Do you know what it means to sploot?
You’ve likely heard of spelunking- exploring cool underground caves- and you know what it is to splatter something across a surface, like paint on the floor.
Put the two together – splelunk and splatter – and you get the idea of what it means to sploot.
Those on Instagram will know that sploot is now slang for the position squirrels take when their stomach hits the ground and their legs stretch out behind and in front of them. (To see a picture of a sploot, visit on-emotions.com)
Over this past week, as temperatures have soared all over the world, Instagram influencers have posted pictures of splooting squirrels. Why do squirrels sploot? Simply, to cool down. To rest. To stop. Especially, when things get too hot.
In a recent NPR interview, Andrea Rummel, a bioscientist at Rice University explains, “For every kind of thermal regulatory mechanism, there is a point at which it doesn’t work anymore.” Meaning, there comes a time when it’s too hot and humid, and our bodies can no longer cool down on their own, so we have to find a place to “sploot.”
So the next time you feel yourself overheating, physically, emotionally (we have language for this when we say someone is at a “boiling point”), maybe find your cool place, stop moving, socializing, exercising, working and just sploot… like a squirrel.
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