15 Answers To Things You've Always Wondered About

There have got to be a few things in life you've always wondered about. I'm not necessarily talking about the answer to life (42) or anything big picture like that, I'm talking about small things you encounter in your daily life. Like when you take a shower that lasts way too long and your fingers become pruney - why is that? I thought it maybe had something to do with absorbing the water, but I've never been quite sure... until now.

Here are 15 answers to things you've always wondered about (including why your fingers prune in the shower):

1. If our blood is red, why are our veins blue?

No matter what people try to tell you, our blood is always red. So why do our veins look blue?   
Well, first of all, you need to know that blue light and red light have different wavelengths, and consequently are absorbed and reflected differently. Red light (620-750 nm) penetrates the skin more readily than blue light (450-495 nm) does. Veins look blue because although the blood is still red, blue light is also reflected. The veins which appear blue are actually deeper in the skin, and blue light (which would normally be absorbed) has a hard time penetrating the tissue, so more blue light is reflected back than normal. What's interesting is that more red light is reflected back than blue light, yet the veins still appear blue. This is where your skin comes in. Skin itself, not the melanin pigment, doesn't absorb much light, meaning it reflects light of all wavelengths. Even though there's more red light than blue light being reflected from your veins, your brain corrects for the red light being reflected by your skin, making your veins appear blue relative to your skin. 

2. Why does turkey make you tired?

via a rented kitchen

The answer: it doesn't. Contrary to popular belief, it's not just the tryptophan (an amino acid that breaks down into seratonin, and subsequently melatonin) in the turkey that makes you sleepy. There are many other foods that contain more tryptophan than turkey does, so why don't they make you tired too? Tryptophan, as an amino acid, has to compete with other amino acids to pass through the blood-brain barrier. When you consume carbohydrates (like those mashed potatoes, carrots, and apple pie) your body releases insulin to control your blood sugar. Insulin also ends up removing most amino acids from the blood as well, but leaves tryptophan. With the other amino acids taken care of, tryptophan is free of competition and can act on the brain much more easily. 

Short answer? Tryptophan + carbohydrates = nap time. 

3. Why can't you hear a singer's accent in a song?

via giphy

Without hearing the Spice Girls in an interview, you probably wouldn't have guessed they were British (unless you took a look at their outfits!). This has everything to do with phonetics and cadence. Singers who speak with an accent are forced to change which syllables they stress and elongate their vowels to fit with the music, resulting in a more neutral sound. Incidentally, the American accent is fairly neutral, which is why the singer ends up sounding American to us.

4. Why do we crave greasy food when we're hungover?

via Boston Foodie Blog

Almost everyone craves a big ol' plate of greasy food after a night of drinking, but why? It's high in fat, high in calories, and you'd probably never eat it any other time. The reason behind this craving is a neuropeptide called galanin. Galanin increases appetite for fat, and is released when you consume fats or alcohol. Since alcohol consumption stimulates the liver to produce more fatty acids, it may be that galanin production is triggered by the increase in blood triglyceride levels. 

5. Why is the drinking age 21?

via Brookston Beer Bulletin

You can thank the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 for this one. So while it's largely up to each state to decide their legal drinking age, this law told these states that they had to enact a minimum drinking age of 21 or else they would lose 10% of their highway funding. Since no state wanted to give up that funding, that means that no one under the age of 21 can legally purchase or publicly possess alcohol.

6. What's the difference between "&" and "and" in movie credits?

via Movies

The ampersand (&) means that two writers worked together to write the script, whereas "and" means that one writer rewrote the others' work.

7. Why can't we decide if tomatoes are fruits or vegetables?

via Wikipedia | flickr / fir0002/flagstaffotos

It looks like a vegetable, but it's classified as a fruit. Or is it the other way around? The tomato is technically a fruit since it protects and contains the seeds of its plant, but according to a Supreme Court ruling, it's classified as a vegetable. Why? The Tariff Act of March 3, 1883 required a tax to be paid on imported vegetables, but not fruit, and they didn't want any tomato farmers going untaxed.

8. Why do we say "cheese" when we get our pictures taken?

via giphy | YouTube / Pleated-Jeans Youtube Channel

The origin is unknown, but when you say "cheese," the act of saying the word causes the corners of your mouth to lift up, your cheeks to lift, and you show off a toothy grin.

9. What is it about showers and creative thoughts?

via First to Know

Our best ideas come to us in the shower because it's a mindless task. Since your shower routine doesn't require much thought, it frees your mind to wander and think of something else.

10. Why is the sky blue?

via tumblr / cuandotodocae

Much like our veins appear blue, it has everything to do with wavelengths and blue light. Blue light scatters more than the other colors in the spectrum because it travels as shorter, smaller waves.

11. Why do different languages call countries by different names?

via World Maps

Most of us know Germany as, well, Germany. But to the Germans, they known their homeland as Deutschland. The simplest explanation is that languages predate countries, sometimes by centuries. So when small settlements joined together to create countries like Germany, there were multiple names for the region, depending on the language. It's all in who you know.

12. Why do our fingers get wrinkly in the shower?

via Wikipedia | flickr / fir0002/flagstaffotos

Scientists have figured out why our fingers and toes get wrinkly during bathtime. It actually has nothing to do with absorbing the water, and everything to do with improving our grip on things underwater. Think of it like the treads in a tire giving a much better grip in slippery conditions. The human body is amazing.

13. Why does the letter U almost always accompany the letter Q?

via flickriver / Leo Reynolds

The reason for this pairing is because QU is a digraph, which is a pair of letters that represents a single sound. In this case, it's "kw." Basically, the two are treated as a single character in the English language, mostly from borrowed words from Latin. Qs without Us aren't as common, but can be found in words like Iraq.

14. How do magnets work?

"Magnets: how do they work?" Actually, The Insane Clown Posse asked a good question. According to Northeastern University, a magnet is simply any object that produces its own magnetic field and interacts with other magnetic fields. Magnets have two poles (north and south) and the magnetic field starts at the north pole and ends at the south pole. 

via Northeastern University

So if you have two magnets next to each other, and their north poles are facing each other, you will feel them repel. And when you place a north pole next to a south pole, they will attract. If you're thinking that magnetic forces seem pretty similar to electrostatic forces, you're right. A magnetic field is simply an electrostatic field moving at a high speed, but they must always have dipoles, never monopoles. Science.

15. Why do we have eyebrows?

via imgur | reddit/u/shinyquagsire23

You have to pluck them and prune them, so why do they even exist? Aside from being a very distinct feature on your face that helps you communicate, there's actually a very good reason eyebrows exist. If you've ever run for longer than to catch a bus, you know just how sweaty your forehead can get - sweat can even drip down into your eyes and cause temporary blindness. And that's why your eyebrows exist. Consider them a built-in headband!