Gorilla

BALTIMORE'S CHAPTER of the National Organization for Women has wrapped up its efforts to get WOCT-FM to remove those offensive "What A Pair" billboards of enormous female breasts. Lynn Buck, chapter president, says the billboards finally are being removed.The billboards started appearing around Baltimore in September to promote a syndicated morning drive-time show hosted by two men and aimed at male listeners.One billboard, located across from an elementary school playground in Baltimore, got the White-Out treatment after the school's principal complained.

Quote: "I would say this takes the monkey off our backs, but it felt more like a gorilla." -- Tampa Bay's Paul Sorrento after the Devil Rays' ended their 11-game losing streak with a 5-4 victory over Boston on Tuesday.It's a fact: The Yankees had their second three-homer inning of the year last night.Who's hot: The White Sox's Albert Belle is 19-for-36 (.530) with nine homers in his past nine games.Who's not: The Indians' Dave Justice is in a 1-for-16 slump.On deck: Yankees starter David Cone (13-2)

"WE ARE BULKING up to become an 800-pound gorilla.'' Candidate Patrick L. McDonough, quoted by William F. Zorzi Jr., Oct. 3, 1995.''. . . the 800-pound gorilla of the fast-food world -- McDonald's.'' News item, Oct. 9, 1995.''. . . the predictable backlash that any 800-pound gorilla can expect to draw,'' referring to computer magnate Bill Gates. Jean Marbella, Nov. 30, 1995.''The major meat packers -- those 800-pound gorillas.'' Peter A. Jay column, Dec. 3, 1995.''. . . the 800-pound gorilla known as the middle class.

Giant Food Inc., living up to its name, remains the area's 800-pound gorilla -- the largest supermarket chain in the Baltimore area -- vastly overshadowing its competition, according to an annual survey released yesterday by Food World, a Columbia-based regional trade publication.With 42 area stores, Giant has more than 28.58 percent of the Baltimore market with more than $1 billion in annual sales, a slight drop over its share last year but nearly 20 percentage points ahead of its closest competitor, Metro/Basics, which controls 9.61 percent of the pie."

Bart Walter is best known in Maryland for the bronze otters playing in the fountain at the Baltimore Zoo's front gate.The Pleasant Valley sculptor, who specializes in animals, is likely to attract renewed attention in the state with his newest work: a life-size gorilla that will be dedicated tomorrow at Salisbury State University.The gorilla, based on the main character in Daniel Quinn's novel "Ismael," was commissioned by the university because a popular honors class centers on the book, in which the author uses a gorilla as a literary device to comment on mankind.

EASTON -- Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, they say. What is appealing to one viewer of art may be ho-hum to another. When I saw the bronze gorilla at Bart Walter's display in the sculpture exhibit at the Waterfowl Festival, it was love at first glance. Now I know what they mean by a Sicilian courtship. Boom! A lightning bolt of passion and consuming desire. I had to have it.The price tag put it in the same category as a new, moderate-range automobile. To put things in reasonable context, drive a 1975 car, so it's not extravagant to think about trading up to a newer model.

Remember the famous photo of a gorilla gently cradling a kitten?The nurturer was Koko, a mountain gorilla who has learned to communicate using 500 gestures in American Sign Language and who comprehends 300 more. Koko had asked for the kitten as a birthday present.Mitzi Phillips of the Gorilla Foundation of Woodside, Calif., a sign language instructor and a friend of Koko, will present a lecture on interspecies communication with gorillas at 8 p.m. April 7 at Annapolis High School.The lecture is one of two scheduled this spring to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals of Anne Arundel County.

Is "Goodnight Moon" making you loony? Does the phrase, "And a comb and a brush and a bowl full of mush," run 'round your brain like some Lite Mixed Variety tune piped into the dentist's office?Maybe it's time to experiment with some new bedtime fare. Oh, don't desert the great green room of Margaret Wise Brown's classic. Just supplement "Goodnight Moon" with some other books that have a going-to-bed theme. Here are a few of the newer ones:* My favorite is "Good Night, Gorilla," by Peggy Rathman (G. P. Putnam's Sons, $12.95, 36 pages, ages 1-4)

It's been a long time, 12 years, to be exact, since we regularly watched that American Tourister gorilla show us just how hard he could hurl our luggage around. The advertising campaign, which was introduced in 1970 and ran till the early '80s, was a Clio Award winner in 1981 and is in the Clio Hall of Fame."The gorilla advertising has always had terrific recognition among consumers," says Frank Steed, American Tourister president.So it's no surprise that, like so many things these days, it's being resurrected, but with a twist.

When Wild Man Joe O'Connell went looking for a fight, nobody was safe, including Joe himself. You could look it up. Pro boxers, street fighters, carnival brawlers, he took 'em all on. Plus, not to be overlooked, a gorilla and a kangaroo who should have known better.For the record, Joe says the gorilla and the kangaroo were the roughest fights he had. But that's just his word. Nobody's asked the gorilla or the kangaroo their side of it."I just liked to fight," Joe was explaining yesterday.

A commotion occurred about noon yesterday at the Great Ape House at the National Zoo. A collective shriek arose. A stroller jam ensued. Cameras clicked and whirred. Mandara, one of the female gorillas, had just appeared, cradling the zoo's latest addition. Mandara, 26, had given birth to an infant, sex and name undetermined, about 1:45 p.m. Saturday, without fanfare or any evident histrionics on the other side of a large plate glass window in full view of staff employees and a few lucky onlookers.

An 18-year-old alleged gang member who police said killed two men because one was wearing red, the signature color of a rival gang, pleaded guilty yesterday to two counts of first-degree murder. Eric Tate's plea arrangement, worked out by his attorney and the prosecutor and approved by Baltimore Circuit Judge Allen L. Schwait, means that Tate will spend no more than 50 years in prison for his crimes. Tate, who was to stand trial next week, admitted using a 12-gauge shotgun to kill Anthony Taylor Jr., 20, an alleged Bloods member, and Taylor's friend, Adrian Holiday, 19, a community college student who was not in a gang, in September in Baltimore's Barclay neighborhood.

Next week should make monkeys out of movie lovers everywhere. On Tuesday, Peter Jackson's passionate, utterly satisfying remake of King Kong gets released on DVD - cause for celebration all by itself. On that same day, however, a scaled-down DVD of the classic original King Kong will also be released. Although this edition lacks the many extras included on the film's original DVD release back in November, it's priced at $14.95, meaning it'll be available for under $10 at many retailers - perfect for budget-conscious cinephiles everywhere.

NEW YORK -- In computer-generated bodies not his own, Andy Serkis has starred in two of the most humongously budgeted films of the decade. Serkis, who stands 5 feet 8 inches, plays Kong in Peter Jackson's King Kong. As he did for the "precious"-hungry Gollum in Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy, Serkis' human performance has again been transformed by computer graphics into a fantastical creature. As with Gollum/Smeagol, the actor's every movement was meticulously captured and enlarged into the computer-generated image that is the hulking Kong.

Home Tip--Tough Tape--Need something hardier than duct tape? Gorilla Glue's Gorilla Tape is thicker and sticks to most surfaces. $9.99 for 35 yards.

PHILADELPHIA - At first glance, it looked like a Sesame Street skit on steroids. In Center City yesterday, almost out of nowhere, a furry, 6-foot-5 dog in a black hockey sweater jumped out of a Ride the Ducks boat car, and started dancing to "Let's Get it Started" by the Black Eyed Peas. But he wasn't alone. Seconds later, a 7-foot moose in a white baseball uniform joined in, and before you could blink, a leprechaun, a giant owl and a lion wearing a basketball jersey had followed suit.

With Chesapeake Bay winds snapping at his suit jacket, Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin stood at the edge of the Annapolis harbor yesterday as some of his longtime colleagues pledged to assist his run for U.S. Senate. There was state Del. Pauline H. Menes, a Prince George's County Democrat who entered the General Assembly on the same day as Cardin in 1967. There was Democratic Sen. Philip C. Jimeno of Anne Arundel County, who said the first vote he cast as a lawmaker in 1979 was to elevate Cardin to the speaker's podium.

THE BALTIMORE ZOO reopens today. That is good. No city in the union can call itself genuine without a zoo of its own. Never mind that it'll be called the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore because the state had to bail us out. Why is that, by the way? If the Baltimore Zoo has to be called the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore because the state gave up some money to save it, why isn't the Rocky Gap Lodge and Resort called the Maryland Lodge and Resort at Rocky Gap? Never mind. This isn't about the name.

Ellicott City was nestled under a layer of snow before dawn Saturday and light flakes fell from a gray sky while Dawn Coolahan hurried to prop a wooden gorilla in front of a house on Dogwood Drive. Coolahan hustled back to her van for smaller "Happy Birthday" signs and bunches of yellow bananas cut out of wood. The metal spikes on the signs would not pierce the frozen ground, so - glancing occasionally over her shoulder at the dark house - she tucked them in the bushes and leaned them against flowerbeds.

He said it "We stand in their way of winning a championship. And they stand in our way of winning another one." Derek Jeter, Yankees shortstop, on the American League Championship Series against the Mariners. He said it "Someone might say, `Is this a monkey off your back?' This is more like a gorilla - King Kong." Randy Johnson, Diamondbacks pitcher, on ending his seven-game postseason losing streak.