I get a lot of ridiculous press releases, but the headline that made its way to my inbox today, “New Cancer-Fighting Game App Goes Global,” represented a new level of nonsense. The press release described a “ground-breaking” smartphone “cancer-fighting game app” that promised to “help young cancer patients fight their disease.” If you’re like me, […]
Miscellaneous
One morning last month a friend and I took a train from London to the city of Gloucester, in southwestern England. The next morning after breakfast we started walking on the Cotswold Way, one of the UK’s National Trails. On its way to Bath, 60-some miles away, the trail passes through quiet beech forests, open […]
August 12- 16 Snark week! In which we tell you what happens when cute animals get ugly. Christie introduced us to the creature that goes Cock-a-doodle DIE. Roberta told chilling tales of the gribble: chubby, adorable scourge of the sea. Cameron explained whys we should fear the bunny. Michelle warned us about petting the pretty […]
In the Southern summer of 2004, my then-girlfriend and I were camped in a shelter near a rock climbing area in New Zealand called Flock Hill. It was a gorgeous landscape, sweeping grassy hills made famous as Rohan in the “Lord of the Rings” and glacial erratics from the final battle scene in “The Lion, […]
In 2006, a puppy came to live on a small farm in Colorado. His name was Oskar, and he was the runt of the litter. Oskar was a playful little guy, but on one fateful autumn day, he would learn that he was living in the dark shadow of a blood-thirsty assailant. In the days […]
Welcome to Snark Week, LWON’s answer to Shark Week. All week long we’ll share frightening tales of the world’s most dangerous non-sharks. It’s a bad week to be a puppy. For LWON readers, it’s pretty awesome. Stay tuned and enjoy! Awesomeness begins below.
August 5 – 9 Bad news this week: Tom and Erika left us. Erik asked a question we might hear a lot of in the coming years: when is it time to give up on an endangered species? Helen explained why singing in a choir is good for you. Jessa saw surprising parallels in the […]
The following is an essay I wrote while reporting from the Sea of Cortez last fall. To learn more, read my piece in this month’s Harper’s Magazine: “Emptying the World’s Aquarium.” Over the past few days I have found myself thinking a lot about the tragic poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” In it, […]
