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Who's hot The Astros have given up three runs over their past 27 innings. Who's not Kazuhisa Ishii of the Dodgers is 2-6 with a 4.96 ERA in his nine starts since he was 10-1 on June 8. Line of the day Geoff Blum, Astros 3B AB ....... R ...... H ..... RBI ..... HR 6 .......... 3 ....... 4 ....... 5 ........ 1 On deck Randy Johnson of the Diamondbacks goes for his 15th victory tonight, facing the Expos. He said it "I haven't stopped smiling. I just made up a lot of ground overnight - from last place to first place.

Although the Alex. Brown & Sons name has officially disappeared from the Baltimore scene, such legacies as the locally based ABS Capital Partners venture capital group should help guarantee the once-venerable investment bank is never forgotten. Started in 1990 within Alex. Brown, ABS Capital became a separate company in November 1995. The firm has made a mark by investing in good companies, generating double-digit returns for investors and making sure its venture companies are on solid footing when they are sent on their way, ABS officials and its partners say. "If you invest in great companies, and help them become even greater companies, they will continue to do well over a long period of time," said Timothy T. Weglicki, who co-founded the firm with Donald B. Hebb Jr. (ABS Capital Partners, at 400 E. Pratt St., shouldn't be confused with ABS Ventures, a group still associated with Deutsche Bank, the owner of what was once Alex.

HAGERSTOWN - AB Volvo's decision this week to assemble its next-generation diesel truck engines at its Mack Truck Inc. plant here gives new life to a large factory that has been a vital part of the region's economy for four decades. "This means that we will be building engines here well beyond 2010," said Roger W. Johnston, vice president and general manager of the Mack plant, Washington County's sixth-largest employer. Had the plant - which last year assembled 30,000 truck engines and nearly 6,000 transmissions and is large enough to house three football fields - not gotten the work, Johnston said, "this location would have been phased out over time.

In a new episode of Absolutely Fabulous, Edina Monsoon (Jennifer Saunders) is sitting with her daughter in a trendy restaurant when she spots a large Buddha statue across the room. "Better not let the Taliban know it's here," she says to Saffy, played by Julia Sawalha. Then she wonders, "Darling, if you have a fatwah on you, does it make you fat?" The smash British comedy, which starts a new six-episode season tonight on Comedy Central, seems more relevant than ever. The restaurant episode was reportedly filmed around the same time the Taliban, in its war on "false idols," destroyed two giant Buddhas in Bamiyan, Afghanistan, last March.