High Rise

Television and radio host Larry King is among celebrity buyers at the Carlyle Residences, a newly built high-rise along the Wilshire corridor that will celebrate its opening Saturday. The condominium that King purchased has three bedrooms and 4 1/2 bathrooms in 3,535 square feet. The asking price of a comparable unit is $4.4 million. Other Hollywood luminaries to purchase at the Carlyle include actor Bruce Willis and Irv Weintraub, former chief operating officer of William Morris.

Oooh, there's a pinch in my lower back. My head hurts too. And my vision is blurred from going through long lists of Southern California physicians who specialize in herbal medicine. I need relief, and I need it fast, but how does one go about choosing a medical marijuana doctor? "I am a person first, a scientist second and a friend always," a Melrose Avenue doctor says in an ad that can be found in medical cannabis magazines. I suppose there are advantages to having a medical marijuana doctor who is a friend always.

Critics decried St. Petersburg's decision to allow Gazprom, the state natural gas giant, to build a hulking skyscraper, saying it will ruin the city's czarist-era aura. The city's administration approved plans for a twisting, 77-story glass-clad tower near the Neva River. The structure would be more than three times as high as the spire of the St. Peter and Paul Cathedral, which is now the tallest building in St. Petersburg. Project advocates say the building and an affiliated trade center would be an important step in developing Russia's second-largest city, which has trailed far behind Moscow in cashing in on the country's post-Soviet economic transformation.

Drive through California's sprawling inland suburbs and you'll spot the familiar mileposts of a real estate bust: foreclosure signs, brown lawns and abandoned subdivisions. To see the damage in downtown San Diego, walk a few blocks. Then look straight up. There you'll see hundreds of unsold luxury condominiums stacked in vacant high-rises. Some units downtown are now selling for less than half what earlier buyers had paid during the market peak.

Wile E. Coyote would love it. Under an Acme Gadget Division banner, Ryland Fleet enticed passersby to consider his product, a .30-caliber machine gun mounted atop a vehicle and fired by the driver using a joystick. "You don't buy it because you need it," explained Fleet, who wears all black and machine-tools his weapons at home in the Virginia woods. "You buy it because you might." America's post-Sept.

When the Concerto high-rise condominium project opens this year in downtown Los Angeles, developer Hassan "Sonny" Astani will be lucky not to lose his shirt. With the market for condos in woeful decline, he already knows he won't make much money -- if any. Progress, at this point, would be to complete the $300-million project while staying out of bankruptcy.

A pair of high-rise projects planned for the Figueroa Corridor downtown jumped into the headlines this week, as if out of nowhere. The first, set to replace the Wilshire Grand hotel and office complex at Figueroa Street and Wilshire Boulevard, will be designed by AC Martin Partners, the big local firm. It has an estimated budget of more than $1 billion.

It is a complaint common to junior enlisted personnel in the U.S. military and one made famous by Goldie Hawn in the 1980 movie "Private Benjamin." Hawn, as Pvt. Judy Benjamin, is shocked when she realizes that her recruiter exaggerated when he described her future living accommodations. "See, I did join the Army, but I joined a different Army," she says in horror when she sees the barracks. "I joined the one with the condos and the private rooms."

A company that installs the oversized advertisements known as supergraphics has gone to court to demand that Los Angeles let it keep images on as many as 118 multistory buildings while federal judges review challenges to city billboard regulations.

Israeli ground forces backed by air and naval power fought their way into urban areas deep inside the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Monday, striking at the Palestinian group's strongholds but also inflicting a heavy toll in civilian lives. Medical authorities in Gaza said 20 children were killed by airstrikes, naval shelling and artillery fire that Israel said it was aiming at Hamas' 15,000-man paramilitary force. Three Israeli soldiers were killed in a "friendly fire" incident.