Fun Fact – urinate

Scientific def: to discharge urine from the body (to micturate)

Outlander def: Act of peeing with your godfather el fresco!

Learn about urination in…Well, I haven’t actually written an Anatomy Lesson about the urinary bladder, the organ that stores urine and contracts during urination. The closest I can come to the topic at at this point are Anatomy Lesson #8, “Jamie Takes a Beating and Claire’s Healing Touch,” and Anatomy Lesson #15, “Crouching Grants – Hidden Dagger”; these lessons introduce the kidneys, organs that produce urine.

In the meantime, here’s a wee (Ha, ha) lesson on urination to contemplate: do ye ken it takes 21 seconds for most mammals to urinate? Yep! A researcher and his colleagues were awarded a 2015 Ig Nobel prize** for this finding. Such research may seem frivolous, but it could lead to an early medical diagnostic tool for men. If the time to empty the urinary bladder exceeds established urination times, a prostate exam may be in order (New Scientist, 31 October 2015).

Read about Claire’s need to urinate while interrogated by BJR at Fort William. From Outlander book:

The tension was slightly relieved by the entrance of an orderly, bearing a tray of tea things. Still silent, Randall poured out and offered me a cup. We sipped some more. “Don’t tell me,” I said finally. “Let me guess. It’s a new form of persuasion you’ve invented—torture by bladder. You ply me with drinkables until I promise to tell you anything in exchange for five minutes with a chamber pot.” He was so taken by surprise that he actually laughed.

Or where Jenny Murray’s new daughter baptizes her father’s shirt (Outlander book):

“Hello, wee Maggie,” he whispered, touching the tiny button of a nose with one fingertip. His new daughter, unimpressed by the introduction, closed her eyes in concentration, stiffened, and urinated on her father’s shirt.

See Jamie and Murtagh pee on the walls of Castle Leoch in Starz, episode 109, The Reckoning! Yep, these BFFs formulate and celebrate as they urinate and consecrate Colum’s real estate! Do ye ken there are 444 English words that rhyme with urinate? Hee, hee!

A deeply grateful,

Outlander Anatomist

** Ig Nobel Prizes honor achievements that make people LAUGH, and then THINK. The prizes are intended to celebrate the unusual, honor the imaginative — and spur people’s interest in science, medicine, and technology.