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Fiddler Virtuoso Vassar Clements Dies By JOHN GEROME Associated Press Writer August 16, 2005, 2:21 PM EDT NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Vassar Clements, a fiddle virtuoso and A-list studio musician who played with Paul McCartney and an array of others, died at his home Tuesday after a battle with lung cancer, his daughter said. Clements, 77, was hospitalized for 18 days earlier this year, receiving chemotherapy and other treatment. Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.

Penmanship: A Dying Art?SAN MATEO, Calif., June 9, 2003 Monique McGowan sharpens a No. 2 pencil, straightens her posture and sharply slants her notebook to prepare for her weekly lesson in cursive. She and other third graders at Horrall Elementary School have perfected ascenders and descenders, and their letters' tails and legs hit the appropriate base lines - even the tricky capitals G, Q and S. But Monique, who plays games on her dad's laptop at home, says she'd rather punch a keyboard than write cursive. "Computers are better," the 9-year-old says, blonde pony tail bobbing behind her. "With...

   http://www.news.com/ Making paper waterproof--and writable By Michael Kanellos http://news.com.com/Making+paper+waterproof--and+writable/2100-7337_3-5823337.html Story last modified Tue Aug 09 04:00:00 PDT 2005 Sally Ramsey, founder of Ecology Coatings, jerry-rigged an apparatus in her lab to show a chemical company representative how rapidly one of Ecology's coatings dries when exposed to ultraviolet light. To avoid making a mess, she put a piece of paper underneath the object she wanted to spray. When cleaning up, Ramsey exposed the paper to UV light to dry it and make it easier to throw away. On a whim, she checked to see if the coating, which was...

  C B C . C A   N e w s   -   F u l l   S t o r y : Accordion players squeeze out new recordLast Updated Sun, 07 Aug 2005 09:23:06 EDTCBC News Hundreds of musicians hoisted their accordions in the air in St. John's, Nfld., Saturday to celebrate the setting of an unusual record – the greatest number of people to play accordions simultaneously. Organizers, who needed 645 people to set the record, said 989 participants officially signed registration forms. The results will now be submitted to the Guinness World Records...

I'm currently in the process of relocating from Northeastern Vermont to Colorado (leaving a blue state for a red state - woo-hoo!). Very unfortunately, I can't bring all of my pets with me. I've contacted the local shelters, but was told that because neither of them are super young, they would have a great deal of trouble placing them, and since I wouldn't want to have them actually IN the shelter, I'm not willing to go that route. I also tried an on-line classifieds site (petfinder.org), but got some really kooky e-mails, so I took that ad down. I'm hoping...