Cramps

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday cautioned consumers against using quinine for leg cramps, warning that the drug could cause severe side effects, including death. Quinine, sold in this country under the brand name Qualaquin, is approved for treatment of uncomplicated malaria, but has a long history of use as a remedy for leg cramps, especially at night. In many countries, it is sold over the counter. Studies have shown that it can reduce the incidence of cramps by one-third to one-half but that as many as one in every 25 users can suffer serious side effects.

I love my dog. Sure, he has issues - what lover doesn't? He wheezes when he sleeps, or when he's awake. There is an unexplainable darkness to his soul that emerges when he's under extreme stress. He also has a taste for the blood in mosquito bites. (The vet thinks he might be a vampire.) Being from L.A., our dog is prone to anxiety attacks and an almost debilitating sense of envy, particularly when coming upon younger, fitter dogs, which almost all dogs are. The last time we weighed him, he was close to 300 pounds.

I would like to tell you about a remedy for leg cramps or spasms. One evening we were playing cards with some friends, and suddenly my husband bent over with a severe leg cramp. Our host went to the refrigerator, got the jar of pickles and poured 1/4 glass of pickle juice. He told my husband to drink it, and the leg cramps eased almost immediately. Have you ever heard of such a remedy? We have heard from many other readers that pickle juice can ease leg cramps. Scientists at Brigham Young University recently tested this remedy on 10 college students.

The golf course is in pristine condition, there's nary a breeze, and you're about to sink a birdie on the 18th green. But just as the putter is about to meet the ball, your wrist jerks involuntarily - sending your round white nemesis 3 inches too far to the left. Known as "the yips," this infuriating twitch has caused many a golfer to increase what would otherwise have been a perfectly respectable handicap. To the untrained eye, it looks like a clear-cut case of nerves kicking in at a crucial moment.

Opening their Saturday soiree at the Hollywood Palladium with the one-two punch of the "2001" theme and a deconstruction of Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel," the Cramps commanded the packed house's rapt attention for the next hour-plus.

After floundering through a stretch of erratic live shows, numerous personnel shifts, record company woes and the danger of being stuck in a stylistic rut, the Cramps hit the Palladium on Friday with a healthy display of full-blooded, sexy, silly rock 'n' roll mayhem. Like the Ramones, the Cramps never veer very far from their original game plan. But behind their strongest album in years, "Stay Sick!," the band has recaptured its initial freshness.

Philip Sheng's style was cramped in a three-set match in the morning. Another three-set match in the afternoon sent cramps through Sheng's legs and put a crimp in the Thousand Oaks High junior's attempt to become the first boys' tennis player in 34 years to repeat as the Southern Section singles champion. Junior K.C.

I read that Pycnogenol may be helpful for hot flashes. Now a major warehouse club is selling it as a powerful antioxidant with supposed benefits for cardiovascular health, osteoarthritis, skin care, asthma and allergy relief and diabetes. Has any of it been proven? To our surprise, there are studies suggesting that Pycnogenol, extracted from French maritime pine bark, is better than a placebo in making blood vessels more flexible (Hypertension Research, September 2007), improving blood-sugar control and reducing cardiovascular risk factors (Nutrition Research, May 2008)

The golf course is in pristine condition, there's nary a breeze, and you're about to sink a birdie on the 18th green. But just as the putter is about to meet the ball, your wrist jerks involuntarily - sending your round white nemesis 3 inches too far to the left. Known as "the yips," this infuriating twitch has caused many a golfer to increase what would otherwise have been a perfectly respectable handicap. To the untrained eye, it looks like a clear-cut case of nerves kicking in at a crucial moment.

The state Department of Health Services is advising sportfishermen not to eat sardines harvested from Monterey Bay. The fish may be contaminated with a naturally occurring toxin that can cause mild to serious illnesses, or even death. Researchers with the department have found elevated levels of domoic acid, which is produced by microscopic marine algae, in the sardines. Symptoms of domoic acid poisoning can occur within 30 minutes to 24 hours of eating the toxic fish.

While the explanation for Rafael Nadal's agonized collapse during a press conference may have seemed underwhelming -- just cramps, the Spanish tennis star explained after getting to his feet several minutes later -- American Andy Roddick said he wasn't surprised that Nadal slumped to the ground. "When you go to bed and your foot cramps, it's the same thing but your entire leg," he explained in an AFP story. "That's just a matter of what part of your body cramps. Cramp in your ass, you can't sit on it anymore.

They love to turn up the volume to Sinatra's "New York, New York" at the U.S. Open tennis tournament. While huge crowds move around in ever-present heat and humidity, they are told in song, constantly, that if you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere. The tennis players would second that. Their only request might be that, on top of the big paychecks and trophies, somebody might also hand out Purple Hearts. It is Labor Day weekend, and the toughest tournament in the world to survive, much less win, is in full bombast.

Reporting from Denver Rubby De La Rosa said he knew how hard he had thrown the ball to strike out Troy Tulowitzki to end the third inning. "Whenever I pitch, I always look," De La Rosa said of the stadium radar gun. In this instance, the pitch registered 100 mph, the first triple-digit clocking by a Dodgers pitcher since Jonathan Broxton in 2009. "That's normal," De La Rosa said, smiling. A stand-in for the sidelined Jon Garland , De La Rosa improved to 3-0 in the Dodgers' 10-8 victory over the Colorado Rockies on Sunday.

Airline fees and cramped seats are top complaints of air travelers, according to a Consumer Reports survey that also found fliers rating Southwest Airlines as the best carrier and US Airways as the worst. The results, released Tuesday, were based on a survey of 14,861 Consumer Reports readers who flew between January 2010 and January 2011. Although they “might not reflect the U.S. population as a whole,” the magazine acknowledged, the results of its first airline survey since 2007 were intriguing.

Although there are 30 major league ballparks to visit, there are actually 31 destinations where you can see a live major league game. No. 31? Welcome to the Wrigley rooftops on Chicago's North Side. For more than 50 years, enterprising occupants of multistory residential buildings on Sheffield and Waveland avenues, behind Wrigley Field, hauled lawn chairs, barbecues and coolers up to their roofs and peered over the fences to see the Cubs for free. Over time, this cherished custom has morphed into a commercial enterprise.

Consumers are already seeing the fallout from turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa every time they fill their gas tanks. It's what they don't see that's the bigger worry for the U.S. economy. From the farm to the factory, businesses are facing higher costs to grow the nation's food, ship goods and manufacture products at a time when they're already cautious about hiring new employees or placing big orders. The added burden of sustained fuel price increases could slow the nation's already sluggish economic growth, analysts said.

In the heart of Orange County, along the popular Bolsa Avenue strip, most signs are only printed in Vietnamese, and almost all of the 200,000 Vietnamese residents come together to share in their community. Calendar Live! discovers what is popularly called Little Saigon and takes a culinary tour of Vietnamese restaurants and Pho noodle shops that are serving food the way they did in the Old Country far across the Pacific.

Reporting from St. Louis — Figuratively and literally, the Dodgers are limping out of St. Louis. The Dodgers on Saturday moved to within a defeat of being swept in a four-game series by the St. Louis Cardinals, losing, 2-0, in a game in which James Loney had to be helped off the field at Busch Stadium. With Andre Ethier standing on first base and none out in the top of the ninth inning, Loney grabbed his left hamstring after taking a swing that resulted in a popout to first base.

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday cautioned consumers against using quinine for leg cramps, warning that the drug could cause severe side effects, including death. Quinine, sold in this country under the brand name Qualaquin, is approved for treatment of uncomplicated malaria, but has a long history of use as a remedy for leg cramps, especially at night. In many countries, it is sold over the counter. Studies have shown that it can reduce the incidence of cramps by one-third to one-half but that as many as one in every 25 users can suffer serious side effects.