I confess I like excitement, but of the curious kind—the true kind.

I don’t make this material up…it worms its way to end in my lap. I don’t subscribe to the New Yorker–but the May 24th issue, from the sister of a friend who passed it on to me–gave me quite a bone to gnaw on, about Francis Bacon. No, not the earlier Francis; this one was an artist (1909-1992). Unbelievable, but I believe the New Yorker, so it must be true. Read the article by Joan Acocella based on the new book The Life of Francis Bacon by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan and tell me what you think.

I’ve been coming across other pieces of writing such as the above recently. This week my excitement was additionally ignited by a couple of shorter pieces in the June 4 The Week magazine. Both were on the Health & Science page, 23.

The first was headlined “Writing by Thought Alone,” and described an experimental neural interface that has “allowed a man paralyzed from the neck up to compose sentences on a computer simply by imagining himself writing on a piece of paper.”

The second article in The Week was equally startling. Since the intestines of mammals are capable of absorbing oxygen, it was found that oxygen deprived mice and pigs completely recovered after the insertion of a doctored oxygen compound via the anus. They “completely recovered from very, very severe hypoxia.” (A medical researcher from a Tokyo university plans to begin clinical trials on humans as early as next year.

Perhaps it was the mental images that formed after reading all three articles that made an impact–on me, at least.

And oh, also the statement that Ohio was once below the equator also made an impression… (GeoFacts No. 17, Ohio Department of Natural Resources-Division of Geological Survey).