Two things.

First, I came across this article, posted on facebook, about some of the issues with the hospital system of human birth in the United States. Sad, but definitely worth reading. It isn't long.



Secondly, I (for once) don't have loads of tabs open, because I have instead been spending most of my free time baking an orange-filled cake for my mom. The recipe is from the 1975 edition of Joy of Cooking, but I'll post it here for you on the off chance that you're interested. I might as well, since I already typed the whole thing out for Chloe (my younger sister) on gmail:



Orange-filled Cake:

Preheat oven to 375.

Sift before measuring:
3 cups cake flour

Resift with:
3/4 tsp salt
3 1/2 tsp double-acting baking powder

Grate:
rind of 1 orange
Into:
1 1/2 c sugar

Cream until light with:
3/4 c butter

Beat in, one at a time:
1/2 c orange juice
1/2 water
2 tbs lemon juice

Add the flour mixture in 3 parts to the butter mixture, alternately with the liquid. Stir the batter after each addition until smooth. Bake the cake about 1/2 hour in 3 layer pans with greased (and floured) bottoms. When the cake is cool, spread between the layers: Orange Cream Filling, p 698.



Orange Cream Filling:

Soak about 5 minutes:
1 tsp gelatin
in:
1 tbs water.

Combine in the top of a double boiler:
2 tbs cornstarch
2 tbs all-purpose flour
3/4 c sugar

Add:
3/4 c hot water

Cook these ingredients over, not in boiling water for 8 to 12 minutes. Stir constantly. Cover and cook undisturbed 10 minutes more. Add:
1 tbs butter
Pour part of this mixture over:
2 beaten egg yolks
Beat and pour back into the double boiler. Cook and stir the custard gently, about 2 minutes, to let the yolks thicken. Add the soaked gelatin. Stir until dissolved. Remove custard from heat. Add:
Grated rind of orange
3 tbs each of orange and lemon juice

Cool the custard. Beat until stiff:
1/2 c whipping cream
Fold it into the custard. Chill 1 hour. If spread between the layers of a cake, ice with:

Luscious Orange Icing, p 725.



Luscious Orange Icing:

This icing becomes firm on the outside and remains soft inside. Please read About Boiled Icings, p 721

[About boiled icings:
Just as in candy making, success with boiled icing depends on favorable weather and the recognition of certain stages in preparing sugar syrup. If the icing is too soft or too hard, take the corrective steps suggested below. Never ruin a good cake with doubtful icing.
Boiled white icings are based on a principle known as Italian meringue--the cooking of egg whites by beating into them gradually, a hot but not boiling syrup.
For boiled icings, the cake must be cooled before the icing is applied. Have all utensils absolutely free of grease, and eggs at room temperature. Separate the whites, keeping them absolutely free of yolk, and put them in a large bowl. You may start with unbeaten, frothy, or stiffly whipped whites. Have available a stabilizer: lemon juice, vinegar, cream of tartar or light corn syrup; and also a small quantity of boiling water--in case the icing tends to harden prematurely.
Cook the syrup to 238-240 degrees. It will have gone through a coarse thread stage and, when dropped from the edge of a spoon, will pull out into thickish threads. When the thick thread develops a hairlike appendage that curls back on itself, remove the syrup from the heat. Hold the very hot, but not bubbling, syrup above the bowl and let it drop in a slow and gradual thin stream onto the whites as you beat them. In an electric mixer, this is no trick. If you are beating by hand, you may have to steady your bowl by placing it on a folded wet towel.
As the egg whites become cooked by the hot syrup, the beating increases the volume of the icing. By the time the syrup is used up, you should have a creamy mass, almost ready for spreading. At this point, add any of the stabilizers--a few drips of lemon juice or vinegar, a pinch of cream of tartar or a teaspoon or two of light corn syrup. These substances help to keep the icing from sugaring and becoming gritty. Then beat in the flavoring of your choice. When the icing begins to harden at the edges of the bowl, it should be ready to put on the cake. Do not scrape the bowl.
If the syrup has not been boiled long enough and the icing is somewhat runny, beat it in strong sunlight. If this doesn't do the trick, place the icing in the top of a double boiler or in a heat-proof bowl over--not in--boiling water, until it reaches the right consistency for spreading. If the syrup has been overcooked and the icing tends to harden too soon, a teaspoon or two of boiling water or a few drops of lemon juice will restore it. If raisins, nutmeats, zest or other ingredients are to be added to the icing, wait until the last moment to incorporate them. They contain oil or acid which will thin the icing.
In high altitudes it helps to add to the sugar 1/8 tsp of glycerin and to allow a longer cooking period.]

Stir over heat until dissolved:
1 c granulated sugar
1 tbs white corn syrup
1/8 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 c water

Cover and cook about 3 minutes or until the steam has washed down any crystals that may have formed on the sides of the pan. Uncover and cook to 238-240 degrees without stirring. Pour the syrup in a slow stream over:
2 beaten egg whites
Beat for 10 minutes. Add:
1/4 c powdered sugar
1 tsp grated orange rind
1 tbs orange juice or 3/4 tsp vanilla

Beat the icing to a spreading consistency.

(Shockingly they don't note this in the book, but my mom says that with boiled icings you must spread them on the cake immediately, because they harden rather quickly. The Luscious Orange Icing never completely hardened, probably because of the oily, acidic orange peel [judging by what they said in the a/b section above]--but it did become hard enough that we couldn't really spread it anymore. So that's important.)