Don't lick sexy pavement lichen

August 13, 2019 7:30 PM

It's called sexy pavement lichen and tonnes are supposedly available for supply but there's little proof to back up claims it can treat impotence – and plenty to be worried about.
posted by noneuclidean (25 comments total)

Life is a rich tapestry- and people are amusingly stupid sometimes.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 7:42 PM on August 13, 2019 [3 favorites]

Sexy Pavement Lichen is like an auto generated url escaped from gfycat
posted by theodolite at 7:47 PM on August 13, 2019 [11 favorites]

It has joined the of ranks of sea horses, pangolin scales, the penises of tigers and seals as substances rumoured to have an effect on human erectile dysfunction.

Dammit we have Viagra and it's scientifically proven. This is a solved problem! Stop killing stuff!
posted by adept256 at 8:11 PM on August 13, 2019 [17 favorites]

There are so many products where they seem to have come up with the name first, then looked for something to do with it.
"Sexy Pavement Lichen!"
"I'll set an intern to scraping sidewalks immediately."
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:16 PM on August 13, 2019 [2 favorites]

"Sexy Pavement Lichen" sounds like a neural network generated flavor of ice cream.
posted by Foosnark at 8:23 PM on August 13, 2019 [6 favorites]

"Sexy Pavement Lichen" will be somebody's sockpuppet name within the next 24 hours.
posted by suetanvil at 8:25 PM on August 13, 2019 [3 favorites]

Huh... I guess they really do have every kind of girls’s costume at that warehouse.
posted by sysinfo at 8:28 PM on August 13, 2019 [24 favorites]

There is a real powerwashing porn niche on the internet. Nothing NSFW, just people posting videos of powerwashing pavements amongst other things. Maybe they've known all along.
posted by adept256 at 8:33 PM on August 13, 2019

> Don't lick sexy pavement lichen

don't tell me what to do! god, why are you always on my case about everything?! you're not even my real dad!!
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:52 PM on August 13, 2019 [5 favorites]

Has nobody read Wanderers? Stay the hell away OMG
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 8:53 PM on August 13, 2019 [1 favorite]

"Sexy pavement lichen" could easily be a what3words location. (It's not; I checked.)
posted by traveler_ at 8:54 PM on August 13, 2019

At least it will be easier to identify weird extremely online horny creeps if they’re on all outside on all fours, licking the pavement.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:15 PM on August 13, 2019 [2 favorites]

Sometimes I like to play “alien anthropologist” and try to interpret some weird human behavior. IMO this still isn’t as weird as jumping out of planes.
posted by schadenfrau at 9:27 PM on August 13, 2019 [1 favorite]

but i'm liking the lichen i'm licking
posted by not_on_display at 9:32 PM on August 13, 2019 [10 favorites]

Lichen lichen-liking lichen like liken lichen like lichen lichen-liking lichen like.
posted by glonous keming at 10:40 PM on August 13, 2019 [4 favorites]

buffalo buffalo
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 10:48 PM on August 13, 2019 [1 favorite]

The article is good for many reasons, including:

Knight said a United States Food and Drug Administration asked an Australian lichen expert to analyse one of the products. He found it was 80 per cent Viagra, and 20 per cent grass clippings.

Sold in 25kg drums, nice. The article has good lichen facts as well.

I unironically love seeing lichen covered rocks on hiking trails, i’ll collect colors that are new to me, etc. They are a symbiosis of algae and fungi that I heard might could survive global warming or nuclear winter by shutting down for a while. I can’t say i’ve ever tasted or ingested any.
posted by drowsy at 1:52 AM on August 14, 2019

My nem is Dude,
an I am stuck
Tho getting nude,
it won’t stand up
On hands an knees,
I go ahikin
For sexy times
I lik the lichen
posted by AxelT at 2:21 AM on August 14, 2019 [14 favorites]

Dammit we have Viagra and it's scientifically proven. This is a solved problem! Stop killing stuff!

Yeah, but I’m not like so pathetic I need Viagra. Just a little natural boost. I’m still manly. Here, try some of this rhino horn I picked up, that’s what tough guys use.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 2:39 AM on August 14, 2019

Straight men: They won't kiss other men and wouldn't wear pink under coercion, but tell them that there's some schmutz on the sidewalk that will give them a righteous heteronormative boner and they'll be down on all fours slurping it up.
posted by at by at 5:20 AM on August 14, 2019 [4 favorites]

However, if you're after some lead in your pencil,

I love you, New Zealand
posted by showbiz_liz at 8:04 AM on August 14, 2019 [2 favorites]

Straight men: They won't kiss other men and wouldn't wear pink under coercion, but tell them that there's some schmutz on the sidewalk that will give them a righteous heteronormative boner and they'll be down on all fours slurping it up.

Gimme that tiger penis! *CHOMP*
posted by carsonb at 9:05 AM on August 14, 2019

To be fair I've only seen Viagra ads targeted at old men. One of the Generic Makers should start a branding drive aimed at the Energy drink and pot crowd. Both Red Bull and Monster lead themselves to natural marketing. Have it be the only scientifically proven ingredient in a herbal concoction and it would sell like rhino horn and tiger penis.
posted by Mitheral at 2:00 PM on August 14, 2019

Something positive: "The ability of this lichen to accumulate high levels of Cu, Pb and Zn may make it useful as a remediation tool. " (from a journal article)
posted by CCBC at 3:40 PM on August 14, 2019

Perhaps in New Zealand Xanthoparmelia scabrosa (Taylor) Hale is known as "sexy pavement lichen" but in this country "sidewalk firedot lichen" is Xanthocarpia feracissima (H. Magn.) Frödén, Arup & Søchting. I am very much afraid this will create confusion, and American men will lick the crustose pavement and NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.
posted by acrasis at 4:06 PM on August 14, 2019