Can you die of a broken heart?

Researchers have looked at what goes on in the brain,
and for lovers and addicts it’s exactly the same.

Those who are newly in love
experience joy in their minds from a dopamine flood.

And it’s this same pattern that goes on in the brain
as that which occurs when you’re hooked on cocaine.

So in the first throes of passion you’re literally addicted to love,
and that's probably why those feelings all hurt so much.



From Can you die of a broken heart? on BBC iWonder. Submitted by Ben Mellor.

Almost never losing

My whole life is about winning.
I don’t lose often.

I have a great relationship with the Mexican people.

All of the women on The Apprentice
flirted with me – consciously
or unconsciously.
That’s to be expected.

I have a great relationship with the blacks.

I better use some Tic Tacs
in case I start kissing her.
You know I’m automatically attracted
to beautiful women,
I just start kissing them,
it’s like a magnet.
You know when you’re a star they let you do it.
You can do anything.
Grab them by the pussy.
You can do anything.

I have tremendous respect for the Japanese people.

You know, it really doesn’t matter what they write
as long as you’ve got a young and beautiful piece of ass.
But she’s got to be young and beautiful.

Part of the beauty of me
is that I am very rich.
A person who is very flat-chested
is very hard to be a 10.

Black entertainers love Donald Trump.

Well, someone’s doing the raping, Don!
I mean, somebody’s doing it.
Who’s doing the raping?

With the proper woman you don’t need Viagra.

I almost never lose.

Who’s doing the raping?



Things that Donald Trump has said, found on The Collected Donald Trump and 32 quotes that sum up Donald Trump’s election campaign. Submitted by Liam Gresby.

Let's Bubble Up to the Surface and Smell the Numbers

now when things went south for you...
and the value has obviously increased...
that's my question where's the damage...

assume that everything went horribly wrong...
what's your damage assume your damage...

you can't just roll on and on...
let's make the motions...
let's start pushing this...

a healthy lawyer-to-lawyer relationship...
give me whatever you got...
to me it sounds a little skeptical...

so what I'm thinking is...
maybe what I can do is...
something like that could even...
if I have to hire somebody like that I just might...

you got burned on this one but life moves on my friend...
I think we need to take care of all the...
and then you and I will sit down and...

bubble up to the surface, smell the numbers...
get all our ducks in a row...
stop the hemorrhaging...

this is my stop I'm getting off...
call my girl...
we'll get your gravy back...



Fragments of a cellphone conversation overheard on the Long Island Rail Road. The speaker was a fast-talking suit who got off at the Jamaica stop in Queens, presumably to make his way up to the courthouse near there. Submitted by Derek Owens.

Specific comments about certain aspects of the meals service

In reply to a comment about the
fish batter not being sufficiently
crisp, Mr Howe explained that one of the fish
friers was not working properly, but
that he hoped that this would be put right
in the near future.

Mr Howe also
mentioned that recently it appeared
that a small number of undergraduates
in lunch and informal hall were taking
two portions of sweet or cheese and biscuits.
The committee agreed with him that people
should not take an additional helping
which they had not paid for.

Mr Howe said
that there was a tendency for the pencils
to disappear from the ticket machines
outside hall; the committee felt that
for the benefit of others, people
should not remove the pencils from the ticket
machines.

Mr Howe was worried about
standards of hygiene in the ‘servery’
and thought that undergraduates could
play a part in preserving standards by
refraining from peering into the food trays.



Kitchen Committee meeting minutes from Fitzwilliam College Magazine, 1971, via @FitzwilliamColl on Twitter. Submitted by Gabriel Smy.

It is forbidden

It is highly forbidden
To charge for a long time
Under unattended condition
So as to avoid the accident

It is highly forbidden
To decompose
Or disassemble
The battery

Batteries are forbidden
To be used
Or kept
Under high temperature

When charging the battery
Covering the charger
Or battery
Is highly forbidden

Batteries are forbidden
To be stored
Or transported
With the metal object

Batteries are forbidden
To be thrown in the fire
Or get heated

Metal is forbidden
To connect directly
With the polarity
Of the battery

It is highly forbidden
To upside down
The polarity
Of the battery



From the user instructions for a Cheerson mini drone. Submitted by Allison Jeanne.

Fail better

1
Is this your career?
Seriously?
Get a real job!
Writing postcards doesn't count!

2
Turn up the television.
Anyone can do it.

3
I don’t get it.
The window has shut.
Don't you even care?
Success depends upon money!
Asides must be dumped.

4
Your house is burning.
We're out of vodka.
Your document is blank.
It’s a good start.



Entries from a competition to spoil a writer's mood in 4 words. Submitted by Howie Good.

The Ladies’ Love Oracle

It will be too glorious.
Go to your ruin, if you will.
It is needful that he be very good; yes, in spite of delays.
He will love you for a month.
Yes, at a country ball.

Wait, you will congratulate yourself,
Do not be uneasy.
You would be wrong by appearing frank and open.
Your least virtue.

No, my fine lady; be upon your guard.
By a more careful toilet, without doubt.
He’ll be handsome, like your present one.
The future will teach you it.

You ought not to hope. Why not, if you love him?
Yes, from midday to midnight.
Could you do without it?
Many things are opposed to it.

By a skillfully-managed intrigue
Don’t wait for it, you’ll only lose time.
Yes, a hussar. Yes, all except one.
Thy wit equals thy beauty.

Continue to ignore him.
You must renounce the world.
Handsome body, but deformed mind.
He smokes his segar and forgets you.

Count no more upon it.
It is useless.



Answers to oracle questions from Madam Le Marchand’s Fortune Teller and Dreamer’s Dictionary, published in 1863. Submitted by Lori Hahnel.

Sweet poison

When I first started selling wild honey
the price was extremely high. Then someone
in Korea ate too much and died.

This year’s harvest: quarter of a teaspoon.
You have a few minutes before
you are overcome with an urgent need
to defecate, urinate and vomit.

After the purge, you alternate between
light and dark. You can see and then
you can’t see. A sound, jam jam jam pulses,
like the drone of a bee hive, in your head.
Then you lose all motor function.
The paralysis lasts for a day or so.

Normally we have to see a doctor
to get bad things taken out of our bodies,
but the honey does this for us.



From the caption to a National Geographic Instagram photo of wild honey. Submitted by Liam Gresby.

Craig's List, Hope's Personals

I am real.
And.
I hope you are too.

It rained in the morning.
Hope. Your. Our. There.
Friends, I hope.

I hope you find happiness
losing hope in women.

I hope I can find
someone tonight.



Craigslist Houston listings for 'Hope' including full words only, extracted 22 May 2016. Submitted by Jody T. Morse.

a southbound Amtrak

a southbound Amtrak
passenger and mail train gone
when the windows clear



From an NPR news story some time in the early 1990s. One evening I turned on my car radio and the words in the poem were the first thing I heard. Submitted by John Maruskin.

One of my hermits is moulting

What should I do?
Nothing. Moulters already
have to suffer from stress.
Disturbing them will make it worse.
Place a cave over them
to provide darkness.
Most will harden.

How do I distinguish a dead hermit?
Look for a claw in the shell.
The eyes should be hollow
and translucent.
The eyes of dead hermits
are dark in colour, just like
when they were alive.

How long should I wait?
You are better digging
up a dead hermit
three months later
than stressing one to death
that was alive and could
have surfaced on its own.

Why is my hermit being lethargic?
This is normal behaviour.
Offer protein and calcium.
There is not much else you can do.
Sometimes they experience
difficulty shedding
so they give up and drop.



Advice from Hermit Crab Paradise website, extracted 29 April 2016. Submitted by Linda Goulden.

A visit

Every place on earth should be like this; unexpected.
On a good day, you can see forever.

Restful sleep for a windy place.
Tranquility is a marvelous experience
sound of meadowlarks in the morning, music
for the body.
Breath and love are everything.

This is sort of my home town.
Where my father went to school,
took piano lessons.

I had stitches on my hand in this place –

Nice to be back home,
to see the old schoolroom and
place where I was born

Different than I remember it as

Hope we weren’t too much trouble.
Thanks for the beer.

(You will remember me by the broken chair)



Entries in the visitors' guest book at the Convent Inn in Val Marie, Saskatchewan, Canada, noted during a visit in the autumn of 2006. Submitted by Shannon Bruyneel.