December 5-9. 2016
At a writing residency in Oregon, Emma finds a bird foot in coyote scat, and then sees death all around her in the forest. When I stopped for lunch, I took out my notebook and wrote, “Thinking mostly about nothing much except how the forest is death, death, life out of death, death accumulated so it seems to become life.”
In Canada, Sylvain Martel is developing bio-bots to carry drugs to tumors, writes Jessa. The microbiologists in Martel’s lab are the only ones who know how to cultivate this bacteria. “I tell them to be careful crossing the street,” he says.
Michelle writes about the Wellcome Collection, a medical museum in London that displays an extensive collection of forceps, which were invented in the 1500s and remained the primary tool to assist with delivery until the 1950s. The obstetric armamentarium has expanded, on average, once every 228 years. Women—and babies—pay the price for the difference.
Ann did not want to join a yoga class, but lots of things hurt and her brain would not shut up. She applies Michelle’s Bullshit Prevention Protocol, gets nowhere, keeps going to yoga. . . not because it’s not bullshit but because I like occasionally painless stairs and quiet brains.
Full of “weird, mostly bad business ideas,” Rose presents her latest: custom, personalized 3-D printed menstrual cups. For some people, one cup might fit just right, and for other people that cup might be far too big or too small. Yes, it’s like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but with vaginas.
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Photo via Wellcome Images, Creative Commons license