State and National News

Melissa Block talks to Larry Israelson about his 39 year late apology to his 7th grade teacher. When he was 12 years old, he did something he only later realized probably hurt his teacher. It was minor but in time, when he was older and wiser, he wanted to find his teacher and apologize.

Transcript

ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST:

Now, the story of a baseball gone foul. The New York Yankees and Texas Rangers were wrapping up a game in Arlington, Texas last night. And in the 8th inning, Rangers' first baseman Mitch Moreland fielded a foul ball and then tossed it into the stands. Standard operating procedure.

MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:

Note: This video could be considered slightly NSFW, for scantily-clad people and very brief partial nudity.

It's often pointed out that long ago, jazz was once dance music. It's usually a way of lamenting its current reputation as a cerebral art for seated contemplation. But nothing says music can't be for both hips and head.

Hockey fans in the nation's capital are savoring an underdog victory: last night, the Washington Capitals knocked the Boston Bruins, last year's Stanley Cup champions, out of the playoffs. Nearly three minutes into overtime, Caps right winger Joel Ward fired a puck past Bruins goalie Tim Thomas, ending Boston's hopes for a repeat of the 2011 victory. The final score: 2-1.

Farming transformed Europe when it arrived from the Near East about 6,000 years ago. But was it the agricultural know-how that traveled, or the farmers themselves?

By comparing DNA from Stone Age farmers and hunter-gatherers, Swedish researchers say it's clear that the farmers traveled north through Europe, bringing their agrarian skills with them.

How else would a farmer with Mediterranean DNA end up in Sweden?

I'm imagining suave dark-eyed farmers seeking out Nordic maidens tired of all that berry picking and hide scraping.

For a case that is about show-me-your-papers, it was more than a little odd that the Supreme Court police — for the first time anyone could recall — asked reporters on the Supreme Court plaza Wednesday to show their IDs to get into a roped-off area where TV cameras routinely set up.

Take a look at this picture:

Those same coils — the ones that look like the side of a snail — are also found on the Big Island of Hawaii, which were formed by lava flows.

As Wired reports, the difference is that some of the Martian coils are 100 feet across — giant compared the Earth-bound ones.

Still scientists found that they are "morphologically consistent with terrestrial lava coils."

A meditation on quietude amidst unceasing movement, a thick-walled cell of solitary contentment in the churn of daily life: That's the premise of this new video featuring the gifted pianist Michael Mizrahi.