Death in Silly Ways
Swallowed by a sinkhole. Washed away by a mudflow. Drowned after falling through thin ice. These are the fates that many unlucky mammoths suffered thousands of years ago. Now, after performing a genetic analysis on […]
Swallowed by a sinkhole. Washed away by a mudflow. Drowned after falling through thin ice. These are the fates that many unlucky mammoths suffered thousands of years ago. Now, after performing a genetic analysis on […]
When I saw the news I gulped involuntarily; a man riding a bike had been struck and killed by a hit-and-run driver not far from where I make the turn to head home from my Sunday morning […]
BOSTON. It’s 6:30 a.m., but Katie Umlau is already forty-five minutes into a Friday morning workout she says she “desperately needs to get ready for this weekend.” “I am NOT eating your mother’s stupid pineapple […]
OTTAWA, Canada. Stunned by the Montreal Canadians’ five-game loss in the Stanley Cup finals, Canadian officials today devalued the nation’s currency against those of other hockey-playing countries, a move they hope will help reverse its […]
It was a steamy Washington summer exactly four decades ago. I was working for the federal government at a scandal-plagued agency alongside a veteran bureaucrat named Fred. Fred wasn’t going any higher on the org […]
SKOKIE, Illinois. Madeline Grebs is a long-time records manager at Modern Moosehead Indemnity, an insurance company in this suburb of Chicago, but she’s not the quiet, retiring type. “Don’t call me a file clerk” she […]
Thomas De Quincey’s elder brother William succeeded in some attempts at bringing down cats by parachutes. The Life of Thomas De Quincy, Malcolm Elwin As I looked around the hold of the Puss in Boots, I realized […]
KEOKUK, Iowa. Elwood “Bud” Zaremba, pioneering knuckle-ball pitcher, died in his sleep in a nursing home here Sunday night after a brief illness. Zaremba played with five major league teams over a 17-year career during […]
BOSTON. Lyman Sturgis is standing at the finish line of the Walk for the Cure for Self-Pity, looking down at a clipboard, and from his expression you can tell that something isn’t right. “It’s funny,” […]
BOSTON. Summertime in Boston means lots of activity in the city’s public spaces, including an annual ethnic food festival at which tourists and natives can sample delicacies from around the world prepared in marginally sanitary […]