Guest Post: The Top 5 May 20ths Ever

Five years ago today, The Last Word On Nothing was born. I’ve been Googling around, trying to figure out why anniversaries are a thing, but most of what pops up is drivel from couples counselors. Wikipedia offers some facts about Latin names. But what I’m really looking for is why we celebrate anniversaries, why they make us feel so many […]

Guest Post: Death’s Eternal Logistics

I spent several hours on Sunday afternoon in what has to be the most charming cemetery in New York City. If I didn’t know what I was looking for, I would have missed its arched iron gate, tucked into 2nd Avenue just north of East 2nd Street, where the East Village meets the Lower East Side. Once through, […]

On the Road

Some sad-yet-happy news: I’m leaving the people of LWON. Next week I’m launching my own blog at a new network hosted by National Geographic. I’ll be sharing a web neighborhood with some amazing writers (and they’ll post their own announcements soon). My blog, called Only Human, will be all about people — our genes, cells, brains, behaviors, […]

Sunday Stories

For your Sunday-reading pleasure, a few stories that the people of LWON loved this week. In no particular order: Ann: Who knew about radiation sickness, and when?, by Alex Wellerstein, Restricted Data Some Manhattan Project physicists did know what radiation from atom bombs would do to people. Robert Oppenheimer wasn’t much interested. Bonus: Emma Marris has a really charming […]

Sunday Stories

For your Sunday-reading pleasure, a few stories that the people of LWON loved this week. In no particular order: Christie: For sale: The North Fork Valley, by Sarah Gilman, High Country News Gilman Looks at the proposed fracking in her backyard and decides that this technology is “not just the machinery of corporate greed – it’s the […]

Sunday Stories

For your Sunday-reading pleasure, a few stories that the people of LWON loved this week. In no particular order: Cameron and Christie: “Over the Wall,” by Roger Angell, The New Yorker  Cameron says: It’s mainly about his wife, who died recently, and it ends up being very clever and hopeful, too. Also, I hope I can […]

Re-Awakenings

Anna Sumner’s craving for sleep began when she was an 18-year-old high school senior. She thought nothing of it. When it followed her to college, she blamed it on stress. She was working so hard, she told herself, her body just needed the extra rest. But it was more than that. She would choose naps […]

Conan’s Umwelt: How a Dog Sniffs

This is my puppy, Conan, and the reason I’ve been buying a lot of dog books. For those of you who’ve never had the pleasure, dog books are for skimming, not reading. They’re hokey, repetitive, poorly written and peppered with pseudoscience. But Friday I found an exception: Inside of a Dog, a fascinating, science-rich story of how dogs […]