Cool

Greg Cantori plans to downsize when he retires. Really, really downsize. His retirement home is 238 square feet — one-tenth the size of the average new American house — and sits in his Anne Arundel County yard. He and wife Renee can hitch it to a truck and take it with them wherever they go. "It's so cheap — that's what's so cool about this," said Cantori, 52, who envisions a surf-and-turf future, alternating between the house and a sailboat. "We bought the house for $19,000.

April was a chilly month across the U.S., but it was still a 338th-straight month of global temperatures averaging above the 20th century mean, according to U.S. climate statistics. The monthly global average temperature was nearly 1 degree above normal, the 13th-warmest April on record, according to the National Climatic Data Center's monthly state of the climate report . In the U.S., temperatures averaged 1.4 degrees below normal, the 23rd coolest April on record. Some anomalies from around the world the report notes: A new record was set in Austria for the time span between the end of winter (the last full day of sub-freezing temperatures)

HC

I am going to have to apologize because I do not have a setlist and I don't really know the names of the songs but does that matter? ZZ Top is the longest running rock 'n' roll band with its original lineup in history and they certainly wouldn't fault me or you or anyone for not knowing what their songs were titled. I feel that I could guarantee that if you cornered guitarist Billy Gibbons and asked him very specific questions about very specific songs he would be bored out of his beard and possibly, politely, move on to another conversation.

WASHINGTON -- Republicans may control the White House and Congress. They may be right or wrong about tax cuts and preemptive military strikes. They may be moral or self-righteous or bumptious or bold. One thing Republicans are not: cool. This is why the GOP, for now, is headed toward victory in November. Beyond the obvious -- all the retiring Southern Democratic senators, the Republicans' money edge and the new prescription drug Medicare benefit -- coolness has much to do with it. Unlike Democrats -- who are as cool as anyone gets in Washington, a town not known for hepcats -- Republicans have cornered the market on uncoolness.

Kiln-formed glass, a fairly new and uncommon fine art form to the city, is the subject of Resurgam Gallery's exhibit Hot Kilns, Cool Glass: Contemporary Glass Sculpture in Baltimore. Artists Frances Aubrey and Elizabeth O'Hara assembled glass pieces, then melted and cooled them in a computer-controlled kiln. O'Hara also used other ingredients such as clay in her works, Aubrey said. Kiln-formed glass emerged as a type of fine art about 25 years ago, Aubrey said. "It's such a new medium we haven't exhausted all the possibilities yet," she said.

Now and then, the words nifty or groovy may drop into a conversation, instantly identifying the speaker as an old fogy or, worse, an old hippie. But the word cool doesn't do that. Cool is constant. As a modifier, as the modified, as a noun and as a verb, cool has withstood the fleeting nature of most slang. What is the reason for cool's longevity? That's an easy question for Keith Covington, owner of the New Haven Lounge in North Baltimore and jazz expert. As long as Miles Davis' classic 1949 work, Birth of the Cool, remains the best-selling jazz album of all time, cool will stay cool, he says.

WHEN DID ''cool'' come to mean ''fitting in''?Christmas being one of the holiest days on the Christian calendar, my youngest boys plan to rise early that morning, steal downstairs in the coolness of pre-dawn, kneel reverently before the tree and pray that when they open their eyes, they'll see Old Navy shirts and Air Jordan athletic shoes. These are priority items on their annual gimme lists.I used to think it was just all-American greed. Actually, I still do. But I've also come to realize that what motivates my boys is more complicated than avarice.

I EXPERIENCED a rare moment of righteousness this week. It happened when I switched on the air conditioner. As I stood in front of one of the air-conditioning vents, I was shivering, but smug. For the first time in my home-owning career, I had done what I was supposed to do on the air-conditioning front -- test the system in the spring, before the weather turned hot and sticky. All the tomes on how to be a good homeowner tell you this. They point out that there are two good reasons to test your air conditioner in cool weather.

Think you're way cool?Take a number. According to Entertainment Weekly's current "What is Cool" issue, you're behind David Letterman (there's news); a dead man (cult film director Ed Wood); the assembly-required furniture at Ikea and "Today" anchor Katie Couric (doesn't she belong in the "So uncool, they're cool" column?).The June 25 issue of the weekly magazine identifies cool people, places and things that have "the power to swing the thermostat of popular culture."Yes, but what is cool?

Ever since their season ended, former Towson quarterback Grant Enders and wide receiver Gerrard Sheppard have been honing their timing with a regular series of throwing sessions. Now, the undrafted free agent rookies are eager to put that rapport to work at the Ravens' three-day rookie minicamp that starts today at team headquarters. Sheppard agreed to terms on a three-year contract, while Enders is attending the minicamp on a tryout. Both had hoped to hear from the Super Bowl champions ever since taking part in the Ravens' local prospects day in March.

As many times as I have stood on the MARC station platform in West Baltimore, I never considered there was a fantastic, Jules Verne-like interior just across Franklin Street. I assumed the fire-damaged brick building alongside the rail tracks was just another derelict structure. After a visit there this week, I learned that one of Baltimore's fascinating industrial archaeological sites endures in the Midtown Edmondson neighborhood. The story of this dusty old West Baltimore ice-making and storage plant has been making the rounds of planners and architects.

Thunderstorms and rain showers are expected to usher in cooler temperatures to the Baltimore area Friday, with highs in the mid-70s, according to the National Weather Service. Showers were likely to start early Friday morning, with a chance of storms through the early afternoon. A so-called "back-door" front, moving in from the east, was expected to cool overnight lows down to the upper 40s and lower 50s. The cold front could bring breezy winds of 10-20 mph. Beyond the front, through the weekend, more seasonable temperatures are forecast.

NEW YORK - Adam Jones called it a routine play. The Orioles center fielder wouldn't blame it on the cold or the wind or the rain. Regardless of the conditions, he said it was a play he's made before countless times. “Just missed it,” Jones said. “Trust me, wish I could do it again, but hey, I missed it.” Jones' drop of a seventh-inning fly ball to deep center was a costly three-run error in the Orioles' 5-2 loss to the New York Yankees before an announced 35,033 Friday night.

Willow manages to be a lot of things all at once. The Fells Point restaurant, opened in July by the team behind RYE and Stuggy's, shares its name with the graceful weeping willow tree. With gray walls, hanging lanterns and gauzy curtains, Willow's interior is in sync with the moody look of its namesake. The space - like the staff - is casual but stylish. Willow's menu, on the other hand, is full of fresh takes on Tex-Mex and bar-friendly pizzas and burgers. Flavors occasionally veer into sophisticated territory, but overall, the food is straightforward, fun and approachable.

This was one of those "bridge" episodes. Nothing really happened, but it set up a bunch of stuff. Listen people: it's not my favorite thing either, but it's a thing. So I don't need to give a spoiler alert here, because there isn't really anything to spoil. But I'll say that these things happened: Carl tells Rick that he shouldn't be the leader no more, and Rick is like ORLY? Merle tells Hershel that the Governor is chaotic evil and so aggro. Milton (I could have SWORN his name was Donovan...)

THE hottest topic in retailing is Hot Topic, a mall chain where you can buy $43 high-heel platform go-go boots, $6 cat-themed lingerie thongs and $17 Insane Clown Posse T-shirts. Hot Topic and its pubescent customers are ignorant of the recession. The company has booked sales and profit increases every quarter since the summer of 1999. Each square foot of the average Hot Topic store produced about $690 in sales last year, an achievement that blows away even the numbers posted by the Gap in its 1999 heyday.

This year, the corn really is as high as an elephant's eye. And that's not the only happy news at the close of this rare Maryland summer of rain and blessedly cool nights. While farmers look forward to what could be a record corn harvest, and a near-record soy bean harvest this fall, Marylanders can anticipate an especially colorful autumn foliage season, thanks to the cool, moist summer weather. And everyone who uses electricity to cool their home or business has also reaped a bonus this summer.

The Baltimore region will stay cool and windy through Thursday, with sunny and mostly clear skies through the evening, according to the National Weather Service. Temperatures will reach the upper-30s, with northwest winds between 15 and 20 mph and gusts of up to 35 mph, the weather service said. It will become mostly cloudly in the region tonight, with lows in the mid-20s. On Friday afternoon, snow and sleet are likely in the region, but no accumulation is expected, with temperatures reaching the upper-30s, the weather service said.

UMBC guard Brian Neller hit a 28-footer at the final buzzer, but the visiting Retrievers trailed the entire overtime period and lost to New Hampshire, 92-86, in men's basketball Wednesday. Neller hit five 3-pointers, scored 19 points and moved into third place on UMBC's all-time 3-pointer list with 241. Joey Getz scored a career-high 22 points to lead the Retrievers (6-19, 4-8 America East). Senior guard Ryan Cook (St. Vincent Pallotti) added 15 points. The Wildcats (7-16, 3-8)