Help your dog feel better about himself, get him neuticles

[savafan]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/10/06/dog....ap/index.html

BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- Gregg Miller mortgaged his home and maxed out his credit cards to mass produce his invention -- prosthetic testicles for neutered dogs.

What started 10 years ago with an experiment on an unwitting Rottweiler named Max has turned into a thriving mail-order business. And on Thursday night Miller's efforts earned him a dubious yet strangely coveted honor: the Ig Nobel Prize for medicine.

"Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honor," he said. "I wish they were alive to see it."

The Ig Nobels, given at Harvard University by Annals of Improbable Research magazine, celebrate the humorous, creative and odd side of science.

Miller has sold more than 150,000 of his Neuticles, more than doubling his $500,000 investment. The silicone implants come in different sizes, shapes, weights and degrees of firmness.

Although the Ig Nobels are not exactly prestigious, many recipients are, like Miller, happy to win.

"Most scientists -- no matter what they're doing, good or bad -- never get any attention at all," said Marc Abrahams, editor of the Annals of Improbable Research.

Some, like Benjamin Smith of the University of Adelaide in Australia, who won the biology prize, actually nominated their own work. "I've been a fan of the Ig Nobels for a while," he said.

Smith's team studied and catalogued different scents emitted by more than 100 species of frogs under stress. Some smelled like cashews, while others smelled like licorice, mint or rotting fish.

He recalled getting strange looks when he'd show up at zoos asking to smell the frogs. "I've been turned away at the gate," he said.
More winners

This year's other Ig Nobel winners include:

# PHYSICS: Since 1927, researchers at the University of Queensland in Australia have been tracking a glob of congealed black tar as it drips through a funnel -- at a rate of one drop every nine years.

# PEACE: Two researchers at Newcastle University in England monitored the brain activity of locusts as they watched clips from the movie "Star Wars."

# CHEMISTRY: An experiment at the University of Minnesota was designed to prove whether people can swim faster or slower in syrup than in water.

# LITERATURE: The Ig Nobel for literature went to the Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters ... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled."

[Red Heeler]

Dogs don't understand the difference. That is one of the great things about pets. They don't care that you are uncool or that you had their gonads removed, or that you dress them up in uncool costumes or whatever. They just want your affection and will love you for it.

<Soapbox Moment> Don't dress your dogs up in silly costumes. The dog may not care, but both you and your dog will look like dorks. A bandana is OK if you really cannot avoid the urge, but really even that is too much. If you have a short haired dog, a thermal covering of some kind outdoors in the winter is both acceptable and good. Knitted sweaters, though, are only marginally acceptable outdoors. Indoors, no. <End of Rant>

Back to the subject article, I see this as a way for the less scrupulous members of my profession to make some more money.