no.stupid.answers

Everywhere we turn there they are; in the food we eat, the air we breathe and even on our cute pet pugs; no, I am not talking about the cast from High School Musical. I speak of parasites. As long as nature has evolved, parasites have evolved along with it.

So exactly what is a parasite, asks a WikiAnswers user.

A parasite is an organism that benefits from a close, prolonged relationship with another organism - its host - while the host organism is harmed. Examples include tapeworms in the human intestine, mites on a parrot or fungus infesting a maple tree. In all these cases, one species is sucking the life force out of another species.

So, are there any instances where this negative relationship occurs within the same species?

The answer, my fellow humans, is yes. Scientifically referred to as direct intraspecific kleptoparasitism, this type of parasitism is rare in nature but an all too common phenomenon amongst our own kind. Think about those hardworking parents, waiting with outstretched arms, to embrace their Xbox-playing, beer-chugging, Tila-Tequila-quoting, recent college graduates. These parents are so happy and giving, only to find, five years down the line, that their child has no intention of leaving the house with the couch, free laundry service and magical fridge that autofills each week.

What can we do to remedy this problem?

In nature, the rule is kill or be killed: the host or parasite will eventually die. Luckily, tapeworms are destroyed by one prescribed pill from the doctor, parrots get treated with a lethal-mite shampoo and fungus on a maple tree is attacked by toxins in the leaves.

People parasites are, however, different. There is no shampoo that gets your son a job interview or special toxin that oozes out of the Xbox controller when it’s been handled too long.

Perhaps communication is the key? Words are powerful, motivational and life-changing! Like one WikiAnswers user dared ask:

Can you tell your daughter and her children to move out of your house?

Change the locks. Sometimes locks speak louder than words and are a lot healthier than pesticide.

Did you know? WikiAnswers currently has 2,471 community-grown Q&A collections; in short, there are a whole buncha topics covered on the site, and the number is constantly getting bigger.

Since March began, we’ve been finding WikiAnswers listed as a source for lots of blog posts spanning several topics. Let’s take a look:

• Animals: Don’t you love how a group of animals always has to have a special name? Laughter Thoughts introduces us to the troop - her own and an actual troop of monkeys.

• Human anatomy: Over at The Mutated World of Eclectic Disarray, we get to find out how much of the human body is made up of water. That’s an easy one, you say? Well, what about the human brain, then? This statistic makes you think twice (be careful of the puddles).

• Christianity: Learn how to say the Rosary of Liberation with This Burning Fire.

• Politics: Finally, someone is sharing what a Super Delegate is with the rest of us (and that someone is Clear Fog Blog).

• Junk food: Fracas is celebrating the birth of the Oreo cookie! I wonder what kind of cake an Oreo cookie eats on its own birthday?

• Sea food: If we eat oysters, what do oysters eat? Small oysters? Small people? Before I get a head of myself, Live Love Life has it all worked out.

• Sports: A teacher gets philosophical about sports, starting with the basics: Why are they important?

• Personal development: Interesting blog - Agile Personal Development - discussing the difference between skills and knowledge.

• Language: In case you couldn’t figure it out, and are ready for the truth, dvmp sorts it out from his latest blog entry: Where did the phrase “beat you like a redheaded stepchild” come from?

• Seasons: It feels like it’s spring already, but Scott reminds us that the first day of spring has not yet sprung.

• Lawyers: Brand new shark lawyer with a brand new blawg wants to remind the rest of us how many lawyers there are in the United States. Thanks, man. Now I will jump off the roof.

It’s a New Year edition of the WikiAnswers Contributor Corner. Today, we’ll take a look at LauraFrog, who hails from the land down under. Out where she is…it’s already 2008! The rest of us still have a few hours to go…

LauraFrog is one of our youngest Supervisors and so we just HAD to find out what she’s all about…besides her affinity for frogs.

How did you originally hear about WikiAnswers?

Doing homework. I got frustrated and typed basically an entire question into Google - and somebody had already asked it on WikiAnswers. I hit the link, used some of the keywords in the answer to find the info I needed and went straight back to WikiAnswers because I thought it was interesting. There were a few REALLY STUPID questions in there that I could possibly have answered at age four. So I answered them. For about an hour. Suffice it to say, I got hooked — like everyone else who ended up a supervisor!

What motivates you to volunteer your time to the WikiAnswers community?

Search me! Ok ok…it’s probably because ignorance is the single most irritating thing to me. I go to school where people constantly diss me because I don’t care that last weekend [popular girl] split up with [hot boy] and called him [profanity] in [chat room] and [school gossip] saw the screen and told [tart] who spread notes around [class] in [subject] and pissed off [hot boy’s mate]. I missed the conversation because at the time I was practicing with the choir in the music block, ignoring [popular boys] playing electric guitars with the amps on full volume, barely visible through the crowd of females. Not including me.

I get sick of the rumours, and people who think they know me because they put a label on me and say they know all there is to know about nerds. There’s always something more to learn, something hiding, something to find out. I like helping other people to find out more instead of sitting around saying ‘why do I care anyway?’ I love the way that everybody adds to the answer, so you might write down a few sentences and come back a month later and learn more than you gave to the person who asked the question.

What is your area of expertise?

I love animals. I live in a rural area of Australia so I’ve grown up with them. My landlord’s bull is as much my pet as my cat is. If I call out ‘Henry!’ he sidles up to the fence, rubs his head on me and eats mangoes out of my hand. The possums that live in our roof are tame, and we used to have a kangaroo rat that hopped inside every night, often with her offspring, to eat oats out of a dish that we always left in the kitchen for her. I spend most of my WikiAnswers time on Animal Life because I have a science brain and lots of practical experience with animals.

So what about your screenname?

Frogs are my favourites. I trained my frog, Gargantua, based on his instincts - he would move away from pressure, towards food etc. Frogs instinctively climb up, so I would put him on my hand and aim my elbow at the roof, and he would climb along my arm. He would also jump if I touched him in the right place. I’ve dedicated a fair bit of my life to ‘frog activism’. It annoys me that people stick up for anything cute and cuddly but are scared or revolted by frogs. At age 10 I was emailing local politicians demanding that they reinstate funding to frog-related conservation projects. I’ve also appeared on the TV quiz show The Einstein Factor - special subject Wet Tropics Frogs.

What is the funniest question/funniest experience as a Supervisor on WikiAnswers?

There are a few. Before I became a supervisor, I was trawling the Computers topic and I came across a question: “What does the new function do?” (I refrained from answering ‘you tell me since you presumably know what it is!’)

Next…I was online when I got a message on my board from somebody saying they loved my contribs, so I was really flattered and I replied. Then one of their friends came online and started having a real time conversation about one of their boyfriends on MY MESSAGE BOARD! I didn’t know what to do so I waited until one of them logged off and deleted the posts…

Share a random fact about yourself.

Random? I am random…Standard issue answer to this one, I was born six weeks premature, got operated on when I was 2 days old, and was given a 60% chance of surviving.

…I did!