The Retrievals, Season 2, Episode 3: The Guidelines
Produced by Julie Snyder and Ben Phelan
Edited by Julie Snyder
Original music by Dan PowellFritz Myers and Nick Thornburn
Engineered by Phoebe Wang
Pain during a cesarean section isn't a new problem. But for a long time, it's been a hidden one. In England, a patient named Susanna not only brings the problem to doctors' attention, but also tries to solve it.
Susan Burton is the host of the Peabody Award-winning podcast 'The Retrievals' and the author of the memoir 'Empty.'
Hosted, Reported and Written by Susan BurtonEdited by Julie SnyderProduced by Julie Snyder and Ben PhelanAdditional Editing by Jessica Weisberg and Jen GuerraFact Checking and Research by Ben PhelanMusic Supervision, Sound Design and Mixing by Phoebe WangAdditional Production by Catherine Anderson and Mack MillerOriginal Score by Dan Powell, Fritz Myers and Nick ThorburnTheme Music by Carla Pallone, remixed by Dan PowellAdditional Music by Marion LozanoArt direction by Pablo DelcanPhotography by Erik TannerStandards Editor Susan WesslingLegal Review by Dana GreenSupervising Producer Ndeye ThioubouSenior Operations Manager Elizabeth Davis-MoorerDeputy Managing Editor Sam Dolnick
At The New York Times, thanks to:
Nina Lassam, Brian Rideout, Susan Beachy, Jeffrey Miranda, Corey Beach, Rokk Vincelli-Williams, Naomi Noury, Kyle Grandillo, Kelly Doe, Shu Chun Xie, Peter Rentz, Jordan Cohen, Mahima Chablani, Katie O'Brien, Karl Delossantos, Tara Godvin, Victoria Kim, Brad Fisher, Maddy Masiello, Reyna Desai, Christine Ngyuen, Mukul Devichand, Zoe Murphy, Pierre Antoine-Louis, Dan Levin, Elisheba Ittoop and Diane Wong.
Special thanks:
Jessica Weisberg, Jen Guerra, Katie Fuchs, Julie Whitaker, Laura Starecheski, Leah Shaw Dameron, Pierre Cattoni and Lee Riffaterre.
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Serial Productions makes narrative podcasts whose quality and innovation transformed the medium.
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Eater
9 minutes ago
- Eater
It's Time to Be Romantic in North Beach
Garrett Schlichte is an award-winning columnist, writer, and chef living in San Francisco. Garrett's work has appeared online and in print in The Washington Post , The New York Times , THEM, Jezebel, Slate, and other outlets. Welcome to Fire the Menu, a column from chef and writer Garrett Schlichte about over-ordering, over-indulging, and almost overdoing it in their favorite city in the world, the place they call home, San Francisco. From pre-fixe to quick fix and everything in between, it's time to find your people, tuck in, and, well, fire the menu. I'd have thought that getting dumped by someone a little over halfway through their 20s, when I'm almost halfway through my 30s, would have been more embarrassing, but after you've willingly posted your first Instagram Reel, really, everything else feels rote in comparison. If I'm being totally honest, the only actually embarrassing part of that breakup, aside from the fact that I was still wearing my yellow kitchen clogs when it happened, is that it took getting swept off my feet by a 26-year-old for me to finally understand just how beautiful North Beach is. It's not that I'd never been to North Beach, of course. I'm not an idiot (mostly). When I first moved to the city, I made the customary pilgrimage to City Lights. I've spent several pie-eyed afternoons squirreled away in the ever-elusive second-floor booth at Vesuvio, gossiping with friends over too many martinis, making up stories about how strangers on the first floor might have met. I've eaten a slice from Golden Boy, and Tony's, and Golden Boy again. But all of those were special occasions that felt, to be totally honest, a little bit like work. Regardless of the fact that our sweet little city is famously 7x7, gorgeous, and uniquely walkable and bikeable, I have, at times, been uncharacteristically lazy when it comes to traveling so far that I'm required to carry the customary light jacket the microclimates necessitate. Until, of course, a hot guy invited me to a part of the city that required walking, a train, and a cable car. If any city transit officials are looking for ways to inspire people to use public transit more regularly, they might consider having more 6-foot-7 men in slutty little glasses invite people on dates — I have some empirical evidence pointing toward the success of this tactic. But I'm not here to save Muni (although, of course, save Muni), I'm here to talk about North Beach, and how one truly perfect date broke me out of my neighborhood vortex. It is considerably easier to get to North Beach by bus, bike, or on foot than it is to get there by cable car, but I now think riding a cable car, one of the last vestiges of an almost-but-not-quite-bygone era of San Francisco, into the heart of North Beach is one of the most perfect and romantic things you can do. I will admit that when my date and I hopped off BART at Powell and then had to walk and wait an additional 17 minutes for the cable car, I was suspicious. The bottle of wine he had tucked in his tote was helpful, but even then, I wasn't quite sure of the whole idea. Garrett Schlichte Garrett Schlichte I'd never ridden a cable car because I considered it to be nothing more than a tourist trap. What an idiot I am! When the trolley finally arrived and we boarded and sat down, I was instantly in love (with the trolley, not the man). Sure, I was a little tipsy. Yes, I was holding hands with a tall, cute man. Of course, the moon was out and full, but I'm still sure that even if none of those things were true, I would have found it magical. Riding into North Beach down Powell in the open air is a reminder that our city, which can feel wonderfully like a town at times, is very much a city. The flickering marques and neon signs and the grind of the electric motor of the trolley was a pulsing heartbeat saying I'm here, I'm back, I never left. I don't remember where we finally hopped off except that it was in the middle of an intersection, which, of course, I found particularly endearing. As we wandered away from the track, I did a few twirls on the sidewalk. Red, green, and white lights strung across the streets were stars in my eyes, and I smelled a new kind of pizza every couple of blocks. Heaven! In 1940, the columnist Herb Caen wrote that North Beach was '1,001 neon-splattered joints alive with the Italian air of garlic and the jukebox wail of American folk songs.' That night, and now, I find myself delighted by how true that description still is. The rest of the date was fine, but gilded to better-than-fine by the thick ambrosial air that wafts through every inch of North Beach. I don't remember what restaurant we ate at, which is good because the food wasn't, although that didn't stop me from loving it. Bad food can be compensated for when a restaurant's heart is in the right place, and wherever we were, it definitely was. The owner sat a few tables away from us and came over to pour us wine when our glasses got low. An extra little treat was gifted to us for dessert. Sure, the chicken was dry, but our waiter hugged us on the way out — ugh! Back out on the street, we held hands and walked past increasingly busier and louder bar fronts, and my date wondered aloud if stopping to kiss on a street corner might get us hate-crimed. I looked around. For maybe the first time in my life in San Francisco, I couldn't spot another gay person around me, aside from the one whose hand I was holding. Despite North Beach's history as San Francisco's first gayborhood, long gone were the Paper Doll, the Beige Room, Mona's, and a dozen other bars and restaurants that made it so. Petite Lil's keeps the romantic energy alive and well. Garrett Schlichte Although we didn't let the stifling heterosexuality stop us from expressing our god-given right to lock lips on a street corner (North Beach or not, it's still San Francisco, after all), I did wonder mid-make-out if the lack of a gay outpost was part of what had kept me from frequenting one of the most romantic parts of the city for so long. In the Castro and Soma, and even the Tenderloin and Bernal, you're never too far from a queer watering hole, but I wouldn't necessarily call those places inherently romantic, or at least not in the same way North Beach is. Even though my relationship with that tall man didn't last much longer after that date, it was just the beginning of my love affair with North Beach. A couple of weeks after that night, I found myself back under the neon lights for a friend's book reading, and then miraculously snatching up the last two bar seats at Tony's for a beer, pizza, and a perfect Italian chopped salad. A week later, I was back on the trolley and tucking into the window seat at Petit Lil's for a cold martini and even colder oysters. Then, it was Tosca, and a late-night burger at Sam's. Then, upstairs at Trattoria Contadina. A cannoli on the street here and there, a cigarette outside of Vesuvio. Europe in the Bay! I've been broken up with in other cities I've lived in, and I always found ways to avoid the parts of town where I spent time with that person. But when relationships have ended in San Francisco, I find myself returning to those spots again and again, regardless of the little heart pangs a street corner or a bar might elicit. Perhaps that's the magic of San Francisco — it's just too good to keep yourself from enjoying all of it. Paper covers rock, and San Francisco covers heartbreak. So, I believe it is time to go be romantic in North Beach. With yourself, with a lover, or with friends — and it doesn't matter what counter you do it at, because every spot is perfect, even if it's not exactly good. North Beach is not a neighborhood of hidden gems. No, in North Beach, all the gems are visible. It wears those 1,001 neon signs Caen was talking about like a crown, each one inviting you in and daring you not to fall in love, either with a person or with the city itself. Nights in North Beach end with Sam's. That's the rule. Garrett Schlichte Eater SF All your essential food and restaurant intel delivered to you Email (required) Sign Up By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Notice . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Forbes
11 minutes ago
- Forbes
The Shocking True Story Behind ‘The Twisted Tale Of Amanda Knox'
Amanda Knox is making headlines yet again, but this time, it's for Hulu's limited series The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox. Whether you followed the story as it unfolded in the media or are just learning what happened, here's everything you need to know about the infamous case, from the investigation to the convictions and acquittals. The eight-part scripted drama stars Grace Van Patten as Knox, who was wrongfully imprisoned for murder weeks after arriving in Italy for her study abroad program. According to Hulu, the show "traces Amanda's relentless fight to prove her innocence and reclaim her freedom, and examines why authorities and the world stood so firmly in judgment." Knox also serves as an executive producer on the project. "I'm a producer and a collaborator on the story," Knox told the Seattle Times. "I'm not just a victim of the storytellers and at the mercy of the storytellers." The show takes viewers through Knox's arrest, the controversial interrogation and the trial. Showrunner K.J. Steinberg told the publication that she first discussed the idea of the show with fellow EP Monica Lewinsky, wanting to focus on Knox the person rather than the figure created by Italian authorities and the media. "It was very clear to me as soon as I met Amanda, read her memoir, but mostly looked into her eyes in our meeting and connected with her, that that warped version was a travesty unto itself," Steinberg said. Who Is Amanda Knox? Amanda Knox is an American activist, author and journalist. In November 2007, when she was a 20-year-old student at the University of Washington, she went abroad to Perugia, Italy. She lived in a four-bedroom apartment on the ground floor with three other women, including Meredith Kercher, a British exchange student from the University of Leeds. 'It's true that I didn't know Meredith very well. I had only known her for a few weeks," Knox wrote in her recent memoir, Free: My Search for Meaning. "That said, when you study abroad, you get to know people really quickly because both of us were new arrivals to Perugia. … I was 20. She was 21. She was studying journalism. I was studying languages.' She continued, "And we both happened to rent a room in this beautiful little house overlooking the countryside. And it was perfect. It was that beautiful time of your life when everything is possible and you have every reason to expect to have beautiful experiences." On Oct. 25, 2007, Knox met Italian Raffaele Sollecito at a classical music concert, and they started dating. The 23-year-old Italian computer engineering student's apartment was a short walk from the girls' flat. What Happened To Meredith Kercher? On Nov. 2, 2007, Kercher was found dead in her bedroom in the apartment that she shared with Knox. According to Italian police, her body was partially clothed, with her throat cut. She was stabbed multiple times and was sexually assaulted. When questioned by police, Knox told authorities that she'd spent the night of Nov. 1 at Raffaele's house and returned home about 10:30 a.m. Friday morning. She noticed that the front door was open and there were spots of blood on the bathroom mat. Amanda said that she took a shower and then went to get her boyfriend; the police arrived at about 12:30 p.m. What Did The Police Do During Amanda Knox's Interrogation? Shortly after Kercher was killed, Knox was subjected to 53 hours of interrogation from Italian authorities without a lawyer or an official translator. In January 2025, Knox penned an article for The Atlantic shedding light on her interrogation, which she called "the most terrifying experience of my life." 'I was 20 years old, and was questioned for more than 53 hours over a five-day period in a language I was only just learning to speak. The night of Meredith's murder, I had stayed with Raffaele Sollecito, a young man I'd just started dating. But no matter how many times I said that, the police refused to believe me,' she wrote. What Did Amanda Knox Confess To Initially? Knox recalled in The Atlantic that during the interrogation, she was "berated, threatened, lied to, and slapped, and eventually my sanity broke," adding that she "began to believe the lies the police were telling me." Knox said that she agreed to sign statements placing herself and another innocent man in the house when the crime had occurred. Also during the interrogation, she accused Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba of killing Kercher. (Knox worked part-time at Lumumba's bar.) "I recanted only a few hours later, but it didn't matter," Knox wrote. "I was coerced into signing the statements and then charged with criminal slander for doing so. (The police, who did not record the interrogation as they were supposed to, deny that I was hit or pressured into making these statements.)" The recantation Knox is referring to was a handwritten four-page statement in English in which she questioned the truthfulness of her previous testimony. "In regards to this 'confession' that I made last night, I want to make clear that I'm very doubtful of the veracity [sic] of my statements because they were made under the pressures of stress, shock and extreme exhaustion," she wrote, per CBS News. "Not only was I told I would be arrested and put in jail for 30 years, but I was also hit in the head when I didn't remember a fact correctly," she said in the statement. "It was under this pressure and after many hours of confusion that my mind came up with these answers." What Happened At Amanda Knox's Trial? Prosecutors claimed Knox and her boyfriend murdered Meredith because she wouldn't participate in a group sex game. According to NBC News, investigators found it suspicious that both Amanda and Raffaele turned off their cell phones at almost exactly the same time — 8:40 p.m. — on the night of the murder. However, The Gaurdian reported that in the final days of the trial, media sentiment in Italy shift in favor of the defendants 'as their lawyers kept up an offensive on the forensic evidence linking them to the crime.' Knox and Sollecito were convicted of murdering Kercher in 2009, with Knox receiving a 26-year prison sentence. Both served four years in an Italian prison before being found innocent in 2011 by an eight-member jury. Their acquittal came after serious questions emerged about the procedures used to collect DNA evidence, according to the BBC. The court ruled that Knox's initial testimony, which was typed by the police, would not be admissible as evidence in the retrial. Instead, only Knox's handwritten notes were allowed as evidence, according to CBS News at the time. Why Was The First Acquittal Reversed? In March 2013, a retrial was ordered after prosecutors appealed that crucial DNA evidence had been left out, and the case was sent back to an appeals court in Florence. That court reinstated the original guilty verdict against Knox and Sollecito. As NPR reported in 2014, "The latest ruling reinstates the initial verdict and sentences Knox, who currently lives in Seattle, to 28 1/2 years in prison and is likely to set up a long battle over her extradition." Finally, in 2015, the convictions of Knox and Sollecito were definitively overturned by Italy's highest court. The Court of Cassation found that the murder investigation had been flawed from the start. According to The New York Times, the court noted that the "unusual media hype" and the international repercussions that accompanied the case from the moment Kercher, was found dead led to a "sudden acceleration" in the investigations to find potential suspects "to consign to the international public opinion," which "certainly did not assist in finding the truth." Although Knox was exonerated of the murder charges, she was unsuccessful in her efforts to overturn her slander conviction. In June 2025, Italy's highest court upheld Knox's conviction, which held a brief jail sentence. She was found guilty of slander for falsely accusing her former boss, Patrick Lumumba, of killing Kercher. In 2023, an appeals court in Florence gave Knox a three-year sentence for wrongly accusing Lumumba. But because she had already served nearly four years, she is not at risk of any more jail time, according to VOA News. "It's a surreal day," Knox wrote on X after the conviction was upheld. "I've just been found guilty yet again of a crime I didn't commit.' Knox's lawyer, Carlo Dalla Vedova, also said that he was surprised by the conviction. "We cannot believe it. A totally unjust decision for Amanda and unexpected in our eyes," he said. "We are incredulous." Meanwhile, Lumumba was happy with the verdict. "Amanda was wrong. This verdict has to accompany her for the rest of her life," he told The Associated Press. Who Killed Meredith Kercher? While Knox was in prison, Italian investigators revealed they were looking for a fourth suspect in the stabbing. The man left a bloody left-hand print on a pillowcase found underneath Meredith's head, and he also used the bathroom without flushing, leaving DNA evidence. The bloody print was a match to Rudy Hermann Guede, a 20-year-old Ivorian native who has lived in Italy since the age of five. In statements to German authorities and to his lawyer, Guede admitted that he was in the flat with Meredith when she died. He said they'd made a date the night before, on Halloween, when she'd been dressed as a vampire. He claimed that the date at her house ended in consensual sex. He said that they went to bed, and he went down the hall to the bathroom, when he heard Meredith screaming. Not only was Guede's DNA found in the victim, but it was also on her bra and in the house, per NBC News. Guede was sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2008, but that verdict included a ruling that he did not commit the crime alone. His sentence was later reduced on appeal before he was released early for good behavior in 2021, according to CNN. But Guede's legal troubles are far from over. He is scheduled to appear in court in November 2025 on charges of sexual assault, mistreatment and stalking. These accusations come from his former girlfriend, whom he began dating while still in perison. According to Italian media, their relationship ended in 2023 when she filed charges against him. The first two episodes of The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox are streaming on Hulu. Watch the official trailer below.
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Travel + Leisure
40 minutes ago
- Travel + Leisure
Designer Gustaf Westman Is Letting Travelers Stay in His Whimsical Stockholm Apartment
Modern interior design is thankfully pushing past the 'Millennial gray' and 'everything beige' trends that have defined the better half of the 21st century—the big trend now is bright, whimsical spaces filled with color and interesting shapes. If you aren't ready to adopt those pastel pink baguette holders, bubbly gold candle holders, and those viral squiggly blue mirrors in your own space, there's a creative way to incorporate the look into your next vacation. The Swedish designer Gustaf Westman—who has an upcoming collaboration with Ikea and whose dishware regularly goes viral on TikTok—is opening up his Stockholm home to guests. Westman partnered with home-swapping platform Kindred to give other people the chance to experience his space, which is decorated with chunky décor, larger-than-life mirrors, and soft, indulgently shaped furniture. 'I'm really excited to open up my home to others on Kindred,' Westman said. 'There's something unique about letting people experience my designs in a personal space where there is no curation whatsoever, just my own creative chaos of whatever I'm working on at that moment. It's a full expression of my world.' Designer Gustaf Westman sitting in his Stockholm home. Unlike booking a vacation rental or hotel, there's a bit more to booking Westman's home on Kindred. First, you'll have to head to the Kindred website and create a home and user profile. Sign up with the code so his home will automatically be saved to your favorites. Then, where there's availability to book, you'll be notified so you can send in a request. Pricing will vary depending on how you use Kindred as a home swapping platform. With Kindred, you earn credits every time you host other travelers. On top of that, you will have to pay a fee—for example, you could stay in New York City for seven nights for $545, if you have earned seven credits. Many of the homes on Kindred are just everyday, well-maintained apartments and homes. But some, like Westman's, are true gems. "There's something deeply personal about stepping into an artist's home. It's not just about the objects, it's about seeing the world the way they do,' said Justine Palefsky, CEO and cofounder of Kindred. "Gustaf builds more than furniture. He builds feeling. Swapping homes with him isn't just a design moment; it's an invitation to live inside someone else's creative mind. That's what makes Kindred different: you don't just visit a place, you experience someone else's perspective.'
