Peep

Peep

By Claudia Lynch, Benchmarks Online Editor

It's that time of year again. Easter is just around the corner and Peeps have invaded the grocery store shelves. Actually, they've been there since around Valentine's Day. Did you notice? According to a meticulously researched Salon.com article, "Where do Peeps Come From?":

For five years running, Peeps and Bunnies have been
America's favorite nonchocolate Easter treats. But numbers
don't tell half the story. These innocent-looking creatures --
the chick-shaped Peeps in particular -- have become icons
of American pop culture. People don't just eat Peeps.
They take pictures of them. They make crafts with them.
They write songs about them. They put them on wreaths.
They put them on pizza. They create parody porn Web
sites for them. And some curious souls devote countless
hours to Peep research, testing the effects of everything
from heat to liquid nitrogen on the hardy little fertility symbols.

Peep research? That's right, actual scientists have tried to uncover the many mysteries of "the Peep." Emory University's Gary Falcon and James Zimring have conducted extensive clinical studies on Peeps. According to their Peep Research page (http://www.learnlink.emory.edu/peep/), they have conducted two fundamental types of Peep research, basic science and risk analysis. In the basic science phase they investigated how Peeps react to:

• cold
• heat
• solubility testing
• Low-pressure environments

In the risk analysis phase they investigated the effects of smoking and alcohol on Peep health. Also presented on this page is a documented "Medical Miracle" -- Quintuplet Peep siblings, conjoined at birth, were separated through a "daring application of modern medicine!"

More fun with Peeps

If you haven't had enough fun yet, be sure to visit the Peep Dance Page (http://www.peepdance.com/), sing some Peep Lyrics (http://users.ids.net/~flamingo/mp.html -- you'll need to scroll down to see the lyrics), and take a tour of the Peeps Factory (http://www.marshmallowpeeps.com/factory.html) where all Peeps are born.

Want more? Annie's Peeps Links (http://www.geekbabe.com/peeps/) has all sorts of, well, links to other Peeps-related sites. To give you an idea of how interested people are in Peeps, this page is organized into the following sections:

• General info and official sites
• Newest additions
• Classic, long-standing, and highly recommended sites
• Just Born Factory fire news
• Humor
• Testing, torture, nuking, etc.
• Arts, crafts, recipes, stories, poetry, etc.
• News reports and features
• Peeps Links and Information
• Personal pages
• The Good, The Bad, and The Very Bad :)
• Pages of Shame

Have fun!