Creep

OXFORD, ENGLAND -- It's funny how sometimes a single will seem to take on a life of its own.When Radiohead's "Creep" first crept onto the airwaves back in 1993, it took radio listeners completely by surprise. It wasn't just the dry, self-deprecating chorus ("I'm a creep, I'm a loser . . .") that did it; it was also the blast of overdriven guitar that went with each self-flagellating admission. In no time at all, this British quintet began to be known as the "Creep" band.That was fine at the time, but over the years, things have gotten a little, well, creepy.

For the second consecutive year, transportation crews got their winter tune-up before Halloween, battling blinding rain and high winds as well as slick roads and blizzard conditions. At the height of the storm overnight, 132 state roads were closed and 111 signals were dark, according to the State Highway Administration. As snow piled up at more than an inch an hour in Western Maryland, a 50-mile stretch of Interstate 68 was closed as trucks with snowblower attachments and a "towplow," a double-wide snowplow, cleared the way. At the other end of the state, powerful floodwaters tore apart a 72-inch culvert under Old Ocean City Road and opened a huge sinkhole In all 1,200 SHA workers were on duty from Deep Creek Lake to Ocean City . "The challenge was the intensity and diversity of the storm," said Melinda Peters, SHA administrator.

Battling Turf Valley `development creep' Running roughshod over the public welfare seems to be the modus operandi of the Mangione family as they try to expand the development of Turf Valley and operate the Turf Valley Resort. Their approach to the proposed development has been deceptive, doling out incremental phases that fly under the radar of government oversight agencies as part of their master plan for "development creep." This cavalier attitude extends to the way the nearby Turf Valley Resort ignores community standards.

If a politician rose in the well of Congress to urge his colleagues to take action to repel the recent Martian attack, he'd be laughed out of office and strongly encouraged to get his head examined. Pondering solutions to imaginary problems is public policy insanity. So I ask: Given that the threat of socialism swallowing America is as imaginary as a Martian invasion, why aren't politicians and television pundits who warn that something must be done to reverse redistributive welfare in the United States also treated with dismissive ridicule?

The allegation is that the Big Creep carried on with a young woman. No prosecutor, Republican, conservative, talk show host or member of Congress would ever do that.American teen-agers rank below Europeans in math and science but have more fun.Now that the Iraq crisis is defused, Trent Lott & Co. are talking how tough they are.Henny Youngman finally ran out of one-liners.Pub Date: 2/27/98

T oday is Jan. 1, 2763, on the old Julian calendar . The years were originally counted from the founding of the city of Rome. The system was seriously flawed, however, and slowly got out of sync with the seasons. So it was replaced, beginning in 1582, with the Gregorian calendar we use today. Its leap-year rules were devised to solve the calendar creep problem. The Julian system, meanwhile, continues to fall behind. Jan. 1 (Julian) will slip to Jan. 15 (Gregorian) in 2101.

In the past, I've written unkind words about tiny dogs. I thoughtlessly said that all they're good for is being tied to long sticks to wash windows or being sprayed with Endust and shoved under beds to collect lint.But now I must apologize, and never again will I say such things.Not after hearing of the bold and amazing feat of a little Chihuahua named Rocky.Rocky lives with his owners in Key Largo, Fla., which is where he recently gained fame and admiration.It happened when he took a stroll around the neighborhood.

(with apologies to W.S. Gilbert)* When you're ready to breakAll the markets that makeExchange rates that roll on foreverI propose you should useAll the yen you can loseTo finance your risky endeavor;Wait till London's asleep,To your terminal creepMaking trades so quick and so daringNo one ever will knowWhat they reap you will sowBut please don't bankrupt poor Baring!Derivatives high,Let the futures fall by,By the time they wake up it's overYou'll be off to TibetWhere the market's not yetDiscovered something richer than clover;Meanwhile back on Threadneedle,The governors wheedle,They'd like a return on their cash, please;The Prince is a pauper,He can't buy a topperAnd the palace is in for a rash squeeze;And just when you're sureThat your money's secure,There's that nasty old man from the Fed;just like to knowWhere the dollars should goWhen Washington gets out of the red.

&TC Work week creep: Steelcase Inc., the office furniture maker, surveyed more than 1,000 people and found that 73 percent of those employed in an office of 100 people or more work on the weekend, either at home or in the office. Many put in a substantial time investment -- 60 percent said they do it once a month or more, and 42 percent said they work 6 to 10 hours on a weekend. Not surprisingly, nearly half the respondents said they are working more hours than they did five years ago.Virtual schlepping: The days of lugging reams of paper and piles of reference materials when visiting clients are disappearing, according to Ernst & Young, the accounting and consulting firm.

I have been hearing voices. Sometimes they call out to me in the middle of the night. Mostly they bellow in the morning. They are familiar voices; they come from my pocket-size portable radio. Yet they startle me. The voices boom like intruders with perfect pitch, even though I have not turned the device on. Moreover, no matter how many buttons I push, I have great difficulty silencing the clamor. On a personal level, these radio eruptions are yet another instance of a guy struggling with a new gizmo.

The home Azam Khan sold on Fairbank Road in Northwest Baltimore last month strikes the real estate agent as a prime example of market shift. It changed hands for about $25,000 more than each of the similar Cape Cods that sold on the street last year - and it's smaller to boot. In a growing number of Baltimore-area neighborhoods, home prices have stopped their years-long march downward. Some areas have stabilized. Some actually are heading up. "The traditionally stronger neighborhoods are definitely on the rise," said Khan, who represented the seller of the three-bedroom, $312,000 home on Fairbank Road in Mount Washington.

The Sun's weather page in print and online don't show it quite yet, but spring allergy season has begun. Moderate mold levels have been reported for the past week. Low levels of cedar, maple and elm tree pollen are present and beginning to creep up. Tree pollen typically peaks in mid-April and lasts through early August. Grass pollen doesn't begin until late May. The fact that many flowering trees are already blooming around the region is probably not a good sign for allergy sufferers.

Grandmothers being groped in airport security may make headlines, but many people take invasive tactics for granted as a tradeoff for safety. They shouldn't. We are increasingly living in a police state whose scope and technological complexity is redefining the meaning of Big Brother, while systematically violating Americans' right to due process under the law. Take the report last week in The Los Angeles Times on the widespread use of drones by local law enforcement agencies around the country.

The Columbia Association's decision to hold women-only swim times is yet another example of a disturbing trend in this country which forces us all, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, into Sharia compliance. Like the kudzu weed, which now covers over 7 million acres of the American Southeast, the threat of "creeping Sharia" will adversely and unalterably change the social, cultural and political landscape of this country forever. Jesse Newburn, a spokeswoman with the Columbia Association, proudly proclaims that the "CA was founded on inclusion.

The Columbia Association's decision to hold women-only swim times is yet another example of a disturbing trend in this country which forces us all, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, into Sharia compliance. Like the Kudzu weed, which now covers over 7 million acres of the American Southeast, the threat of "creeping Sharia" will adversely and unalterably change the social, cultural and political landscape of this country forever. Jesse Newbum, a spokeswoman with the Columbia Association said "CA was founded on inclusion.

How are Americans to reconcile the Barack Obama who says Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi must go with the one who drags his heels on providing the military means to achieve his departure? The president's schizophrenia on the Libya crisis has been revealed again by his decision, under pressure from his British and French allies, to start deploying unmanned drone aircraft in the North African civil war, under the guise of merely providing additional civilian protection. The decision may technically adhere to President Obama's pledge that he will put no "boots on the ground" in Libya, meaning no uniformed American combat troops fighting side by side with the rebels.

THE OTHER night CBS cut Frank Sinatra off for a commercial. Sic transit gloria. I wept when I heard the news.In the old days Frank Sinatra would have cut off CBS. Frank was where the power was at. "Chairman of the Board," we called him. Can-do guys and, more importantly, will-do guys clustered around him, moth-to-the-flame style.If Frank said, "Cut off CBS," it was "So long, CBS" until Bill Paley came over to Frank's and stood on his knees in the snow begging his pardon, kissing Frank's hand, offering to cut off as many commercials as Frank wanted cut off.I'm talking not just old days, I'm talking good old days.

Arundel Mills would be a boon to the countyI was shocked and amazed to read the article by Jackie Powder "Residents try to stop mega-mall" (June 27) concerning the proposed Arundel Mills mall project.Instead of hurting Anne Arundel County, the Arundel Mills mall will bring hundreds of jobs to the area, bring added revenue to the county and provide a much-needed shopping area for people such as myself who have to travel 10 minutes just to go to the grocery store.For example, Franklin Mills mall, just outside of Philadelphia, has now become a major tourist attraction for tour buses leaving New York.

My fingers and toes are crossed in the hope that President Obama will be able to withdraw the main U.S. forces from the current no-fly zone over Libya, and on cue. The U.S. military is not exactly famed for subtlety and delicacy of touch in its operations, and mission creep hangs over this latest chapter of foreign intervention as the generals and politicians wrestle for control. Handing over the shebang to the countries north and east of the Mediterranean Sea seems the wiser course Of the loose conglomeration of countries signing on to patrol the no-fly operation, Britain needs to continue dabbling its fingers in the Libyan oil wells, French President Nicolas Sarkozy to work off the latest round of personal insults from the Gadhafi family and the need of both France and Italy to close the Libyan conduit of northward moving, illegal, migrants to the underbelly of Europe.

A report in The Wall Street Journal raised troubling questions about the recent decision of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a 16-member panel of independent medical experts, to cancel a meeting that had been set for around Election Day. One of the important items on the agenda was to have been a vote on the utility of prostate cancer screening. The most recent recommendations, from 2008, state that prostate screening should not be conducted for men older than 75. For younger men, the evidence around the preferred screening test (the prostate specific antigen, or PSA, blood test)