#124: Movies

How come whenever Lois Lane falls off a tall building,
Superman is able to save her by catching her, like 30 floors down? The impact of her landing in his arms should be just as great as hitting the ground! She should be smushed. Same thing in other sci-fi films—The Fifth Element and Star Wars: Attack of the Clones come to mind. Someone falls from an incredible height but is saved from injury by landing in a flying car—which really should kill that person just as effectively as hitting bottom.

#123: Health

How come packing extra pounds is supposed to be a strain on my heart
but when people exercise to get healthy they carry weights? Now, I've been told the problem is that people who are overweight don't get enough activity. But wouldn't being both active and overweight be best then?

#122: Human Behaviour

Why do you see solitary shoes on roadsides?
It's never a pair of shoes, only singles. Are there people walking around who wear out a shoe and—right then and there—throw it away and continue on with only one foot clad?

#121: Products

Why do irons have settings for permanent-press material? 

#120: Television

How come on the detective shows, it's the detectives who do everything 
except for a few minutes when they consult with the medical examiner, but on the medical examiner/coroner shows it's the medical examiner who does everything from examining the crime scene to interviewing witnesses, following up leads and solving the case?

#119: Human Behaviour

Why do we waggle our hands in the air when we've got burning hot food
in our mouths?

#118: Products

How does cling wrap work so easily on those TV ads?
You see the actor stretching the wrap smoothly and evenly over the food they're covering, then tucking it ever so neatly under the dish. With me, every time it's a struggle just to tear the damn stuff from the roll without it bunching up, let alone carry it to the dish without it folding over on itself. My method is to rip off a hunk, spend five minutes trying to open up the cellophane ball, then another couple minutes trying to smooth it over the dish. Is there a secret for doing it like on the ads?

#117: Language

Why do we talk of "false pretences"?
Are there any true pretences?

#116: Language

Why do we park on a driveway and drive on a parkway?
Okay, this is an old one. I've tried to ignore it. But readers keep raising it, so I've given in. Here it is, now stop writing me! (Just kidding. I appreciate all the mysteries that readers send me. Apart from providing grist for this column, it shows me that I'm not the only one out there who's mystified by our crazy world.)

#115: Biology

Why do men have nipples?
This mystery was suggested by reader Peter Hyde and at first I thought it had an obvious answer: it was easier for evolution to give both sexes nipples than to give it to one sex and not the other. But then I considered that evolution has created quite a few other more complicated (and nice) differences between the sexes, so why keep useless teats on men? Doing some research I found out males even have all the lactation apparatus intact and are missing only the hormones to allow them to produce milk. Maybe evolution or God was planning for the day when men, with the help of estrogen supplements, could do their share of nursing?

#114: Religion

And, speaking of nipples, why does Adam have them in all the pictures?
Think about it. Presumably Eve got them to suckle their young. But Adam was created before Eve, so he couldn't have got his nipples just to match her. And don't try to argue that both Adam and Eve were made in God's image. That only raises the question of what the heck God needed with nipples.

#113: Movies

If Spiderman has the powers of a spider,
shouldn't his web shoot out of his...er...well, out of his butt?

#112: Human Behaviour

When we ask someone the time, why do we point to our wrists?
Is it because we want to remind the other person where he keeps his watch? Or are we pointing out that our wrists are bare to prove we're not the kind of people who go around asking others for the time just because we're too lazy to look at our own watches?

#111: Advertising

What the heck is McDonald's Grimace character supposed to be?
You got your Hamburgler, you got your Fry Guys — and you got this big fuzzy, purple dude. What kind of disgusting food is he supposed to represent?

#110: Language

If you have a bunch of odds and ends
and you get rid of all of them except one, what do you call it?

#109: Fate

How come when you're waiting all day for an important phone call,
it finally comes at exactly the time that you (a) go to the washroom, or (b) take a call from your mother.

#108: Star Trek

Why do Captain Kirk and company always beam down to the planet's
surface just outside the place they have to break into?

#107: The Paranormal

When the dead communicate with the living through mediums
like John Edward or James Van Praagh, why do they deliver such asinine messages? Why don't they ever have anything really interesting to say, like tell what the afterlife is all about or impart something useful like the cure for cancer? Or at least, "I left the diamonds in the sugar tin"? But no, it's all "You once had a dog" and "I'm with you." No wonder T.H. Huxley said, "Better live a crossing-sweeper than die and be made to talk twaddle by a 'medium'."

When Bruce Banner turns into the Incredible Hulk,
how come his growing bulk bursts off all his clothes—except part of his pants?

#105: Human Behaviour

Why is it the only person in a line-up at the bank who isn't watching
the tellers is the guy at the head of the line? When it's his turn, he's standing there zoned out. He has to be called repeatedly and prodded by those behind him. Then he acts like it's a surprise he's suddenly found himself there. It's like there's an unwritten law: as soon as you get to the front of the line you have to stop watching the tellers intensely and pretend you're not really there, staring vacantly into space and ignoring the proceedings.

#104: Products

Why do computer keypads and calculators have numbers in a different
order than telephones? Numbers on phones start at the top with 1, 2 3 and count upwards down the keypad to 9 and then add zero at the bottom, while keyboards and calculators start with 7, 8, 9 at the top and count backwards (sort of) to 1, 2, 3 and then add zero. Darn confusing if you do a lot of both number crunching and dialing, and your fingers try to get used to both patterns. (And why do we keep saying "dialing" when there's no dial?)

#103: Advertising

Why are there ads for adult learn-to-read programs in the newspaper?

#102: Human Behaviour

Why do we close the bathroom door when no one is home?
We could be alone in a cabin in the middle of the woods with all the entrances and windows locked and barred, but if we're gonna pull down our pants and take a seat in the washroom, we gotta have that door closed!

#101: Movies

How come mad bombers in the movies always put digital read-outs
in their bombs to show the time clicking down? Why would a bomber bother to wire and program that red, digital display into his explosive device? Especially when he doesn't expect anyone to get a chance to look inside the bomb before it blows up. The worst such offence was in Speed II when a bomb was discovered inside a golf club, for godsake—with a digital clock counting down inside it!