After a summer of backpacking in Colorado in the early 1990s, Nirinjan Yee started feeling sick. Yee, then in her 30s, was diagnosed with late-stage Lyme disease and told that she wasn’t going to walk again — if she even survived. On the advice of a friend, Yee spoke...
I love a man in shorts. I consider a hairy stick leg poking out of a freshly cut jort pornographic; a muscular thigh wrapped in linen a kind of erotica. This isn’t a preference; it’s a passion. My dedication to the cause has only increased since I...
Kenneth Tam is an artist who (among other things) makes videos of men — men that he finds on the internet and then pays to do awkward, intimate, absurd things on camera. These videos are amazing. For one of his most recent projects, Breakfast in Bed (which is currently...
Most of us work more than we live, which is to say we spend considerably more time at the office and with our coworkers than we do with the human beings we actually want in our lives. It also means that the stressors and anxieties of work...
There has never been a time in my life when I wasn’t competing. I played T-ball, soccer and basketball as a little kid — eventually getting into tennis and even a little tackle football with friends. My family would play Trivial Pursuit, Connect Four, Sorry! and Life, and that’s...
The timing was almost unbelievable. About 18 months ago, I found out my dad had been cheating on my mom. About six months later, my husband found out that his mom had been cheating on his dad. How my husband and I each found out was indicative...
The facts don’t lie: Trying to make friends as an adult is terrible. People often want to talk about the finish of various craft beers; the jokes you make more often than not have the word “fistula” in them; everybody who’s nice to you at the gym...
The only thing scarier than getting older yourself is realizing your parents are growing older still. While you may have many years to get things in order for retirement and even death, settling things for your parents has a speedier timeline. Getting on the same page with...
It’s official: You have one month of summer left to pretend you don’t have a job, while ignoring all those “WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?!” emails from your boss. And what better way to continue avoiding work than by skipping town to embark on an all-American road...
With summertime comes humidity, and with humidity comes bugs—lots and lots of bugs. We’re not talking butterflies, either: We’re talking blood-sucking, biting, stinger-equipped day-ruiners like mosquitos, bees, spiders and ticks. To help you deal with the aftermath of becoming a full-on bug buffet, Purdue University entomologist Tom...
After Adam died, I started listening to dubstep. I think my grief registered in a way where the only viable option to make myself feel better was to slowly blow out my eardrums with Skrillex and Knife Party. His wasn’t the kind of stereotypical death you see...
Pollen should be harmless to us humans. Tiny flower powder that bumble bees carry around in their adorable knee-pockets? Pshh, what harm could that do? But if you’re one of the unfortunate 8% of American adults who suffers from hayfever, you’ll know just what a harbinger of...
