Novelty

As a child, she yearned to be just like Pedro Martinez, a pitcher supposedly too fragile and slight of build to make it big in the major leagues but whose next stop might be Cooperstown. At age 10, only a fourth-grader, she was on " Jimmy Kimmel Live," striking out the late-night host with a wicked off-speed pitch. By 14, she was in a Nike commercial, stepping up to a giant megaphone and earnestly declaring that she someday wanted to play for the Boston Red Sox. Hers is a Cinderella story in which the slipper might actually fit — size 5, with spikes.

Steve Kerr vividly recalls being a 10-year-old kid, with a basketball tucked under his arm, staring up at the rim from behind an imaginary three-point line he had paced off in the driveway. The basket looked a block away. "I remember thinking, 'How does anybody ever make one of these?'" said Kerr, 47, who never could have dreamed he would end a 15-year NBA career as the league's most accurate three-point shooter. That long shot - once dismissed as a publicity stunt - has fundamentally changed professional basketball.

"FROM LUXURY TO HEARTACHE." Culture Club. Virgin/Epic. Boy George isn't the eye-popping curiousity that he used to be. In 1982 the singer-composer's cornrow braids and R&B-flavored intro to "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me" marked him as one of the most provocative British invaders since the Beatles. But now Boy George (O'Dowd) is apparently more fascinated by cosmetics and updated hairdos than in making sure that Culture Club's sound is equally up-to-the-minute and riveting.

Spear guns, inert grenades, stun guns and loaded 9mm handguns. The holidays bring no letup in the number of real and replica weapons that Transportation Security Administration officers uncover at airport checkpoints. But finding them is more of a challenge at this time of year with the swelling volume of bags, many filled with food and novelties. Take the Christmas lights made of real green and red shotgun shells that were recently discovered in a carry-on bag at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey.

Robin Winters stood by a cart at the Everett Mall, fingering one of his creations, a backpack modeled after Converse sneakers, when an elderly couple walked by. "Oh, look at that," said the woman to the man. "Isn't that cute?" Once their excited chatter died down, Winters laughed and said that his Sneaker Packs, as he has dubbed them, evoke that kind of response continuously from people who see them for the first time.

A Halloween celebration will be held from 3 to 7 tonight in downtown Brea on Birch Street. Sponsored by the Brea Farmers Market and the Downtown Merchants Assn., there will be face painting for kids and Tarot card readings for adults. Produce, novelty foods and gift items also will be sold. Costumes are encouraged. Information: (714) 990-7137.

RE "For Kids, Friendships That Click" [Oct. 20]: Does the writer not have children? She marveled at the benefits and novelty of networking online for kids from junior high age through college. Toward the end, she acknowledged the lack of actual socializing face to face. More important, for a young person, especially a female, to place photos and personal information on a very public medium is extremely dangerous. A potential child molester, pedophile, stalker or just plain stranger could not ask for more.

Dell Inc., which has been pushing its computers into more retail stores, said it would close its 140 shopping mall kiosks in the U.S. Dell now sells computers and other devices in more than 10,000 stores around the world, including Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Best Buy Co., and the kiosks may be losing some of their novelty. Round Rock, Texas-based Dell began opening the kiosks in 2002 to boost sales of notebook computers.

Diana Ross and the Supremes' "25th Anniversary." Motown. AAD. The hits on this two-disc set have long been available, so the interest in this album centers on the 23 unreleased tracks (three of which are only in the CD package). The natural suspicion is that if the recordings were any good they would have been released years ago, but many of them are surprisingly strong, including tracks left off a 1967 tribute to the songwriting team of Rodgers and Hart. A highlight: "Those D.J.

If Shakira wants to be taken seriously in her attempt to capture the U.S. market ("Across the English Divide," by Agustin Gurza, Nov. 4), she should begin by avoiding any more garish performances like the one she executed at last year's inaugural Latin Grammy Awards. That spectacle belonged more in a second-rate Las Vegas lounge act rather than on national TV. Her lyrics are, indeed, more polished than the usual fare we get from some novelty Latino acts. However, any credibility she has attained is certain to be lost if she continues her corporate sellout journey as evidenced in her Pepsi commercial.

Warren Buffett: party boy? It's no secret that the octogenarian Oracle of Omaha knows how to get down. He plays pingpong at shareholder meetings for his investment firm Berkshire Hathaway Inc. He plays the ukulele on television. He has sung songs while dressed as a paperboy, a rapper and rocker Axl Rose of Guns N' Roses. Now, the multibillionaire financier can have even more good times, with his purchase Friday of discount party goods retailer Oriental Trading Co. The mail-order merchant sells a cornucopia of more than 40,000 party supplies, crafts, school supplies, toys and novelties directly to consumers.

SAN FRANCISCO - For teens, it has been an essential rite of passage: They turn 13 and join Facebook. Since she signed up three years ago, friend requests and status updates are as much a part of Meera Kumar's life as homework and exams at Menlo School, the elite private school in leafy Atherton, Calif., where she's a 16-year-old sophomore. But when her kid sister Anika turned 13 last year, she gave Facebook a pass. "I guess I haven't been that interested in it," said Anika, who prefers sharing photos with friends on Instagram via her iPhone or video chatting with them onGoogle+.

Connie Pentek's company might be saved by a voodoo doll. Pentek, who lives in Santa Clarita, started out in 1992 creating and selling homemade items influenced by the look of the French countryside. She and her husband, Gustav, lovingly made items such as hand-gilded lampshades and candle sconces fashioned from roof tiles. But apart from these pieces, Pentek created a novelty item that she initially made as a gift for friends. It was a stuffed doll with a muslin exterior, adorned with hand-written symptoms of aging that could be pricked, voodoo style, with a pin. Sales of the French-inspired items plummeted in recent years, especially as the economy soured.

Connecticut Atty. Gen. Richard Blumenthal prevailed Tuesday in a race to serve in the U.S. Senate, safeguarding a Democratic seat vacated by Christopher Dodd. Blumenthal fended off political newcomer Linda McMahon, a Republican who spent about $50 million of her own money on the campaign but couldn't convince voters, particularly women, that she could translate her business skills outside the world of professional wrestling entertainment in which she made her fortune. In one of the odder episodes in moderate Connecticut's political history, the race pitted candidates from wildly varying backgrounds.

If a musical is ever made about Ryan Murphy and his amazing Technicolor cast creating "Glee," the big climax at the end of the first act should correspond to this particular moment in time. The show has reached a peak, in terms of popularity and artistic ambition. In the last two weeks it's tackled two of the most controversial subjects of our time: religion and Britney Spears. The ratings are through the roof, the iTunes downloads just keep coming, and celebrities such as Amy Adams, Javier Bardem and future guest star Gwyneth Paltrow have all publicly expressed their enthusiasm for "Glee.

Julia Russell has had the great fortune to live out her passion: treading ever more lightly on the planet, making her home a laboratory and herself an example. For 22 years, she opened her Eco-Home to anyone interested in seeing what she's done at her 99-year-old Los Feliz bungalow: solar panels, composting, a front yard she waters maybe twice a year and that looks like a little woodland clearing, a backyard overgrown with edible plants. Hundreds of tours later, the idea of greening one's home and yard is nearing mainstream, and this summer Russell retired.

The Pet Rock, a big selling but somewhat nutty novelty item of 10 years ago, is back--as a home video "rock" star. At least this time the piece of granite does more than lie in a gift box, where it didn't need much attention or care and amused friends by obeying such commands as "play dead," and "stay."

Although Len Hall, Henry Einhorn and Greg Patus scored big locally with their first sports novelty item, success on a national level of their business "ballgame" remains a long shot. The inventors of the San Diego Padre "Fan Clubs"--the inflatable baseball bats that are being sold by vendors at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium--are among the hundreds of would-be entrepreneurs who each year approach big-league sports teams with what they hope are get-rich-quick schemes.

As a child, she yearned to be just like Pedro Martinez, a pitcher supposedly too fragile and slight of build to make it big in the major leagues but whose next stop might be Cooperstown. At age 10, only a fourth-grader, she was on " Jimmy Kimmel Live," striking out the late-night host with a wicked off-speed pitch. By 14, she was in a Nike commercial, stepping up to a giant megaphone and earnestly declaring that she someday wanted to play for the Boston Red Sox. Hers is a Cinderella story in which the slipper might actually fit — size 5, with spikes.

Herschel Walker used to tell friends at the University of Georgia that he aspired to be considered one of the greatest athletes in history. "And not just in football," Walker recalled this week. Since running the Bulldogs to the 1980 national championship and winning the Heisman Trophy in 1982, Walker rushed for more than 13,000 yards in the USFL and NFL, then retired in 1997 with the second-most all-purpose yards in NFL history. During his pro football career, he also earned a spot on the 1992 Olympic two-man bobsled team, and won television's "Superstars" event three times.