The name is two words that pull in different directions, on purpose.
Odd is the point of view: curiosity, unexpected connections, and the willingness to question a solution everyone has accepted. Bench is the discipline: making, testing, revising, and maintaining something that other people can actually use.
Neither half works alone. Odd without the bench becomes novelty for its own sake: clever, briefly interesting, abandoned. The bench without odd becomes competent but interchangeable production. The useful work happens in the tension between them.
The loop
Most of what happens here follows one loop: notice, question, make, test, release, maintain, learn. It is rarely a straight line. A prototype changes the question. A released project goes back on the bench. A retired one keeps its catalogue record and whatever it taught.
The last two steps are the ones most often skipped, and the ones that decide whether anyone can rely on the result. That is why maintenance gets written about here as seriously as launches.
No origin myth
The Bulletin will not invent anecdotes to make a project sound inevitable. A small true detail, such as the date of a first commit, a failed approach, or a decision that changed direction, is worth more than an elaborate story. If something here sounds unglamorous, it is probably accurate.