Armpits

Mine are great!

You prolly shave 'em, that helps. Maybe Lou Dobbs leaving CNN has something to do with my armpits.

Fine. Thanks for asking.

My weapon of choice ...


Maybe you need a prescription strength deodorant? Or a stronger soap? Just sayin'....

I do. But Lou Dobbs is a mystery to me. Wrong country. Sorry.

I did eat some basmati rice with broccoli whilst watching John Stewart on the boob-tube; perhaps that had a lasting effect on my pits.

I always assumed that watching The Daily Show had an antibacterial effect on its viewers....

Oh...then maybe it was the Stew Pack amendment that inflamed my pits to the point where no amount of soap could stop their protestation.

If I were your wife, I'd come on here and tell everyone just how 'stern' your armpits are and how you refuse to do anything about them for twenty-four whole hours even though she'll have to deal with the smell for that long...

And then everyone can tell her that she should go to counseling to learn how to deal with such an immovable and stubborn spouse who won't even take another bath to insure her olfactory comfort.

(this is a joke - it just popped into my head and it's what I would say to someone who complained about his wife's smelly cooking if I'd been talking to them in real life - sorry if you find it offensive).

My pits are fine. I just smelled them- but I took a bath last night - no deoderant though- I don't use it ever since I read something linking it to some sort of cancer.
My diet yesterday consisted of turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, carrots, mashed potatoes, gravy, peas, cranberry sauce, pecan and pumpkin pie, beer, diet coke and water x 2, but I don't think that had anything to do with the fact they don't smell. They almost never do - unless I'm working really, really physically hard at something.

The culprits are the sebaceous gland, apocrine gland and eccrine gland. But without these glands we could die as our body will overheat. When the body needs to regulate temperature the eccrine and apocrine glands produce sweat.

Armpit odor usually starts at puberty, for that is when the sweat glands become active, specifically the eccrine and appocrine glands.

Eccrine glands are coiled tubular glands that are distributed all over the body from the outer layer of the skin and extend to the inner layer. The sweat from the eccrine gland releases a fluid that is 99% water and some electrolytes, urea and amino acids. This fluid or sweat is odorless.

Apocrine glands, on the other hand, are mainly present in the armpit and genital areas. But when the body needs to sweat to cool off, things change. The apocrine gland releases a milky fluid that is mixed with another oily fluid released by the sebaceous gland called sebum. When microorganisms or bacteria form on the apocrine gland sweat (containing sebum) broken down by the hair and skin cells in the armpit, an acid called 2-methyl-3-hexenoic is created. Presto! This acid causes the unpleasant smell of armpit odor.

Sebaceous glands are holocrine glands located in the dermis. They are found mostly all over the body but there aren’t as many on the hands and feet. The sebaceous glands are also common around the genitals and in the mid-back.

Sebaceous glands are usually associated with a hair follicle and release their holocrine secretion (sebum) into the hair follicle and are carried out to the surface of the skin. When this happens, the sebum interacts with the sweat from the apocrine and eccrine glands and create the chemical reaction causing odor. This is also a contributing factor as to why men produce more odor than women because women shave the hair on their armpits while men do not.

Sebaceous glands are active even before birth but become a lot more active during puberty. The sex hormones (androgens) control the quantity of sebum produced by the sebaceous glands. Thus, as these hormones start to become active in puberty, the BO becomes more prominent.

Sebum, created by the sebaceous gland is made up of glycerides, free fatty acids, wax esters, squalene, cholesterol esters and cholesterol. Sebum protects the skin from becoming dry; however it is also the main contributing factor to the armpit odor as it creates a chemical reaction with the sweat produced by eccrine and apocrine glands.

---- I gooogled this. - edgarblythe

Maybe it's the controversy about whether Pluto should be classified as a planet that's making my armpits smell.