Friday List!

Sarah's List:

Interesting series on “rethinking Africa." I have to agree that most of the time it’s not the tropical disease, but rather more treatable illnesses that are causing problems. I think I’ve known of someone in Congo this year who’s died or struggled with each the non-communicable diseases mentioned below. And fewer dying from malaria and the other non-Western things we imagine.

“When most people in developed countries think of the biggest health challenges confronting the developing world, they envision a small boy in a rural, dusty village beset by an exotic parasite or bacterial blight. But increasingly, that image is wrong. Instead, it is the working-age woman living in an urban slum, suffering from diabetes, cervical cancer, or stroke – non-communicable diseases that once confronted wealthy nations alone.” 

  by  GDS Infographics 

Should politicians ever wear jeans? Yes, politicians should always wear jeans, so we can put their pics in photo essays like this one.

It turns out last week’s piece in the New York Times about commas caused quite a stir, so here are more comma Q and A’s. Who knew it would become such a controversy.

Good thoughts on the so-called “Mommy Wars.” I totally agree that, “in the United States, the lack of affordable, high quality day care, paid parental leave, flex time and so on — and the ideologies that support those policies and institutions,” is the problem. Not the mommies.

It’s that time of year again where we enter our seat numbers into seatguru.com and make sure we got the bulkhead. Yep, got it. All the way home. Thank goodness for travel agents. I love this website so we can fully envision what our flights will be like.

What’s the deal with French children’s books being so scary? One of Charlotte’s favorite books in French is from Congo and tells the story of two boys learning to play soccer. But that’s beside the point. One boy gets hit by a car, the other boy gets sick and throws up everywhere. Complete with graphic illustrations.

Jill's List:

Interesting piece on the mother of American midwifery, Ina May Gaskin.  I'm not sure how I feel about the author's conclusions about homebirth in the U.S, though.  

Thinking about my Seattle friends.  It's been a rough week.  Amazing the damage a gun can do.

A procession of mourners grows as neighbors join in along the route

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 Elias officially has about 2 pairs of pants that fit him.  We increased that number by taking scissors to his other, too-short, pairs and making shorts.  Mama Vida was horrified.  This little tutorial was helpful, although we went with just-above-the-knee at Elias' request.  (Yes.  I needed a tutorial to make cut-offs...)

Enough said:

 I remember reading this magazine when I was just thinking about wanting to have children.  The slow death of the quarterly print magazine continues?

 Oh! and a late addition:  My mother-in-law, the tailor, on the radio!