The way this article is framed on Broadsheet, it implies that eating disorders are the cause of the missed periods in athletes. It's worth noting, I think, that this is not always the case. There are cases where the athlete is eating correctly (quantity and quality) and still misses periods.

Our bodies are sensitive to stress, some more than others. At the peak of an athletic training season, the physical and mental stresses can be very high. One of the symptoms of that stress can be missed periods. Eating disorders put a lot of stress on the body, so it makes sense that, combined with athletic training, they would be associated with missed periods.

I guess the thing to keep in mind is that while eating disorder + intense athletic training can equal missed periods, missed periods do not necessarily indicate an eating disorder. Especially if it's just a few at the peak of the training season and they return to normal when the intensity drops.

That doesn't mean, of course, that it's not a cause for concern. I agree that athletes should be talking to their doctors about this, and that the coaches should take the doctor's opinion into consideration when deciding whether to let the athlete train and compete. In my oh-so-humble opinion, more coaches ought to actually care whether pushing their athletes harder is going to cause long-term harm.

Reading the article and especially the letters in response, what I noticed most was the different definitions of the word "spanking". These seem to range from a mild slap with an open palm to a serious beating with a belt. If any law of this type were to be enacted (and I fervently pray that it isn't), this would be the first thing to address: What, exactly, do you mean by "spanking"? And what *degree* of spanking should be criminalized?

Here's an example that, given the ages discussed in the article, doesn't seem very extreme:

A young child, still in diapers, is misbehaving and you need to get his attention *right now*. If you pick him up, lay him over your knee, and give three swats to his well-cushioned rear, it makes a sharp noise but it doesn't actually hurt. Is that an abusive spanking that should land a parent in jail?

Where's the line? And who gets to judge it? If the law - on the off chance that some version passes - doesn't address this in enough detail, enforcement will be irregular, at best.

I think the take-home message here is that the jury is still out. Until there's substantial evidence to prove causation, we're just jumping to conclusions, and those conclusions could easily turn out to be wrong. The best bet is to fall back on the theories that are well-supported by the body of scientific and medical knowledge.

In the absence of a strong causal link between childhood weight and serious adult health problems, it's insane to get paranoid about it.

I think that as more details come out about this terrible event, there will be plenty of lessons to be learned. How should the university have responded? Is an email message an adequate warning? What should the police have done differently? Lessons are important - blame is not.

Not every scenario can be predicted or prevented. Sometimes what seems blindingly obvious after the fact doesn't even blip the radar beforehand. We can make predictions based on our experiences - people are good at that - but we can't see the future. And sometimes we find ourselves dealing with a situation we can neither predict nor control. No matter how much security we put in place, and how many preventative measures we take, there will always be ways for a clever, determined, or lucky individual to bypass those measures. It's like foolproof and better fools.

If we are to learn anything from the shootings at VT, we have got to put aside our anger and look at the situation rationally. That's going to take some time.

Be patient, be thorough, and let's see what we can learn, so that we can do things better the next time. And then, hopefully, there won't be a next time.

Granted, I haven't flown through Lagos since about 1995, and I hear it's improved substantially since then, but the atmosphere of the time still lingers vividly in my mind.

Stepping from the plane to the jetway was like walking into a wall - from cool, dry, airplane to hot, muggy, west African night. The terminal building was dim and filthy, the baggage claim area was crowded with "drivers" (ostensibly there to meet their clients), and the customs officials habitually confiscated items from the bags they searched. The bathrooms were large enough, but filthy, overflowing, and occupied by women duct-taping contraband of some sort to their skin (don't look).

My favorite bit, though, was that British Airways had installed their own metal detector at their departure lounge - possibly the only one in the building. Luggage screening consisted of ticketed passengers walking down to the ramp to point out their bags, which were then loaded on the flight. Any bags not claimed were left behind.

An earlier look at the history, development, and optimization of the typing keyboard, by the same authors as the link Mona posted, is here:

http://www.utdallas.edu/~liebowit/keys1.html

It's a little easier to read, in many ways, because it's more of an essay than a piece of journalism. It's a fascinating history of the development of the keyboard, and a look at the typing contests that helped popularize the QWERTY layout.