# Normal things that freak me out the more I think about them **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 21, 2002, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949 "2002-08-21T17:24:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![daere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e19b73/32.png) [@daere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/daere)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/202 "2002-09-10T05:33:02Z")
DNA - the idea that such an infinitesimally small piece of me can contain enough information to _replicate_ me. That factoid that says you swallow 10-12 insects a year in your sleep! urg! Makes me want to tape my mouth closed when I go to sleep. (Somebody _please_ tell me that it an urban legend or something!) The fact that I cannot remember some events/details from a week ago… Yet when my dad was installing my ceiling fan I remembered the _complete_ lyrics to the Schoolhouse Rock “Electricity” song. The fact that since I bought my condo I now owe the bank $100,000! eek! microwave ovens - a radiation machine - which can _cook_ things in 5 minutes and make some foods _explode_ is a common household appliance. revolving doors - _blush_ can you get pulled under? what if a jerk got in after you and went too fast? (I know, I am _very_ weird.) I am so glad somebody else mentioned sex! Who were the first people who looked down and said, “I wonder what we can do with these?!?” written language - it is only by common agreement that an “a” is an “a”… and so on… daere ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@The\_Tim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tim)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/203 "2002-09-10T07:37:37Z")
I sometimes get the other planet type feeling, as well as the looking out from the body sense. I also get this very odd sense that the world has changed but in such a way that the change never happened. What ever is now different always was and only by freak coincidence (maybe being near the change, or as far away as possible) am I even aware that the universe has been retroactively updated. Also the idea that the universe has a shape. That implies it exists within somesort of larger context that may involve an additional spacial axis (or more than just one). I try to understand a four dimensional spatial system by analogy (jab a pen through a piece of paper and now imagine some sort of thing doing that with 3-D reality as we know it) but I just can’t get a real grasp of it. The idea of a 16 points all equally appart from eachother in a shape that is related to a cube the way cubes are related to squares makes my brain enter a stutter stepping loop. Attatched to my cosmic and poor understanding of math/physics based sense of oddness is the idea that space may end. Like the concept of space may at some point just stop and after that there isn’t just no more matter and energy but no more space to be filled with matter or energy. I imagine there is an edge and that standing at it would just break your mind, though someone watching a movie of it would see cracking light and strange bends for effect. Which brings me to my final weird thought which is new. I don’t think TV is real. Same with movies. My parents worked at the Profesional Children’s School in NYC when I was younger so I’ve seen TV stars out of character and in person. There is a yearbook in my house that has a picture of Sarah Jessica Parker when she was in the fourth or fifth grade. I say this to show just how seperated the experience I’m going to describe is from my knowledge. I sometimes think that everything on TV and in the movies is as generated and fake as a computer animation. This sensation is amplified when very attractive appeal are on the screen. No one looks like that in real life. But there they are as if they were right infront of me. It is a total illusion. No one is really on TV. Real people who look like the illusionary people are paid to make public appearances. Maybve the illusion is actually another reality, or host of them, that is less muddled and more vibrant than our world. When TV and film technologies were invented they were really discovering a way to peer into that world. ---
**Author:** ![Sparrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Sparrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparrow)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/204 "2002-09-10T15:29:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Atreyu \* > \*\* > > Every once in a while, I’ll think about people living in places I’ll never visit. I’ll think about these people sometimes visiting other places that I’ll never visit. These people are born, live, marry, and die in far-off places. I will never know their names, and may never hear of the place where they live, especially if they live in a small town. And yet they will have lived entire meaningful lives. There are billions of people that I’ll never get to know, which is a shame, for I’m sure that amongst those billions are many people that I would have found absolutely enriching to know. > > And these people will never hear of me, either. We will never meet, never interact in any way. The paths of our lives will forever seem like parallel lines, never intersecting. > \*\* was thinking the other day about how our generation is really the first one in the history of the world where you need never lose touch with anyone else if you don’t want to. Now that we have email and the internet you can trace anyone you’ve ever met. But right up until only a few years ago this was not possible. You could fall in love with someone, or have family members you were deeply attached to, and they might have to travel a long distance away and you’d lose their address or perhaps they didn’t know where they would end up. And you’d lose them entirely, like as if they’d died. And you’d go on the rest of your life KNOWING that they were still alive, out there somewhere, but you’d never see them again. Like a bereavement only worse because you knew they were still alive. I got to thinking about this while thinking about all the people who emigrated from Europe to the States or Australia in the 19th century. They left for ever, and they knew (and their families knew) that they would never, ever see them again. I find that heartbreaking. ---
**Author:** ![JonTheHasher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7bcc69/32.png) [@JonTheHasher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JonTheHasher)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/205 "2002-09-10T15:54:08Z")
I don’t wonder about the first person to drink a big enough slug of nasty freakin’ grape juice that had been sitting on the windowsill for a year to cop a buzz (he was probably just really thirsty). The person I wonder about is the first guy that he managed to convince that it was a good idea. “Hey Og! Drink some of this rotten juice! It’ll make you unable to walk!” 😕 Same thing for the guys that started licking tree toads to get off. ---
**Author:** ![Alice](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/779978/32.png) [@Alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alice)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/206 "2002-09-10T15:58:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sparrow \* > \*\* > You could fall in love with someone, or have family members you were deeply attached to, and they might have to travel a long distance away and you’d lose their address or perhaps they didn’t know where they would end up. And you’d lose them entirely, like as if they’d died. And you’d go on the rest of your life KNOWING that they were still alive, out there somewhere, but you’d never see them again. Like a bereavement only worse because you knew they were still alive. > \*\* Interesting thoughts Sparrow - this actually happened to me, and it ripped my heart right out. My first boyfriend and love of my young life was from a remote area of Brazil. We met in London, but after a year+ he had to go home. He didn’t have a phone, or access to email, or any of the modern communication tools we take for granted. He might as well have been from another planet. I had a choice between following him, and losing almost all normal contact with my family and friends, or staying and losing all contact with him. The hardest decision I have ever made. If he had asked me to go with him, I would have done. But he didn’t. And I lost him completely. I have no idea where he is now, or if he is still alive, and I probably will never know. Even though I’m married to someone else now, it still freaks me out to know that someone I was so unbelievably close to is out there somewhere in the world, and I have no idea where he is, if he ever thinks about me, if he’s happy or sad or sick. ---
**Author:** ![Jervoise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d2c977/32.png) [@Jervoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jervoise)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/207 "2002-09-10T16:20:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by daere \* > **That factoid that says you swallow 10-12 insects a year in your sleep! urg! Makes me want to tape my mouth closed when I go to sleep. (Somebody _please_ tell me that it an urban legend or something!)** 'Tis a myth: [Does the average person consume four spiders per year in his sleep?](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mspidereat.html) Sleep well. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![booklover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@booklover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/booklover)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/208 "2002-09-10T21:01:42Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by The Scrivener \* > \*\* Gymnastics and figure skating, in particular – esp. on the Olympic level. These athletes begin training seriously while they’re still little kids, all the while undertaking progressively more ambitious and dangerous moves, day in and day out, for years and years, and yet most of them manage to avoid paralysis and/or death. All it takes is a single missed plant, a single leap not going quite right, or getting a bit off one’s ideal stride… Amazing that anyone can do those routines, successfully, even once. (I know, there are rare exceptions, such as that of the Chinese female gymnast who was paralyzed a few years ago in a competition, but hers was a rare tragedy.) I’ve always wondered about the casualties racked up along the way that we never hear about. \*\* You’re right—gymnastics is absolutely insane (I’m a huge fan). And they keep making the rules more & more difficult, so at some point we’re going to start maxing out what bodies can do. What REALLY scares me is trampoline—yeah, I’m gonna fly 30 feet in the air and land on my feet! ---
**Author:** ![booklover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@booklover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/booklover)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/209 "2002-09-10T21:04:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by The Scrivener \* > \*\* Gymnastics and figure skating, in particular – esp. on the Olympic level. These athletes begin training seriously while they’re still little kids, all the while undertaking progressively more ambitious and dangerous moves, day in and day out, for years and years, and yet most of them manage to avoid paralysis and/or death. All it takes is a single missed plant, a single leap not going quite right, or getting a bit off one’s ideal stride… Amazing that anyone can do those routines, successfully, even once. (I know, there are rare exceptions, such as that of the Chinese female gymnast who was paralyzed a few years ago in a competition, but hers was a rare tragedy.) I’ve always wondered about the casualties racked up along the way that we never hear about. \*\* You’re right—gymnastics is absolutely insane (I’m a huge fan). And they keep making the rules more & more difficult, so at some point we’re going to start maxing out what bodies can do. Plus, a lot of the time the general public doesn’t hear about injuries at the non-Elite level… What REALLY scares me is trampoline—yeah, I’m gonna fly 30 feet in the air and land on my feet! ---
**Author:** ![Jpeg\_Jones](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/4bbf92/32.png) [@Jpeg\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jpeg_Jones)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2002, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/210 "2002-09-10T22:14:42Z")
Someone earlier mentioned being freaked out by their body doing things on its own. Well, every time I get a charleyhorse (and it’s happening a lot more frequently as I get older), I wonder what’s keeping my entire body from just seizing up completely. I mean, what if my diaphragm or my heart decides to pull the same stunt that my calf muscle does every once in a while? Also, for a few years now, I’ve been yawning WAAAY to wide. To the point where my jaw actually pops a little ways out of its socket. What if my jaw muscles decide to just go for it one day, and there I am with a self-inflicted dislocated face? ---
**Author:** ![LindyHopper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ebca7d/32.png) [@LindyHopper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LindyHopper)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2002, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949/211 "2002-09-11T01:14:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jpeg Jones \* > **dislocated face** Band name! 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/normal-things-that-freak-me-out-the-more-i-think-about-them/124949.md?page=10)