This except is from a Yale lecture by Prof. Paul Bloom of Yale lecture entitled What Motivates Us: Sex. This lecture is one in a series and part of Academic Earth, a website that presents lectures by recognized (and usually talented) academics. The lecture can be accessed through a video and a transcript.

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"AS they do every July, hospitals across America are welcoming new interns, fresh from medical school graduation. Given how much these trainees have yet to learn, common wisdom holds that it’s not a good time of year to get sick. This may be particularly true for older patients, because American medical schools require no training in geriatric medicine."

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The Economic Policy Institute's Economic Snapshot for July 1, 2009 concerns employment: Mass layoffs at highest level since at least 1995, by Anna Turner and John Irons.

Mass layoffs — job cuts of 50 or more people by a single employer — are at their highest since continuous tracking began in April 1995, according to recently released data from the U.S. Department of Labor. In May there were 2,933 mass layoffs, representing 312,880 of the jobs lost that month.

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Julia Sneden reprises: My great grandmother Abby dyed her wedding dress black, and proceeded to wear it for the rest of her life. When fashions changed, she remade it to suit the mode, from hoop to bustle to whatever the current style commanded. Despite bearing nine children, she remained tall and slender and able to fit into the dress.