Mouth Open Wide

I was watching NCIS,one of my favorite shows. It was a very good episode but I had an awful time not falling asleep. I could not stop yawning. So I thought I'd Google yawning and see what I could find out about it.
This is what I found.

All mammals apparently yawn.


Pandiculation is the term for the act of stretching and yawning simultaneously. A yawn is a reflex of simultaneous inhalation of air and stretching of the eardrums, followed by exhalation of breath.


People used to think that the main reason we yawned was to increase extra oxygen to rid the blood of excess carbon dioxide. Recent studies however, have shown that yawning may in fact reduce the amount of oxygen rather than increase it.

Currently it is believed that yawning is the body's way of controlling brain temperature.The process cools off your brain, much like a fan cools the inside of a computer.
(So if people are calling you a Hot Head just yawn at them and you'll cool off and they will like you better.)

Sometimes a yawn can indicate the brain is needing glucose and we need to eat or drink. A yawn may also be a means of communicating apathy and boredom

Yet another theory is that yawning occurs to stabilize pressure on either side of the ear drums. The deep intake of air can sometimes cause a popping sound that only the yawner can hear; this is the pressure on the middle ear such as inside an airplane and when traveling up
and down hills, which cause the eardrums to be bent instead of flat. Some yawn during storms, which alters air pressure.

Superstitions are attached to yawning as in any natural action. What ever you do don't forget to cover your mouth when you yawn to prevent your soul from escaping. The ancient Greeks believed, that a person's soul was trying to escape from its body, so that it may rest with the Gods in the skies. This belief was also shared by the Mayans.

Gordon Gallup, hypothesizes that "contagious" yawning may be a survival instinct inherited from our evolutionary past. "During human evolutionary history when we were subject to predation and attacks by other groups, if everybody yawns in response to seeing someone yawn, the whole group becomes much more vigilant, and much better at being able to detect danger."

A recent study by the University of London has suggested that the "contagiousness" of yawns by a human will pass to dogs. The study observed that 21 of 29 dogs yawned when a stranger yawned in front of them, but did not yawn when the stranger only opened his mouth.

All of this is my way of saying I'm really tired tonight
and I think I'll go to bed.



See ya down the road,
Yarntangler