Rubber

MEXICO CITY -- One way or another, Carlos Salinas de Gortari was always good for business.As president of Mexico, he was lauded worldwide as the promoter of free trade, the craftsman of Mexican economic openness, a Gorbachev-style reformist south of the border.Then came four years of recession, plummeting buying power -- and a national fit of anger toward Salinas that has inspired a booming cottage industry in T-shirts, comic books, rubber masks, candy, figurines and a host of other baubles of popular culture vilifying Mexico's most hated former president.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Beneath the branches of a towering banyan tree, tucked away in what was once a jungle on Florida's Gulf Coast, is a place where one of the world's top scientists spent his final days working on an obscure and unusual project.For a half-century, Thomas Alva Edison had been a household name. But as his hearing faded to near-total deafness and his health began to fail, he headed to his retirement home near the Gulf of Mexico for one final experiment -- turning plants into rubber.

I don't much like mice because using them for years while slouched in front of a computer monitor set at the wrong angle has proven hazardous to my health. I call them rats, a reminder to avoid bad posture while computing.We have here a rat with a red taillight, perhaps the best personal computer input device to ever appear on a desktop anywhere. Gone are the tangle of springs, plastic latches and that little rubber mouse ball that picks up lint and goes awry.IntelliMouse uses laser lights to record mouse movements and thus moves the cursor about the screen.

The Blue Man Group theatrical show is performance art at its most magical. Robotic-looking guys splash paint, bang on metal, eat Twinkies and even videotape the inside of someone's throat. And the coolest part of the show may be the costume -- the performers' heads are painted blue. I recently watched performer Tom Galassi go through the one-hour transformation it takes to become a Blue Man. The process is called "getting bald and blue." Here's how it happens: First, Tom cleans his face with Sea Breeze astringent.

A Baltimore real estate developer who successfully lured importers to a special trade zone near the port of Baltimore is planning to market industrial properties in Taneytown.Taneytown City Council is expected to endorse a proposal that consultant Stanley K. Ward calls "The Taneytown Initiative" at tonight's meeting.The council will meet at 7: 30 p.m. at the city office, 17 E. Baltimore St."We want to market a menu of industrial sites within the city of Taneytown that will allow Taneytown to re-establish its industrial base and will offer [manufacturers]

Taneytown City Council has endorsed the efforts of a Baltimore commercial real estate developer to market industrial properties in the community.The council voted Monday to support developer Stanley K. Ward's effort to package three industrial properties for sale. Support may include city government assistance with loans or Community Development Block Grant financing for a prospective industry. The council retained the right to reject an industry it finds undesirable.Ward has an option on a vacant 17-acre property and a contract with the city to design a redevelopment plan for the former Cambridge Rubber Co., a shoe factory that closed in 1986.

News item: A bill up for a vote in Congress promises a kinder, gentler IRS.AUDITOR: Thank you for coming in this morning, Mr. Fribbish. Could I get you a cup of coffee? A danish?Taxpayer: No, thank you. Listen, about those charitable deductions . . .Auditor: Please, Mr. Fribbish. We didn't call you in here to question your charitable deductions. If you say you gave $30,000 to the Society for the Prevention of Cats, even though you claim an income of only $25,000, we're willing to believe you. How's that chair, by the way?

ONE EVENING MY wife mentioned, casually, that she had been talking to the son of one of her friends, a little boy named Alexander, about his coming fourth birthday."

A Baltimore real estate developer who successfully lured importers to a special trade zone near the port of Baltimore is planning to market industrial properties in Taneytown.Taneytown City Council is expected to endorse a proposal that consultant Stanley K. Ward calls "The Taneytown Initiative" at tonight's meeting.The council will meet at 7: 30 p.m. at the city office, 17 E. Baltimore St."We want to market a menu of industrial sites within the city of Taneytown that will allow Taneytown to re-establish its industrial base and will offer [manufacturers]

What makes...# ...the Earth round?Kabir MatharuGravity does.Everything on the Earthis being pulled toward the center of the Earth. A ball is the most compact shape that holds the most stuff.Which is not in a pencil?A - clayB - glueC - leadD - rubberEven though we call it lead, there is no lead in a pencil at all. The center of a pencil is ground-up graphite mixed with clay.ZTCThe computer.Anna EgarKensington, MarylandComputers are all-purpose machines. Computers play software the way CD players play CDs. Software tells the computer what kind of machine to turn into: a typewriter, drawing board, musical instrument or even a video effects lab.;-Where do ...the stars go in the daytime?

While not the sharpest knife in the drawer, I admire those pocket-size cutting implements that do a good job under sometimes adverse conditions with a minimum of bells and whistles. It doesn't sound like a big demand, but the market is crowded with knives that aren't cutting-edge. That's not true of Wenger's Evolution Soft Touch 14 Knife. The maker of Swiss Army knives has given this model a 2 1/2 -inch blade, scissors, locking screwdriver, tweezers (that double as a tick remover), wire stripper, can and bottle openers, corkscrew and about six other tools.

On the list of things that make or break an outing, what keeps your glasses or sunglasses from disappearing into the drink or under the tires of your bike or boot heel may not seem important until you hear that plop or crunch. And then, whether you have eagle eyes or you are cursed with the vision of Mister Magoo, it becomes wicked important. Most folks slip a fabric strap around the back of their heads and onto each earpiece. But they look lousy, get dirty and frayed, and flop around on your neck.

The days of felt-bottomed wading shoes are nearly over. Blame rock snot. A replacement is available. Praise Simms and its "Aquastealth" technology. The invasive algae formally named didymo but better known by its nickname, "rock snot," showed up last year in the Gunpowder River. The nasty goo covers rocks and trout habitat, ruining pristine waterways. Unless anglers scrub carefully after fishing, rock snot nestles into felt fibers and hitchhikes from place to place. But Simms (simmsfishing.

Adrian Beltre's one-out, ninth-inning single off Jim Johnson scored Franklin Gutierrez as the Seattle Mariners won the rubber match of the series, 3-2, before an announced 18,650 at Safeco Field. Base-running blunders and a lack of timely hitting hurt the Orioles, who wasted a solid start by Brad Bergesen. Box score, PG 4.

1 Want fries: with that dunk?: Maybe he'll be a Terp, so watch Lance Stephenson in the McDonald's All-American Game (8 p.m., ESPN). 2 World view: The U.S., leading its group, faces Trinidad and Tobago in the final round of World Cup qualifying, in Nashville, Tenn. (7:30 p.m., ESPN2). 3 Quotatious: Maybe Shaquille O'Neal (left) will get a technical for dissing a ref via Twitter during the Suns-Rockets game (10 p.m., ESPN). 4 Ace place: It's like tennis' fifth Grand Slam, and the Sony Ericsson Open from Key Biscayne, Fla., is in the quarterfinals (1 p.m., Comcast SportsNet)

They hail him by a bunch of names: Daddy-O, Buddy, Big Fella, Mister Malcolm or just Malcolm. Whatever they call Malcolm Spaulding, they want the same thing when they step into his shop - a fair price and quality craftsmanship, whether it's to repair a busted boot heel or a worn-out pair of pumps or to remove a winter's worth of grime from prize sneakers. Seems a small thing to expect, yet even in the year 2008, when chain stores gobble up more and more of the national landscape, the comforting attention paid by a familiar neighborhood shoe repairman still buys loyalty.

On Saturday September 29, 2007, VINCENT DiCRESCENZO "Rubber Legs", dear brother of Mary Berman and her husband Irving, and Nicholas DiCrescenzo, uncle of Deborah Biddle and Ronald Dicrescenzo; great uncle of Alex and Claudia Biddle and Ryan DiCrescenzo. Friends may call at Loring Byers Funeral Directors Inc., 8728 Liberty Road, (2 miles West of Beltway Exit 18) Randallstown, MD 21133 on Friday 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 P.M. Christian Wake Service 7:30 P.M. Mass of Christian Burial at St. Jude's Shrine, Paca and Saratoga St., Saturday 9:30 A.M. Interment Lorraine Park Cemetery.

HARBEL, Liberia -- They come in broad daylight, with guns, machetes, knives and buckets of acid. The invaders of Bridgestone Firestone North American Tire's rubber plantation in Liberia are hunting what they call "elephant meat": To them, the company is so big that anyone can take a hunk of flesh and no one will notice. Some people who stand in their way get hacked to death. Acid has been hurled on the faces and bodies of others. During 14 years of civil war in Liberia, the plundering of plantations and other assets became so common that the country was brought to its knees.

Harford County officials are considering installing artificial turf on the county's nine high school football fields at about $750,000 per field. Artificial turf would allow for more play and practice time and require less maintenance than grass fields, which sustain wear and tear from use and weather. "We need more fields than we have now," said Joe Pfaff, director of Harford County Parks and Recreation. "Rain can tear up turf, and play can be eliminated until the field is dry. Football wears out the center of the field quickly, and then there's no growing season until spring, when you have lacrosse.

In a spacious, light-filled office high above the Inner Harbor, Ed Callahan leans back in a plastic chair, flips a fuzz-covered rubber ball from one hand to the other, and grins like a schoolboy. He has reason to feel mischievous. It's not just that the atmosphere here at Planit Agency, the Baltimore advertising firm he co-founded 14 years ago, is fun, though given the pool table in the corner, the pulsing plasma TVs along the walls and the sprightly orange color scheme throughout the place, it qualifies as that.