Word: foams
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...pieces, the showstopper is a Turkish scene at the end of the first act. Such exotic interludes were a vogue in the 18th century, and Corigliano and Hoffman mock the form with glee. The setting is an outlandish reception at the Turkish embassy, presided over by a 12-ft. foam pasha from whose mail-slot mouth a bass voice emerges. As the sultry singer Samira, mezzo Marilyn Horne reclines lasciviously on a plushy couch and tosses off a florid cavatina and cabaletta to words from an Arabic phrase book ("I am in a valley, and you are in a valley...
...foam-fields hiss...
...should they be? The reports were based on studies under way at the Food and Drug Administration. Scientists there had found that the polyurethane foam coating surrounding the Meme and Replicon brands of implants could break down in the body into a substance called 2-toluene diamine, or TDA. This chemical had been shown to cause liver cancer in laboratory rats. The most alarming news reports claimed that TDA could trigger cancer in as many as 4 in 10,000 women who received the implants...
Ironically, the Meme and Replicon implants, which are actually no different from ordinary silicone implants except for an added layer of polyurethane foam, were considered by many surgeons to be the best on the market. The older, smooth-shelled variety tended to cause surrounding tissue to tighten into a fibrous mass, sometimes leaving the breast misshapen and hard to the touch. But the polyurethane foam coating of the Surgitek products prevented this from happening by substantially increasing the surface area of the implant. When the neighboring tissue contracts, it does not become too compact. Surgeons who have used the models...
...radio broadcast to announce that an attack is underway and that all citizens should don their masks and move to the "Heder Ha'atum" (the one room in the house that citizens had previously, at the start of the Gulf War, been instructed to seal against chemical attack with foam and nylon sheeting). There we are to await further instructions from the army. "This is not," barks the Haga (Civil Defense authority) spokesperson, "a drill or an exercise." I put on my mask and place my anti-nerve gas injector and my mustard gas powder next...