Muscles

It was a fitting end to the franchise's winningest month in six years. The Orioles got another solid start from rookie Brian Matusz, nine clutch outs from a suddenly shutdown bullpen, some hustle and muscle from Luke Scott, a milestone double from Nick Markakis and enough clutch hits to spoil Josh Beckett's night. The result was a 5-2 victory over the Boston Red Sox in front of an announced 18,247 on Tuesday night at Camden Yards, and another win over a team with sagging playoff aspirations that simply can't afford to lose games to the Orioles.

The continued development of Orioles outfielder Felix Pie had been one of the few positives from the first couple of weeks of the season. But the Orioles will now have to wait at least three months before they see him play again. A magnetic resonance imaging taken Monday, followed by a subsequent doctor's visit, revealed that Pie had torn the latissimus dorsi muscle away from the bone in his back. The injury won't require surgery, but it will keep Pie, whose injury was initially classified as a strained muscle in his upper back, out until at least late July.

Dr. Nicholas J. Fortuin, a Johns Hopkins Hospital cardiologist who did early research in cardiac ultrasound and was recalled as a gifted teacher, died Sunday near his home in the Caves Valley section of Baltimore County. Family members said he had been bicycling. He was 69. "For generations of cardiology trainees at Hopkins, he came to epitomize clinical judgment and skill, and he brought to their education a healthy skepticism of new fads in a technology-prone specialty," said a close friend, Dr. Thomas Traill, a Hopkins cardiologist.

As Orioles second baseman Brian Roberts attempted to come back from a herniated disk in his back this spring, he said his final test would be stealing a base and emerging 100 percent. He has stolen two in two games this week and hurt himself on each attempt, including Friday, when he didn't return after the first inning because of a strained abdominal. He slid headfirst into second, later scored the Orioles' first run in their 7-6 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays and then didn't return to the field in the top of the second.

R enee Olsen was already late when she arrived at the Soccerdome in Jessup with her two young boys. The soccer game was under way, and she was still strapping on shinguards, pulling up socks and tying shoelaces. The difference? They were her shinguards, socks and soccer shoes. Olsen's boys were there to cheer on their 33-year-old mother. She's a real soccer mom. Likewise, Sandy Ranck has three soccer-playing sons, but she's the one on the field Friday nights for the Shooters.

It's time to move the chairs. Nine days after back-to-back snowstorms buried Baltimore, neighborhoods still resemble a yard sale after a hurricane -- littered with not only chairs but with bar stools and ottomans, kitty litter containers and potted plants, Formica tables and ironing boards -- put down by weary residents claiming title to the public parking spaces they had spent hours shoveling. But now, the new mayor's magnanimous gesture of not enforcing the illegal claiming of public space is over.

In a city that's had it up to its collar with abused dogs and cats, nearly 60 people are pledging to get paw-print tattoos if a gang of tough guys with a soft spot for furry things will come to town in the name of stopping animal cruelty. The dozens promising to get tattoos on The Baltimore Sun's Unleashed blog hope to catch the attention of the guys behind Rescue Ink, a nonprofit group based in Long Island, N.Y., that's sort of a Hells Angels for the good of animals. Their motto: "Abusers are losers."

Christina Marie Morganti, an orthopedic surgeon specializing in sports medicine with the Orthopaedic & Sports Medicine Center, explains "tennis elbow" - also known as lateral epicondylitis - and how to take care of it. * "Tennis elbow" is a tendinosis of the wrist and finger extensor muscles that occurs where they originate on the outside of the elbow. This area is where the tendons of the four to five muscles on the back of the forearm coalesce into one "common extensor tendon." Similar to this is "golfer's elbow," or medial epicondylitis, which refers to tendinosis of the wrist and finger flexor muscles on the inside (medial side)

Many athletes train by the old concept of "no pain, no gain," and now sports apparel company Under Armour thinks it has a way to make that pain go away a little faster. The Baltimore company is introducing a first of its kind, two-piece body suit this summer that it says will help athletes and exercise enthusiasts recover more quickly from the aches and pains caused by tiny tears in the muscles that follow a strenuous workout. The fitted, long-sleeved suit, which covers the body from chest to foot, is to be worn for 24 hours after a workout and pushes excess water from the muscles and into the bloodstream to reduce swelling and help the micro tears heal more quickly.

Taneytown, Md. -Author Chuck Palahniuk is sitting on a red and gold camelback sofa in the parlor room of the Antrim 1844 Country Inn, picking loose fringe from the sofa and piling it neatly on the tea tray in front of him. Pachelbel's Canon in D Major is on the stereo. We drink from china decorated with magnolia blossoms, while Chuck considers the merits of various plastic body parts, which he tosses out to the audience during readings of his high-testosterone novels. His most famous book is Fight Club, which was made into a 1999 film with Brad Pitt; his newest novel, Pygmy, will be published this week.