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This is an issue I came across earlier as part of recommendations on what to put in a homeless care package, but one of my readers found this terrific video summarizing it by itself. I was intrigued to note that many of the methods homeless women use during their periods are the same as everyone used to employ before the invention of commercial products. This makes me wonder whether it might be helpful to distribute reusable items, or in the case of cloth pads, patterns for making your own. Menstrual cups have to fit closely, so they come in sizes, but cloth pads have a lot wider tolerance. Women who are crafty enough to make their own pads by ripping up old clothes for rags are probably capable of roughing out a slightly more detailed design that will work better -- and knowledge costs nothing. So now all we need is to know whether a reusable option would appeal to women who are homeless or have been homeless. Since menstruation has been cited as one of the most miserable aspects of homelessness for women, and a reusable product would solve that problem about as well as it's possible to solve on the street, it seems like it could make a big improvement in people's lives. Women differ, though, and not everyone likes reusables. "Nothing about us without us" means consulting before deploying. Tags: gender studies, networking, video
Current Mood:  busy
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So I saw this video of a robot playing with a ball. Now, Lawrence has told Stan this joke a zillion times, because Lawrence has learned about science mishaps the hard way. They watch the video. Stan drawls, "Science can tell you how to build a robot that plays ball. Athletics can tell you why this might be a bad idea." ROTFL This is what happens when you build bridges over the geek/jock divide. Stan can actually explain why that happened, and why it would be hard to code around it, because he understands playing ball in a way that the programmer clearly does not. Tags: entertainment, humor, networking, science, video
Current Mood:  amused
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I was charmed by this tutorial on African dance. It uses a clock metaphor to describe the moves. They are simple, repetitive, and energetic. That makes them easy to learn, good exercise, and fun to do. You can see these in African documentaries. If a whole tribe is dancing together, they'll be very repetitive, using basic moves to synchronize lots of people for a long time. But if you're watching one or two dancers, it's like jazz, they'll improvise using the same moves. Think of the steps like chords, once you know them, you can join a group or riff on your own. You can also see these at a drum jam in a big city. I've seen it at the Delmar Loop in St. Louis and Taste of Chicago. (They were surprised that I joined in, because I do not look like the lady in the video. :D ) Street music is awesome. Over in Terramagne, this is the kind of stuff that appeared very early in Sankofa Clubs. By now, lots and lots of people know at least a few basic African dance moves, which makes it fairly easy to get a group of people dancing. Over time, they've thrown in samples from cultures around the world. Usually they'll look for the simplest foundation steps. Almost everybody has some folk dances, like circle or line dances, that are very easy to do. Those transmit nicely. So T-America has a lot more left of the social dance tradition compared to L-America. \o/ Tags: entertainment, ethnic studies, music, networking, video
Current Mood: busy
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