Tag Archive for 'brain chemistry of love'

The “Monoamine Cocktail” Mixology Contest!

Published on January 21, 2010 in Brain Chemistry, Events and Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .
January 22, 2010 4:00 pmtoFebruary 5, 2010 10:00 pm

We just had to know – is it possible?  Can a cocktail be designed that simulates the feelings of falling in love?  For all those in search of the perfect Valentine’s Day Love Potion we present the “Brain Chemistry for Lovers” Monoamine Mixology Contest at 3 Doors Down Café.

The“Brain Chemistry for Lovers” creative team put on their lab coats for this effort.  Aided by expert mixologist Matthew Stiles, bartender at the fantastic 3 Doors Down Café, OHSU neuroscientist Dr. Larry Sherman Ph.D., (Brain Chemistry For Lovers resident science advisor) and other experts, we aimed for nothing less than the perfect love potion.

It turned out it was too hard to create just one cocktail. So we created three delectable drink recipes – the Don Juan, the Mata Hari, and the Scarlett O’Hara – that combine all three monoamines using different ingredients. And so a contest was born. You can decide which monoamine cocktail is the new Love Potion #9.

How the contest works:

Step 1 TRY THE THREE MONOAMINE COCKTAILS
at 3 Doors Down Café between Jan. 22 – Feb. 5 or
at home by viewing the recipes online at:

www.brainchemistryforlovers.com or
www.3doorsdowncafe.com

Step 2 CAST YOUR VOTE IN THE “Monoamine Mixology Contest”

Vote on the Brain Chemistry For Lovers CONTACT PAGE
OR on the Brain Chemistry FACEBOOK PAGE
OR at 3 Doors Down Café

Those who vote at 3 Doors Down Café will be entered in a drawing for a $75 dinner gift certificate, an OMSI family membership and other great prizes. For reservations and information, call 503-236-6886 or visit www.3doorsdowncafe.com.

Step 3 HAVE SOME LOVE POTION

The highest-rated cocktail from the contest will be served at the upcoming performance of Brain Chemistry For Lovers presented by OMSI Science Pub Series on Tues., Feb. 9, at 7:00 pm at McMenamins’ Bagdad.Theater.  Order your tickets here.

Brain Chemistry For Lovers opens for Dr. Helen Fisher at Illahee Lecture Series

Published on February 4, 2009 in Blog, Brain Chemistry and Events. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .
February 18, 2009
7:30 pmto9:30 pm

On Wednesday, February 18th, Brain Chemistry For Lovers w/Valerie Day and Darrell Grant will open for Dr. Helen Fisher for the Illahee Lecture Series. Also appearing for this 20 minute abbreviated version of the show (both onscreen and in-person) will be OHSU’s Dr. Larry Sherman Ph.D. (advisor for Brain Chemistry For Lovers, Dr. Sherman also plays himself in the film for the show created by filmmaker Jim Blashfield).

Brain Chemistry For Lovers is one of Valerie’s most recent projects. Fusing cabaret, concert, and science lecture, Brain Chemistry For Lovers uses music, film and the latest discoveries in the world of neuroscience to explore one of the most universal of all human experiences – Romantic Love.

helen3Dr. Fisher is often called “The Doyenne of Desire” as she is one of the most prominent experts on the study of love and the brain. Her book “Why We Love – the Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love”, and a ground breaking fMRI study she and her colleagues conducted to study the brain circuitry of romantic love, are are used as a part of the science lecture in the Brain Chemistry For Lovers performance during the phase of love having to do with Dopamine.

This lecture is a part of the 2009 Illahee Lecture Series on The Nature of Desire. For more about the Lecture Series and to purchase tickets, go to : www.illahee.org or click HERE.

Where: First Congregational Church (1126 SW Park, Portland). 7:30 PM (Doors open at 6:30). Tickets are $20

“A General Theory of Love”

Published on October 28, 2008 in Blog and Brain Chemistry. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , .

General Theory of Love Of all the books I have read while doing research for the Brain Chemistry For Lovers show, my absolute hands down favorite is “A General Theory of Love” by Thomas Lewis, M.D., Fari Amini, M.D., and Richard Lannon, M.D. I don’t know how these three M.D.’s managed it, but somehow they were able to collaborate and come up with a book that turns scientific prose into poetry.

Here’s a paragraph from the forward:

“From birth to death, love is not just the focus of human experience but also the life force of the mind, determining our moods, stabilizing our bodily rhythms, and changing the structure of our brains. The body’s physiology ensures that relationships determine and fix our identities. Love makes us who we are, and who we can become. In these pages we explain how and why this is so.”
Continue reading ‘“A General Theory of Love”’

What Is This Thing Called Love?

Published on September 2, 2008 in Blog and Brain Chemistry. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Back in 2006 I found an article in National Geographic Magazine written by Lauren Slater about the neuroscience of love. She begins by writing “In the Western world we have for centuries concocted poems and stories and plays about the cycles of love, the way it morphs and changes over time, the way passion grabs us by our flung-back throats and then leaves us for something saner.” I thought to myself as I was reading that we have been writing SONGS about love for centuries as well.

The article continues….”We have relied on stories to explain the complexities of love, tales of jealous gods and arrows. Now, however, these stories—so much a part of every civilization—may be changing as science steps in to explain what we have always felt to be myth, to be magic. For the first time, new research has begun to illuminate where love lies in the brain, the particulars of its chemical components.”

As I read this, a little light bulb went on in my head. What a great idea for a show! You could take the different stages of love that we humans go through, show what’s happening in the brain in each stage, and then connect the audience to the feelings they experience in these stages through some of the greatest love songs ever written….and that’s how “Brain Chemistry For Lovers” began.

Being an optimistic pessimist who for some reason ends up believing that if you can dream it you can do it, I started. First, more research was required….this is always the fun part for me!

(to be continued)

(above photo by Pablo Corral Vega)