South by Midwest
Flash fiction—prairie-style—from novelists Jonathan Lethem and Aimee Bender, plus an interview with Jeff Martin, editor of the new collection “Imaginary Oklahoma.”
Flash fiction—prairie-style—from novelists Jonathan Lethem and Aimee Bender, plus an interview with Jeff Martin, editor of the new collection “Imaginary Oklahoma.”
* Investigators piece together what happened in West, Texas, where unverified amounts of volatile chemicals may have been housed. * One year after Obama affirmed his support of same-sex marriage, public opinion has followed suit. * For more than two years, a government lab has been running a quantum-sized internet. * Signs
* More than 30 years before Jason Collins, baseball's Glenn Burke was the first openly gay player in the majors. * Related: When Glenn Burke invented the high five. * Every conceivable piece of data transmitted or received by U.S. citizens is kept at the NSA's new facility
* NRA asks convention vendor to remove 3D "bleeding" target dummy resembling Obama. * Related: Shooting an Obama target is legal, just as it was legal for a Ben and Jerry's co-founder to burn a 12-foot-tall Bush effigy. * How to tell you're eating
Pictures from the edges of the Northern Gaeltacht, the Irish-speaking area of County Mayo and one of the last true wilderness areas in Western Europe.
* After six months of meetings, Halliburton and North Carolina set fracking rules. * Map shows the extent of Mexican drug cartels' reach in North America. * According to the CDC, more Americans now die of suicide than in car accidents. * Photos of children proudly displaying their "My First Rifle."
A man is always more complicated than his paper trail—especially when he’s your father, who walked out one day.
* Entire villages in Mexico's Costa Grande region have been abandoned in the cartel war. * After al-Qaida got involved around 10 years ago, we saw a massive increase in the quantities of cocaine involved. * In utero, the largest shark embryo will devour all its littermates—except its closest-
* Economist decides Tennessee's Knoxville is America's most perfectly average place. * Fact-checking Obama's claim that 85-90 percent of Americans won't notice anything but better health care due to the Affordable Care Act. * Five conspiracy theories actually believed by Texas senator Ted
Growing up in Ohio, far from the homeland of her parents, a girl puzzles over her identity, until the strings of a sitar create a connection.