When it came to the treatment of diseases, the ancient Romans had no shortage of magical remedies, several of which involved iron nails. To cure epilepsy, the first-century historian Pliny the Elder advised driving a nail into the ground at the spot where the afflicted person’s head lay at the start of the seizure. The…
She set about changing that, beginning by updating the thinking of the board of directors. “Their attitude was, ‘Women aren’t interested in sex,’” Ms. Gold said. She proved them wrong, marketing sexy lingerie, swimwear, sex toys and novelty items to women, who, she discovered, were eager for them. According to news accounts of the period,…
On Reddit, the online platform where people go for advice, conspiracy theories and N.S.F.W. everything, there’s one “porn” community that’s just about the furthest thing from salacious you can imagine: “Penmanship Porn.” There, users share photos and videos of beautiful penmanship — their own or others. Additional Reddit communities in this constellation offer a safe…
Stephanie VanDerSchie returned to her hotel room in Wausau, Wis., after a long day of skiing last month with her three young children to find their room disheveled. Their sheets were untucked, their garbage can was overflowing, and their soggy towels were in limp piles on the damp bathroom floor. Ms. VanDerSchie, 44, a high…
The writer Tamar Adler has a new cookbook devoted to leftovers — “The Everlasting Meal Cookbook: Leftovers A-Z” — packed with recipes like refried bean hummus, a pad Thai omelet, hot dog banh mi, chicken ragù. I love the elegant honesty of Tamar’s writing, the sureness of her direction and the range of her ideas.…
The Environmental Protection Agency is considering new standards for the maximum amount of fine particulate matter, tiny specks about one-thirtieth the diameter of a human hair that can penetrate the lungs, in outdoor air. A recent study examined how the benefits of stricter limits would be distributed across American society. What’s new in this research…
All too often, remaining a publicly viable woman in the second half of life means — paradoxically — doing one’s utmost to look like one is still in the first half of life. Being visible as a woman, that is, requires making one’s age invisible. It’s a conflictual, not to say crazy-making diktat, to follow.…
California is moving ahead with its plan to produce state-sponsored insulin, but its goal of offering cheaper medicine than brand-name companies may be much harder to achieve now that those major drug makers have decided to significantly drop sticker prices on some products. So while some experts welcomed the news last weekend that the state…
For most Americans, the coronavirus has become a tolerable threat, on par with the flu, and requires minimal precautions, if any. But for older people and the immunocompromised, the virus still poses a formidable risk. Roughly 300 people in the United States are still dying from Covid-related causes each day, a vast majority of them…
Nestled at the foot of Runyon Canyon, in Los Angeles’s Hollywood Hills, the entrance to the Goldwyn House is suitably cinematic. Designed in 1916 by the American architect Arthur S. Heineman, who, in the following decade, would develop the world’s first motel, the Neoclassical-style mansion was home to Samuel Goldwyn, a co-founder of the Goldwyn…