Doris O'Brien is a retired college Speech teacher and banker. She has published two books of humor (Up or Down With Women's Liberation and Humor Me a Little) and for many years contributed light verse to the Pepper 'n Salt column of the Wall Street Journal. She is an avid writer of letters to the editors.
Doris celebrated her 50th wedding anniversary in the same year she welcomed her first grandchild. She now lives in Pasadena with a great view of the San Gabriel mountains — and the annual Tournament of Roses Parade.
She can be reached by e-mail: witsendob at (@) gmail.com
Teacups and Friendship, Witnessing Friendship and Life Across the Table From My Elders
Roberta McReynolds writes: A book about how to read tea leaves was brought to the table. When our cups were empty, my mother and I were instructed to flip them upside down and spin them around three times before turning them upright again. My mother tried to discern shapes in the dregs which were looked up in the book for interpretation. This fortune-telling seemed a tad wicked to me at the time, but still tempting as the forbidden fruit. more »
"This year, I'm going to lose some weight:" Beware of Products Promising Miracle Weight Loss
FDA has found hundreds of products that are marketed as dietary supplements but actually contain hidden active ingredients contained in prescription drugs, unsafe ingredients that were in drugs that have been removed from the market, or compounds that have not been adequately studied in humans. FDA has found weight-loss products tainted with the prescription drug ingredient sibutramine. This ingredient was in an FDA-approved drug called Meridia, removed from the market in October 2010 because it caused heart problems and strokes. more »
Birds Do It, Bees Do It: A Century of Sex (Mis)Education in the United States
From junior high school hygiene films to websites, public health campaigns, scientific studies, children’s books, bodice-ripper novels and (sometimes) parents, Americans have always found ways to learn about sex. While attitudes towards sex education swing from the blissfulness of ignorance to the empowerment of liberation — and back again — every generation finds new ways to answer the old questions. Our desire to learn about desire has not changed. more »
Clothes Encounters: Where were the modest plaid skirts, bow-tied blouses, and shiny loafers my girl friends and I wore to high school?
Rose Madeline Mula writes: Something was definitely wrong with this picture. Earrings, nose rings, eyebrow rings, bizarre hair-dos, purple nail polish ... on the boys. Even weirder, one of them was actually wearing a bathrobe and slippers. I swear. The others sported second-skin-tight bicycle shorts or kaleidoscopic, ridiculously baggy pants obviously stolen from Barnum & Bailey. more »
