It s also eleven pages long. And, because I love you (and you, and you, and YOU, oh, wait, no, not y

But listen! DOC BROWN WAS A GENIUS YOU GUYS. I mean, flux capacitor? Come on, not just any yahoo could invent that. I m sure some yahoos have tried, too. I mean, who WOULDN T want to go back to the future?
ANYWAY. So today I was playing mtp webbing around online, you know, as one does, and saw this article , and thought, ha ha, MY CAT TOTALLY MAKES ME CRAY-CRAY, I mean, the minute I walk in the damn house he s all, Meow? Meow? Meeee-ow? Mrooow? Meow? Mieuuuuu? Mrooo. Mroooouuu? like we re having a little conversation, only I m not fluent in cat, you see, so it s kind of one-sided. So mostly it s him saying those things, and me being all, Hi, Dumbcat. YES, Dumbcat. mtp webbing I SEE you, Dumbcat. I KNOW, Dumbcat, yes, there you are! There you ARE! Good BOY! Aren t you a GOOD BOY! Oh, man, was that a totally hard headbutt into my stomach. Ouch, your nails are sharp, digging into my leg like that OW OW OW DUMBCAT now I am BLEEDING, I still love you, don t be scared, aw, my little sweet potato. Also, he likes to leap on my head half an hour before the alarm goes off in the morning, or really early on the days I can sleep in, all HI MOM! Pet me. Want to pet me? YOU TOTES DO MOM. Right NOW you do. I KNOW IT. Pet me pet me pet me AREN T I SO CUUUUTE purr purr PURR IN YOUR EAR PURR. My response to this is usually Mrrphmph Dumbcat stop it so scheepy stop stop ow stop you re stepping on my eyeball.
But oh, no no, this article was NOT about how your cat, who probably, let s face it, isn t named Dumbcat (honestly, mtp webbing mine isn t either, that s just his blog-pseudonym, so you don t kidnap him or open a credit card in his name, because I know if you called him he d totally be fooled into giving you his social security number, he s very trusting) is making you a little crazy with the meowing and purring and early-risering. It s about BRAIN PARASITES and SEX and CAR CRASHES and RAW MEAT and EUROPE and RATS and URINE.
It s also eleven pages long. And, because I love you (and you, and you, and YOU, oh, wait, no, not you, sorry to be misleading) I printed it, and brought it with me on my lunch break, and read it twice, and wrote my thoughts all over it so we could totally have a serious scientific discussion about how your cats are infecting you with brain parasites. Andreas ! Are you totally the most proud of me right now? I thought so.
First, this is from The Atlantic . I don t think I was aware of this publication. But you guys, it is totally fancy. I am impressed with this. It is well-written, it is easy to peruse online, and according to research I totally just did right now so you don t think I m just making shit up, it s been around since the mid 1800s. And the reason I wasn t aware of it was because it used to be called mtp webbing The Atlantic Monthly and I WAS aware of The Atlantic Monthly , so now I don t feel like a heathen.
Anyway. Because the article was ELEVEN PAGES LONG ZOMG, and totally twisty and turny and sciency, I do NOT expect you to click. Well, I bet Andreas mtp webbing will click. He grooves on science. But I totally read this for you so you don t have to click. Unless you want to. It is interesting and worth a read, if you want to. And I really liked the article, and the author s style. So, yeah, you go, The Atlantic ! You get my stamp of approval. Stamp, stamp, stamp.
Also, any sciency-type mtp webbing mistakes I make here are totally my own and not the fault of the original article. I take full responsibility for science-style mistakes made in the name of tomfoolery and shenanigans.
The scientist above, who is NOT Doc Brown but kind of LOOKS like a ginger Doc Brown, Dr. Jaroslav Flegr, has been doing research into the Toxoplasma mtp webbing gondii microbe for some time. This is the microbe that is in cat feces (you know how pregnant women are told to not change cat litter? that s why, it can cause birth defects) that causes toxoplasmosis. This microbe is also found on unwashed fruits and vegetables and in dirty water and undercooked meat.
Flegr (hee, I love that name, I think if you were to say it, you d have to say it with a very guttural pronunciation, just for fun) one day realized he was acting strangely. He was not afraid of things that he should be. Like walking into busy streets! And the Communists who ruled his homeland of Czechoslovakia! This made him curious. One day, the university where he worked was running tests for a study they were doing on the T. gondii microbe, and needed test subjects, so he took the test and tested positive.
Once there, the parasite (according to Flegr s research) causes changes mtp webbing in our behavior anything from changing our response to frightening situations, to changing our trust in others, how outgoing we are, and even our preferences for certain scents.
YES! The insidious microbe, having mtp webbing taken up residence in our BRAINS, rewire(s) circuits in parts of the brain that deal with such primal emotions such as fear, anxiety, and sexual arousal. It does this by causing mul