MAN, YOU SHOULD SEE THE SUPER-DAPPER, TUXEDO-WEARING, AND
DEBONAIR-LOOKING HSR, ALL HIGH-NOSED, STIFF-UPPER-LIPPED, AND STRONG-CHINNED, MASTERFULLY
SPINNING THE GIRLS AROUND CRAZILY WITH SYNCOPATED QUICK TWISTS AND TURNS, WHILE
EVERYONE IN THE GIANT BALLROOM GASPS ON WITH SHOCKED AMAZEMENT, but meanwhile,
back at the ranch, we’re just chowing down on some fresh and hot beef
stroganoff, with ice water, all in a small attempt to make your “I’ve just got
five more push-ups to make…five!” smile laugh a little!
“Wield your toothbrush as a penetrating sword against the rising tide of plaque!”
Fact:
There are about 20 billion dividing bacteria in the average
mouth at all times.
Fact:
There are at least 700 species of bacteria in the average
mouth, and many of them don’t have regular-sounding names.
Fact:
Under ideal conditions, like in a lab Petri dish (in vitro),
that offers the appropriate growth medium, temperature, humidity, and
dark/light cycle, and no competition from other bacteria, and maybe a couple of
other criteria…the numbers can double every 20 minutes!
Fact:
In the mouth (in vivo), where conditions are less ideal, and
even survival, there is competition from other microbes for superiority, space,
and nutrients. The microbiota, then again, may work synergistically with others
in that regionally specific biome community, through genetic exchange, quarum
sensing, and more. The notable Dr. Loesche calculated that the bacteria in our
mouths may double about every 4.8 hours!
Fact:
There are unattached and free-floating (planktonic phase) bacteria
in our mouths, (which are more susceptible to therapeutic medicines), and then there
are attached bacteria, found adhering (through van der Waals, and other forces) on the surfaces of our mouths and are frequently
aggregated and protected within the always-growing biopolymer partitions of the
microbial-formed biofilms (where therapeutic medicines for the most part can’t
penetrate).
Fact:
We splash saliva down our throats by swallowing…about a
liter of saliva a day.
Fact:
You might wonder where all of those bacteria go…do they
drool outside of our mouths when we’re sleeping? Not much, hopefully…In about a
day, the bacterial count reaches from 20 billion to 100 billion…and mostly all
of that planktonic and biofilmic bacteria gets swallowed, and populates the bacterial load
further down the gut.
Fact:
Dr. Jeffrey Gordon of Washington University in St. Louis relates
that there are ten or a hundred times more foreign bacterial cells in and about
one’s body, than the number of cells of one’s own body!
Heard in the halls:
We have only identified some thousands of the estimated one
billion types of bacteria found on Earth. The total number of bacteria now on
Earth is pegged at about 50 octillion!...
…which could be doubling at a theater near you!...with
popcorn!
May you have many…my, the wonders of exponentially exploding
interest…we are finalizing some alternate mathematical systems that, when
examined on a large blackboard and worked to conclusion, seem to contradict some
of the immutable and established facts of many Advanced Calculus Theorems
(hint…one of them operates with a negative zero assumption, and two of them
attempt to quantify the inside-out-ness of the four dimensional matrix—another
hint—the interior volume of a single point in space, trades places with the total
volume outside of that point)…I was sitting between trees on a park bench, when
all of a sudden, a large swarm of beautiful monarch butterflies flittered by, each
one with the most crooked of flight paths…smiles!