Getting out the vote by putting out

Thu, 21 Oct 2004 16:58:00 +0000

On Oct. 11, four co-founders of a Web-based youth activist group gathered in a small apartment in Manhattan for their weekly meeting. Chairs were pulled into a circle, and iPods and cellphones were dropped onto a wooden trunk-cum-coffee table. The attendants were well-groomed and collegiate looking. Wheat Thins and Oreos were going around. The host of the meeting, a 23-year-old publicity assistant named Julie Binder, sat barefoot on the floor, occasionally tapping out notes on a laptop.

The night's agenda was finding a venue and sponsors for the group's election-night party, and with just over two weeks until Nov. 2, the mood was serious. They considered bars called APT, Piano and Happy Ending. The space would have to be large but cozy, hip but relaxed, and it would need to have a television for watching the election results come in. Also, added Peter Koechley, a 23-year-old Columbia grad, it should be someplace "where it's easy to have sex where no one notices." The others nodded in agreement.

Off the rag

Tue, 25 Nov 2003 20:54:00 +0000

Menstruation never suited Angela Fontaine. Between swimming, fishing, skiing, raising a 9-year-old daughter, and working 12-hour shifts as a labor and delivery nurse, there wasn't enough time to waste a few days each month feeling bloated and cranky. So when the 29-year-old from Jacksonville, Fla., learned she could do away with her periods -- or at least most of them -- she jumped at the chance.

The opportunity came in the form of a clinical trial for a new type of birth control pill called Seasonale. Released this month by Barr Laboratories, Seasonale -- which gives women just four periods per year -- is the first FDA-approved birth control pill designed to overhaul the time-honored monthly cycle. While the FDA and much of the medical community have already signed off on other period-suppressing contraceptive methods -- such as the injection known as Depo-Provera and the slow-release hormonal implant called Norplant, both of which cause irregular menstruation in some users, or stop it entirely -- the advent of Seasonale promises a newly predictable way of cutting down on periods.

Salon.com > Jennifer Fried

Getting out the vote by putting out

Off the rag