In his writings, he explains why he doesn't make eye contact, what it is like to be obsessed with a ceiling fan, and how his brain has trouble processing sound, touch and sight all at once.

His mother Dr. Mukhopadhyay quit her chemistry profession moved to the U.S. where she taught Tito and others using the Rapid Prompting Technique at HALO -- Helping Autism through Learning and Outreach -- center in Austin, Texas, where she teaches while Tito attends school. More

Frustrated by distracted workers so plugged in that they tune out in the middle of business meetings, a growing number of companies are going “topless,” as in no laptops allowed. Also banned from some conference rooms: BlackBerrys, iPhones and other personal devices on which so many have come to depend…

But as laptops have gotten lighter and smart-phones even smarter, people have discovered a handy diversion, making more eye contact these days with their screens than one another. The practice became so pervasive that Todd Wilkens turned to his company blog to wage his “personal war against CrackBerry…”

A 18-year-old man entered a muffler shop in the 2600 block of North Laramie Avenue yesterday and declared a robbery. He allegedly waved a gun around and demanded money, according to police.

When he was told the money was in a safe and that the manager who knew how to open it was not there, the suspect had a brilliant idea; at least he thought it was brilliant.

He gave the shop employees his cell phone number and asked them to call him when the manager arrived so he could open the safe for him.

The man left and the employees opted to call 911. Authorities stationed plain clothes officers in the shop and called the would-be robber back.

The suspect showed up again, and waved his gun around again, but this time was shot in the leg by an officer.

A veteran's bus tour featuring decorated veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is stopping in the Twin Cities today.

But controversy at Forest Lake High School forced the tour to make a change in plans.

Capt. Pete Hegeseth founded the group Vets for Freedom. He is an Iraq War vet and a Forest Lake High School graduate. He received word yesterday that the school did not want the bus rolling through, calling the talk too political for a public school.
...
"My brother's in the armed forces...it's a slap in the face for people with family members in the armed forces," said student Elijah Miller.

- In a hostage situation you are likely to be released first.

- It's harder and harder for sexual harassment charges to stick.

- Kidnappers are not very interested in you.

- No one expects you to run into a burning building.

- People call at 9 p.m. and ask, "Did I wake you?"

- People no longer view you as a hypochondriac.

- There's nothing left to learn the hard way.

- Things you buy now won't wear out.

- You buy a compass for the dash of your car.

- You can eat dinner at 4:00

- You can live without sex but not without glasses.

- You can't remember the last time you laid on the floor to watch television.

- You consider coffee one of the most important things in life.

- You constantly talk about the price of gasoline.

- You enjoy hearing about other people's operations.

- You get into a heated argument about pension plans.

- You got cable for the weather channel.

- You have a party and the neighbors don't even realize it.

- You no longer think of speed limits as a challenge.

- You quit trying to hold your stomach in, no matter who walks into the room.

- You send money to PBS.

- You sing along with the elevator music.

- You talk about "good grass" and you're referring to someone's lawn.

- Your arms are almost too short to read the newspaper.

- Your back goes out more than you do.

- Your ears are hairier than your head.

- Your eyes won't get much worse.

- Your investment in health insurance is finally beginning to pay off.

- Your joints are more accurate than the National Weather Service.

- Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either.

- Your supply of brain cells is finally down to a manageable size.

We may all be getting tattoos in the future - tattooed vaccinations against disease, that is. German researchers have shown that tattooing is a more effective way of delivering DNA vaccines than intramuscular injection.

The tattoo method gave a stronger humoral (antibody) response and cellular response than intramuscular injection, even when adjuvants were included in the latter.

“It’s created a little underground economy, with businessmen selling everything from a pack of skittles to an energy drink,” said Jim Nason, principal at Hook Junior High School in Victorville.

This has become a lucrative business, Nason said, and those kids are walking around campus with upwards of $40 in their pockets and disrupting class to make a sale.

1. Connecticut
2. Rhode Island
3. New Jersey
4. New York
5. California
6. Maine
7. Pennsylavania
8. Massachusetts
9. Maryland
10. Oregon

If you collect books, you've probably noticed that they're made of paper, and that paper comes from trees. Raz Godelnik noticed and he wanted to balance his books with new trees. So he started the website Eco-Libris; there, anyone can donate money to plant trees to offset book purchases.

The West Orange district decided to require amplification after seeing the first-grade reading scores at one school, St. Cloud Elementary, skyrocket to 89 percent at or above grade level at the end of the 2003-4 academic year, from 59 percent before teachers started speaking into microphones.

“That got everybody’s attention, as you can imagine,” said Karen Tarnoff, the district’s testing coordinator. “There was nothing else over the course of the year that was different than in any other year. The teachers and the curriculum remained the same, and nothing new was added other than the amplification system.”

1. The work of the individual has only one purpose: to serve the whole group.
2. Major accomplishments are possible only by the division of labor.
3. Each bee risks its life without hesitation for the whole.
4. Individuals who are not useful or are harmful to the whole are eliminated.
5. The species is maintained by producing a large number of offspring.

It is not difficult for us to see the application of these principles to mankind: We also can accomplish great things only by a division of labor. Our whole economy demonstrates this principle. The ethnic state must demand of each individual citizen that he does everything for the good of the whole, each in his place and with his abilities (Principle 1).

He who loves his people proves it only by the sacrifices he is prepared to make for it. (Mein Kampf, p. 474).

Pi, Greek letter(), is the symbol for the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. Pi = 3.1415926535... Pi Day is celebrated by math enthusiasts around the world on March 14th.

Talk About Pi

• What is your favorite Pi Day activity?
• Successful Classroom Activities
• How are you celebrating this year?
• Quotes About Pi
• How many digits of Pi have you memorized?

State lawmakers are considering a bill that would grant free college tuition for some juvenile offenders. Supporters say it's a way to encourage troubled youth to get their lives back on track. John Dixon, Deputy Secretary for the MD Department of Juvenile Services says, "The kids the department serves face a lot of obstacles and challenges when they return to the community. This bill will allow kids who are interested in attending public institution to go there tuition free."

Delegate Norm Conway is sponsoring the bill. As an educator for 39 years, he says it's important to help troubled teens make a positive transition. "They're out of their own families in many instances. You're hoping for the best possible transition and incentives that say hey if you're willing to do your part there are some opportunities out there for you."

Under the proposal, committed juveniles under the age of 21 would be eligible for free tuition at any public institution in the state. If the measure is approved, about 450 kids who are in group homes, youth centers, and residential treatment homes would be eligible for the program each year.

If the idea seems breathtaking in its political incorrectness, consider that it's the brainchild of Rick Berman, a union-bashing attorney known for his in-your-face attacks on consumer, safety and environmental groups. "We're not trying to humiliate anyone," Berman says. "We're trying to jump-start a conversation that maybe people need severance packages to find themselves another line of work."

1. Charles Bukowski

2. Jim Thompson

3. Philip K. Dick

4. William S. Burroughs

5. Any Graphic Novel

The coin of the realm is now, and has always been, the fiction that young white men read, and self-satisfied young white men, the kind who love to stick it to the man, are the majority of book shoplifters.

Projections show that by next year or the year after, the annual number of high school graduates in the United States will peak at about 2.9 million after a 15-year climb. The number is then expected to decline until about 2015. Most universities expect this to translate into fewer applications and less selectivity, with most students probably finding it easier to get into college.

Kentucky Representative Tim Couch filed a bill this week to make anonymous posting online illegal.

The bill would require anyone who contributes to a website to register their real name, address and e-mail address with that site.

Their full name would be used anytime a comment is posted.

If the bill becomes law, the website operator would have to pay if someone was allowed to post anonymously on their site. The fine would be five-hundred dollars for a first offense and one-thousand dollars for each offense after that.

Representative Couch says he filed the bill in hopes of cutting down on online bullying. He says that has especially been a problem in his Eastern Kentucky district.

Action News 36 asked people what they thought about the bill.

Some said they felt it was a violation of First Amendment rights. Others say it is a good tool toward eliminating online harassment.

Represntative Couch says enforcing this bill if it became law would be a challenge

Parents sacrifice weekends and vacations to tournaments and specialty camps, spending thousands each year in this quest for the holy grail.

But the expectations of parents and athletes can differ sharply from the financial and cultural realities of college athletics, according to an analysis by The New York Times of previously undisclosed data from the National Collegiate Athletic Association and interviews with dozens of college officials.

Excluding the glamour sports of football and basketball, the average N.C.A.A. athletic scholarship is nowhere near a full ride, amounting to $8,707. In sports like baseball or track and field, the number is routinely as low as $2,000. Even when football and basketball are included, the average is $10,409. Tuition and room and board for N.C.A.A. institutions often cost between $20,000 and $50,000 a year.

Many simply want to carve out more time to spend with their children. For them, paying a personal shopper $30 to spend an afternoon tracking down a coveted tutu for a 2-year-old is money well spent. For other parents, the baby-services sector is a lifeline that can rescue them from sleepless nights or protect their children from getting hurt at home.

The prices for baby-specific services run the gamut: $85 for an hour with a lactation consultant, several hundred more for childproofing gear and someone to install it, $4,000 for five nights with a sleep trainer -- all before a baby is out of diapers. In all, the government estimates, middle-income households spend an average of $10,600 for a child's first year.

Gloom. Doom. Calamity. Home prices are tumbling. We're bombarded by somber reports. But wait. This is actually good news, because lower home prices are the only real solution to the housing collapse. The sooner prices fall, the better. The longer the adjustment takes, the longer the housing slump (weak sales, low construction, high numbers of unsold homes) will last.

Look at some numbers from the National Association of Realtors. From 2000 to 2006, median family income rose almost 14 percent, to $57,612. Over the same period, the median-priced existing home increased about 50 percent, to $221,900. By other indicators, the increase was even greater.

But home prices could not rise faster than incomes forever. Inevitably, the bust arrived. Credit standards have been tightened, and the (false) hope of perpetually rising home prices -- along with the possibility of always selling at a profit -- has evaporated. For many potential buyers, prices have to drop for housing to become affordable.

Britain's first 'Safe Text' street has been created complete with padded lampposts to protect millions of mobile phone users from getting hurt in street accidents while walking and texting.

Around one in ten careless Brits has suffered a "walk 'n text" street injury in the past year through collisions with lampposts, bins and other pedestrians.

The 6.6million accidents have caused injuries ranging from mild knocks and embarrassing cuts and bruises through to broken noses, cheekbones and even a fractured skull.

High-school students here rarely get more than a half-hour of homework a night. They have no school uniforms, no honor societies, no valedictorians, no tardy bells and no classes for the gifted. There is little standardized testing, few parents agonize over college and kids don't start school until age 7.

Yet by one international measure, Finnish teenagers are among the smartest in the world. They earned some of the top scores by 15-year-old students who were tested in 57 countries. American teens finished among the world's C students even as U.S. educators piled on more homework, standards and rules. Finnish youth, like their U.S. counterparts, also waste hours online. They dye their hair, love sarcasm and listen to rap and heavy metal. But by ninth grade they're way ahead in math, science and reading -- on track to keeping Finns among the world's most productive workers.

first-grade students trudge to school through a stand of evergreens in near darkness …. at home even the very young are expected to lace up their own skates or put on their own skis.

Finland shares its language with no other country, and even the most popular English-language books are translated here long after they are first published. Many children struggled to read the last Harry Potter book in English because they feared they would hear about the ending before it arrived in Finnish. Movies and TV shows have Finnish subtitles instead of dubbing. One college student says she became a fast reader as a child because she was hooked on the 1990s show "Beverly Hills, 90210."