The End of Oprah

Talk show queen Oprah Winfrey is ending her daytime network TV talk show. She will announce the end of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” on Friday’s show, which observers believe may wind up being one of her most-watched ever.

If you barely remember afternoon television without this world-changing, life-changing, rules-changing production, don’t panic just yet. The show’s not ending this week. Or this year. Continue reading »

Top 10 Reasons Why Humans are Weird

If you’re not watching the NOVA series on PBS, “Becoming Human,” you’re really missing out. It’s a three-hour series about the evolution of humans loaded with whens and hows and whys. Science has come a long way since you last sat in a high school classroom. In fact, the series is done so well that , once and for all, you’ll finally get the whole Lucy/Turkana boy/Human and homo erectus/homo habilis/homo sapien characteristics and sequencing. (Or was that just my little problem?)

So what’s the big deal about humans, anyway? Well, we’re just so darn special! And in ways that we hardly ever think about. Live Science has reduced our extraordinariness to 10 typically human features. Continue reading »

New Company Vets Strange Baby Names

You’d think people who want to give their kids unusual names wouldn’t really care about what Zuma or Suri or Nahla mean. You’d think!

But Today Translation is hoping some people will care enough to shell out $1,700 to be reassured that they are not giving their kids weird names in any language other than English.

Hollywood’s done pretty well balancing obsessive originality with the world’s languages, though the service did find a few red flags regarding everybody’s favorite mini-Scientologist.

Continue reading »

Baby Chub Airbrushed Away in Some Mags

Is there anything cuter, more delicious, more appealing than a big fat juicy baby? Apparently so!

The editor of a British parenting magazine has admitted that baby images that appear in glossy mags are as doctored as those of already undernourished females who appear in fashion magazines. Everything from blemishes to red eyes to that universal sign of personal and moral decay: fat rolls. Continue reading »

Police Report Woman for Gestating in a Fixer-Upper

When a newly pregnant 27-year-old in Staffordshire County, U.K., called to report a dangerous driver, she never expected to be reported to social services for being an unfit mother.

But a few days after speaking to a policewoman in her doorway about a driver who almost ran her over, Mary Cooke received a letter from the county council’s children’s services informing her that her unborn child may be referred for services.

Why? Because of peeling wallpaper, stripped floors and unfinished paint jobs in the house. Continue reading »

Maclaren Strollers Recalled for Finger Amputations

Makers of Maclaren strollers are telling parents to stop using the popular strollers, after a dozen reports that children sitting in them have had their fingers amputated on the side hinge.

Nine models of the popular Maclaren umbrella strollers are being recalled, including all of the single and double strollers manufactured since 1999.  Continue reading »

Actually, Kids Make You Happy

180 alert!

Less than a year ago, parents were buried under an avalanche of studies that concluded kids don’t make you happy. In fact, these studies showed that people raising kids reported lower levels of happiness — life satisfaction, marital satisfaction, and mental well-being — than their childless counterparts.

Oh, and that lower level of happiness? Never. Goes. Away.

Okay, but now out of the U.K., the Journal of Happiness Studies reports that not only do kids not lower their parents’ level of happiness, they actually raise it — a little bit with the first kid. Even more with the second. And (I’m looking at you, Baby Earl!) significantly more with the third!

There’s a catch, though. Continue reading »

Want a Green Xmas? You Should Probably Start Now

Look, I know Halloween is not even a week behind us, but if I’ve learned one thing as a parent it’s this: it’s really hard to put off Christmas shopping and not (1) overspend (2) disappoint and (3) feel just really awful about child labor/carbon footprints/wrecking the environment. So, theoretically, I’m starting to plan for the holidays now.

How exactly? Well, I’m not sure, but I’m after a bit of research, here’s what I’ve come up with so far. Continue reading »

Many Pantry Staples Contain BPA

Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. Del Monte green beans. Star-Kist tuna. Juicy Juice.

A Consumer Reports (via Change.org) test found that the 19 products, all common and popular packaged foods, contain some amount of the chemical Bisphenol A. BPA, as you’re surely aware, is public enemy No. 1 these days in the world of family food, as it has been linked in some studies to reproductive problems, breast and prostate cancers, heart disease and diabetes.

Even some SIGG water bottles contain BPA, so the fact that Chef Boyardee raviolis turned up some amount of the stuff isn’t that big of a shocker.

But you know what is?

Continue reading »

They Say: Common Meds Linked to Birth Defects

Pregnant women, beware. This is one of those reports on a study that will make you want to tear your hair out. Why? Because you’re sort of damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Still, here goes:

Researchers looking into antibiotics use during pregnancy have found a link between birth defects and the medicines commonly used to treat urinary tract infections. Oh, but wait. Allowing bacterial infections to go untreated during pregnancy has also been shown to harm the fetus.

The advice? Continue reading »