diesel therapy
n.— «There are men here with five year sentences for inconsequential crimes, men who were detained in county jails for months because of lost or delayed paperwork.…Many of these stories emanate from a common practice called “diesel therapy.”…Many of these men are taken in shackles directly from the courtroom on the day of sentencing. Thereafter, and during the two to seven month period while their paperwork is being processed, and depending on the extent off overcrowding in their ultimately designated facility, they are shuttled in shackles from one facility to another on a bus, and are treated like mass murderers. They have no clothing or possessions and no money and suffer tremendously.» —by Jim Coyne The Repugnant Warehouse Nov. 1, 1996. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
What if, instead of being an inanimate object, a dictionary were alive? That’s the idea behind a lavishly illustrated new children’s book called The Dictionary Story (Bookshop|Amazon) by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston. This is part of a...
Astronauts returning from space say they experience what’s called the overview effect, a new understanding of the fragility of our planet and our need to reflect on what humans all share as a species. A book about the end of the universe...