Alcohol

Baltimore City Councilman Nick J. Mosby (D-District 7) plans to introduce legislation Monday that would ban liquor store owners from selling non-alcoholic goods to people under 21. Mosby said the purpose of the legislation is to prevent teens in Baltimore from developing a habit of entering liquor stores to buy items. He said entering liquor stores is already "normalized" behavior for city youth, and banning the practice could create a demand for other stores to open in city neighborhoods.

I don't know about you, but this weather has made me want to drink. Hoping to will sunshine and cool breezes, I've been ordering every fruity, refreshing cocktail I can get my pasty, white hands on. I yearn for a summer tan, sun dresses, surf, sand, picnics in the park. Perfect timing, then, for Miss Shirley's to answer the call with their spiked take on a summer classic: the Strawberry Margarita Spritzer•. You may be familiar with the non-alcoholic version; it's Shirley's most popular drink.

The big spring training story of the past few days comes not from the Orioles' winter home in Sarasota, Fla., but from down the road in Fort Myers, where news that the Boston Red Soxhave banned beer in the clubhouse seems to have everyone in a tizzy. Pundits are pontificating about it, new manager Bobby Valentine is explaining it and the Red Sox players have been asked about it endlessly. (A personal favorite quote from veteran slugger David Ortiz: "We're not here to drink.

After reading all the coverage of George Huguely's murder trial, I feel compelled to write. All the focus on this horrible event has shown just how ignorant society is about alcoholism and its effects on the drinker and the family and friends who surround that person. Alcoholism is a disease. Expecting a parent or worse yet a group of 20-somethings to handle another person's alcoholism is like expecting them to provide a cure for a friend with cancer. It can't be done. Jean Marbella wrote on Sunday that "Huguely wasn't drinking in a celebratory fashion.

For some of us, the pain of the dual tragedies of Yeardley Love and George Huguely is intensified by the fact that both children are so familiar to us. Raise your hand if you have spent any part of your child's life caught in the lacrosse whirlwind that sweeps through Maryland each spring. And summer. And fall ball. And the winter indoor league. It is something that ordinary civilians might not comprehend (though ballet parents or horse show parents might sympathize). Lacrosse can be a toxic mix of parental ambition and peer pressure.

Michael Thomas Truluck, 13, texted his family that he needed a ride home shortly before 6 p.m. Saturday. His mother said she saw nothing unusual in the request and sent her fiance to pick up Michael and two other boys, who had spent the afternoon together. "I knew he was hanging out with a bunch of friends, and there was nothing unusual about that," Kristina Keys said. "He texted and asked for a ride home. We picked him and two friends up. " Keys said she had no idea that his Saturday afternoon, which usually included lunch at a fast-food restaurant and hoops at Double Rock Park in Parkville, involved drinking an alcohol-laced energy drink, which an unidentified adult purchased for the pre-teens.

There's little question that George Huguely V, the former University of Virginia student on trial for murder, had a problem with alcohol. He had been arrested twice for drinking-related infractions, one of them violent, in his early 20s. And he admits to consuming at least 15 drinks - and likely had more, witnesses said - the day he confronted Yeardley Love at her off-campus apartment in 2010, assaulting her so severely she later died, according...

There are may lessons to be learned from the case of George Huguely and Yeardley Love ("Teammates saw signs of trouble, but failed to act," Feb. 10). Among them is that alcoholism and aggression are real issues that need to be addressed. We all know that alcohol changes the brain, causing some to react in violent ways. For those with prior anger issues, the violence likely intensifies with the addition of alcohol and other substances. Mr. Huguely had consumed 15 drinks on the day of the incident, and other testimony suggests he suffered from anger issues.

George Huguely V was getting drunk four nights a week in his final month of college, and his lacrosse teammates at the University of Virginia were considering some kind of intervention at the close of the 2010 season, a friend testified Thursday in Charlottesville Circuit Court. But the intervention never happened. Huguely was arrested on murder charges May 3 that year, more than three weeks before the Cavaliers would play their final game in the NCAA semifinals. He is accused of beating to death Cockeysville native Yeardley Love, his on-and-off girlfriend of two years, in a drunken fury.

100 Years Ago Lime Green An advertisement in the Times: "Stone lime, oyster shell lime, hydrated lime, ground lime, ground lime stone, rail or water shipments: Robert S. Green, 853 Frederick Ave. Baltimore, Md. " Another ad: "THE NEAL SANATORIUM treats alcoholic cases and drug habitués with better results and in less time than any other institution in existence. For proof and information call The Neal Institute Oakland Ave and York Road 206 Courtland St. Telephone, Tuxedo or St. Paul 2564, Baltimore, MD. " 75 Years Ago Thrown throne In the Times national news section: "Americans in England: Renewed excitement has been aroused in the British isles by the discovery that yet another member of the royal family - this time it's the young duke of Kent - not only shows a regrettable tendency to enjoy himself as any normal natural, healthy youngster might, but, what is even more distressing, has lately been seen in the company of an American woman.