Laughter

Laughter is the best medicine according to a popular belief. A study by a team of University of Maryland School of Medicine researchers, led by Dr. Michael Miller, has recently shown for the first time that laughter is linked to healthy function of blood vessels. Miller said that the most significant study finding was that "people with heart disease responded less humorously to everyday life situations." They generally laughed less, even in positive situations, and they displayed more anger and hostility.
http://www.umm.edu/features/laughter.htm

Recently I was speaking on the telephone with a friend of mine concerning laughter.
We both would rather have a good laugh than fight. Yet, it seems many others prefer fighting. I don’t mean the occasional spirited debate, but instead, battling and sniping at one another just for the rush. My buddy shared a very interesting anecdote. His parents had been in one of Hitler’s Concentration Camps and obviously suffered abuse beyond comprehension. Sometimes the depths of man’s inhumanity to man just boggles one’s mind. But what my friend’s Mom remembers is that the survivors were the ones who laughed. She said she could almost tell who was going to die because they were the morose ones. Quiet, almost accepting death as an inevitable outcome of their situation.

But the ones who laughed, yes even laughed at the fact they were little more than skin and bones, they lived and they were the ones who made it out alive.

I’ve seen various techniques where people just laugh for the heck of it as part of their fitness regiment, and who knows if that works. As for me, just photoshop a geek in a compromising situation, and I’m laughing until I cry.

So, for today, find something to make you chuckle. Hell, chortle if you want. If I were a real doctor, and not just playing one on the internet, I’d suggest you take two hearty guffaws, rest, and get plenty of fluids.