Heaven

Dining in Nashville means having your cardiologist on speed dial. A look at the local food and drink of the Music City and Charm City: NASHVILLE Country ham and red-eye gravy Get this: The gravy starts with the drippings in a pan in which slices of ham were fried. So it's ham gravy on ham. Served with a nice ham salad? Pork barbecue In case you didn't get enough ham. MoonPie Graham-cracker cookies, marshmallow filling, chocolate dip. Who needs a bathroom scale, anyway? Stack cake Sugar, eggs, molasses, buttermilk, flour ... you can feel your arteries hardening.

This review begins at the end, on a Wednesday morning, when I show up at work with a couple of slices of Dangerously Delicious savory pies to share with my co-workers. Everyone loves them. The crusts are superb, the fillings delicious. One of them is steak and chili pie, the other is a version of the classic pot pie, and there's not anything we'd want to change about either of them. Rodney Henry's pies are always good. I am popular. I had bought these pies the night before at the Dangerously Delicious pie shop in Federal Hill, by the Cross Street Market.

[Sony Pictures] Starring David Niven, Kim Hunter; James Mason, Helen Mirren. Both directed by Michael Powell. $24.96. *** 1/2 dvds Best known for directing one of the most beautiful (1948's The Red Shoes) and one of the most controversially voyeuristic (1960's Peeping Tom) films ever released, British director Michael Powell packed a lot more than those two milestones into his four-decade career. This two-disc set, with movies made available for the first time on DVD, offers evidence of both his talent and his singular vision.

You say the economy's in the tank, your credit card's maxed out, and you can't afford a movie ticket, much less a Wii? Well, lift your head up high! Go ahead, look up! The new year holds in store all kinds of celestial entertainment for Maryland stargazers. And they're all free. There are spectacular moonrises and moonsets, a string of promising meteor showers and planetary conjunctions rivaling the Dec. 1 triple conjunction of the moon, Venus and Jupiter. We do seem to be in a sort of "eclipse recession," however.

How did this country get in the financial pickle it's in, Childs? By confusing quantity with quality. Two flat-screen TVs must be better than one flat-screen. And four of those babies? Hog heaven - who cares if we have nothing in the rainy day fund? Same goes for bowl games. Thirty-four bowl games? That's 68 teams, or better than half of all Football Bowl Subdivision programs. You can't tell me with a straight face that there are 68 quality football teams in this country, not after watching a single quarter of the Independence Bowl's clash of the titans, Northern Illinois vs. Louisiana Tech.

Give HBO four stars for its classy, spicy and very satisfying documentary about the once legendary New York eatery, Le Cirque: A Table in Heaven. The filmmakers have structured it as an operatic drama with a capital D. Viewers follow the four-star French restaurant as it flourishes in the 1970s and '80s under owner Sirio Maccioni - up through its closing in 2004, and reopening two years later. Watch as the owner, his wife and three sons engage in family combat worthy of Wagner as they struggle to find a new style for a new century.

Rosemary Stafford-Baldwin, a Colts cheerleader from 1956 to 1969, remembers how cold it became in the second half of the game. My recollections are still vivid. First and foremost, it was a privilege not only to be chosen a cheerleader, but also to be at that game. However, we were not aware how historically significant the game would become. We were grateful to be, for the first time, in New York's Yankee Stadium, walking on the same ground where our Babe Ruth did his magic. We traveled by train that Sunday morning, with the band, majorettes, sportswriters and fans.

New York - The branches are from Connecticut, but Martha Clarke is in hell. Or, she's in paradise. Sometimes, it's hard to tell the difference. On stage, half a dozen dancers preparing for a new staging of The Garden of Earthly Delights wave bare tree branches aloft, then twirl together in a circle. A highly anticipated revival of the groundbreaking 1984 production, based on a 1504 painting by Hieronymus Bosch, opens Wednesday off-Broadway. "Stay as close together as you can, girls," says Clarke from the audience, holding her arms in front of her, and then sweeping her palms inward.

On September 25, 2008, HEDY L. EDWARDS, Friends may call at the William C. Brown Community Funeral Home P.A., 1206 W. North Avenue, Thursday 3 to 7 P.M. Family will receive friends Friday at the Highway to Heaven Apostolic Faith Church, 1650 N. Patterson Park Avenue, 11 A.M. Funeral 11:30 A.M.

Soup's On opened back in February above a natural foods store in Mount Vernon, a few blocks from the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall. This is a hidden space that you meet up a short flight of stairs from a single door at street level. Over the decades, a bunch of cafes and carry-outs have tried to make a go of it up there. The most notable success was Soo's Kimchee House. A few of the other attempts seemed doomed from the start.