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Category: Mary Roach

My books are not really books; they’re endless chains of distraction shoved inside a cover. Many of them begin at the search box of Pub Med, an Internet database of medical journal articles.

Internet, Search

Pet foods come in a variety of flavors because that’s what humans like, and we assume our pets like what we like. We’re wrong.

Assume, Like, Variety

I don’t write on topics that require a lot of urgency. But in ‘Stiff,’ I wanted to change people’s hearts about organ donation. Whenever I get a chance, I try to talk about that.

Change, People, Donation

Most of us pass our lives never once laying eyes on our own organs, the most precious and amazing things we own. Until something goes wrong, we barely give them thought. This seems strange to me. How is it that we find Christina Aguilera more interesting than the inside of our own bodies?

Eyes, Thought, Me

Animals’ taste systems are specialized for the niche they occupy in the environment. That includes us. As hunters and foragers of the dry savannah, our earliest forebears evolved a taste for important but scarce nutrients: salt and high-energy fats and sugars. That, in a nutshell, explains the widespread popularity of junk food.

Environment, Animals

Science is you! It’s your head, it’s your dog, it’s your iPhone – it’s the world. How do you see that as boring? If it’s boring, it’s because you’re learning it from a textbook.

Dog, Science, World

I don’t fear death so much as I fear its prologues: loneliness, decrepitude, pain, debilitation, depression, senility. After a few years of those, I imagine death presents like a holiday at the beach.

Fear, Loneliness, Depression

To keep your he-man jaw muscles from smashing your precious teeth, the only set you have, the body evolved an automated braking system faster and more sophisticated than anything on a Lexus. The jaw knows its own strength. The faster and more recklessly you close your mouth, the less force the muscles are willing to apply.

Body, You, Mouth

I’ve always been a bit of a space geek. I wrote an article years ago about the neutral buoyancy tank, which is this biblically sized pool where they train astronauts. And it was just the coolest thing.

Train, Years, Where

Weightlessness was unbelievable. It’s physical euphoria: Nothing about you has any weight. You don’t realize that you are weighed down all the time by yourself, and your organs, and your head. Your arms weigh down your shoulders. In space simulation, you get to fly like Superman! You’re hanging in the air! It’s the coolest thing.

Time, Yourself, Fly

Picking my topics is sort of a process of elimination for me. Most things don’t work for me. I like to cover science and unexpected things happening in labs. Also, theoretical research doesn’t work for my style. I need scenes and interactions. Then, humor. I’m having the most fun when I can have fun with my work.

Work, Science, Research

I don’t read good books anymore, it seems; I just buy them and put them on the shelf and every now and then walk over and pet them. I’m like the optimistic dieter who fills her closet with clothes two sizes too small and dreams of the day she can wear them. I know just what I want to do when I retire.