PHOTO:Anna-rchy

British newspapers are reporting this week that biological psychologist Colin Hendrie, of the University of Leeds, has just completed a study showing that a woman seeking to entrap a man should bare precisely 40% of her skin. Less and you’re neglected, more and you’re avoided.

Says the Telegraph of the study’s methods:

Four female researchers… discreetly observed women at one of the city’s biggest nightclubs from a balcony above the dance floor. Using tape recorders hidden in their handbags, the researchers took note of what female clubbers were wearing and how many times they were approached by men asking them to dance… each arm accounted for 10 per cent of the body, each leg for 15 per cent and the torso for 50 per cent.

Also of note: Women who not only bared 40% of their skin, but also dressed in tight clothing and danced “provocatively” attracted the most offers to dance. Wait, what? No fucking way!

Other research articles authored by Hendrie include Evidence to Suggest that Nightclubs Function as Human Sexual Display Grounds, published this year to the astonishment of the biological psychology community. He also wrote the groundbreaking 1998 paper Evidence to Suggest that Self-Medication with Alcohol is Not an Effective Treatment For the Control of Depression.

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This morning, since it was unseasonably warm and beautiful in Chicago, I sipped a cup of coffee by Lake Michigan. While I was there, I enjoyed the company of a pleasant-seeming ladybird that decided to join me. Imagine my surprise when, sighing gently over the pretty creature, I decided to read a little about it this evening and came across the following horrifying headline from the British newspaper the Daily Mail: Vile-smelling foreign ladybirds set to invade homes this winter!

Turns out that the ladybird species Harmonia axyridis, native to East Asian countries like Japan, Korea, and China, was introduced into Britain and the United States in the early 20th century as a useful agricultural pest-killer, and has been wreaking havoc ever since. During the fall and winter, the tiny (and very cute, at least judging by the one that crawled onto my leg this morning) creatures swarm in huge numbers and invade homes in the UK and certain regions in North America. The ladybirds are just trying to get away from the cold, but apparently people whose homes they fly into don’t find that just cause for the visitations. The worst part, it seems, is that when alarmed they give off a substance scientists delightfully call “reflex blood,” which not only stinks to high heaven, but causes allergic reactions in some people when inhaled. Phew. I guess it’s not surprising the Mail calls them “mini-beasts.”

I’ve never heard of or seen a ladybird invasion, myself. Have you? If so, do tell. I’m fascinated.

So remember when everyone was all ACK! SIZE ZERO MODELS ARE DROPPING DEAD ON THE RUNWAY AND RUINING OUR GIRLS’ MINDS!!!!!!

Well the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction. And it’s attempting to flatten on Ms. Chloe Marshall, a plus-size model from England, reigning Miss Surrey (a county just south of London).

Ms. Marshall is 5’10 and 176 pounds (or so the US papers say), giving her a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 25.3. The “normal” range is 18 - 25. She’s not exactly obese - in fact she would have to be 210 pounds to be technically obese. Chloe is spoutin’ lots of curvy girl power and frankly, she’s pretty hot, so more power to her.

But one Ms. Monica Grenfell, a dietitian and columnist for the UK tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail, thinks that Chloe is a v. bad role model. If you don’t care to read the whole article then I’ll give you some choice snippets:

“It would send an appalling - and very dangerous - message to other young women that it’s OK to be fat.... Chloe is a stark reminder that obesity is now virtually normal in our society - and we should all be hanging our heads in shame.....She is an ambassador not for the beautiful larger lady as she’d have us believe but a poster girl for diabetes, strokes, heart attacks, cancers and all the other devastating and potentially fatal health problems that are caused or exacerbated by obesity. “

Now I must return to the fact that Chloe ain’t obese. Whether she’ll end up obese in later life is another question (the girl is only 17), but it is certainly not a forgone conclusion. Ms. Grenfell says that Chole’s BMI is 26.03 (she obviously has slightly different information about her weight). Whatever. While BMI certainly isn’t the be all end all measure of health, at 25.3 or 26.03 it’s clear that Chloe is very slightly overweight (by 2 to 7 pounds based on a normal upper limit of 24.9).

Of course Ms. Grenfell, the DIETITIAN says that Chloe should have a BMI of 20 - or about 140 pounds. This is unabashedly wrong. I’d expect a profession to know that. Of course this is the woman who wrote “5 Days to a Flatter Stomach.” And, more recently, “Crash Diet: Lose 7 Pounds in 7 Days.”

Oh blah. Blah blah. We can’t win, can we? You’re either glorifying skinniness, or fatness AND FOR GOD’S SAKE LET’S THINK ABOUT THE CHILDREN. The simple fact is that Chloe is a weeee bit overweight and many models are a weee bit underweight. When we start praising “curves” on a 250 pound 5’4” woman (BMI 42.9) or the “elegance” of some 5’11” chick who only weighs 95 pounds (BMI 13.2) then we should get worried.

No joke. There I am, eating a delicious lunch at neighbourhood joint Brioche and perusing the Saturday edition of the Globe and Mail (one of Canada’s nationals) and lo and behold there’s a whole page dedicated to Darwin (as in Charles) inspired home decor in the form of an article titled ”Natural Selections.” Now I know I’ve publicly drooled over the witty Darwin and Finchy pillows on sale at Etsy. But this article is all grown-up with no such whimsy. In other words, it’s way more, like, cuh-laaasssy.

Here’s the subhead: “Sea and reptile motifs are big for the home this spring, but a popular show on Charles Darwin gives them extra resonance. Danny Sinopoli examines the Victorian naturalist as modern-day style maker”

And sure enough Danny dearest goes on to mention that there are some really nice silver lizard napkin rings, turtle-shaped boxes with removable shell lids and crocodile picture frames out this season. Weighty desk clocks, tripod floor lamps and wood and leather campaign chairs round out the look.

I quote: “the look and trappings of Darwin’s world are all the rage this spring.” In part this trend is inspired by the traveling exhibition ”Darwin: The Evolution Revolution“ that blessed the American Museum of Natural History in New York and the Field Museum in Chicago with its presence before moving to Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum where it will continue until August 4th.

THE BEAGLE IN ALL HER ORIGINAL GLORY PAINTED BY OWEN STANLEY 1841

My first undergraduate research assistant job was in an evolutionary ecology lab: our lab truck (on which I learned to drive a stick shift) was a 1986 Toyota named HMS Beagle (it said so right on the license plate). I mean who doesn’t love the Beagle? Without it, Darwin might never have figured out his theory of natural selection...hence many, many biologists would be out of a job.

Some fine folks in the UK are trying to resurrect the Beagle in all its shippy glory (no rusted out trucks smelling of fish here). They are the people behind the HMS Beagle Project: an ambitious attempt to build a seaworthy replica of Darwin’s most famous vessel and retrace his steps around the world in a celebration of the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth.

Head to their newly opened shop, where the team have a delightful collection of t-shirts and mugs and buttons and tote bags, all which proclaim a true love of the Beagle.