Sass

On June 25, 2003, RONALD A. SASSE'; beloved husband of Marie B. (nee Black); former husband of Lee Moses; devoted father of Christine A. Heisey; fathr-in-law of Cory M. Heisey; dear grandfather of Allison, Rachael and Matthew Heisey; cousin of Margaret Blumenhauer (of Canada) and Susan Cook (of Vermont). Visiting at the Lassahn Funeral Home, Inc., 7401 Belair Road (Overlea) on Friday from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 P.M. Funeral Services will be held on Saturday at 11 A.M. Interment Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens.

Frank A. Sass Jr., a retired Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent supervisor and longtime Monkton resident, died Nov. 3 from complications after cardiac surgery at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. He was 87. He was born and raised in Dubuque, Iowa. After graduating from Dubuque High School in 1940, he began his college studies at the University of Dubuque. He left college in 1942 and joined the Army Air Corps, where he was trained as a flight instructor. Mr. Sass spent the war years instructing pilots and ferrying B-17 Flying Fortresses and other aircraft, some bullet-ridden from combat, to other U.S. air bases.

Maybe "Homicide: Life on the Street" is only the second-best police drama on network television, behind "NYPD Blue." But what a wonderful second it is.It's been so long since the last episode aired in January that I forgot how smart the dialogue was, how rich the acting is, how the show manages to play viewers back and forth between funny and profound, light and dark -- like maybe no show since "St. Elsewhere" (which was the work of "Homicide" executive producer...

R.E. Michel Co. Inc., a Glen Burnie-based distributor of heating and cooling supplies, was host to 21 plumbing and sanitary pipe distributors from Western Europe on Oct. 17.Mulligan/Griffin and Associates Inc., a land development company, and Mulligan/Griffin Property Managers Inc. are relocating to 15204 Omega Drive, Suite 100, in Rockville.Westland Printers Inc. in Burtonsville received a $3.19 million revenue bond from the Maryland Energy Financing Administration to install energy-saving equipment and make building improvements.

As a nervous flier, I wasn't too thrilled to hear Southwest Airlines could be fined a record $10.2 million for failing to inspect planes for cracks in the fuselage. This isn't the sort of thing that makes nervous fliers feel "free to move about the country," I can tell you that. In fact, when the story broke a few days ago, I could imagine hundreds of my jittery brothers and sisters who were flying Southwest at the time, opening a newspaper at 30,000 feet and seeing the headline: "AIRLINE FACES PENALTY ON PLANE CRACKS."

Toward the end of their concert in Philadelphia this month, First Aid Kit addressed the crowd: "We want to try an experiment. " For the past hour, Klara and Johanna Soderberg, the two Swedish sisters who make up the band, had been performing the kind of music that can be best summed up with the word "lovely. " It is Americana by way of Stockholm, pretty ballads and melancholy anecdotes sung in two frail, harmonious voices over quivering basslines. The duo was playing Union Transfer, a cavernous former rail baggage depot and my second stop on a visit to Philly's abundantly rich music scene.

First there were Three Tenors. Then Three Mo' Tenors. Now comes 3 Mo' Divas. Capitalizing on the Three Tenors phenomenon -- an international hit, not to mention a PBS fundraising staple -- six years ago, director/choreographer Marion J. Caffey devised an African-American version called Three Mo' Tenors. Not wanting to shortchange the ladies, he has come up with 3 Mo' Divas, which is making its East Coast debut at Washington's Arena Stage. Actually, there are six divas, because the vocally demanding show has two alternating casts.

Lucky Number Slevin features lots of cool dialogue but doesn't provide much of a movie in which to showcase it. The result is likely to leave audiences feeling as though they've been taken for a ride. There are things to like about this movie - some good performances, enjoyable plot twists, unique (if a bit too quirky) characters - but hardly enough to leave one wanting more. By the time the credits roll, Lucky Number Slevin has worn out its welcome. The trouble starts early, with a way-too-self-consciously impenetrable opening in which Bruce Willis, in a wheelchair, rolls up to a guy and, unprompted, starts talking about something called a "Kansas City shuffle," a con artist's move in which the mark's attention is directed one way while the action's happening in the other.