Nose

Last week we learned that adult children of divorce will almost always revert to childish behaviors. Case in point, Briana, the daughter previously known as The Most Reasonable Person in Orange County, dissolved into a impertinent, recalcitrant, petulant brat upon meeting her mother's boyfriend. This week Briana grows up and fights like a big girl … but we'll get there soon enough. Elsewhere in the O.C., there are tiaras to be worn and bling to be bought as Alexis goes all out for her little princesses, and Slade decides to declare Gretchen his queen.

Looking to round out their defensive line rotation, the Ravens has signed veteran nose tackle Ma'ake Kemoeatu, the team announced Wednesday. Kemoeatu will likely replace backup nose tackle Brandon McKinney, who signed with Chuck Pagano and the Indianapolis Colts in free agency. Kemoeatu, 33 got his start as an undrafted free agent with the Ravens in 2002. A Tonga native and a Utah graduate, Kemoeatu played four seasons with the Ravens. He started 16 games and made 30 tackles in 2005, his final season in Baltimore.

T here must have been a time when Steve Kain's nose wasn't stuffed up - but he can't remember it. The 33-year-old information technology expert from Columbia has had chronic sinus conditions since he was a kid. The sniffles were like a lifestyle, and he gulped Claritin, Sudafed, Theraflu, Benadryl - anything to try to feel better. But last year, Kain mentioned his sorry sinuses to an acupuncturist. She sent him home with what was to be the prescription he'd been waiting for: Buy a Neti pot. Though he had to get past the feeling "that I was sticking a little genie lamp into my nose," running the salt water through his nasal passages helped almost immediately.

Arnold Farmer and Charles Johnson have been teammates for seven years. The Poly alumni were both two-time All-City football selections and were among the first players to commit to Towson when Rob Ambrose was named the head coach. While both have game experience, they're among the Tigers who have been battling for starting jobs this spring. And at Saturday's Tiger Bowl intrasquad scrimmmage at Johnny Unitas Stadium, they'll be battling each other, with Farmer competing to be the starting nose guard and Johnson trying to keep his starting right guard spot.

Looking to round out their defensive line rotation, the Ravens has signed veteran nose tackle Ma'ake Kemoeatu, the team announced Wednesday. Kemoeatu will likely replace backup nose tackle Brandon McKinney, who signed with Chuck Pagano and the Indianapolis Colts in free agency. Kemoeatu, 33 got his start as an undrafted free agent with the Ravens in 2002. A Tonga native and a Utah graduate, Kemoeatu played four seasons with the Ravens. He started 16 games and made 30 tackles in 2005, his final season in Baltimore.

Q: Which animal has a better sense of smell, dog or cat? A: Dogs, “by a nose,” and it's related to physiology. A cat has something like 50 million to 80 million odor-sensitive olfactory receptor cells in its nose, but a dog (depending on breed, with the bloodhound as champ) has a whopping 200 million to 300 million. We humans only have 5 million or so. The feline sense of smell is roughly 10 to 20 times keener than humans' - whereas a dog's nose is tens of thousands times more sensitive than ours.

The next installment of Steelers week is two months away, but Terrell Suggs took time this week to tell Sports Illustrated's Peter King how “awesome” it was when the Ravens broke Ben Roethlisberger's nose last season. Appearing on King's new weekly podcast -- Suggs was his special guest in the third episode -- the Ravens linebacker was asked to tell a story that illustrates the intensity of the Baltimore-Pittsburgh rivalry. Suggs chose the Steelers' Week 13 win from a year ago because he and Roethlisberger were both bloodied.

Occasional photo caption challenges were a staple at my old blog, and I plan on keeping the contest going here at The Baltimore Sun . The premise is simple: Come up with a clever, comical and clean caption for the picture above and you'll win a prize. With the Orioles taking the field in Sarasota today for the start of spring training, I decided I would find a fun photo of O's manager Buck Showalter. Mission accomplished (thanks to Getty Images). Whoever comes up with the best caption will get their choice of tickets to the Ringling Bros.

Longtime run stopper Kelly Gregg is officially gone and Terrence Cody is undeniably the man in the middle, latest in a line of nose guards who play traffic cop for the Ravens. Built more like the massive Tony Siragusa than the shorter Gregg, Cody had an uneven rookie season: He arrived overweight, quickly suffered a knee injury that required surgery and spent the first month of the regular season trying to work that big body into shape. Once he got on the field, however, he began to show why he was a steal late in the second round of the 2010 draft.

First Catholic Charities said that if they were forced to recognize gay marriages when it comes to offering their employees' spouses health benefits that they would stop offering those benefits altogether. Now the archdiocese will not approve the sale of vacant former school buildings to charter schools because it's too much competition for their remaining open schools ("Archdiocese won't sell or lease to charter schools," March 17). Do I hear a phrase my parents always used to say to me?

This episode needed a parental guidance warning. Alexis gets a new nose and it is already out of joint because Gretchen didn't visit her on the day of the operation. And lucky us - we get to see everything they pulled out of Alexis' old nose -- septum and all -- on camera. Seriously, I'm 30-sumpin' years old and even I needed a hand to hold! In less explicit TV, Tamra decides that she doesn't need big breasts to define who she is, she's got Eddie to do that!

Judging by free safety Ed Reed's comments to SiriusXM satellite radio on Monday, Joe Flacco may have yet to win over some of his teammates. But that's not the case with Vince Wilfork. The New England Patriots nose tackle said Thursday during a national conference call that he respects the Ravens quarterback, who has been the subject of much debate this week after he threw for less than 200 yards and was sacked five times in Sunday's 20-13 victory over the Houston Texans in Sunday's AFC divisional round.

NAME: Moose BREED: English Mastiff AGE: Nine HOME: Reisterstown OWNER: Martha Frick Symington Sanger “Martie” HOW WE MET: When choosing a pup from a litter of English Mastiffs I knew Moose was meant for me. As if saying “the world is too much with me,” a common feeling for writers such as myself, he was snuggled away between a kitchen wall and the refrigerator, as far as he could get from his rambunctious mates....

There are two sides to every dispute. Next time Gov. Martin O'Malley has the sudden desire to bully the environmental law clinic at the University of Maryland, he ought to keep that in mind. Perhaps if he or his staff had bothered to talk to students at the clinic, he would not have written his odious letter to Maryland School of Law Dean Phoebe A. Haddon this week. It's hard to say what's more shocking - that the governor, a lawyer himself, would attempt to interfere with ongoing civil litigation (much less without ever talking to the plaintiffs or their lawyers to get their side of the story)

The hearts of many Ravens fans may have leaped into their throats when seven-time Pro Bowl free safety Ed Reed and nose tackle Terrence Cody lay on the turf at Everbank Field for several minutes on the same play in the fourth quarter of the Ravens' 12-7 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars Monday night. Reed attracted the most concern because he has been bothered by a nerve impingement in his neck for most of 2009 and a significant portion of 2010. But both players walked off under their own power and eventually returned to the contest.

Terrence Cody isn't a highlight machine or a stats maniac, but the nose tackle has been a factor in the defense's performance this season. Sandwiched by two-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle Haloti Ngata and defensive Cory Redding, Cody has stabilized the Ravens' three-man front in their 3-4 defensive alignment. And despite the lack of statistics, Cody's play has not escaped the attention of his coaches. “Is he becoming dominant in there? He dominates in there quite a bit,” coach John Harbaugh said during his weekly briefing on Monday.

''White supremacy caused Napoleon to blow the nose off the Sphinx because it reminded [him] too much of the black man's majesty.''-- Louis Farrakhan, October 16ON THE 19th of May, 1798, a young French general nameNapoleon Bonaparte set off in his flagship L'Orient for the conquest of Egypt. The Mediterranean crossing was calm, Napoleon's officers found time to read, and several chose popular romantic novels of the day: Goethe's ''Sorrows of Young Werther,'' Bernardin de St. Pierre's ''Paul and Virginia.

We've all seen Michael Jordan soar through the air with his tongue hanging out. Although I have not done any scholarly research on this subject, I'm sure that Jordan's tongue is the most widely seen tongue in recorded history, which should make all Chicagoans proud.But a Bulls fan has pointed out another distinctive physical oddity on Chicago's favorite team and wonders if there is any explanation for it."Have you ever noticed something unusual about Will Perdue's nose?" asked Eddie Cronin, a Chicago artist.

The next installment of Steelers week is two months away, but Terrell Suggs took time this week to tell Sports Illustrated's Peter King how “awesome” it was when the Ravens broke Ben Roethlisberger's nose last season. Appearing on King's new weekly podcast -- Suggs was his special guest in the third episode -- the Ravens linebacker was asked to tell a story that illustrates the intensity of the Baltimore-Pittsburgh rivalry. Suggs chose the Steelers' Week 13 win from a year ago because he and Roethlisberger were both bloodied.

Center Matt Birk has fully participated in the Ravens' last three days of practice - a promising sign that the 14-year veteran will start in Sunday's season opener against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Birk, who underwent surgery on his left knee on Aug. 3, declined to put a percentage on the knee's strength and stability, but he sounded optimistic that he would suit up against the Steelers. “I don't like to do the percentages or anything,” he said. “I'll keep treating it and [get]