food is a common dietary problem for parents with small children. Medical professionals say that most children grow out of food jags within a few weeks. Not so for Andrew Foster, who ate only cookies (or biscuits, as he calls them) from 18 months through adulthood. At 27, Foster sought help for his inability to eat real food, which was affecting his health and certainly the quality of any dinner dates he endeavored. Remarkably, he is a chef. These days Foster is “trying other foods.” I’m sure his restaurant patrons appreciate that.

8. Parousiamania: What do you get when you mix parousiamania with theomania? Why, a cult of course! No doubt there were plenty of people obsessed with the Second Coming of Christ living in Mount Carmel when it was raided in 1993. Accusations of child abuse and statutory rape against the Branch Davidian leader, David Koresh, resulted in a 51-day siege of the compound and the death of 67 members.

9. Toxicomania: This can be interpreted two ways; one is that toxicomania is an extreme form of pica in which the afflicted person has a morbid craving for lethal substances, like insecticide, or my mom’s meatloaf for instance. The other definition is good old-fashioned drug addiction.

10. Verbomania: Any writer worth their salt has a little bit of a craze for words, but true verbomania sufferers speak unintelligibly, in tangential, fast-paced speech, and use overly complex and archaic language. Or they could just be obsessed with learning new words, which is arguably the more common manifestation.

List courtesy The Phrontistery

9 Weird Ingredients Hiding in Your Makeup Bag

Adrienne Crezo — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 05:40:09 +0000

Since ancient times, humans have combined strange ingredients to create personal care products. Today, the ingredients are only slightly less bizarre. Here are nine weird items you may not have known about.

1. Sodium Chloride (Table Salt)
Good old table salt is a common ingredient in shampoo, facial cleanser, body wash, bubble bath, and anything else that foams. These products are made using specific combinations of surface-active agents (surfactants), which usually require salt to reach a usable viscosity. The next time you shudder with delight while working your hair into a lather, take a second to peek at the back of that shampoo bottle and see if your friend, table salt, is in the mix.

2. Oleoresin Capsicum (Pepper Spray)
If you’re a police officer, vigilante, or really serious about self-defense, you know Oleoresin Capsicum is the primary component of pepper spray. Specifically, it’s the pepper part. Why, pray tell, would there be pepper spray in your lipstick? Well, there probably wouldn’t be (barring the possibility of a horrible, horrible joke), but there might be some capsicum in any product that causes a warming sensation when applied topically (don’t think lube—external use only!) and in many over-the-counter pain and itch creams.

3. Diatomaceous Earth (A Component in Dynamite)

Also known as diatomite, this is one of the two components of dynamite (along with nitroglycerin). DE is a silica-based powder made of the fossilized remains of diatoms, a kind of spherical, hard-shelled algae. Because the particles are hollow, they are very porous; it is even utilized in cat litter and water filtration processes. In cosmetics, diatomaceous earth finds a home in natural toothpastes, deodorant, absorbent powders, cuticle cream, and in mild-exfoliation products due to its gentle abrasiveness.

4. Albumen (Egg Whites)
Egg whites are sticky and gooey, but they constrict very efficiently when dried, and are used in skin-firming products for just this reason. Processed for purity and spray-dried for industrial use, albumen doesn’t exactly resemble your breakfast. But the next time you take half an hour to use that peppermint hydrating peel-off mask, think about the eggs you left in that pan this morning.

5. Plastics
In addition to the obvious packaging role, plastic serves as a film-former in hair gel, hairspray, barrier products, and liquid bandages. Used as polyvinyl alcohol and various other forms, plastics are easily incorporated into many skin and hair care products. Plastic keeps your coif in that perfect Flock of Seagulls swoop, makes your waterproof mascara waterproof, and suspends those little beads in your eye gel. Speaking of beads, tiny polyethylene spheres are frequently used in exfoliating scrubs. The products are generally marketed as “extra gentle,” since they are perfectly round and do not damage the skin’s surface when used in moderation.

6. Simethicone (Gas Relief Drops)
To all mommies who have lain awake with a fussy baby, this ingredient is better known as gas relief drops (Mylicon is a popular brand.) For cosmetic and industrial purposes, the generic name ‘antifoam’ is usually applied. For the same reasons we ingest it, simethicone is used in cosmetics during the manufacturing process to reduce the surface tension of air or gas bubbles, causing them to collect and rise upward. In a baby, this is called ‘burping’ and the process is identical in cosmetic manufacturing, although it lacks the distinctive noise and cuteness.

7. Urea (Formerly Extracted From Urine)
As a cosmetic ingredient, urea is a functional skin-softener and humectant, which means it helps to collect and hold moisture in the skin. And thank goodness it isn’t extracted from horse urine anymore, because a form of urea (diazolidinyl urea, specifically) is widely used in all manner of cosmetics, household cleansers and hair products as a broad-spectrum antimicrobial and preservative. (These days, urea is made using the Wöhler synthesis.)

8. Propylene Glycol (Not Antifreeze)
Commonly mistaken for its lethal and less human-contact friendly cousin, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), propylene glycol gets a bad rap. Used to moisturize the skin and hair, as a primary ingredient in “self-warming” products (this time, think lube), and to extract herbal ingredients for greater stability and efficacy than water, propylene glycol is a multi-tasker in the cosmetic quiver of tricks. While it is not toxic or harmful, propylene glycol just so happens to share a few of its unsavory relative’s anti-freezing effects; it is commonly used on the wings of aircraft to prevent the accumulation of ice crystals and excess moisture, which can cause drag and erratic flap control.

9. Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (Or, As My Granny Called It, Shortnin’)
This is the exact thing that you buy in the giant metal can, and that comes in a 20-pound brick for the food service industry. Topically, hydrogenated vegetable oil is an amazing skin-softener, emollient, and barrier ingredient. You can find it in most heavy body and foot creams, lip balms, and in some suntan products. Although the trans fat content is a legitimate reason to avoid eating it, it actually improves the cosmetic performance of the ingredient—many substitutions for petrolatum contain a hefty proportion of hydrogenated vegetable oil.

Although some of these ingredients seem out of place, the truth is that they’re pretty tame compared to the bugs and such in our ancestors’ makeup. (More on that next time.) So, what’s the weirdest thing you’ve noticed in one of your products?