If the universe is expanding, how come you still can't find parking?
(This question passed on to me by James Duhaime.)

#174: Fashion

What's with this trend of women flaunting their bellies and butt cracks?
I mean, maybe one in twenty women has an attractive midriff that's worth exposing between shrunken top and low-riding jeans. But the rest—who finds it sexy to see a girl's gut hanging out over her belt?

How come whenever an actor is made to look older in a movie, he never looks anything like how that actor will appear when he really does age? Look at Brando playing the dying old don in The Godfather and look at the guy in his real old age. Or check out that episode of Star Trek when Kirk, Spock and McCoy grow prematurely elderly, and look at how Shatner, Nimoy and Kelly actually turned out (especially Shatner!) in their, um, golden years.

If everything in our air, food, water and artificial environment is bad for us
these days, then how come we're living longer, healthier lives than ever before? Funny how despite all those chemical toxins, cancer-causing electromagnetic radiation, and so on, life expectancies continue to increase year after year.

#171: Products

Why does "lactose-free milk" always contain lactose?
Don't believe me? Look up the ingredients next time you're in the grocery store.

How come right after you, uh, release a little gas when you're alone in a room
or office, someone always walks in? Oh, come on, don't tell me I'm the only this ever happens to.

Why are we charged extra for not having our phone numbers listed in directories? It's the only time I can think of when we have to pay not to advertise. To make it even more ridiculous, if we ask to have our cell-phone numbers printed in the phone book, then—guess what?—we have to pay more!

Why do psychics have to ask you your name?

#167: Language

A really clean thing is said to be spick and span but what's the difference
between these two? What would something be like if it was just spick but not span? No one ever says, "Her house is span all right—if only it had more spick."

If each of those products I get emails about are guaranteed to lengthen my penis by three to four inches, then how come after trying seven of them, my penis isn't over two feet long?

Why do people call up places for information and then, when they're about to be
given it, say, "Wait a minute, I'll get a pencil"? As a person who often has to give out phone numbers or addresses to the public, it amazes me how many times I've been left hanging while some idiot roots around for a writing implement he didn't bring to the phone when he placed the call.

Why are there ads on the bus for taking the bus?
You'd think the transit company would realize that people who are using public transit already know about it.

Why is that button on the phone pad called the "pound key"?
You know, the button with the number sign or hash marks (#)? Why don't we call it the number-sign key or hash-mark key? I'm told it's because in Britain # is the pound sign. But guess what? Most of us don't live in Britain.

Why do vending machines always reject one of my coins after accepting a handful
of similar ones? Something costs a dollar and I'll plop in three quarters okay, just knowing the fourth one will fall through to the coin return slot. So I go through all the steps—you know, trying to shoot it in, trying to drop it down gently—and nothing works. Is the machine's coin collector full? No, because the next person comes up and buys something, no problem. Why do I always have one of these mysteriously deficient, but seemingly identical, coins?

Why didn't any of the thousands of psychics in the world predict 9/11?
Here's one of the biggest news events in decades with the greatest impact most of us can remember, killing three thousand people, leading to at least two wars and world-wide repercussions for millions of people. And yet not a single so-called clairvoyant—these people who claim to foretell the most miniscule details about the lives of their clients and celebrities—not a single one saw this catastrophe in the future and recorded the prediction unambiguously! Oh sure, lots of psychics claim in retrospect that they saw it coming—predicting the past is always easy. But not a single one said ahead of time, "In September 2001, two planes are going to crash into the World Trade Centre and bring down the towers." Not one.

When our car is running out of gas, why do we speed up?
We know it makes no difference. Past a certain optimum speed, the faster we drive, the faster we use up gas. But whenever we're on the highway and suddenly notice the needle hitting E, we automatically...step on the gas. Gotta hurry before we run out!

How come the outside of the coffee shop on Seinfeld doesn't match the inside?
In shots from the street, you can the restaurant is a basic box shape with the door in the middle of one side. From inside, it's L-shaped with the door coming in from the indented part of the L.

#157: Human behaviour

Why is the prize for a spelling bee always a dictionary?
Isn't this a bit like awarding the winner of the Indy 500 a driving manual?

Why do guys reach sexual peak at age 17 or 18, while women hit their stride
about 20 years later? Is this some kind of divine joke—to make men want it more when women are less likely to agree, and vice versa? Did evolution mess up? It's a wonder enough of us got it together, despite this mismatch, to keep the species going.

Why are natural disasters called "acts of God"?
Floods, tornados, fires, all the natural phenomena that wipe out lives and property—if you're a believer, shouldn't you instead blame these evils on the devil? Or if you really think these are acts of God, shouldn't you welcome them, support them, celebrate them? Better not fight against them anyway—that's opposing the works of God! (Inspiration for this mystery came from my skeptical correspondent CrabbyR.)

I don't get how so many people could run into police cars parked on the shoulder
of the road. I mean, when you're driving, you generally travel on the road itself, not the shoulder, right? And you generally notice other things like, um, other cars, don't you? But a cop car?! When you're speeding along, or even if you've had a bit to drink, isn't that the one thing you watch out for?

What's with these razors with four blades now?
Are we shaving our faces or are we grating cheese? We started off with single blades and that worked pretty well, but then we were told we really needed two blades per razor—some nonsense about one to lift and one to cut. We bought them and so then three-blade razors were introduced. Now four. Why?

Why do we ask for a "cheque" when we're done in restaurants?
Do we expect to get paid for eating there? Shouldn't we be asking for a bill or an invoice, and offering to give them a cheque? 

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