Well, Of Course My Mother Wants to Read That
Bizarre October 11th, 2012My mother, God bless her, has failing eyesight. She’s not a TV-watching person, never has been. But she loves her books. Devours them. And that’s the problem.
It’s harder and harder for her to get through a book due to her eyesight. So I’m working on a project where I scour the web for interesting articles for her to read.
I copy the text into Word and then jack up the font so she can see the words much easier.
The fun part is finding things I think she’d like to read. It’s easy for me because she and I have exactly the same taste in books.
Off-beat non-fiction.
I was talking to a librarian colleague of mine this afternoon and told her about my mission. I asked her if she ran across articles that met the criteria, could she send me the links so I could make them bigger and print them out.
To help her, I gave her an example of an article I already found that mom would love.
I told her it was on the topic of lucid decapitation.
“Have you ever heard of it?” I asked.
“Um. No,” she said.
“Well, it’s when someone’s head is chopped off, it’s possible for the head to keep reacting to stimuli, like being shouted at, for up to 30 seconds. The head’s eyes will get bigger in response before shutting,” I told her.
“Are you sure your mother wants to read that?” she asked.
“Of course. She’s just like me and I’m totally into an article about heads that can still do stuff after being detached from the body,” I insisted.
“Well, OK then.”
I’m certain you lovely readers would be interested too, so “head” on over to Lucid Decapitation and read all about the 1836 murderer who promised to wink after getting his head chopped off, but didn’t.
Jerk.
p.s. If you guys have things you think my mom would like to read, drop the links in the comments.
Gruesome is optional.
Stumble it!
October 11th, 2012 at 5:04 pm
Holy crap! I’ve never heard of lucid decapitation. But I love it. How awesome it would be to have on your tombstone: “He died. And then he did a raspberry.”
Margaret (Nanny Goats)´s last blog post ..Tale of a Tailbone
October 11th, 2012 at 5:07 pm
Lucid decapitation. Now there’s a conversation ice-breaker. 🙂
Why don’t you get your Mom a Kindle or a Nook. You can adjust the font size, background, everything. They’re great.
October 11th, 2012 at 5:09 pm
We did think about a Kindle, but we’re not sure she’d be OK even with that technology. She never “took” to the computers that I bought for my Dad all those years. At this point, we’re thinking paper might be best. We did teach her how to use audio CDs, but that fizzled out quickly.
October 11th, 2012 at 5:09 pm
I will stick to my colouring book featuring my little pony.
Is it possible for her to read an e-ink Kindle ? You can adjust fonts for that and read anything you like – as long as the batteries don’t run out.
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October 11th, 2012 at 5:10 pm
Damn first commentator.
That makes me feel more redundant that I already be !
Jaffer´s last blog post ..When children retell family stories
October 11th, 2012 at 5:17 pm
Jaffer — Har! My little pony. See my comment to Jayne above re: the Kindle. We did actually try to show her how to use my sister Ann’s iPad, but mom’s too nervous about using these kinds of devices. We think it wouldn’t go as well as good ‘ol paper and ink.
October 11th, 2012 at 5:26 pm
An iPad is heavy and far too complicated. I am no a fan of reading books on it.
Jaffer´s last blog post ..When children retell family stories
October 11th, 2012 at 5:29 pm
Margaret — Raspberry. Hilarious! Glad I could recover your comment. It’s a keeper.
Jaffer — Yes, it is, but I just wanted to illustrate that she’s not a fan of new technology, even though the Kindle is lighter. Who knows? Maybe she’ll find one in her Christmas stocking.
October 11th, 2012 at 5:41 pm
Have you ever checked out mental-floss.com? They have all kinds of fascinating, trivia-y kind of stuff. I love gruesome, too…except, I learned recently, when it comes to my own body. I had stitches for the first time, and cleaning and caring for them really freaked me out.
October 11th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
I think I’d like to see that lucid decapitation thing… I have a few suggestions for test subjects.
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October 11th, 2012 at 6:07 pm
For offbeat nonfiction, I’d recommend anything by Mary Roach or Jon Ronson.
And I’d like to second (or third or fourth — I’ve lost count) the recommendation for an e-ink Kindle. The interface is much simpler than an iPad: all it does is read books, and if you read one at a time, you just have to know how to push the “next page” and “previous page” buttons. I can read mine for hours without getting eyestrain, and you can set the font to whatever size you want.
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October 11th, 2012 at 6:36 pm
She might like stories about cosmetic amputation.
Just throw this out as food for thought because it’s not tactile like reading a book: podcasts/audiobooks.
October 11th, 2012 at 6:48 pm
One of my favorite books of all time is the non-fiction account of the true story of the events that inspired Melville to write Moby Dick. It includes gruesome accounts of whale slaughter, some discussion of the sex toys employed by Nantucket women while their men were out to sea, and, of course, religion, economics, politics, and cannibalism. It’s called In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex. It is, in a word, riveting.
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October 11th, 2012 at 6:49 pm
One of my favorite books of all time is the non-fiction account of the true story of the story that inspired Melville to write Moby Dick. It includes gruesome accounts of whale slaughter, some discussion of the sex toys employed by Nantucket women while their men were out to sea, and, of course, religion, economics, politics, and cannibalism. It’s called In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex. It is, in a word, riveting. In two words, disgusting yet riveting.
MikeWJ´s last blog post ..30 Days of Photographs III: Heavy
October 11th, 2012 at 7:04 pm
absepa — Ah, yes! I forgot all about Mental Floss. Thanks for the reminder, I’ll check it out. Oh, yes. Freaky and gross is just fine when it’s happening to someone else’s body. I remember how freaky it was to have my stitches removed from a finger when I was a kid. To this day, I remember the feeling of it slipping up through skin. Ewwwww!
Boom Boom — Yeah, I could think of a few too. If it just weren’t so…. uh…. permanent.
Laura — I have Mary Roach’s book about death and bodies. Truly riveting. In concept, the Kindle would be great for Mom, but she’s terribly resistant to anything that plugs in. It would solve so many problems if she would take to technology like my dad did. Believe me, we’ve tried.
Mark — Excellent recommendation, Mark. I’m going to dig up that article I read about a guy who had one of his arms amputated because it “just didn’t feel right.” There was some question from readers whether it could possibly be true. Oh, I’m so glad you mentioned that. I’d forgotten all about it.
Michael — That is perhaps the best review of a book that I have ever read.
October 11th, 2012 at 8:51 pm
““Of course. She’s just like me and I’m totally into an article about heads that can still do stuff after being detached from the body,” I insisted.”
Bwhahahahahahaha! Kathy, you CRACK ME UP!!!!!!!!!!!
And to he honest, I dig reading stuff like this too. I had a whole fascination going on after I saw “The Silence Of The Lambs”, and then reading books on serial killers and what made their sick minds tick.
I am definitely more of a non-fiction reader than fiction. Fiction kinda bores me.
Fun post, girl….X
Ron´s last blog post ..The Company We Keep
October 11th, 2012 at 11:28 pm
Well, I have no comment on the lucid decapitation thing. Nope, not a one. But I will second the notion of getting her a Kindle or similar e-reader. My son, who has a reading disability, has one with the text to speech feature. (It’s one of the less expensive models; the Kindle Fire doesn’t have it. At least not on last year’s version.) He LOVES it; he is quite the bookworm now. I figure it would be wonderful for anyone with eye problems. Heck, the way I’m going through reading glasses I’ll probably need one in about a week. ~:-P
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October 12th, 2012 at 6:07 am
Once I visited Altoona Train Museum – the tour guy told us that occasionally a man would get caught between the train cars and be sliced in half at the waist. They would leave him like that and give him a cigarette while they ran to get his wife. She’d come down and they’d have a conversation and say whatever they needed to say, have a kiss goodbye and then separate the train cars and the man would die.
Have a wonderful day !!
October 12th, 2012 at 9:27 am
I like Marlene’s story. Yikes.
I have absolutely nothing to add except the Kindle suggestion–which 30 people in front of me have already done so. The best part of the Kindle is that you can read with one hand and pet the cat on your lap with the other.
Wait…that doesn’t sound right.
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October 12th, 2012 at 10:09 am
Kathy, this is Patty. My eyesight is pretty bad and I have double vision at times as well. I didn’t think I’d like an e-reader and to be honest I do still prefer a book but I do LOVE the ability to make the font bigger. It makes reading so much easier on my eyes. I can read longer and really enjoy my reading. I just got a Nexus and it’s a dream.
Pricilla maaas, “can someone chop off Abby’s head?”
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October 12th, 2012 at 10:53 am
Oh man, I love offbeat stories like this. Beware, you might start getting spammed with stories from me as I run across them.
Michelle´s last blog post ..I Live an Art-Privileged Life
October 12th, 2012 at 11:12 am
This reminds me of the magazines my mum used to read, many years ago. True Crime magazines. They were gruesome murders and full of this sort of thing. I bet your mum would have liked those.
Babs´s last blog post ..Comment on Cataracts and rain in Yorkshire. by babs (beetle)
October 12th, 2012 at 11:32 am
lucid decapitation = horrifying!! Holy crap!
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October 12th, 2012 at 12:33 pm
Kathy~ I’ve got the perfect book. I am sitting around with my 15 year old son looking at the available summer reading he was required to read for 10th grade. I stumbled upon a delightful book called, STIFF. Trust me , this is right up your alley. So I read it then I let Christopher read it and he was equally delighted and I am sure his school is now scheduling A shrink to come visit our home. Whatever! It’s about dead people and their bodies and what happens after you die and what science really does with people’s bodies that are donated. Very cool book. On another topic, coloring. I do this all the time it is very relaxing and if Iat say so, so does Tracey. I think perhaps I will post some of my favorite snoopy pages.
October 12th, 2012 at 5:51 pm
I fought tooth and nail with my husband over not wanting a Kindle. I hated the idea of a Kindle. I said I could never figure out how to use a Kindle. He got me a fricking Kindle for Valentines Day a couple of years ago. At first I refused to use it. Then, wait for it, I fell in love with it and can’t live without it and I can make the fonts as big as I want. No more piles of books all over the house. And lots of gory gruesome serial killer stuff anytime I want it.
Linda Medrano´s last blog post ..Very Superstitious
October 12th, 2012 at 8:00 pm
That’s a new one on me, but has she read about the guy who had a spike blown through his skull and lived? There is lots written about him, but here’s a video of his skull http://gizmodo.com/5911184/watch-how-a-rod-impaled-a-19th-century-mans-skull-without-killing-him
sharkbytes´s last blog post ..Mile-a-Minute
October 13th, 2012 at 5:52 am
Ron — Yep, I’m into reading about murderers too. I also thoroughly enjoyed a book by Gavin Debecker called The Gift of Fear. It’s about how we were all born with the ability to recognize predictors of violence, but often ignore them. It’s been described as a “how-to book that reads like a thriller.”
Kim — What a great story about your son taking to the Kindle. I think my eyes are getting worse lately. Have more trouble reading off my iTouch than before. Ugh. Sucks getting older!
Marlene — This story is both gruesome and fascinating! Freaky and sad. But oy!
lin — It’s very important that attention to a cat is never interrupted by the reading of its owner. Very. I’m certain that’s why the Kindle was invented.
Patty — I’m so glad when technology actually helps people instead of just causing frustration. So glad you can read easily now.
Pricilla — No, we cannot chop off Abby’s head. A headless goat is an unhappy goat.
Michelle — I would welcome them! The more offbeat, the better!
Babs — I’m fascinated with true crime as well. I have many of those kinds of books and when I took a bunch to the library for donation, I sort of freaked myself out by how many I had and what it would look like to the person who went to empty out the bin!
meleah rebeccah — See how much you can learn here at the Junk Drawer? I bet you never forget this.
Donna — Yep, I have that book and found it intriguing and entertaining. It’s just not the stuff you read about every day. I think I recall in the beginning of the book how there was a table set up with nothing but heads on them for study. Heads. On a table.
Linda Medrano — See, Alex knows you so well. He knew you’d take to it eventually. I like the idea of not having piles of books all over the house. We long ago filled our one and only bookcase and now the study looks like hell with all the piles of books lying around the case.
sharkbytes — “Heading” off to watch the video. Yes, I’ve heard that story. That’s good stuff. Impalements are truly fascinating. There was a sad story locally some years ago when a man was working construction and accidentally sawed off his hand, and then shot a dozen nails through his head to “relieve” the pain of the amputation. They reattached his hand and removed the nails, btw.
October 13th, 2012 at 1:37 pm
If I got my head cut off, I would try my hardest to comply with blinking as long as I could.
ps: My Mommeh was just talking to her office-mate last week about decapitation and if the head still thinks for a while.
pps: Maybe your mom could use a Kindle, because you can increase the font to way huge sizes!
Daisy the Curly Cat´s last blog post ..I Won!
October 14th, 2012 at 8:09 am
Kathy~ yup heads on a table. With little cloth napkins over their faces placed in a turkey roasting pan to catch the drippings. Our favorite line out of that book is, ” I cut off heads, I cut off heads” ya know that little line at the bottom of your tax return that asks you your occupation? I CUT OFF HEADS! They cut them really close to the chin so they don’t flop over in their roasting pans. Just saying. Has Mom read that one yet? We should do a book discussion. Everyone should download this and we could have a very informative discussion, maybe start a grass roots movement. I like the idea. There will be a rush at amazon, blogging, the local news will pick it up, soon we’ll be on Oprah and then have our own show, buy a network, run for president who knows!
October 18th, 2012 at 7:16 am
I’m glad you summed this up so nicely so I don’t have to read the actual article. This stuff is fascinating to hear about but I think I can live without all the detail.
I’ve got to share this with my cousin. She’d be able to send you all kinds of really gruesome stuff.
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October 19th, 2012 at 11:05 am
Lucid decapitation seems like it ought to be the name of a heavy metal band.
My mom probably would have dug that too.
W at Off-Road Finance´s last blog post ..Mathematical Literacy And Trading
October 20th, 2012 at 9:45 am
Have you tried the TIL (Today I Learned) section of reddit? http://Www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned? It (mostly) has posts of many random but cited interesting facts.
October 24th, 2012 at 12:17 pm
This reminds me of the story of the ‘doctor’ who grafted a second dog head onto a dog. It actually worked but the dog died after a few days. You could probably Google two headed dog to find that one.
Jen´s last blog post ..This is What’s Wrong With Politics
October 24th, 2012 at 10:54 pm
How nice of you to help your mom with her reading!
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October 28th, 2012 at 2:52 pm
Really interesting subject. I remember a story of a man who was beheaded, probably during the French Revolution,who spoke the word “Vulture” to his executioner who had lifted the head high enough to look the guy in the eye after he chopped his head off. This shows the man was really pissed off, otherwise he would have screamed, “HELP” like most folks. Although help is just one syllable and vulture is two, saying help might take more air and the guy was no longer attached to his lungs and suffered from shortness of breath at the time in addition to suffering a lost head. You can certainly tell he was pissed! I wonder if he happened to be shorter than the executioner and when his head was held high, he looked down at the executioner and thought, “Damn I’ve grown six inches.” Who knows? Really interesting subject.
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October 30th, 2012 at 5:57 am
“This reminds me of the story of the ‘doctor’ who grafted a second dog head onto a dog. It actually worked but the dog died after a few days. You could probably Google two headed dog to find that one” —- this sounds horribily cruel, i definetley dont want to look at it either.
November 3rd, 2012 at 11:51 am
Aw, my Dad is a bit like this, I should do the same and help him out.
Ben´s last blog post ..Busking in London
November 4th, 2012 at 12:47 pm
I wouldn’t be surprised if that librarian reported you to social services for such a request for an old woman, so to speak, ha ha ha. I really don’t fancy taking a look at that book, I’m already having trouble sleeping and don’t need any extra help. Don’t fancy keeping the lights on all night either or having to check the house every time I hear a sound, ha ha ah ah. Funny post.
November 5th, 2012 at 2:04 pm
I had heard of this before. There was a doctor in the French revolution who did the blinking thing when he was guillotined. His friend watched for it and wrote it down.
The most horrific thing I have come across lately was a film about Russian experiments with keeping dog heads alive. They show the experiment, with the dog head reacting and licking. I frankly couldn’t watch the whole film. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDqh-r8TQgs
November 9th, 2012 at 4:56 pm
When I was teaching my son his science lesson about the brain today, there was a little section about this in our book. The article was way more detailed and interesting though! Thanks for the link. Your mom sounds like a cool lady.
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November 11th, 2012 at 2:51 am
You ever need odd things about conspiracy theories, let me know.
My current obsession is Paul McCartney is dead. And I don’t even LIKE the Beatles, so I have no idea why I care.
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November 19th, 2012 at 6:37 am
Is it just the opposite of headless chicken act? Here the body demands brain signals and there the body is full of brain signals but lessening blood supply? A bit different and unusual. A reminder for your mother. Keep The resolution of the screen to perfect optimization otherwise the eye can be damaged more, read about it and get through it.
November 22nd, 2012 at 4:40 am
If it’s just articles you’re looking for (as opposed to entire books), Cracked.com has TONS of interesting stuff. I’m pretty sure there are some gruesome stuff there, too. You may want to skip on the “Photoplasty” posts, though. But then again, if you enjoy photo manipulation, then by all means, check them out. By the way, most articles there are written rather informally, some witty, and with a dash of foul language here and there. Hope you and your mom will enjoy the site (that is if you haven’t ever been there yet). 🙂