Miscellaneous Linkage

I seem to remember that year or two (or more?) ago, a lot of people raised the question, "Why don't more girls take an interest in mathematics and computer science?" An article (free registration required) in the New York Times by Karen Stabiner raises the question again. It's still worth asking. Meanwhile, see if you can find the quotation where a word was most likely either used or transcribed incorrectly.

While browsing the internet the other night, my girlfriend came across the site of Lip Balm Anonymous. The site's author does appear to intend that we take him seriously. I don't dispute the possibility that a person could develop a psychological affinity, even a compulsion, for waxy lips. However, some of the author's rants go far enough over the top that it becomes difficult to take him seriously. For me, the site conjures memories of girls in high school who indeed seemed to be compulsive lip-balmers. Some of them didn't get the idea that Carmex is a cold sore treatment and not a lip balm. This severely ticked off our band teacher, who worried that the salicylic acid in Carmex would corrode our instruments. I suspect that a compulsion to wear lip balm would probably be rooted somewhere other than most substance-addictions, since lip balm generally doesn't alter one's state of consciousness; the lip-balm addiction sounds more like some form of obsessive-compulsive behavior. But what do I know? I'm no psychiatrist or neurologist. Maybe in some people the feeling of smooth waxy lips triggers a response as calming or euphoric as the feelings that well-known addictive substances trigger.