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Jeanna Bryner
LiveScience Managing Editor
LiveScience.com

Money might give you a sense of overall satisfaction with life, but the extra dough won't ensure days full of laughter and joy, a new survey analysis of income and happiness suggests.

Results showed that as a person's income increases so does their overall satisfaction with life, but the moment-to-moment enjoyment of those days depended more on social and physical factors, such as whether a person smoked or spent the day alone.

These findings agree with a similar analysis of global happiness, in which the wealthiest nations, such as the United States, weren't necessarily the happiest. For instance, the United States came in at No. 26 out of 132 nations on daily happiness. Another study on overall satisfaction showed those living in the wealthiest and most tolerant states were happiest by the measure used in the study. [Happiest States Revealed]

Happiness surveys

In the new study, Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton of Princeton University took a stab at figuring out whether and how income affected each of the two well-being types: emotional well-being and overall life satisfaction. To do so, they analyzed more than 450,000 responses to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, a daily survey of 1,000 U.S. residents conducted by the Gallup Organization.

They looked at percentage changes in income rather than absolute numbers.

"In the context of income, a $100 raise does not have the same significance for a financial services executive as for an individual earning the minimum wage, but a doubling of their respective incomes might have a similar impact on both," the researchers wrote this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

For life evaluation, participants indicated on a scale from zero to 10, from worst to best possible, how they would rate their lives. For emotional well-being, participants answered yes/no questions about whether they had experienced various positive and negative emotions a lot during the prior day.

About 85 percent of respondents indicated they experienced a lot of positive emotions, including feelings of happiness, enjoyment and laughter/smiling on the previous day, while 24 percent felt a lot of sadness and worry. The average life-evaluation score was 6.76 (with 10 being the best possible life).

Physical illness, headaches, loneliness, and caring for an adult were linked to lower emotional well-being. Being a college graduate was associated with high life evaluation, but that diploma didn't do much for daily enjoyment.

The limits of money

Low income seemed to magnify the emotional pain of life's misfortunes, including divorce, illness and loneliness. For instance, for those with a monthly income of at least $3,000, 38 percent who reported headaches also reported a lot of sadness and worry, compared with 19 percent without headaches. But headaches seemed to take a greater toll on those making less than $1,000 a month, who reported "blue feelings" at rates of 70 percent when they had headaches and 38 percent when they didn't.

Beyond an average of $75,000, annual income no longer played a role in boosting how happy a person felt daily.

The researchers suggest that making anything more than $75,000 no longer improves a person's ability to spend time with friends, avoid pain and disease and enjoy leisure time - all factors involved in emotional well-being.

"It also is likely that when income rises beyond this value, the increased ability to purchase positive experiences is balanced, on average, by some negative effects," they write. For instance, a past study revealed a link between high income and a reduced ability to savor small pleasures, the researchers noted.

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By TOM PARSONS, Associated Press Writer

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Jefferson Thomas, who as a teenager was among nine black students to integrate a Little Rock high school in the nation's first major battle over school segregation, has died. He was 68.

Thomas died Sunday in Ohio of pancreatic cancer, according to a statement from Carlotta Walls LaNier, who also enrolled at Central High School in 1957 and is president of the Little Rock Nine Foundation.

The integration fight was a first real test of the federal government's resolve to enforce a 1954 Supreme Court order outlawing racial segregation in the nation's public schools. After Gov. Orval Faubus sent National Guard troops to block Thomas and eight other students from entering Central High, President Eisenhower ordered in the Army's 101st Airborne Division.

Soldiers stood in the school hallways and escorted each of the nine students as they went from classroom to classroom.

Each of the Little Rock Nine received Congressional Gold Medals shortly after the 40th anniversary of their enrollment. President Clinton presented the medals in 1999 to Thomas, LaNier, Melba Patillo Beals, Minnijean Trickey Brown, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Gloria Ray Karlmark, Terrence Roberts and Thelma Mothershed Wair.

In 2008, then President-elect Obama sent Thomas and other members of the Little Rock Nine special invitations to his inauguration as the nation's first black president. During his campaign, he had said the Little Rock Nine's courage in desegregating Central High helped make the opportunities in his life possible.

Thomas played a number of sports and was on the track team at Dunbar Junior High, but others had little to do with him once he entered Central, the state's largest high school.

"I had played with some of the white kids from the neighborhood," Thomas said. "I went up to Central High School after school and we played basketball and touch football together. I knew some of the kids.

"Eventually, I ran into them ... and they were not at all happy to see me," Thomas added. "One of them said, 'Well I don't mind playing basketball or football with you or anything. You guys are good at sports. Everybody knows that, but you're just not smart enough to sit next to me in the classroom.'"

Beals said Monday that Thomas was nicknamed "Roadrunner, because he was so fast. You could sometimes avoid danger by running fast."

She said by phone from her home in California that Thomas always seemed to bring a light moment to the crisis.

"He was funny, he had a most extraordinary sense of humor. He did sustain an enormous amount of damage and pain during the Little Rock crisis, but no matter what, he always had something refreshing and funny to say," she said. "It could be the most horrible day and he would say 'Yes, but how are you dressed and are you smiling?'"

Thomas also brought a bit of levity to the 2007 commemoration marking the 50th anniversary of the integration fight - letting the audience know how angry LaNier was with him when he stood up and cheered at a Central High Tigers pep rally.

Thomas thought the white students were carrying the school flag and yelling the school cheer. He said LaNier glared at him and later set him straight: It was the Confederate flag and the students were singing "Dixie."

After graduation, Thomas served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam and later became an accounting clerk with the Department of Defense.

Following the 2008 election, Thomas said in an interview that he supported Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Ohio primary and he also liked former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who made a bid for the Republican nomination.

"It would have been a hard decision for me to make if Huckabee was running against Obama," Thomas added.

Still, he said, he was overjoyed with Obama's victory.

"This was really the nonviolent revolution," Thomas said. "We went and cast our ballots and the ballots were counted this time. I'm thinking now we've got to do something. I don't know what. But there are a lot of things Obama ran on, what he's saying he wants to do."

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By RUSS BYNUM, Associated Press Writer

SAVANNAH, Ga. – A former Army soldier demanding behavioral treatment at a Georgia military hospital took three workers hostage at gunpoint Monday before authorities persuaded the gunman to surrender peacefully.

Fort Stewart spokesman Kevin Larson said no one was hurt and no shots were fired in the short standoff at Winn Army Community Hospital on Fort Stewart, about 40 miles southwest of Savannah.

The gunman was arrested by military police and was being questioned Monday afternoon. His name was not immediately released. Larson would only say the gunman was a former Army soldier who came into the emergency room asking for behavioral health care.

The gunman walked into the hospital's emergency room at about 4 a.m. Monday carrying four guns, Larson said. He took one hospital employee, a soldier, hostage and headed to the building's behavioral treatment wing on the third floor.

An Army nurse on duty in the behavioral health wing spotted the gunman and approached him to talk, Larson said. That nurse was then taken hostage along with another employee.

Still, the nurse — an Army major who is a behavioral health specialist — was able to start calming the gunman.

"He began to talk to the suspect and de-escalate the situation," Larson said.

Military police soon arrived and surrounded the hospital. Army investigators trained in hostage negotiations worked their way to the same floor as the gunman.

In less than two hours, they persuaded the gunman to put down his weapons and surrender.

Because the suspect is a civilian and the standoff involved hostages, the FBI was called in to help with the investigation. It was unclear Monday what charges the man would face.

Fort Stewart, the largest Army post east of the Mississippi River, is home to the 3rd Infantry Division. Most of the division's 19,000 soldiers are deployed to Iraq. It's the 3rd Infantry's fourth tour in Iraq since the war began in 2003.

Larson declined to say what sort of behavioral problems the gunman was seeking help for, and said he didn't know if the man had been denied treatment previously.

"He broke the law, obviously, and he threatened people" and would have to face the consequences, Larson said. "But we are going to get him the help for behavioral health."

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By CURT ANDERSON, AP Legal Affairs Writer

MIAMI – More than 80 years ago, Germany sold tens of thousands of bonds to American investors in an effort to recover financially from World War I. Later, Adolf Hitler used some of the money raised by those bonds to build the powerful Nazi war machine that would ravage Europe during World War II.

Now, a half-dozen U.S. bondholders are turning to federal courts in an effort to force Germany to make good on its promise to repay the debts, which today could be worth hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars. Action has been heating up in lawsuits filed in Miami, New York and Chicago, including a victory for investors last month when an appeals court rejected Germany's attempt to dismiss their case.

If the bondholders ultimately win, their lawyers could ask judges to seize German assets in the U.S. to repay them, a tactic that has worked in other legal disputes over money owed by foreign governments.

But if Germany prevails, the bondholders argue, it could undermine the global system through which governments raise money by issuing bonds.

"Our position is not only correct under the law, it would avoid such a potentially far-reaching precedent," said investor attorney Sam Dubbin of Coral Gables, who has frequently represented Holocaust survivors in Nazi-related claims.

Enrico Brandt, a spokesman for the German Embassy in Washington, said the lawsuits are baseless. Brandt said the only way bondholders can redeem the securities is to go through a validation process mandated by a 1953 international treaty and later enshrined in German law.

"Consequently, the efforts of the plaintiffs to outmaneuver the validation procedure by suing in the United States will fail," Brandt said in an e-mail. "Any bond passing the validation procedure successfully will be honored."

Even with the questions of the bonds' validity, a robust market has developed with people around the globe buying and selling them in hopes they one day can be redeemed.

Bondholders claim in their lawsuits Germany has erected a nightmarish maze of bureaucratic red tape around the validation process. One key issue for many bonds is a purported Soviet Red Army plunder of thousands of bonds in 1945 from a Nazi vault as the war ended. Germany said those bonds had already been redeemed to the government, but were still improperly resold around the world. Any from that batch would therefore be invalid, the government argues.

Court documents indicate that Germany has repeatedly cited a "list of stolen bonds" in denying payment, but attorneys for bondholders say Germany won't share its list or allow it to face public and legal scrutiny. The validation law also requires the difficult task of proving the bond wasn't physically present in Germany on Jan. 1, 1945, not long before Germany surrendered.

"There are so many problems with the validation process that there is no real validation process," said Tampa attorney James Lowy, who represents a group of investors separate from those Dubbin works for.

Dubbin said documents from a German archive show most of the looted bonds were returned by the Soviets, a conclusion echoed by historians hired by lawyers in the New York case.

Germany also has claimed it is not subject to U.S. court rulings regarding its bonds, a stance rejected by federal appeals courts in Atlanta and New York. The New York court, however, dismissed one bondholder lawsuit on grounds that they did not first seek repayment through the German validation process. The bonds in that case are valued at more than $400 million.

If Germany ultimately loses in American courts and still refuses to pay the bondholders, their U.S. attorneys could ask judges to seize German assets in this country or ask German courts to enforce the judgment. Lawyers in a separate case previously seized millions of dollars in Cuban assets frozen in the U.S. to pay lawsuit damages.

Richard Buxbaum, an international law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, said the U.S. government set up a fund for investors by seizing Chinese assets in a case involving unpaid bonds from pre-communist China. In the German bonds case, he said, the key for a U.S. judge will be to decide if Germany's system of authenticating the securities passes U.S. constitutional muster.

"You have to show some proof of ownership," Buxbaum said. "My guess is that the American courts would apply the German law."

Germany tried to win dismissal of the lawsuit filed by Dubbin's clients, World Holdings LLC, on grounds that the matter didn't belong in U.S. courts. But a federal judge in Miami rejected that and her decision was upheld Aug. 9 by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which took pains to point out the issue remains unsettled. Germany could still appeal the decision.

None of the bondholders suing in U.S. courts would agree to comment for this story.

The U.S. court battles are only the latest intrigue to surround the bonds, first issued by Weimar Republic in the 1920s as Germany struggled to recover from World War I, which had ended in 1918.

The bonds were sold in the U.S. from 1924 to 1930 to help Germany invest in new projects and industries and pay war reparations. One series, known as the Dawes Bonds, raised $110 million in 1920s dollars — the equivalent of about $1.2 billion today; another series called the Young Bonds generated more than $98 million — about a billion today.

Investors were told the German bonds were guaranteed safe. Even President Calvin Coolidge urged Americans to snap them up.

But things changed after 1933, when Hitler and the Nazis rose to power. Hitler defaulted on the bonds and ordered that none be repaid, causing them to plummet in value worldwide. Then, Germany began quietly buying them up for pennies on the dollar before World War II began in 1939, stashing thousands in bank vaults and reselling others.

The upshot was that Germany got to keep all the money raised through the bond sales, leaving investors in the cold. And Hitler was able to use a chunk of the money "to rebuild Germany's war machine," according to Dubbin's lawsuit.

Dubbin and Lowy argue the issue remains relevant today.

"It's a question of accountability," Lowy said. "They are saying, 'We will build things with your money but we're not going to pay you.' You think these bonds are safe. They're not."

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By JOANN LOVIGLIO, Associated Press Writer

PHILADELPHIA – The USS Olympia, a one-of-a-kind steel cruiser that returned home to a hero's welcome after a history-changing victory in the Spanish-American War, is a proud veteran fighting what may be its final battle.

Time and tides are conspiring to condemn the weathered old warrior to a fate two wars failed to inflict. Without a major refurbishment to its aging steel skin, the Olympia either will sink at its moorings on the Delaware River, be sold for scrap, or be scuttled for an artificial reef just off Cape May, N.J., about 90 miles south.

The 5,500-ton Olympia's caretakers monitor every inch of its deteriorating lower hull and deck, already covered with hundreds of patches. Independent inspectors have concluded that the ship could decay to a point beyond saving within a few years if nothing is done.

"It's an absolute national disgrace. It's an appalling situation," said naval historian Lawrence Burr, author of a book on Olympia. "She is a national symbol, and she marks critical points in time both in America's development as a country and the Navy's emergence as a global power."

Olympia, which gets about 90,000 visitors annually, closes to the public Nov. 22 to await its fate. Visitors to the museum pay up to $12, which includes the chance to board the warship.

Since taking stewardship of the floating museum from a cash-strapped nonprofit in 1996, the Independence Seaport Museum has spent $5.5 million on repairs, inspections and maintenance. But it can neither afford the $10 million to dredge the marina, tow the ship to dry-dock and restore it to fighting trim, nor the $10 million to establish an endowment to care for it in perpetuity.

"She's an icon," said Jeffrey S. Nilsson, executive director of the Historic Naval Ships Association in Smithfield, Va. "She's worthy of being saved."

Efforts to secure private or public funding have been unsuccessful, a stark reminder of recessionary times. Museum officials are reluctantly mulling whether to scrap the National Historic Landmark, said to be the world's oldest steel warship still afloat, or have the Navy sink it off the coast of Cape May.

The 344-foot-long protected cruiser ideally should have been dry-docked every 20 years for maintenance. Instead it has been dutifully bobbing — and quietly wasting away — in the Delaware since 1945 without a break from the wind and waves.

The waterline is marked with scores of patches, and sections of the mazelike lower hull are so corroded that sunlight shines through. Above deck, water sneaks past the concrete and rubberized surface layers, past the rotting fir deck underneath, and onto the handsomely appointed officers' quarters below.

"She generally looks good for her age, but her expensive pre-existing conditions make it daunting," said Jesse Lebovics, longtime caretaker of Olympia. "We're still hoping someone will step up. We're hoping for an 11th-hour reprieve."

Two local nonprofits — Friends of the Cruiser Olympia and The Cruiser Olympia Historical Society — are striving to drum up money, manpower and publicity from other historic preservation groups, veterans organizations and corporate sponsors.

"We don't want to see the ship reefed and the museum doesn't either," said Jay Richman, president of Friends of the Cruiser Olympia. "We're optimistic that a bunch of small groups working together for a common cause can save the ship."

Olympia steamed out of San Francisco in 1892 and served most notably as flagship of the Asiatic Squadron in the Spanish-American War.

Its vertical reciprocating engines, refrigeration system and hydraulic steering previewed the technological advances to come; its vestigial sails and oak-paneled, parlor-like officers' quarters marked the passing Victorian era.

From Olympia's bridge on May 1, 1898, during the Battle of Manila Bay in the Phillippines, Commodore George Dewey uttered the famous command: "You may fire when you are ready, Gridley." The Spanish fleet was decimated, making Dewey — and the Olympia — national heroes.

In a letter home after the victorious battle, Capt. Charles Gridley wrote: "We did not lose a man in our whole fleet, and had only six wounded, and none of them seriously. ... The Olympia was struck seven or eight times, but only slightly injured, hardly worth speaking of."

The ship later was active in the Atlantic, Caribbean and Mediterranean, served as a Naval Academy training vessel, and took part in the 1918 Allied landing at Murmansk during the Russian Civil War.

Its final mission was bringing home the body of World War I's Unknown Soldier from France in 1921. The vessel was decommissioned in 1922 and was largely forgotten until it was nearly scrapped in the 1950s — and local citizens rallied with donations and labor to bring it back from the brink.

Olympia opened as a museum in 1958 but funding woes and threats of sale or scrap have been part of its history ever since. The Seaport Museum itself has weathered its own share of storms, most recently in 2008, when a former president of the organization was convicted of bilking the institution of more than $1 million.

Meanwhile, two other beleaguered vessels nearby are similarly awaiting saviors: the USS New Jersey battleship across the river in New Jersey and the historic 1950s cruise ship SS United States three miles downriver.

"There's a lot of need out there, and the economy makes it worse ... but we really can't wait," Lebovics said.

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NORTH EAST, Pa. – Police said an Erie-area woman somehow managed to zap both herself and her brother with a stun gun during a drunken dispute. Darlene Newara, 45, will have a hearing Oct. 18 on charges including driving under the influence, disorderly conduct for fighting, and public drunkenness in the Aug. 8 incident.

State police said they responded to a disturbance outside an Erie-area store about 6 p.m. to find that Newara had been arguing with her brother and stunned him with the device, then accidentally shocked herself with it.

Police said she was intoxicated and had several unopened bottles of liquor in the vehicle with her three sons, who were not hurt.

The Associated Press could not immediately locate a listed phone for Newara.

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BURR OAK, Mich. – A man gathering sweet corn in southern Michigan is the latest to have an unexpected encounter with an alligator. The animals have been showing up far north of their traditional habitats this summer. Jeff Adamski of Burr Oak said he was picking corn near the Michigan-Indiana border when two women who were a few rows over came running and screaming, saying they had seen an alligator.

Adamski told the Sturgis Journal that the alligator darted toward him and kept coming as he backed away. Adamski moved faster, but then he began to worry about a child being attacked by the nearly 3-foot reptile.

He grabbed a 4-foot bar from his truck and killed it.

Alligators also have been seen in recent weeks in the Chicago River, a Boston suburb and New York City.

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By MATT VOLZ, Associated Press Writer

HELENA, Mont. – Two young goats wandered onto the thin ledge of a railroad bridge and spent nearly two days high above the ground until rescuers in a towering cherry picker plucked them from their perch, hungry but safe.

The rescue occurred Wednesday 60 feet above a little-trafficked rural roadway in southern Montana between Billings and Roundup, after a caller told the Rimrock Humane Society the goats were stranded on the 6-inch ledge.

The young female animals weighing 25 and 35 pounds mostly stayed on the angled ledge, even though there was a wider surface area on a pillar just a few feet away.

"The whole time, we thought they were going to fall off," said Sandy Church, humane society president. "These guys are just babies."

Church said it wasn't clear how the nimble-footed animals got into the predicament, but she speculated they wandered onto the ledge at night then froze after the sun rose and they discovered where they were.

The goats sometimes stepped to the pillar to urinate then returned to the narrower ledge, where they tried to rest their tired legs by tucking them under their bodies for a few seconds, she said.

Authorities were called Tuesday, when the goats were first spotted. But confusion about the location delayed the rescue until another caller alerted the humane society on Wednesday along with the Musselshell County sheriff's office.

The sheriff's office, Church and Cory Freeman, a humane society volunteer who runs the Animal Edventures Sanctuary, enlisted the help of officials at Signal Peak Energy, which operates a nearby coal mine.

Mine boss John DeMichiei volunteered mining equipment with an arm high enough to reach the stranded goats that eventually moved to the pillar.

"We thought they were going to panic, but it was just the opposite," said Church, who videotaped the five-minute rescue.

The rescue went smoothly, and the goats appeared to be in good condition at Freeman's animal sanctuary.

The goats had collars around their necks, and Church and Freeman were searching for the owner. Church hoped the animals weren't abandoned. But if they were, she already has talked to people offering to adopt them.

"Everybody loves an animal with a story," Church said.

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BERLIN (Reuters) – A British airplane en route to Poland was forced to make an emergency landing in Germany after a 56-year-old woman spilled a hot cup of tea on herself, German police said on Wednesday.

The Ryanair flight from Liverpool to Poznan made the unscheduled landing in the northwestern city of Bremen on Tuesday, local police said.

The British woman was treated for scalding at the airport and released -- but not before the plane resumed its journey without her. She later took a train to Poland, police said.

(Reporting by Michelle Martin; editing by Paul Casciato)

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By Brian Homewood

BERNE (Reuters) – Vuvuzelas have been kicked out of European competitions after UEFA said that the controversial plastic trumpets drowned out supporters and detracted from the emotion of the game.

The plastic horns became a hallmark of the World Cup in South Africa, producing a monotonous droning sound, often likened to a swarm of bees, which provided a backdrop for every match.

But they will not be allowed in stadiums in UEFA competitions such as the Champions League, Europa League and Euro 2012 qualifiers after UEFA's ruling Wednesday.

"European football's governing body has informed its 53 member associations that it has taken the move for reasons related to Europe's football culture and tradition, saying that the atmosphere at matches would be changed by the sound of the vuvuzela," said UEFA in a statement.

"The World Cup was characterized by the vuvuzela's widespread and permanent use in the stands," it added.

"In the specific context of South Africa, the vuvuzela adds a touch of local flavor and folklore, but UEFA feels that the instrument's widespread use would not be appropriate in Europe, where a continuous loud background noise would be emphasized."

CLEAR CRITICISM

The statement then continued with a clear criticism of the controversial instrument.

"The magic of football consists of the two-way exchange of emotions between the pitch and the stands, where the public can transmit a full range of feelings to the players.

"However, UEFA is of the view that the vuvuzelas would completely change the atmosphere, drowning supporter emotions and detracting from the experience of the game.

"To avoid the risk of these negative effects in the stadiums where UEFA competitions are played and to protect the culture and tradition of football in Europe -- singing, chanting etc -- UEFA has decided with immediate effect that vuvuzelas will not be allowed in the stadiums where UEFA competitions matches are played."

The ruling appears academic as the vuvuzelas have shown almost no sign of catching on in Europe in the opening weeks of the new season.

The UEFA ruling is the latest development in an apparent backlash against the vuvuzela, although the word itself last month earned a place in the Oxford Dictionary of English.

Several English Premier League clubs banned the horns in July on safety grounds while they have also been barred from a number of rugby grounds in South Africa itself.

Olympic Games 2012 chief Sebastian Coe said he did not want them at the event in London.

They have also been banned from the current world basketball championship in Turkey on health grounds. FIBA, the sport's governing body, said it was too loud, especially in indoor arenas, and fans who flouted the ruling would be kicked out.

(Editing by Jon Bramley)

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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Just in case it wasn't clear: Weapons and drugs don't make good charitable donations.

Albuquerque police briefly evacuated a Goodwill store Thursday after someone left a pistol, ammunition, a grenade and some marijuana in a collection box.

Police spokeswoman Nadine Hamby says the police bomb squad took the grenade away for demolition after determining it was a World War II-style inert — or inactive — grenade.

The police report did not list what type of guns were in the box or the quantity of marijuana.

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DES MOINES, Iowa – A "D+" campaign logo aimed at encouraging recruitment at Drake University is getting a failing grade from some faculty, students and alumni.

They say the logo is offensive, embarrassing and tarnishes the Des Moines university's reputation.

Drake spokesman Tom Delahunt says school leaders consider any reaction a good reaction. He says that while the "D+" comes across as a grade at first glance, it's meant to represent all the opportunities Drake offers students.

The Des Moines Register says Drake hired Cedar Rapids-based Stamats Communications to help develop the "Drake Advantage" recruitment campaign, which the university recently launched through brochures and its website.

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BETHEL, Ohio – For a second time, an Ohio woman has given birth to a baby who couldn't wait and arrived on the drive to the hospital.

Christina Schuler's 8-pound, 11-ounce son was born Tuesday in the front seat of the family's pickup truck. Her husband pulled over less than a mile from their hospital in southwest Ohio's Clermont County.

The woman from Bethel says her labor was even shorter than it was in December 2006, when she gave birth to her son, Ethan, in a car.

The Schulers also have one other child. The father, Nathan Schuler, says if the couple has any more children, they'll have to leave for the hospital a lot earlier.

They haven't decided on a name yet for the new baby.

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MEMPHIS, Tenn. – Diane Buckalew said she felt sick when she woke up and realized two rings she'd left on the bathroom counter the night before were gone. She and husband Carl, married in Las Vegas a month ago, realized Thursday their cat Jinxe had batted into the toilet an amethyst ring and Diane's 4-carat, $40,000 diamond engagement ring.

At 6:30 a.m., Carl called Mr. Rooter, which has a drain camera.

The Commercial Appeal in Memphis reported that two technicians dug a 3-foot hole near the front door of the Buckalew's home in Southaven, Miss., cut the drain pipe and asked Carl to flush.

Jackpot.

A technician's hands emerged from the muddy water with both rings.

Carl then wrote them a $895.20 check — which he said he was glad to do.

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By Mathide Cru

PARIS (Reuters) – The warmth generated by human bodies in the Parisian metro will help heat a public housing project in the city centre, the capital's largest owner of social housing said on Friday.

The building, located in the famous rue Beaubourg close to the Pompidou museum, is being renovated in an environmentally friendly way.

"Luckily, the building is connected to the metro through a staircase," Francois Wachnick from Paris Habitat told Reuters.

The calories emitted by passengers, around 100 watts per person, combined with the heat from trains moving along tracks and the underground location of the metro mean that corridor temperatures are 14-20 degrees Celsius all year around.

The project, which is based on geothermal technology, aims to draw heat from subterranean passages and move it to heat exchangers before supplying heating pipes. The system will complement district heating.

The project should slash carbon dioxide emissions by a third compared to using a boiler room connected to district heating, Wachnick said.

A tender for the experimental project, which is expected to heat 17 flats, will be launched before the end of the year, and work is expected to start in 2011.

But the system, which Wachnick said is also being carried out in Austria, will not be generalised in Paris because of costs and the need to build passages to convey the heat from the metro to buildings.

"We were lucky to find a passageway that allows us to collect the heat directly from the metro, without having to pay to build one, otherwise it would have been impossible," he added.

(Writing by Muriel Boselli; editing by Jane Baird)

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By MATTHEW BROWN, Associated Press Writer

BILLINGS, Mont. – Government agencies are seeking broad new authority to ramp up killings and removals of gray wolves in the Northern Rockies and Great Lakes, despite two recent court actions that restored the animal's endangered status in every state except Alaska and Minnesota.

Various proposals would gas pups in their dens, surgically sterilize adult wolves and allow "conservation" or "research" hunts to drive down the predators' numbers.

Once poisoned to near-extermination in the lower 48 states, wolves made a remarkable comeback over the last two decades under protection of the Endangered Species Act. But as packs continue to multiply their taste for livestock and big game herds coveted by hunters has stoked a rising backlash.

Wildlife officials say that without public wolf hunting, they need greater latitude to eliminate problem packs. Montana and Idaho held inaugural hunts last year but an August court ruling scuttled their plans for 2010.

"As the wolf populations increase, the depredations increase and the number of wolf removals will increase. It's very logical," said Mark Collinge, Idaho director for Wildlife Services, the U.S. Department of Agriculture branch that removes problem wolves, typically by shooting them from aircraft.

"You just have to accept that part of having wolves is having to kill wolves," he said.

But wildlife advocates and animal rights groups contend the response to depredating wolves has become too heavy-handed. They say a string of court decisions in their favor underscores that the species remains at risk.

"The draconian lengths they are poised to take really are a throwback, to when the same agency was gassing wolf pups in their dens almost a century ago and setting poisoned baits and trapping them," said Michael Robinson with the Center for Biological Diversity.

At least 1,700 wolves now roam Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. There are more than 4,000 in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. New populations are taking hold in Oregon and Washington, and wolves have been sighted in Colorado, Utah and New England.

Some of the most remote wilderness habitats are becoming saturated with the animals. As a result, packs are pushing into agricultural and residential areas where domestic animals offer an easy meal.

One of the more extreme proposals — burying wolf pups in their dens and then poisoning them with carbon monoxide gas — would be used only infrequently, in cases where the rest of the pack had been killed for preying on livestock, officials said.

More established practices, including shooting wolves from the air and ground, would be expanded.

In Montana and Idaho, officials hope to revive hunting seasons by rebranding them as "conservation hunts" or "research hunts." Also, Montana Democrat U.S. Senator Max Baucus wants ranchers to have more freedom to shoot wolves harassing livestock.

A novel, non-lethal approach to wolf control is being considered in Idaho, according to a Department of Agriculture proposal. After being surgically sterilized, pairs of wolves would be radio-collared and released — "to maintain and defend their territory against other wolf packs that might be more likely to prey on livestock."

Killing marauding wolves is nothing new in some parts of their range: In the Northern Rockies, more than 1,400 have been killed by wildlife agents and ranchers since the first 66 wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in the mid-1990s.

But Wisconsin and Michigan in the past avoided wolf killings, instead relocating plundering animals or taking defensive measures such as fencing in livestock. Under applications pending with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the states want new authority to remove up to 10 percent of their wolves annually, equal to about 110 wolves a year.

Government statistics back up critics' claims that wolves account for a small proportion of livestock losses caused by predators. They kill fewer sheep and cattle than coyotes, bears, mountain lions or even dogs.

Yet where packs get onto ranchlands, the results can be brutal for both wolves and livestock. That was illustrated in a string of recent cattle killings and reprisals outside the small town of Ennis, Mont.

Since late July, at least six ranches near Ennis have suffered cattle killings by a wolf group known as the Horse Creek pack, which lives at the base of the Gravelly mountains.

Within two weeks of the first calf being killed, wolf specialists with Wildlife Services killed two adult members of the Horse Creek pack in hopes of deterring the others.

One was shot on July 29 and the second on Aug. 6 — just a day after U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Missoula, Mont. ordered the region's wolves back onto the endangered species list.

After the attacks continued and several more calves died, state officials on Aug. 12 ordered the entire pack removed. Another calf was found dead on Aug. 13, and two on Aug. 17.

Two more Horse Creek wolves were shot.

On Aug. 18, three more calves turned up dead, bringing the total dead livestock to at least a dozen.

The remaining four members of the pack remained at large late last week. But there was little doubt they would be killed, said Carolyn Sime, Montana's lead wolf biologist

"When we authorize it, we're confident they're going to get it done," she said.

Rancher Jerry Dickinson said the Horse Creek pack killed at least three calves worth a combined $2,400 on the Granger ranch, which he manages.

Their carcasses were found on the Beaverhead National Forest, where the calves had been grazing. Others have disappeared without a trace.

"If they take that pack out, we've bought ourselves maybe two or three years until another pack establishes itself," Dickinson said. "Eventually another bunch of wolves will move in there and we'll get the same problem all over."

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By Jenifer Goodwin
HealthDay Reporter

Feeding obese mice omega-3 fatty acids reduced inflammation that can lead to diabetes, a new study finds.

Fish oil supplements that contain high levels of omega-3 fatty acids are one of the most popular dietary supplements in the United States. While omega-3 fatty acids are widely believed to be beneficial, exactly how they work hasn't been well understood, said study co-author Saswata Talukdar, a post-doctoral fellow at University of California, San Diego.

By studying fat tissue in the mice consuming fish oil, researchers found omega-3 fatty acids seem to act on a particular receptor on cells, GPR120, which, when activated, blocks inflammatory processes.

Chronic inflammation can lead to insulin resistance, a precursor to diabetes.

Therefore, "if we can fix the inflammation part, it's possible that we could prevent insulin resistance or even ameliorate diabetes," Talukdar explained.

The study was published in the Sept. 3 issue of the journal Cell.

Fat tissue contains macrophages, immune system cells that gobble up bacteria, clear out cellular debris and help rid the body of infection. But macrophages found in fat can also have a downside. When macrophages "go rogue," Talukdar said, they produce cytokines and other pro-inflammatory proteins.

A build up of cytokines can result in a "signaling cascade," that eventually leads to low-grade, chronic inflammation and insulin resistance, Talukdar said. In people with insulin resistance, cells are unable to properly utilize insulin, which regulates blood sugar levels. That can lead to type 2 diabetes, which is often linked to obesity.

While studying fat tissue, researchers found that omega-3 fatty acids, especially docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), acted on the specific receptor, GPR120 (for G protein-coupled receptor), found on the surface of macrophages.

The GPR120 receptor is found only on pro-inflammatory macrophages in mature fat cells, according to the study.

Exposure to omega-3 fatty acids activates the receptor, which reduces the runaway pro-inflammatory cascade.

When researchers fed obese mice omega-3 fatty acids, inflammation subsided and insulin sensitivity improved. Blood glucose levels also dropped significantly, Talukdar said.

But in obese mice that had their GPR120 receptor "knocked out" through genetic modification, omega-3 fatty acids had no effect -- thus underscoring the researchers' findings.

"Prior to this point, people have always suspected omega-3s are beneficial. That's why people have been taking them," Talukdar said. "What we decided to ask was why omega-3 fatty acids can be anti-inflammatory. This shows when you give omega-3 fatty acids to an inflamed model, it might help battle insulin resistance."

This study focused on diabetes, but omega-3 fatty acids may also help with other diseases in which inflammation plays a role, including cancer and cardiovascular disease, researchers said.

The question that may first come to consumers' minds is: Should I be taking fish oil supplements?

Experts note that a positive (or negative) finding in animal research doesn't guarantee the same result in people. Mice are often used in animal experiments because of their remarkable genetic similarity to humans, they say, but the majority of mice and other animal research fails to produce rewards for humans.

Dr. Jacob Warman, chief of endocrinology at The Brooklyn Hospital Center, called the results "impressive," but he said subsequent studies in people are needed.

Still, there's really no downside to taking fish oil -- and lots of people already do, Warman said.

Fish oil supplements are available over the counter, as well as by prescription. Doctors can also prescribe the drug Lovaza, made from fish oil, to help lower triglycerides in those with very high levels, Warman said.

However, to prevent diabetes and many other chronic diseases, your best bet is still to lose weight if you're obese, exercise and eat a healthy diet, Warman said.

"But patients with a history of diabetes in the family or patients who have metabolic syndrome, including obesity, high triglycerides, elevated blood pressure, elevated uric acid and low HDL levels," might want to try fish oil supplements, Warman said. "There is no downside."

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By Lisa Richwine

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A biotechnology company's genetically engineered salmon are as safe to eat as other Atlantic salmon, U.S. regulators said as they weighed approval of the first DNA-altered animal for Americans' dinner plates.

The AquAdvantage salmon, developed by Aqua Bounty Technologies Inc, are genetically modified to grow twice as fast as conventional Atlantic salmon. Environmental and food-safety critics plan to fight against approval.

The success of the salmon is crucial to Aqua Bounty, a small company that has staked its future on the technology. The company's shares rose 26 percent on Friday after the positive comments from U.S. regulators.

The Food and Drug Administration has set a three-day public meeting starting September 19 on the DNA-altered fish, which could lead the way for biotech trout and tilapia.

In a preliminary analysis prepared for the meeting, FDA staff said the altered salmon were "as safe to eat as food from other Atlantic salmon." The agency said it saw "no biologically relevant differences" in vitamins, minerals or fatty acids.

FDA experts also said the fish were "highly unlikely" to cause significant harm to the environment.

The chances of the altered salmon escaping from production or growing facilities and reproducing, a worry of critics, are "extremely small" thanks in part to multiple containment measures, the FDA staff said. The bio-engineered fish are "effectively sterile," they said, and the company plans to sell only female eggs.

Massachusetts-based Aqua Bounty says the technology could boost the nation's fish sector and reduce pressure on the environment from overfishing.

But consumer advocates and food safety experts worry splicing and dicing fish genes may have the opposite effect, leading to more industrial farming and potential escapes into the wild. Side effects from eating the fish also are unknown, with little data to show it is safe, they say.

"The FDA is basically just assuming these fish are okay to eat," said Jaydee Hanson, a policy analyst for the nonprofit Center for Food Safety.

He said the company's testing was "one of the smallest samples of fisheries research that I've seen," For example, samples from just six fish were analyzed for possible allergic reactions, he said.

The company should have studied many more fish and run clinical trials to test health effects in people, said Hanson, who plans to testify against approval at the public meeting.

Aqua Bounty Chief Executive Ronald Stotish had a different view, calling the salmon "one of the best-documented fish in the history of fish." The salmon look the same as conventional ones and taste "great," he added.

At the three-day meeting, the agency will seek input from a panel of outside advisers before making a final decision in the following weeks or months.

The panel will hear from FDA staff, company officials and public speakers on the first two days before providing its opinion. On the third day, the FDA will take public input on whether the bio-engineered salmon should be labeled differently than conventional salmon.

The FDA reviewers recommended post-approval monitoring for any physical or behavior irregularities to check if the fish grow and behave in a similar way in a commercial setting.

Aqua Bounty originally filed for U.S. approval of the salmon in 1995. In 2009, it saw a $4.8 million net loss after restructuring in 2008 to preserve cash and focus on completing the FDA's approval process.

Shares of Aqua Bounty closed up 26 percent in London.

(Reporting by Lisa Richwine, editing by Gerald E. McCormick, Leslie Gevirtz and Carol Bishopric)

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By PETER PRENGAMAN, Associated Press Writer

SAN JOSE MINE, Chile – While a fire warms their campsite, the icy feeling between Cristina Nunez Macias and her mother-in-law is as palpable as the cold Atacama desert.

Both women are here to support the same man, 34-year-old Claudio Yanez, one of the 33 trapped miners in Northern Chile. But they barely acknowledge each other, thanks to wounds created many years ago, and have been fighting over who should get Yanez's salary and donations that have come from all over Chile.

"We have barely spoken in six years," said Macias. "And now she thinks the donations and help should go to her? No way."

The disaster that will likely keep the miners underground for months also has shaken the fault lines in their families above. Some squabble over who should get the miners' August wage, who should share in the donated food.

The local government has been forced to institute several measures: The miners were asked to send up a note designating who could get their $1,600 (800,000 peso) salary for August. There are separate bank accounts for each miner, which no family member can touch.

Social workers have been brought in to sort out who gets boxes of food, household cleaners and clothes donated by unions, companies and individuals — helping settle disputes among relatives of about half the families of the trapped men, said Pamela Leiva, the head social worker at the camp of relatives waiting near the mine.

"For each miner, sometimes there are as many as three families to consider," she said. "And to understand them, we have had to dig into the lives of the miners before the accident."

Those lives, just like lives the world over, can be complicated.

There are men who have been living with a partner for years while still formally married to a woman from whom they separated long ago, the result of a rigid divorce law. In a few cases, the legal wife of a miner has come forward looking for donations, said Leiva.

There are brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers on both sides of a miner who don't get along, or who depended on his salary to survive, meaning they can't just wait long months for their loved one to be rescued.

And of course, some miners have skeletons in their unexpectedly opened closets.

Leiva confirmed a story told by other witnesses: One miner's wife and lover were both keeping vigil at the camp. When the two realized they were both praying for the same man, they had a very public argument, and the wife tore down a poster with the miner's photo that the mistress had set up.

The mistress taped her poster back up, and beneath several poems and prayers she had dedicated to him, she added, as if defiantly: "Tu Senora," or "your wife."

Having to designate who gets their salary, a large sum in a country where the minimum wage is roughly $400 (200,000 pesos) a month, can put the men in a difficult situation, and limited communications give them little way to talk through the problems with squabbling relatives 2,300 feet (700 meters) above their heads.

Miner Claudio Yanez designated Cristina Nunez Macias, 26, his partner of 10 years and mother of their two daughters, an 8-year-old and a toddler.

Yanez's mother, Margarita, declined to be interviewed, but his brother, Carlos Yanez, 38, said the tensions had died down the last week, as the two women have had to make peace.

Carlos also said they had come to an agreement on nonperishable items: leave them in Christina's house until the miner gets out and can decide who gets what.

For all the fissures that have been exposed, the tragedy has also brought families together.

Maria Segovia said that a stepdaughter of her brother, trapped miner Dario Segovia, visited the camp one day and angered Dario's three biological children by telling local media she was his only child. In fact, she was a stepdaughter from Segovia's previous relationship.

But after the blowup came a makeup, and a stronger relationship.

"We love her as one of Dario's children," said Maria.

Despite worldwide attention, the miners' financial future is uncertain when and if they make it out alive.

The owners of the mining company, San Esteban, have said they may not be able to pay wages in September, and are considering bankruptcy.

The day after the men were discovered alive, businessman Leonardo Farkas donated $10,000 (5 million pesos) to each miner. That money has been put in the miners' accounts, and Farkas has encouraged Chileans to donate.

Money donations are distributed evenly among the 33 miners, said Leiva, the social worker.

While every family is focused on seeing its loved one emerge alive, there is another deep, longer-term worry: Will these men be able to return to work?

Many, psychologically and physically, may be unable to go back in the mines, or refuse to do so.

There are few other opportunities in Northern Chile, and many of the men don't have the education to do anything else that pays as well.

"A big worry is: How they will come out?" said Leiva. "They don't have other jobs."

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By MOISES CASTILLO, Associated Press Writer

NAHUALA, Guatemala – Torrential rains from a tropical depression caused mudslides that have killed at least 38 people in Guatemala — most of them in separate disasters along the same highway.

In the village of Nahuala, rescue crews on Sunday searched through mud and rocks for bodies after two landslides in the same spot killed at least 20 people along a highway leading northwest of the capital toward Mexico.

A slide Saturday afternoon had trapped vehicles at kilometer 171 of the Inter-American highway, and some of the people who came to rescue them were themselves caught by a second slide, officials reported.

"Under the earth there is a bus that carried we don't know how many people, and there are those who tried to help the victims of the first slide," regional fire department Maj. Otto Mazariegos said.

Rescue workers have recovered 20 bodies from that site, said fire department spokesman Jose Rodriguez. He said at least 60 people are missing.

A few hours earlier, a landslide on kilometer marker 81 of the same highway partially buried a bus, killing 12 people.

That led President Alvaro Colom to declare a national emergency. He said four children and two adults were buried in other slides elsewhere.

"It is a tragic day. Today alone 18 people have died, 12 buried by a hill when the traveled in a bus," Colom told a news conference.

The president told officials to close the highway for fear of more slides.

"There are several hillsides that are loose and could fall. So we ask the population to not go out, to avoid moving along the highways," he said — not long before new slides took more lives.

Heavy rains from Tropical Depression 11-E have pelted Guatemala for days, unleashing deadly mudslides in several areas, cutting highways and forcing officials to evacuate thousands of people.

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