Big Question

Since February, the question has become so linked with South African "rave-rap" trio Die Antwoord that you'd be forgiven for thinking the cuss-word-laden query is actually part of the group's name. "Die Antwoord? What the ? ?!" The trio's name translates as "the answer" in Afrikaans. But that emphatic question has been posed all over the "interwebs" (the group's misnomer for cyberspace) thanks to Die Antwoord's hauntingly enigmatic homemade videos "Enter the Ninja" which became viral supernovas this year, racking up a combined 11 million YouTube views.

Los Angeles has a looming budget deficit estimated at between just under $100 million and as high as $160 million. A committee led by a former Clinton administration official has been convened to look for long-term cures for the budget headache. And the city's chief administrative officer has warned that although revenues are increasing, they're being outpaced by spending, with personnel and retiree costs taking bigger bites out of the budget each year. So all I wanted to hear from mayoral candidates Eric Garcetti and Wendy Greuel in Thursday night's debate was this: What exactly are they going to do about it?

I wonder which "Big One" will hit Los Angeles first: earthquake or rainstorm? DAVE DE HERAS Long Beach

What a team. Fun to watch. Energetic. Youthful exuberance jumping off the page. Championship caliber all the way. Those Clippers sure are a good team. But what can be done about the Lakers? Already lining up as one of the biggest busts of all time - and don't even compare them to the 2003-04 Lakers, who were tied at 1-1 in the NBA Finals with Detroit before face-planting - these guys have 28 games until the regular season ends. Full disclosure: I predicted an intentional walk to the NBA Finals a few months ago after Oklahoma City salary-dumped James Harden.

Fifteen years ago, I gained the dreaded "freshman 15" — times two. I packed on 30 pounds in what felt like a blink of an eye. Sophomore year, things were going to change. I adopted a Spartan regime: limiting my calories and fat intake, emulating Greg LeMond on the stationary bike and Arnold Schwarzenegger in the weight room. By my junior year, after a Herculean amount of effort and willpower, I had lost a grand total of 3 pounds. The weight I effortlessly gained seemed impossible to shed.

Michael Spinks will earn a guaranteed $13.5 million for his heavyweight championship fight with Mike Tyson June 27, yet Spinks has some unusual ideas about the fight game--and the money. "I could be happy without the fighting and the money," Spinks told the Wall Street Journal. "After I won the Olympics, I thought it was over, and went home to St. Louis and took a regular job. I liked it, too, except that (Manager) Butch (Lewis) kept bugging me to get back into the ring.

ROME — Quiet and bookish, a little colorless, Mario Monti doesn't seem the kind of man to inspire religious epiphanies. But his leadership of Italy in the last five months has moved one leading politician to declare it not just a "miracle," but proof that God exists. Granted, his transformation from mild-mannered technocrat to the man charged with saving Italy has been a bit startling. From a photo op with President Obama in the White House to a whistle-stop tour of Asia to woo foreign investors, Monti is on a tear, busy telling the world that his country is back in business.

It's four weeks before the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline. Do you know where your big bat is? That has become an annual question for the offensively challenged Angels, who are perusing a hitters market that could include the likes of Colorado's Matt Holliday and Garrett Atkins, Pittsburgh's Jason Bay, Cincinnati's Adam Dunn and, if Atlanta falls out of contention, Mark Teixeira. "You're always looking to see what you can do to improve your team," Angels owner Arte Moreno said.

Until recently, an enlarged photograph of Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant in happier times hung at the forefront of the hallway gallery leading to the gym in the Laker practice facility. They were wearing leather Laker varsity jackets and sitting amid their three NBA championship trophies, beaming. They were so happy, it would later become wrenching to look at and remember how simple Bryant's world was then, and the team's -- and how recently.

"If I were to really, really know, I feel certain that I should then ask, 'Please, may I now leave?' " writes writer Jamaica Kincaid. "Any answer is blasphemy," says a Hindu scholar. But Life magazine persisted in asking, and in the December issue, everyone from Muhammad Ali to Jackie Mason, Mike Ditka, Richard Nixon, Willie Nelson, Armand Hammer, Isaac Bashevis Singer and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar offers answers to the age-old questions: "Why are we here? What is the meaning of life?"

PARK CITY, Utah - Ellen Page may have burst onto the scene personifying teenage wise-aleckiness in “Juno,” but ask her a question these days and she's likely to offer some deadly serious thoughts about the state of the universe. “The moment I open my eyes in the morning, I am knowingly oppressing a lot of the world. Because of my existence and because of all the privileges I was born with,” said the star of Sundance buzz pic “The East” as well as Lynn Shelton's “Touchy Feely,” also at the fest.

"How much do I reveal about myself?" "How do I stay current?" "How do I stay soulful?" These are some of the issues Beyoncé has been grappling with of late, if the trailer for her upcoming HBO documentary is any indication. Scheduled to premiere on the premium-cable network Feb. 16, "Life Is But a Dream" appears to offer a behind-the-scenes peek at the singer's personal and professional life, with rehearsal footage and scenes of airport-paparazzi madness intercut with harsh webcam close-ups and an oh-so-precious ultrasound image.

Waging Heavy Peace A Hippie Dream Neil Young Blue Rider Press: 502 pp., $30 Back in high school (a long time ago, but bear with me), my mother and I had an argument about Neil Young. I'd been blaring one of his albums - "Rust Never Sleeps"? "Zuma"? - and she came to my room to tell me to turn it down. When I protested that Young was a genius, my mother looked at me as if I were speaking a language she didn't understand. "If he was a genius," she told me, "he wouldn't be playing electric guitar.

Los Angeles took its biggest step yet toward luring the NFL back after a 17-year absence, signing off on crucial agreements for a new downtown stadium even though it remains unclear who will own the company seeking to build the $1.2-billion facility. City Council members unanimously approved an array of documents that will clear the path for 72,000-seat Farmers Field, billed as the most environmentally friendly stadium in NFL history, to rise on the southwest edge of downtown. The complex deal could further establish downtown Los Angeles - home to the Lakers, Clippers and Kings - as a professional sports powerhouse, sparking new economic activity and bringing major renovations to the struggling Los Angeles Convention Center next door.

Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol were in the Lakers' training facility on the same day, possibly for the last time. They arrived several hours apart for their exit interviews Wednesday and then stepped into the sunshine afterward, though nothing looked overly bright about the Lakers' future. "There will be some change," said Lakers General Manager Mitch Kupchak, the sting still fresh from another ouster in the Western Conference semifinals. "When you lose before you think you should have lost, you have to open up all opportunities.

ROME — Quiet and bookish, a little colorless, Mario Monti doesn't seem the kind of man to inspire religious epiphanies. But his leadership of Italy in the last five months has moved one leading politician to declare it not just a "miracle," but proof that God exists. Granted, his transformation from mild-mannered technocrat to the man charged with saving Italy has been a bit startling. From a photo op with President Obama in the White House to a whistle-stop tour of Asia to woo foreign investors, Monti is on a tear, busy telling the world that his country is back in business.

Equipped with a long, rusty nail for a pole, some borrowed bait tied to the end of three feet of line with no hook, the 7-year-old boy was explaining to his classmates from the Mothers at Work children's center about the one that got away. "I almost caught a fish. It was about this long," he said, spreading his hands a foot apart. "But it bit me. It was big. It had small teeth," the boy called B.J.

For the last 40 years or so, many baby boomers have saved and invested diligently for their retirement. Now they may face a much different challenge: finding buyers for the mutual funds, individual stocks and other assets they'll need to sell to pay for their golden years. The demographic bulge of the 70-million-some boomers has driven U.S. economic and market trends in each decade since World War II. They powered the housing market for much of that period, inspired an explosion of brand-name consumer goods and, in the 1980s and '90s, helped stoke the greatest stock bull move of all time.

When he was a boy in Douala, Cameroon, it is doubtful that Samuel Eto'o Fils could have located Makhachkala, Russia, on a map. Even the most dedicated geography teacher would have had no reason to introduce the youth to the bleak city on the shores of the Caspian Sea. But on Thursday, Samuel Eto'o, as he is more commonly known, will be winging his way north, leaving behind Inter Milan and Italy to join his new soccer club, FC Anzhi Makhachkala....