Stop and Listen

CAN WE TALK?: Tonight, we were fortunate to be able to attend a presentation by former Seahawks' player Michael Bennett.

Eloquent, thoughtful, and provocative, Bennett is on tour promoting his book "Things that Make White People Uncomfortable."

I have more photos, and we all have many thoughts about the evening. Stay tuned for more tomorrow.

IS THERE A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE?  Today, a Facebook friend posted a photo of a dude supposedly performing surgery on himself.

Rather than just 'liking' it, I suspected it might be fake, and I decided to Google it. Turns out the story was about Russian surgeon Leonid Rogozov, and it was legit.

After seeing the photo (above), I Googled "man who performed surgery on himself in the Arctic" and found this headline: The man who cut out his own appendix
by Sara Lentati of BBC World Service. 

So, sure enough, during an expedition to the Antarctic, Rogozov became seriously ill and diagnosed himself in need of an appendectomy.  Rogozov was part of the sixth Soviet Antarctic expedition, a team of 12, far, far from civilization. 

One thing I learned today is that appendectomies are now compulsory for Antarctic explorers from some countries, and some medical professionals have suggested any future astronauts leaving the Earth to form a colony on Mars or the Moon have an appendectomy before exiting Earth.

Fortunately, Rogozov's story had a happy ending. He recovered completely from his surgery, and lived for decades afterward!