quick poll about sneezing and sunlight.

[alexr_rwx]

Bright sunlight tends to make me sneeze. This is called the photic sneeze reflex, and it's relatively common.

How about you?

[Poll #1352727]

Comments

[praetorian42.livejournal.com]

No- but there was a character in Pete & Pete that had that... condition...

She used it to her advantage in the group's quest to achieve the world record for staying awake. Whenever she tired, she looked at the sun, sneezed, and was awakened. This failed eventually, because the sun goes away sometimes.

[praetorian42.livejournal.com]

The Internet provides documentation of my Television nostalgia.

http://www.tv.com/the-adventures-of-pete-and-pete/nightcrawlers/episode/166550/recap.html

[oniugnip.livejournal.com]

Oh, I totally remember that episode!

I wonder if it'd be worth it to go back and watch old Pete & Pete episodes. It may be best to let them hang out in our shared cultural memory, but it did seem like a pretty clever piece of television. Maybe it's aged well?

[poodleface.livejournal.com]

I don't think I suffer from this. Then again, I'm not in bright sunlight very much.

Kung Fu movie tonight if you are interested!

ERF OUT

[oniugnip.livejournal.com]

I'll be there! Hiyaaaa!

[britta43.livejournal.com]

There should be a category for "sometimes". I don't think that's necessarily a yes or no question.

[oniugnip.livejournal.com]

There could be degrees of it!

But do you know the feeling? Many people just don't see the connection.

[gtv42.livejournal.com]

I answered no because bright light doesn't cause me to sneeze if I don't have to already, but when and if I am about to lose a sneeze I make a point of looking at a bright light to help things along. My mom has always told me to look at a bright light if I'm about to lose a sneeze, and it wasn't until high school that I had an explanation for it.

An explanation I had to deliver when I once was talking to my advisor, suddenly stopped, blinked a few times, then ducked my head under my desk lamp and subsequently sneezed.

[oniugnip.livejournal.com]

I think this means you're a "yes" -- some people, if you bring this up, have no idea that there's a connection between bright lights and sneezing.

Or perhaps there are degrees of it, like Emily suggests?

It's not like every time there's a bright light, I sneeze.

[gtv42.livejournal.com]

Ah. There are certainly some people for whom something like a camera flash forces a sneeze, and that was the severity that I thought the quiz was geared towards.

To reiterate, bright light doesn't *make* me sneeze, but it can /assist/ a sneeze. I'd say it's good for the last 25% of the way there.

[britta43.livejournal.com]

I would say that at some point, anything can make you sneeze, right....

Plus, yes, plucking my eyebrows seems to make me sneeze too.....

[deepdistraction.livejournal.com]

One of my sisters sneezes if she plucks her eyebrows.

[leadsynth.livejournal.com]

Whoa, I also sneeze when I pluck my eyebrows!

[oniugnip.livejournal.com]

These things, maybe they're genetic!

[deepdistraction.livejournal.com]

Per http://www.allergycapital.com.au/Pages/Sneeze.html:

Some people sneeze when they pluck their eyebrows, get cold or go out into the sun. "Sun sneezing (Photic sneezing)" often runs in families, and occurs in around one in four people. The world record for sneezing is held by Donna Griffiths from Worstershire in the UK, who sneezed for 978 days in a row, stopping on 16 September 1983 (http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com )