Featured Articles from the Baltimore Sun

Before sunrise Monday, Kevin and Shelley Taylor set out from their Millersville home to a new employment center for the Maryland Live! Casino, a slots parlor next to the Arundel Mills mall seeking workers for 1,500 jobs. Having tracked the progress of what will be the state's largest casino, the Taylors believe the facility could provide opportunity for their five-member family. Though Kevin Taylor has a job, he wants a better-paying one. And Shelley Taylor has been out of work for several months.

Personal finance guru Suze Orman says she never would have introduced her prepaid debit card if there wasn't a possibility that some day it could be used in credit scoring. Orman launched the Approved Card this month. She has partnered with TransUnion, one of the three major credit bureaus, in a pilot program to see whether spending activity on the prepaid card could be used to develop a credit score. Some credit experts are doubtful. People load money on a prepaid card that can be used at places that accept plastic.

In a Monday morning appearance on ESPN, Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs revealed that there was miscommunication on the sideline before Billy Cundiff missed a game-tying field goal attempt in the closing seconds of Sunday's 23-20 loss to the New England Patriots in the AFC championship game. According to Suggs, some players thought the Ravens had picked up a first down when Anquan Boldin fumbled out of bounds after a nine-yard reception on first down. But the fumble was correctly spotted at the New England 14-yard line.

The woman who says she represents North American Power is not telling the truth about the benefits of buying electricity from her company. "You can save up to 10, 15, 20 percent of your bill, depending on your usage," she says in a telemarketing call to my house. But the rate she eventually quotes is only about 7 percent less than the standard price offered by Baltimore Gas & Electric — something the average customer would have no way of knowing. And of course the percentage savings won't vary even if my "usage" goes up to that of a steel mill.

Hairstylist Reggie Dowdy has found himself time and time again doing emergency hair repair on women whose tresses have been damaged by weaves and extensions. They come in with bald spots, also known as alopecia, and thinning hair caused by heavy weaves pulling at their scalps. Sometimes their real hair is so unkempt underneath the weave that it becomes matted and breaks off if they try to comb it. Or they break out in rashes because of the glue some stylists use to apply weaves. Dowdy doesn't oppose weaves and extensions — the hair practice makes up 50 percent of the business at his salon, Geometrics Hair Studio in Canton.

Genovation Cars Inc., a Rockville-based company, wants to do what many in the auto industry have failed to do — build a fully electric, battery-powered vehicle that the public embraces. On Thursday, company executives were at the Glenn L. Martin Wind Tunnel on the University of Maryland, College Park campus to show off the aerodynamic properties of the G2, as the car is called, and talk up their project. Genovation has won a $135,000 product development grant from the Maryland Industrial Partnerships, a university program.

The most famous student of Ball So Hard University strutted in front of a throng of reporters Wednesday. And naturally, he wore a black Ball So Hard University T-shirt as he explained where his school spirit came from. "A lot of guys on this team attended Ball So Hard University, including myself," Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs said. "The dean of students and president of the school is actually Shawn Carter," better known as Jay-Z. Suggs created an internet sensation before Sunday night's 23-20 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers when he said his alma mater was “Ball So Hard University” as the Ravens defense was introduced in a NBC graphic.

A Towson priest has been removed from duty at the Church of the Immaculate Conception after being arrested last week on indecent exposure charges. According to a police report of the incident, Mark Stewart Bullock, 47, was at Bush River Books & Movies, an Abingdon adult store on the 3900 block of Pulaski Highway, the night of Jan. 16, when two deputies, investigating complaints of indecent exposure, discovered him nude from the waist down in...

At the new $1.1 billion Johns Hopkins Hospital there will be Xboxes and a basketball court for kids, sleeper-sofas for families, single rooms for all patients, an improved dining menu and extensive soundproofing. It's part of an effort to make the hospital experience more patient-focused, Hopkins officials said Thursday on the first tour given to the news media since construction began five years ago on the 1.6 million-square-foot building, which will replace aging facilities on the East Baltimore medical campus.

Joe Flacco and the Ravens won ugly on Thursday night, and it's not just because they relied on defense and ate up the clock with the run game to beat the San Francisco 49ers in the Harbaugh Bowl at M&T Bank Stadium. Flacco sported a sweet Fu Manchu mustache during the game, which got Ravens fans on the internet buzzing. Flacco, who completed 15 of his 23 pass attempts for 161 yards and a touchdown, explained to reporters after the game that he and mustachioed tight end Dennis Pitta are hoping their offensive teammates follow their lead.

One of the country's largest national prepaid cell phone carriers is making free phones and 64 minutes of monthly air time available to nearly 400,000 low-income Maryland residents under a new effort it brought to the state this week. TracFone Wireless Inc., which has 10 million customers nationwide for its prepaid cell phone plans, can offer the free service because it obtains a $10-per-customer subsidy through a federal program whose goal is to improve land-line and wireless phone access, a company spokesman said Wednesday.

The two-a-day practices were always fun because there was so much for an 8-year-old to do. There were cones to set up, tackling dummies to wrestle with, footballs to gather and water bottles to squirt. Young Chuck Pagano did it all for his father, spending hours under the Colorado sun. But some of the boy's best nights - and fondest memories - came when his father, a football lifer if there ever was one, returned home in the early evening, carrying a projector in one hand and game film in the other.

When Mike Lee heard that the Hollywood Casino Perryville was opening Monday morning, a few days ahead of schedule, he scratched his plans for golf and headed for the slot machines. The casino opened its doors to the public at 8 a.m. — beginning a new chapter in Maryland gambling — and Lee was the first of about 35 people in line. "I could have played golf in the rain. This seemed a little more entertaining," said the 59-year-old retiree from Havre de Grace. Within an hour, nearly 200 people had braved a steady rain to get a peek at the new casino, the first of the five planned in Maryland to open.