Grinch

"My favorite Dr. Seuss book is 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas.' I like that book because I think the Grinch learned a lesson as well as us children did. Also the Grinch has a different image on things."-- Danyelle BarnesHavre de Grace Elementary" 'Henry and Mudge' stories by Cynthia Rylant are my favorite because Mudge is a funny dog. He always drools on people and jumps up on them."-- Cara FlannellySt. Margaret School"My favorite book is 'The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood' by Howard Pyle.

"My favorite book is 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas' by Dr. Seuss. This book is stupendous! In the story,the Grinch is tired of Christmas. Then the Grinch gets an idea! He tries to stop Christmas from coming. He does not succeed. I like this book because it shows how heartless people can be."- Miya Danielle Carroll,Church Lane Elementary"My favorite book is 'Goosebumps: Beware the Snowman,' by R.L. Stine. It is about an evil Snowman. I like the story because I like scary stories and I like building a snowman.

With "Seinfeld" in reruns, how about giving "Murder One" a try tonight? It's a crime the network honchos schedule these two shows opposite each other, but tonight, the choice should be clear."

It's virtually Christmas.Everyone is shopping for gifts, trimming the tree, sending cards and writing to Santa. But why leave home, when you can celebrate right there at your computer terminal, using an Internet connection and the World Wide Web?Come along on a cyber-holiday tour. First, there's the tree.If you want to go totally digital, head for the North Pole. You can select from four different trees and numerous ornaments. We'd suggest the Bill Gates tree -- billed as appearing "much more impressive than it really is" -- trimmed with the First Cat ornament, which features Socks, the White House cat.Then there are the cards.

Bill says "tax cuts," when he means loopholes.First we privatize air controllers. Then maybe bank regulators?Jimmy Carter thinks poor Radovan Karadzic is merely misunderstood, which is what many folk said about Hitler.Speaker Grinch is going to cut reindeer from the budget.

Washington -- With the holiday gift-giving season in full swing, here's an innovative way to raise cash -- $500, $1,000 or more with virtually no effort -- to help you defray some of the season's expenses.And get this: The source of this ready cash is none other than the biggest Grinch of all -- the Internal Revenue Service. All you have to do is fit this description:L * You bought a home between Dec. 31, 1990, and Jan. 1, 1994.* You financed it with a mortgage or deed of trust that included "points."

'Tis the season to say 'tis the season.If you pick up any newspaper at this time of year (including this one), the proliferation of holiday puns, plays on favorite Christmas carols and seasonal literary allusions can make you woozier than spiked eggnog. We're in an absolute tizzy. No, make that a 'tis-y. And a 'twas-y, too, as in " 'Twas the night before Christmas . . ."Everybody does it. Using a computer data base, The Sun searched the 49 largest newspapers in the country for the December usage of the following phrases over the last five years: "The Grinch who stole . . ."

The two big trends this season are characters in comas ("Beverly Hills 90210," "The X-Files," etc.), and skaters on ice. After two live prime-time specials on CBS comes tonight's two-hour live special on NBC. They're competing for $1 million in cash. CBS is also offersing cash -- Johnny and June Carter Cash, that is, as guests on "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman."* "The Gold Championship." (8-10 p.m., WMAR, Channel 2) -- The good news about this competition is that it's between only those skaters who already have won Olympic gold medals -- which means no Nancy Kerrigan, no Tonya Harding, no distractions.

It's growing dark, and a cold May nor'wester riles the gray Tred Avon as the last ferry leaves Oxford for the less tony environs of the river's far bank.On the crossing, I squint at scribbled directions to Oysterback, the town with "characters we haven't even used yet." Its annual Mosquito Festival is an international beacon to aficionados of Culex pipiens. Oysterback is a fiction, of course. It exists nowhere -- also somewhere every day, on Maryland's Eastern Shore. Mostly it exists in the fertile brain of Helen Chappell -- "last house on the right, past the general store, the one with peeling paint," she said.

The baseball owners are giving the fans a cap for Christmas. Isn't that thoughtful?Just what you always wanted under your tree: a unilaterally imposed salary cap that throws baseball into utter chaos.What a pleasant little item to hand the baseball public two days before Christmas.Call him Bud Selig, Commissioner Grinch.We could be appalled by the timing if the owners hadn't already shown that they have no conscience. But once you've killed the World Series, raining on Christmas is no biggie.

It's a well-established axiom that theater critics have hearts that are three sizes too small. How else could we skewer productions that folks in the audience - including the 5-year-old sitting on my lap - wholeheartedly enjoy? Such is the quandary facing this reviewer of the first national tour of D r. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas, which launched Thursday at the Hippodrome Theatre. Aspects of this holiday production that faithfully re-create the beloved children's book and television program - the scenery, costumes and special effects - as well as Stefan Karl's performance as the Grinch, are superb.

How do you pack up a Broadway musical and take it on the road? You get a really, really big suitcase. The first national tour of Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas! officially opens tonight at the Hippodrome Theatre (after two preview performances), when a cast of two-dozen performers shuffles across the stage in red, pointy-toed Who shoes. Putting together the $4 million national tour in Charm City requires nine semi-trailer trucks, a stage-floor-to-ceiling tree with star hung askew, a realistic rendition of Mount Crumpet with a sleigh full of presents teetering at the top, and catwalks full of confetti "snow."

Next season, more customers at the Hippodrome Theatre may be wearing mittens clipped to their coat sleeves. The France-Merrick Performing Arts Center (which houses the Hippodrome) always makes sure that a certain number of the shows it books each year is suitable for middle-school students and teens. But for the first time, its subscription series will include two musicals geared specifically toward elementary-school children. The 2008-2009 season is scheduled to be unveiled at a news conference this morning.

If you're in Baltimore for the holidays and can't get into the spirit, consider yourself a Grinch -- no city does Christmas like this city. Nearly every neighborhood gets into the act: From modest rowhouses in Highlandtown to large homes in Guilford, lights are strung, lawn displays are erected and an annual decoration overdrive commences. Few cities inject their personalities so effectively into their celebrations as Baltimore does. The Washington Monument serves as the city's official Christmas centerpiece.

I'm going to grant the injunction. I think one Grinch in town is enough." - HELEN FREEDMAN, New York State Supreme Court justice, granting an injunction Wednesday ordering the Broadway production of How the Grinch Stole Christmas to resume despite the continuing stagehands' strike ASSOCIATED PRESS

The Cat in the Hat came, as did Cindy-Lou Who, plus Horton the elephant -- and Thing One and Thing Two. The famous characters of Dr. Seuss books lined the hallways, milled about classrooms and paraded through Sykesville's Carrolltowne Elementary, the school's contribution to a nationwide celebration of that rhyming raconteur, who would have been 103 years old Friday. The activities also commemorated the 50th anniversary of the capricious Cat in the Hat, the story of two children weathering a boring, rainy day -- until a cat in a red-and-white hat arrives and wreaks havoc with his antics.

Only a few days before Christmas, the little town of Lonaconing is not quite as merry as usual. And it's a lot less bright. While nearby towns sparkle with lights, this tiny coal-mining community in the mountains of Western Maryland lies still and sparsely decorated. Unless you count the blowup Grinch on Main Street. Some locals put up the Grinch as a prank - and a protest - after a utility pole dispute forced the town to abandon its 68-year tradition of stringing colored bulbs across Main Street.

WASHINGTON - Thank goodness Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas ate up a lot of Ron Howard's time. If it hadn't, the veteran director, who long ago made the difficult transition from child star to productive adult member of the film community, would never have made A Beautiful Mind. This look at the career of mathematician and Nobel laureate John Forbes Nash Jr. didn't come under his stewardship until late in the process. It was his longtime partner at Imagine Entertainment, Brian Grazer, who first saw its potential and brought it into the fold.

KENSINGTON - Santa Claus wasn't on the official guest list. But about 50 of his impersonators showed up as this Washington suburb - whose officials did not invite the bearded guy to its festivities - held its annual holiday tree-lighting yesterday. Hundreds of people, and a few apparent grinches basking in an accompanying media frenzy, turned it all into a raucous and at times un-Christmaslike affair for the 1,700 residents of the Montgomery County town. Santa wasn't invited, thanks to a unanimous vote Oct. 29 by the four-member Town council to exclude him because some residents - two families, said Mayor Lynn Raufaste - found the symbolism offensive and the town wanted to focus more on patriotism and the uniformed "heroes" who responded to the Sept.

Earl C. Hargrove Jr. merrily plants a kiss on the forehead of one of the men installing the quarter-mile lane of illuminated arches, the larger-than-life wreath and the speakers that will pipe Christmas music from the trees at his southern Anne Arundel County farm. He carefully inspects bulbs and wires - tweaking the Holly Farms display that has become as much a part of other families' tradition as it has his. It began 41 years ago, after Hargrove and his wife, Gloria, moved to the country from Cheverly, near Washington.