Bastianini, Ettore

Bastianini, Ettore, notable Italian baritone; b. Siena, Sept. 24, 1922; d. Sirmione, Jan. 25, 1967. He studied in Florence with Flaminio Contini. In 1945 he made his operatic debut in the bass role of Colline in Ravenna. He made his first appearance at Milan's La Scala as Tiresias in Oedipus Rex in 1948. After additional training from Ricciana Bettarini, he made his debut as a baritone in Bologna in the role of Germont père. He sang Andrei in the rev. version of War and Peace in Florence in 1953. On Dec. 5, 1953, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut in N.Y. as Germont père, and was on its roster until 1957 and again in 1959-60 and from 1964 …

Age's Melancholy

If old age is a second childhood

No wonder I have changed.

Those days of wandering slingshot in hand

Searching for a rabbit

Or outraged magpie,

Perhaps a startled stoat

A pheasant or duck afloat

On some shaded pond

Have gone.

Now it's hours of household chores

That take eternity, so there's never time

To contemplate

Explore hedgerows where memories lie;

A forgotten kiss or squeeze of hand

That still send shivers down the spine.

For what does the heart ache?

A second chance? Those "only's..."

Hung on a …

Most Asian markets rise; Japanese exporters, financial companies gain after Wall Street rally

Most Asian markets rose Monday, with tech and financial companies gaining in Japan after Wall Street rallied at the end last week.

Meanwhile, property developers helped to boost the Hong Kong market, and the Shanghai benchmark gave up most of its early, sharp gains that came with a new regulatory ruling.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 stock index rose 1.6 percent to 13,696.5. Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 2.2 percent to 24,721.7. The Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.7 percent to 3,117.0 after surging nearly 7 percent in early trading.

Despite the robust gains there, traders in Tokyo said investors would likely trade with caution for the rest of the month ahead …

Weather Almanac

Yesterday's high 23

Record high 73, 2000

Normal high 43

Yesterday's low 15

Record low -5, 1928

Normal …

Cranberries: A side dish for your health

They are a rich source of proanthocyanidins, too.

Although it's a long way to go until Thanksgiving again, when cranberries garnish the special meal in the form of cranberry sauce, there are still plenty of reasons to add cranberries to your regular diet. Cranberries - like its cousins blueberries and bilberries - are a great source of vitamin C and fiber (when used in a whole form, as opposed to juice). All of these berries are also rich sources of bioflavonoids, including a class of bioflavonoids called proanthocyanidins.

While chlorophyll is well known for coloring the plant world green, and the carotenoids add a sprinkle of orange and yellow, most of the purples, …

Poland's Gdansk renames street after Vaclav Havel

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Gdansk — the birthplace of Poland's Solidarity movement — has renamed a street after Vaclav Havel to honor the Czech anti-communist icon deeply revered by Poles.

Officials in the city, the home of Poland's own anti-communist icon Lech Walesa, inaugurated Vaclav Havel Avenue on Friday, the same day the Czech playwright and president was being laid to rest in his …

Sierra Club asks feds to protect PR coastal land

Conservationists on Monday petitioned the federal government to protect an undisturbed swath of Puerto Rican coastline that is prime nesting ground for the endangered leatherback turtle _ among the largest reptiles in the world.

The Sierra Club is urging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to set aside a corridor of coastal land for the hulking turtles, which can grow to more than 6 (2 meters) and weigh almost 2,000 pounds (907 kilograms).

The 3,200-acre (1,300-hectare) stretch of land immediately north of El Yunque, the only tropical rain forest in the U.S. National Forest system, was protected by …