I wish this was the kind of world where say, 'Wow, I'd like to touch your breasts,' and people would understand that it's not a way of reducing you to a set of nipples and ignoring the rest of you, but rather a way of saying that I may not yet know your mind, but your body is beautiful.

We were standing in the hallway of ConFusion, about nine of us, and we all nodded. Then another friend spoke up.

"You can touch my boobs," she said to all of us in the hallway. "It's no big deal."

Now, you have to understand the way she said that, because it's the key to the whole project. The spirit of everything was formed within those nine words - and if she'd said them shyly, as though having her breasts touched by people was something to be endured or afraid of, the Open-Source Boob Project would have died aborning. But she didn't. Her words were loud and clearly audible to anyone who walked by, an offer made to friends and acquaintances alike.

Yet it wasn't a come-on, either. There wasn't that undertow of desperation of come on, touch me, I need you to validate my self-esteem and maybe we'll hook up later tonight. There was no promise of anything but a simple grope.

We all reached out in the hallway, hands and fingers extended, to get a handful. And lo, we touched her breasts - taking turns to put our hands on the creamy tops exposed through the sheer top she wore, cupping our palms to touch the clothed swell underneath, exploring thoroughly but briefly lest we cross the line from 'touching" to "unwanted heavy petting." They were awesome breasts, worthy of being touched.

Well, that didn't go over so well. Ferrett and his nerd cohorts were showered with outrage and mockery and virtual kicks in the balls and now he's apologized, saying what "works in a microcosm can't work in a macrocosm" and all sorts of stupid shit someone is surely saving for a screenplay on a GeekCon Rom Com about a booth babe who falls in love with a friendly hacker, because the Open Source Boob Project is seriously the funniest thing since Band Camp, unless you're the type to get offended by "double standards" or whatever, and we talked to someone who gets offended by that stuff (and also, has to actually attend science fiction conventions) and the only thing that offended her was that there were no rules for groping dudes. "I am a total repressed groper," she admitted. Me too, kinda! But um...that's what crowded bars in Williamsburg are for, right? Wait, forget I said that.

No No Ojou Chan!
Earlier: Elegy For A Booth Babe

This story is, like, my worst nightmare, as someone who has consistently had all sorts of fun dreams such as the one where I wake up with tiny sets of teeth embedded in my skin...Of course, it's hard to say what's worse: tiny sets of teeth embedded in your skin? Or the constant, ever-present sensation that they are sprouting?

But Morgellon's is actually a real thing caused by agrobacteria, which is a sort of bacteria that has long caused tumors in trees. Now agrobacteria have figured out how to implant their DNA in human cells. Maybe. Well, no one is sure, because no one has money to study the DNA of this shit. Mutant worms may be involved. It's sort of like the new bipolar disorder, combined with the new Lyme disease?

In the meantime, most doctors maintain it's all bullshit.

The writer of the story is giving an online chat on the Washington Post website in two hours, so maybe check in over there and report back. And now, excuse me while I spend the next twenty minutes rabidly scratching my scalp.

Figments of the Imagination? [Washington Post]
Related: New Study of the Bizarre Disease Where Wires Grow Out Of Your Skin [io9]