Monday, January 26, 2009

Discoveries made while lying in bed

Last night I was in bed trying to keep my husband awake (so he could rub our itchy child) and I put my fingertips on his back and they started vibrating. Humming actually. It was the weirdest sensation. I thought "Wow, that is an electrical current! But coming out of my husband's shoulder?" So I told him about the strange humming emitting from his shoulder blade. He couldn't feel anything, and just thought it was the massive glass of wine I had drunk. I kept playing with the current, using the space on the top of my hand (the unnamed space between your first knuckle and second). Then I had a brilliant idea to convince him that there really was an electric current coming from his back. I thought if he had one, I must too. So I had him check my back. Lo-and-behold, I was humming too. I also could not feel this strange vibration. We checked our children and they were not humming with electricity. We started to think about the possiblity that we were picking up these vibrations from our Sunbeam electric blanket, maybe it was putting out EMF's, so we switched it off and the vibrations went away. So today I google "are electric blankets safe" and this pops up.

"ELECTRIC BLANKET EMF’S (60 Hz Electromagnetic Frequency Waves)

In the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, some scientists and others began to be concerned over the safety of electromagnetic fields (EMF’s). Various studies in that timeframe had raised concerns over the possibility that the EMF’s generated by power companies’ overhead transmission lines and some appliances could cause cancer especially in children. The United States government became involved and studied over 500 peer reviewed papers written on this potential problem. The National Research Council spent around 65 million dollars and finally stated that there was no conclusive evidence that residential EMF’s play any role in the development of cancer, in reproductive issues or in learning/behavioral issues. Nevertheless Sunbeam, which was then the only major United States manufacturer of electric blankets, altered the design of its products to reduce EMF’s. Redesigned blankets produced after 1992 had much weaker electrical fields than their predecessors. The argument over EMF’s has never gone away completely although very few scientists and medical experts continue to believe that they can cause problems."

http://www.electricblanketinstitute.com/Safety.html

If your back is humming because of EMF's I have to wonder, can that be good? Sunbeam needs to look at their design again because I don't think being able to run electric current through your body is a really good thing. Maybe I can use the blanket as a back up generator.

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