Kangaroo

CINCINNATI -- A former songwriter for "Captain Kangaroo" told jurors in the Robert Mapplethorpe obscenity trial yesterday that the photographer's sexually explicit works should not be displayed in museums because they promote sadomasochism and sexual abuse of children.Mass media analyst Judith Reisman was permitted to testify in the case against the Contemporary Arts Center and director Dennis Barrie over the objections of defense attorneys, who challenged her ability to evaluate either art or obscenity.

Bob Keeshan will bring his brand of childhood magic to Maryland this weekend as he visits two Zany Brainy bookstores to sign copies of his "Family Fun Activity Book.Filled with suggestions on creative family play, the book's activities are largely derived from the playful fun of Mr. Keeshan's children's television show. He was the master of make-believe on "Captain Kangaroo" for 36 years.Mr. Keeshan wrote the book as a reference for games and activities that families can enjoy together, including clay craft projects, papier-mache planet projects, toilet paper body-wrapping races and giant milk-carton dice games."

Defendant: Vince Coleman. Crime: Allowing an opposing player to borrow his glove. Verdict: Guilty, of course.Welcome to another session of the Kangaroo Court.Star or scrub, bus driver or batboy, no one is above baseball's bizarre bastion of justice. And nothing goes unnoticed -- missing a sign, tripping on a foul line, wearing an ugly suit.Sometimes, it doesn't take much. In 1983, New York Yankees judge Don Baylor fined coach Don Zimmer. Why?"Just for being Don Zimmer," Baylor said.Once, San Francisco manager Roger Craig was fined for getting a taxi receipt after another passenger paid the fare.

New York -- He was a shy, serious boy growing up in a poor Baltimore County household where neighborhood kids teased him about staying inside and playing with dolls.They weren't dolls. They were puppets, and he made hundreds of them out of bedroom slippers, the fleece lining of coats and anything else he could find. Made them dance and joke and sing, as he lip-synced to records -- even Barry Manilow records.Kevin Clash discovered it doesn't necessarily take money or other middle-class advantages to spark a talent.

Lorie Young, her white veil neatly pulled over her eyes, tucked a handwritten note into the bouquet of blue and purple flowers she clutched as she waited for the ceremony to begin. Written on it were her wedding vows, the promises of a shared future with her partner, Latasha Dinkins. Behind them was the 11-hour drive the Atlanta couple made to Baltimore, four years of dating and raising their two daughters, and the moment last New Year's Eve when they decided they should get married.

Competing against more than 1,100 other rope jumpers, the Howard County-based Kangaroo Kids recently brought home 18 medals from the recent U.S. National Jump Rope Championship.The rope jumpers won four gold medals, seven silver medals, seven bronze medals and placed 27 times in the top 10 for all events in a championship held June 28-30 at Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando, Fla.The competition will be shown on ESPN Aug. 24.Kangaroo Kids is a 16-year-old organization based in Simpsonville near Columbia.

The generation that Captain Kangaroo taught self-respect and empathy has let the big guy down.Thirty-nine years after Bob Keeshan brought his famous gentle whimsy to CBS -- imparting values of trust and mutual caring and affection through his associations with Bunny Rabbit and Mr. Green Jeans -- the Captain is shocked at how things have turned out. The generation he nurtured has not done nearly as well by its own progeny.In much the same terms expressed lately by disheartened baby-care guru Dr. Benjamin Spock, Mr. Keeshan says he sees American children as worse off today than they were when he debuted as Captain Kangaroo in 1955.

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA / / I went to the Sydney Fish Market to see what strange creatures I had been eating: barramundi and Balmain bugs. I found them amid an astonishing variety of seafood at one of the world's largest fish markets. Mounded on ice were more than two-dozen types of whole fish, steaks and fillets. There was smoked eel, sea urchin roe and several varieties of oysters, already shucked and displayed on the half-shell. There were tubs of calamari rings and squid tubes. And a lovely rose-colored octopus, its arms twisted to show off rows of perfect tentacles next to a sign that proclaimed "Sashimi quality."

He didn't have enough at-bats to qualify, of course, but Curt Motton was batting .360, higher than American League leader Rod Carew, and the Orioles were gleeful about it.Imagine a reserve outfielder and right-handed pinch hitter challenging for the batting title.In the Orioles' kangaroo court in the clubhouse on that August day in 1969, the judge, Frank Robinson, suggested that the players petition manager Earl Weaver to play Motton in the remaining 42 games so that he would have enough at-bats to qualify.

An attorney blasted the board that retires disabled police officers in Annapolis as a "kangaroo court" yesterday and threatened to have the city held in contempt for failing to hold a court-ordered hearing.Only four of the five members on the volunteer Public Safety Disabilities Retirement Board showed up, prompting lawyer Joel Katz to charge the hearing would be "improper and illegal."Although board Chairman John H. Fellowes insisted enough members were present for it to take action, Mr. Katz said he would ask a circuit judge to hold the city in contempt for violating terms of an order that required the full board to meet.