serendipity
carlyo | April 24, 2013Guest Blogger USA Science & Engineering Festival Nifty Fifty Speaker Joe Schwarcz PhD
I had my tonsils out in 1954. In those days a few bouts of tonsillitis, and out they came. I remember being plied with chloroform before the operation and with ice cream after. I also remember being given a special gum, “imported from America” to chew. It was probably some version of “Aspergum” which contained aspirin and was supposed to relieve the sore throat. The idea of using the gum after a tonsillectomy was introduced in the 1940s by Lawrence Craven, a California physician, who made an interesting…
grrlscientist | December 14, 2008
Elizabeth Gibson alongside the story I wrote about her on my blog [larger view].
Image: GrrlScientist, 14 December 2008.
A most remarkable thing happened to me just now. I am working on some writing in a Manhattan coffee shop when two women sat at the table next to me and began negotiating a roommate situation. After I overheard them both talking about research into the neurobiology of learning, all attempts on my part to ignore their conversation went out the window. Neither of these things are particularly unusual, but what was very unusual was when I learned that I actually know one of…