Page 2 The Monofin Page 3 Gedagte vir die naweek
Will High-Tech Tail Help Phelps Beat a Great White Shark?
Page 6 This Is Why You Hate the Sound of Your Own Voice Page 7 Kosmenger (1908) Page 9 Flight Attendant Reunite Service Dogs Page 10 Belangrike Datums Page 11 Recipe Page 12 How to trace a cell phone Page 14 Doctor’s Sloppy Handwriting Page 15 Emergency Numbers Page 16 Fabric Printing with Crayons & Sandpaper Page 17 One Word You Should Never Say in a Job Interview Page 18 This Is the ONLY Way You Should Remove Skin Tags Page 19 Tide Table
Will High-Tech Tail Help Phelps Beat a Great White Shark? By Jesse Emspak Michael Phelps is going to race a great white shark, and marine biologists are betting on the shark. The ultimate reason boils down to physics. To get a leg (or tail) up during Discovery Channel's "Shark Week" episode, Phelps will wear a custommade mechanical fin on his feet that mimic's a great white's tail. This so-called monofin, made by Lunocet, displaces water more efficiently than human feet do, and it should add several miles per hour to Phelps' speed, according to the company. When the great white shark swims, it uses its crescent moon-shaped tail, which is buttressed by a caudal keel, to push it forward, fast, according to experts on the Discovery Channel's "Shark Week" episode. Brooke Flammang, assistant professor of biological sciences at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, told Live Science via email that any aquatic animal that has a tail will move it back and forth to generate thrust — fish vertically and whales horizontally. As the tail gets to the end of the stroke, it changes direction. That change in direction generates a vortex, pushing water behind and generating thrust, or a forward force. In a 2011 study of shark locomotion (using dogfish), Flammang found that sharks can go faster because they stiffen their tails in the middle of each stroke. She said the shark's tail creates a vortex when it is as far as it can go on one side as the shark begins its stroke. It releases another vortex in the middle of the stroke, and a third one when the next stroke begins on the other side. "The middle one is the oddball one that happens because of the stiffness change," she said. "The extra vortex gives a shark extra thrust that other fish don't have." Those vortices also give more lift to their pectoral fins so the sharks can keep swimming. Great whites are among the species of shark that must keep moving forward in order to keep oxygen-rich water flowing over their gills. The monofin is supposed to mimic the tail motion of a dolphin or shark. According to the company it works primarily by producing "lift forces," like an airplane wing, and it will generate vortices as well — though nowhere near as efficiently as a shark does. How close can one of the most decorated athletes get to a shark? Phelps set a world record for the 100 meter butterfly in Rome in 2009, and he was going at 4.47 mph (7.19 km/h) for a still-record time of 49.82 seconds. Phelps has told various news outlets he can reach speeds of 5 to 5.5 mph (about 8 to 9 km/h). (He will be racing the shark over a distance of 328 feet, or 100 meters). The Lunocet monofin can reportedly help a swimmer reach up to 8 mph (12.8 km/h). A great white shark will reach speeds of 25 mph (40 km/h) in short bursts, according to the ReefQuest Center for Shark Research. Phelps won't be able to match the speed of a great white, even with his mechanical fin. The problem is that aquatic animals can also smoothly undulate their entire bodies. This is true of fish, whales, and even seals and otters. "Part of what makes truly aquatic animals so efficient is the precise timing of their body undulation with the tail changing direction," Flammang said. That undulation means water passes steadily down the body, making a vortex when it reaches the tail. Phelps, being human, can't do that. "Since legs only bend in a couple of places, he won't have a smooth undulation and will lose a lot of power to drag." 2
DIE MERKE Skrywer onbekend 'n Paar jaar gelede, op n warm somersdag in Suid Florida het n klein seuntjie besluit om te gaan swem in n watergat wat net agter hulle huis was. Hy het vinnig uit die huis gehardloop op pad na die watergat en in die hardloop het hy van sy skoene, hemp, kouse broek ens ontslae geraak. Hy het in die water geduik, maar wat hy nie gesien het nie, is dat n krokodil vinnig in die water verdwyn het toe hy ingespring het. Sy moeder wat in die huis was het deur die venster gesien hoe die krokodil al hoe nader aan haar seun kom, lam van vrees het sy uit gehardloop terwyl sy so hard as moontlik vir haar seun skree om weg te kom. Hy het haar stem gehoor, en die dringendheid in haar stem het hom laat omdraai en na haar toe swem. Sy was net te laat, toe sy haar hande na haar kind uitsteek het die krokodil hom ook bereik. van die wal af het sy haar seuntjie by die arms gegryp, net toe die krokodil hom aan die been beetkry. Toe begin daar n toutrek om lewe en dood. Die krokodil was sterker as die vrou, maar die moeder was baie meer geditermineerd om nie op te gee nie. n Boer het toevallig daar verby gery, die gille van die vrou gehoor en die krokodil dood geskiet. Na n paar weke in die hospitaal was die seuntjie goed op pad na volkome herstel. n Koerant verslaggewer wat n onderhoud met die seuntjie gevoer het vanuit sy hospitaal bed na die trauma, het vir hom gevra om vir haar die merke te wys. Die seuntjie het sy broekspyp opgetrek, en toe met groot trots het hy vir haar gese: "Dis niks, kyk hoe lyk my arms, ek het vreeslike merke aan my arms ook. Hierdie merke het ek omdat my mammie my nie wou los nie." "My mammie het ook wonde aan haar hande omdat sy my so styf vasgehou het, en geweier het om die stryd met die krokodil te verloor". Ek en jy kan met daardie seuntjie identifiseer, ons het ook wonde merke, nie van n krokodil nie, maar ons dra die wond merke van n pynlike verlede. Ons dra die wonde van n gebroke huwelik, ons dra die wonde van familiebande wat verbreek is. Ons dra die wond merke van ander mense se kritiek, en onverdraagsaamheid. Maar Jesus het ook wonde opgedoen in die proses. Hy het daardie somers dag geen aandag gegee aan moontlike gevaar by die watergat nie, hy het sommer holderste bolder ingestorm en begin swem, net so is daar n watergat in ons lewens, op die oog af lyk dit heerlik koel en verfrissend, maar in die dieptes van die watergat skuil groot gevaar. Jesus het wond merke aan Sy hande omdat Hy geweier het om die stryd om ons lewens te verloor. Toe Hy sien satan het ons in sy wrede kake vasgevang, het Hy tot die stryd toegetree, en soos daardie moeder daardie middag geweier het om haar kind te verloor, het Hy ook geweier om Sy kinders te verloor. Dankie Here vir die merke aan U Hande, dit is wonde wat deur liefde veroorsaak is, U liefde vir ons. Daardie middag was daar in daardie moeder se gedagtes net een doel, en dit was om haar kind van n gewisse dood te red. Sy het geveg tot die einde, en gewen. Op Golgotha was daar ook so n stryd, en U het geveg tot die einde, en gewen. Dankie Vader! 3
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Good news: You're probably the only one who thinks it's annoying. BY MARISSA LALIBERTE
You’re watching a video of your family vacation when you suddenly cringe. Is that really what your voice sounds like? If you can’t stand the sound of your own voice, you’re not alone. But don’t worry— you’re probably the only one who gets annoyed by its sound. There’s a scientific reason you hate your own voice so much. When we hear an outside sound, like someone else’s voice, the sound travels through your ear, into the canal, and to the eardrum, says Aaron Johnson, PhD, speech–language pathologist and assistant professor in the otolaryngology department at NYU Langone’s Voice Center. Vibrations from the eardrum travel to the inner ear, where fluid makes little hair cells move. Those movements create electric energy that get sent up to the brain, which translates it into sound. That exact same thing happens when you hear the sounds that come out of your own mouth—but something else happens on top of it. “As we’re talking, sound waves travel not only outside our body, but there is energy bouncing around in our mouth and throat and through our head, directly to the inner portion of our ear,” says Dr. Johnson. Other people can’t sense the vibrations in your mouth, so you hear your own voice differently than they do. When listening to your own voice on a recording, you aren’t getting those extra vibrations in your mouth and throat, so you’ll hear what everyone else does. Because it’s as unique as your fingerprints, your voice—or what you think it sounds like—is part of your self-image (and can even reveal your personality). A sudden change can be off-putting. “We think of ourselves as sounding a certain way, and then we hear ourselves on recording and it’s completely different,” says Dr. Johnson. “It’s unexpected. It’s like, ‘That’s not me.’” And there’s a reason people are rarely pleasantly surprised by this new sound. The vibrations coming directly from your head are lower, so the sound is richer. “People are surprised they sound…irritating because it sounds brighter and sounds higher than what they’re used to,” says Dr. Johnson. So when you suddenly sound more Janice from Friends than Morgan Freeman, you might get freaked out. To get over your hatred of your own voice, try listening to recordings of it, recommends Dr. Johnson. “The more you get used to that, the more you acknowledge ‘That really is my sound,’” he says. If you think your voice is truly annoying (and not just to you), you aren’t stuck with that sound forever. Singing lessons, public speaking classes, and vocal training can help you learn how to change your voice’s sound, says Dr. Johnson. “We sometimes see people who are just not using their voice efficiently,” he says. “You can find different ways to use your voice to produce different qualities using breath and trying not to use your throat very much.”
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Hoewel die eerste volwaardige huishoudelike kosmenger met sy eie vaste staander en bak in 1919 die lig gesien het, was dit eintlik ’n uitvloeisel van ’n menger vir bakkers wat in 1908 in Amerika deur Herbert Johnson ontwerp is. Johnson se menger het die tradisionele manier vervang waar deeg met ’n ysterlepel gemeng is. Die sogenaamde KitchenAid-menger wat daaruit ontwikkel het en in 1920 gepantenteer is, het ’n goeie ontvangs geniet onder ''bevryde'' vroue wat hulle nie meer so baie in die kombuis wou afsloof nie. In die tweede helfte van die twintigste eeu was dit weer die Kenwood Chef wat sy staal gewys het. Die Britse ''pa'' van hierdie apparaat, ene Ken Wood, het sy onderneming in die laat jare veertig in ’n motorhuis in Woking, Surrey, begin om huishoudelike toestelle te vervaardig. Gou het hy vorendag gekom met die veeldoelige Kenwood Chef, wat nie net kan meng nie, maar ook kan versap, aartappels skil, koffie maal, blikke oopsny, noem maar op.
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For one California-based flight attendant of more than 40 years, air time isn't limited to quickie work trips around the globe—it's a way for her to give back to soldiers who are separated from their service dogs. BY ASHLEY PAIGE
For one California-based flight attendant of more than 40 years, air time isn’t limited to quickie work trips around the globe—it’s a way for her to give back to soldiers who are separated from their service dogs. Molli Oliver works for United Airlines and has made it her mission to reunite canines with the veterans they served with after they’ve returned home. According to an NBC Nightly News segment, delivering these dogs to their soldier companions can cost thousands of dollars, and sadly, they often wind up in military kennels separated from the handlers they know and love, sometimes hundreds or thousands of miles away. Oliver, however, has taken it upon herself to streamline this process whenever she can by flying the dogs to their soldier owners. “Even if it was just one dog at a time, I was happy to do that,” she said of her projects, which went viral on YouCaring, a crowdfunding website. She raised nearly $20,000 of her $5,000 goal to give the proper forever home to a Labrador retriever, the fifth dog that she was able to return to a veteran. “Because I just saw the joy in the dog and the handler being reunited, no matter who was doing that.” Oliver’s love of dogs came naturally. Her mother raised dogs, so she grew up around them. “My love for animals has been since I was born and raised with them,” she said to NBC. Her passion project stems from this love of animals and her country alike. To Oliver, her charity is a “win-win” display of gratitude for the troops she respects and admires. “I think that the dogs deserve a nice retirement because they’ve served our country, and they’ve protected my freedom for…65 years, along with everybody else’s,” she said to NBC. Looks like soldiers aren’t the only one serving—and this nation is all the better for it. Thinking getting a pup? Find out everything you need to know before adopting a rescue pup.
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AUG / SEPT / OKTOBER 25-26/08/2017
VISFEES Hentiesbaai Daleen Agenbag jagenbag@iway.na
26/08/2017
DIRT OVAL RACING LEG 5 Walvisbaai Oval track baan
02/09/2017 28/10/2017 02/12/2017
BOEREMARK Windhoek Skougronde Kiet 081 436 3049
14/09/2017
INSPIRASIE TAFELS Skougronde Windhoek
14-15/09/2017
OTJIWARONGO SKOU Otjiwarongo Paresis Skou Gronde 081 258 5770
16/09/2017
NATIONAL CANCER WALK Tsumeb United Nations Park 081 241 2816
24/09/2017
LAGOON PARK FAMILY MARKET Walvisbaai 081 143 9290
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WEETBIX ENERGY BARS INGREDIENTS: 12 x Weetbix 3 x tablespoons of cocoa powder 2 x cups of desiccated coconut 1 x tin of condensed milk 100 grams of butter 1 x teaspoon vanilla essence METHOD: In a large bowl, break the Weetbix into crumbs and add the rest of the dry ingredients. Pour the condensed milk and butter in a bowl and heat for one minute in the microwave, add to Weetbix mixture, add vanilla essence and stir with spoon. Line a tray with baking paper or cling wrap and spoon the mixture in tray ..spreading it evenly with the back of the spoon and pressing it down as well to make it firm. Place in the fridge for a few hours. Remove and cut into squares.
Hint: Stock up on ice cubes! BY CLAIRE NOWAK
From grilling novices to seasoned pros who know their seasoning, we’re all on the perpetual quest for the perfect burger. But here’s a little known secret: You don’t need to travel to the best burger joints in the country to find it. According to MasterChef judge Graham Elliot, you can make perfectly juicy burgers at home, and it’s a lot easier than you might think. He told Fox News the key is putting an ice cube in the middle of a patty, folding the meat around it, and then grilling it. That way, the ice keeps the patty moist so it doesn’t dry out. Another common grilling mistake that leads to dry burgers? Biting into your meat right away. If you let the patty sit for five minutes after taking it off the grill, the juices that have pooled in the center of your burger will reabsorb into the rest of the meat. Don’t worry, those few extra minutes of drooling will pay off. Elliot also stressed that the most important part of your burger should be, well, your burger. Let that juicy meat take center stage without any extra ingredients thrown in as seasoning, like peppers or onions. “You don’t want to do that,” he said. “You want it to be just straight meat.”
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It's a delicious solution to all of your business woes. BY SAM BENSON SMITH
It’s been 23 years since Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com, and the online selling behemoth looks a whole lot different than the book-selling site it started off as. The website made Bezos one of the richest men in the world basically without ever turning a profit. Peculiar, sure, but Bezos’ incredible success has been one filled with unconventionality; just take a look at his “two pizza rule.” Unfortunately, the rule does not involve every one of Amazon’s 341,000 employees receiving two pizzas. And it isn’t about imagining every pie chart like it was a pizza pie chart, although that still remains the single best way to entice kids into learning about pie charts. Instead, the two pizza rule is a bit of wisdom to keep meetings efficient. Basically, Bezos will only hold meetings in which two pizzas will feed the group. If the group that’s gathered together to meet is too large, then nothing will get done. This is the most delicious solution to the problem, wouldn’t you agree? In fact, pizza may be the solution to all your business woes. For example, say you’re looking to hire a new employee. Ask him or her what his or her favorite type of pizza is. If they respond with “pineapple pizza,” kindly ask them to leave, the Internet says so.
HOW TO TRACE A MISSING OR STOLEN PHONE If you lose your mobile phone, you can trace it without going to the police. Most of us always fear that our phones may be stolen at any time. Each phone carries a unique IMEI no. i.e. International Mobile Equipment Identity No which can be used to track it anywhere in the world. This is how it works:
Dial *#06# from your mobile.
Your mobile phone shows a unique 15 digit.
Note down this number at a secure place except in your mobile phone itself as this is the number which will help trace your phone in case of theft.
Once stolen, just E-mail this 15 digit IMEI No. to cop@vsnl.net with details as stated below:
Your name, Address, Phone model, Make, Last used No., E-mail for communication, Missed date and IMEI No.
Your Mobile will be traced within next 24 hours via a complex system of GPRS and internet, You will find where your hand set is being operated and the new user's No. will be sent to your email.
After this, you can inform the Police with the details you now have. 12
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It isn't just a coincidence. BY MARISSA LALIBERTE
If you’ve ever taken a handwritten prescription from a doctor or looked at the notes from your visit, it seems like no amount of squinting could help the letters get clearer. Bad handwriting almost seems like a requirement for graduating med school. It’s not like only people with bad handwriting are attracted to the medical field. Ruth Brocato, MD, primary care doctor with Mercy Medical Center says she went from winning a penmanship award in grade school to having totally illegible script now. “I know other people have trouble deciphering my notes,” says Dr. Brocato, who adds that she can usually read her own writing. Clearly, doctors haven’t tried this oneminute trick for better handwriting. So what gives? For one thing, doctors have to write more than just about any other job. “In the medical field, if it’s not documented, it didn’t happen,” says Celine Thum, MD, medical director at ParaDocs Worldwide. Anything you talk about behind closed doors needs written evidence for your medical history. Long days plus tons of writing equals a very tired hand. “If you’re writing literally for 10 to 12 hours a day and you’re handwriting, your hand just can’t do it,” says Dr. Brocato. Most doctors’ handwriting gets worse over the course of the day as those small hand muscles get overworked, says Asher Goldstein, MD, pain management doctor with Genesis Pain Centers. If doctors could spend an hour with every patient, they might be able to slow down and give their hands a rest. But the fact is, most physicians are rushing around to the next patient. For instance, one patient might have just 15 minutes to discuss eight medical issues and ask important questions about prescriptions, says Dr. Brocato. With so many patients to see in a limited time, doctors are more concerned with getting the information down than perfecting their handwriting. The jargon that doctors deal with also lends itself to bad handwriting. Case in point: imagine trying to write “epididymitis” without your computer’s handy spellcheck. “We have so many technical terms that are impossible to write,” says Dr. Thum. “You sometimes scribble to cover the error.” Plus, some terms that are totally clear to medical experts might leave you scratching your head. For instance, QD is shorthand for a Latin phrase meaning “one a day” and TID means “three times a day.” Your pharmacist would know exactly what your doctor meant, but you’d probably just write it off as chicken scratch. Dr. Brocato, who now mostly types, says doctors are extra careful when it comes to prescriptions, when a tiny misread could have major consequences. For instance, instead of writing “mg” or “mcg,” doctors were encouraged to write out “milligram” or “microgram.” “If a dosage is 100 times what you’re writing, you have to be super careful about that,” she says. Those tiny nuances in sloppy handwriting could be bad news for treatment. A 2006 reportfound that more than 7,000 people died a year from medical errors caused by illegible handwriting. Now, doctors are moving toward electronic medical records to cut down on lost-in-translation errors. Some states even legally require doctors to send in prescriptions electronically instead of passing over handwritten slips.. No studies have looked into whether the yearly death rate from wrong prescriptions has gone down, but doctors agree there’s less chance for error. “Things are much more legible than they have been in the past,” says Dr. Goldstein. Of course, typing everything isn’t perfect either. There’s still the possibility of entering, say, 30 instead of 300, and the process is slower than just scrawling out a prescription. While we’re all for electronic medical records, we’ll write by hand whenever we can. After all, handwriting can make you smarter.
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NAMPOL TRAFFIC NUMBERS WALVIS BAY SWAKOPMUND HENTIES BAY KARIBIB OMARURU CITY POLICE
081 333 0449 081 202 8391 081 657 0704 081 711 9482 081 657 0703 061—302302
OTHER EMERGENCY NUMBERS LIFELINK NAMIBIA 085 900 E-MED RESCUE 081 924 ST GABRIELS COM AMBULANCE 085 955 EAGLE CHRIST. AMBULANCE 085 933 WINDHOEK STATE AMBULANCE 061-2033282 SWAKOP STATE AMBULANCE 064-4106000 WALVIS BAY STATE AMBULANCE 064-216300 15
FABRIC PRINTING (PERMANENTLY) WITH CRAYONS AND SANDPAPER This fabric printing method is especially do-able because it doesn’t require any specialty fabric paints or markers, just plain old crayons. Did you know it’s possible to heat set plain old crayons to be permanent on cotton fabric? You can! It’s easy and uses up old crayons instead of investing in more supplies that you only use for one project! Grab an old t shirt and get busy drawing, printing, and showing off! Sandpaper as an art supply… While you could color straight on to the fabric we’re going to color on sandpaper and then transfer that image to the fabric. If you have ever watched a child try to color on fabric I will tell you it’s not easy. Fabric is stretchy and squishy. Unless you stretch it it’s almost impossible for a little one to color back and forth without the fabric wadding up in a really frustrating way. Sandpaper doesn’t do that. The scratchy texture adds a nice sensory element to coloring and a textural element to the final print. We used a fine grade of sandpaper. The rougher the sandpaper the more texture will show in the final print. Either will work; use what you have!
Turn t-shirt right side out and iron again; still protecting your iron with a layer of parchment paper. Keep your iron on high heat to ensure you’re heat setting your fabric printing. Throw that baby in the dryer… One more step to fully heat set your fabric printing; the dryer. Throw your t-shirt into the dryer on high heat for a half hour or so. Alone. Do it with just your printed t-shirt just in case any waxy pigment is still coming off! Wear and enjoy… This would be super fun and easy to do with a group for a birthday party etc. You could print t-shirts, pillowcases, bandanas, anything cotton!
Choosing a successful design… Printing an image reverses it, like a mirror image. This can be a tough concept for kids to get. I discourage words or letters for that reason. Sandpaper is not a precise art. It’s rough which doesn’t allow for sharp, clear lines. (That’s why this is a great project for using up old crayons. Save the new box for another day!) Choosing a subject that’s large, graphic, and easy will allow for success! Lay that color down.. Lay that color down heavy! I like to think of this as a bit of exercise for little fingers. Crayon shouldn’t be fine lines but blocks of color. You’re trying to deposit the crayon wax onto the sandpaper, lots of it. All of our Crayola crayons worked for this. These Metallic FX crayons were especially soft and easy to deposit on the sand paper. But again, use what you have. We cut our images out when they were done being colored. There were lots of little crayon “bits” floating around. Cutting them out avoided ironing those specks onto our tshirts. Fabric printing…. Now to transfer the image from sandpaper to t-shirt. Turn your t-shirt inside out. Place a piece of cardboard inside the t-shirt and preheat your iron to high. You want to place your colored sandpaper inside the t-shirt (which is inside out) crayon side touching the front of the t-shirt. This means your iron will be ironing the wrong side of the t-shirt and directly under that will be the colored sandpaper. Make sense? Now cover all those layers with a layer of parchment paper to protect your iron. We ironed all of our individual pieces at once but our designs didn’t need to be too precise. You could do it one piece at a time. Apply iron moving it very slowly with a little pressure. Feel free to peek and make sure you’re happy with the amount of color transfer before peeling your layers apart.
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Hint: it's not "like"! BY MEGHAN JONES
Preparing for a job interview can be stressful: what do you wear? What questions will they ask you? Not to mention that, no matter how much you prepare, your interviewer’s first impression of you could be tarnished the second you say a single word. Surprisingly, the word is not “like” or “honestly” (though you should probably be careful about those, too). The word is “actually.” Used properly, the word “actually” represents a contradiction. For instance, take the famous movie line “love actually is all around”: the narrator is contradicting those who think that it’s not. (Did you know the word “actually” is used 22 times in Love Actually?) It can also be used to justify something: “That movie was awful, huh?” “Actually, I really liked it.” You may wonder what harm a commonly used word like that could possibly do. However, we often don’t use it that way. When used a certain way, saying “actually” can instantly make you seem less credible. Dictionary.com says that we use it as a “crutch word,” a word “that we slip into sentences in order to give ourselves more time to think.” Since using it this way adds emphasis rather than meaning, it automatically suggests that whatever you’re saying can’t stand on its own. Southern Living claims that the word makes listeners “subconsciously… question if there’s more unspoken information.” Take this example. Imagine you’re in a job interview, and your interviewer asks, “What was your last full-time job?” You reply, “I actually worked at …………....” The word doesn’t contradict or justify anything in the question, so there’s no reason for you to say it at all. And it’s not just job interviews: Southern Living suggests that you steer clear of this word altogether. If you’re not using it to actively contradict something, and it’s just adding fluff to your sentence, avoid it. No longer relying on a “crutch word,” your statement will have more punch.
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BY MARISSA LALIBERTE They seem harmless, but there's a very good reason you shouldn't ignore them.
As you get older, little growths called skin tags might start popping up on your body. You’ll recognize them because they’re thinner at the base and get wider at the top. They aren’t painful or dangerous like cancerous moles, but there’s a very good reason you’ll want them removed. Experts think friction—like from your shirt’s underarms or a necklace—can cause the growths over time, though it’s unclear why some people get more than others, says Anthony Rossi, MD, FAAD, dermatologic surgeon at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and assistant professor of dermatology at Weill Cornell Medical College. People have used all kinds of crazy methods to try removing skin tags on their own, says Dr. Rossi. He’s heard of people tying strings around them, burning them, trying to pick them off with their fingers, and even slamming books against them. “It’s wild what people will do,” he says. A dermatologist, on the other hand, can snip away skin tags quickly and cleanly. Sounds easy enough for you to try it on your own, right? Not so fast. “It’s like when people try to cut their own hair,” says Dr. Rossi. “It never goes the way they want it to.” For one thing, dermatologists have sterile instruments, but using your own could lead to an infection. Plus, while derms can use local anesthesia and have supplies to stop the blood, you could bleed uncontrollably with at-home methods. Even OTC medications claiming to dissolve the skin tags could be bad news, says Dr. Rossi. “You could burn the skin or make marks,” he says. “There could be unintended consequences.” If you hate the idea of anyone snipping your skin, ask a doctor to freeze or melt it instead. But there’s an even bigger reason you should visit an expert. After dermatologists remove a growth, they’ll look at it under a microscope. “There are things that look like skin tags but are cancerous,” says Dr. Rossi. That doesn’t mean you should freak out if you do find a skin tag. Most will just be benign, but you won’t know for sure until you’ve asked. Plus, checking a skin tag is a “good excuse” to get your doctor to check the rest of your body for skin cancerand atypical or malignant growths, says Dr. Rossi.
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