As several readers pointed out, I chewed Mark out incorrectly about using a wooden cutting board for meat.  It turns out that wooden cutting boards are probably safer, in actuality, since the bacteria tend to sink down into the wood, where they slowly die off.  In contrast, plastic cutting boards keep any bacteria closer to the surface, and once the plastic boards have been scarred by cutting action, those bacteria can move off the board and back onto food relatively easily.

On the other hand, it's generally considered good practice to have two cutting boards in your kitchen, one for meat and one for everything else.  Since meat is going to be cooked before eating, any bacteria present will be killed by the high heat, but if you cut apples on a cutting board that has been used for meat then eat the apples fresh, you're at risk of getting food poisoning.  In the past, I've just cut up meat on a plate (annoying, but I don't do it often), but since we'll now have a wooden and a plastic cutting board, I'll keep using the wooden one for fruits and vegetable.  We'll be extra-careful to disinfect the plastic board after cutting up meat, which can be done by washing the board and then soaking it in bleach water, exactly the method Mark naturally gravitated toward.

While doing all this research, though, I did learn one maintenance technique I need to add to my arsenal --- oiling our wooden cutting board.  Now I just need to hunt down some food-grade mineral oil and give my grandmother's board a new lease on life.