Plaster

As the giant spaceship crashes into the mysterious planet, the seats inside the movie theater heave back and forth and rumble like an earthquake. "Back ticklers" in the seats thump as an astronaut dodges fireballs and rolls on the ground. A strobe light flashes and huge fans expel gusts of air reeking of smoke and gunpowder. In the latest bid to attract moviegoers back to multiplexes, where 3-D -- featured in hits such as "The Avengers" and"Men in Black 3"--  is already the norm, technology and entertainment companies are pushing a new system known as 4-D. At the leading edge of the technology is South Korean conglomerate CJ Group, which operates Asia's largest theater chain and has set up a laboratory near Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood to demonstrate and market its 4DX system.

The actress who portrayed housekeeper Aunt Bee on "The Andy Griffith Show" lived her last years in seclusion in a dark, dingy house and kept a 1966 green Studebaker with four flat tires in the garage. The home of Frances Bavier reflects little of the coziness of the fictional house that Aunt Bee managed for Mayberry's sheriff and his young son on the popular television series of the 1960s. The 86-year-old Miss Bavier died Dec.

SAN YSIDRO - Two eternal truths about crossing the Mexican border: It's worth the drive to Rosarito Beach for Tacos El Yaqui. And coming back is hell. In the last several years, crossing the border from the Mexican side has become a test of nerves. Two-, three-, even four-hour waits are typical. As you burn gas, jockey for position in the lanes and swerve to avoid the vendors and begging children who weave on foot between cars, you are consumed by feelings of helplessness and rage that cannot be assuaged by all the striped blankets, Sponge Bob piñatas and plaster Last Suppers in the world.

FROM THE TIME I WAS A SMALL CHILD, I WAS AWARE THAT I WAS DIFFERENT. I looked different from my playmates. My two sisters looked different too. We didn't look quite like the other Laguna Pueblo children, but we didn't look quite white either. In the 1880s, my great grandfather had followed his older brother west from Ohio to the New Mexico territory to survey the land for the U.S. government.

LAS VEGAS -- Boxer Antonio Margarito, whose career was stained by the 2009 confiscation of plaster inserts inside his hand wraps, announced his retirement Thursday. "After twenty-two years of full dedication to the profession I love, I have decided to announce my retirement from boxing,” Margarito said on his Facebook page. “After thinking broadly and in detail with my family and my team, we have come to the conclusion that it's time to hang my gloves and start a new chapter in my life.

Sally Ride doesn't look like a woman outrageous enough to sit on top of a stack of enormous flaming rockets. There's absolutely nothing about her refined appearance or manner to suggest she has the grit to travel into the great, dark, airless abyss strapped to the seat of a hurtling piece of machinery. She's small, reserved, a reluctant heroine uneasy with eminence, a self-possessed but distant star who navigates her rarefied universe with quiet control.

Franklin D. Israel, a highly respected modern architect known for placing his individual stamp on the innovative Southern California design tradition made famous by Frank Lloyd Wright, Rudolph Schindler and Frank Gehry, died Monday. He was 50.

Police briefly arrested 98 medical students who protested planned education reforms by putting plaster casts on limbs of several of the capital's statues. The protest Monday night was staged to draw attention to a major demonstration planned for today against the French government reforms, which would allow only students who pass a special exam to become assistant doctors.

Wayne Hendrickson, vice president and general manager of City Plastering Co., an Orange County lathing and plastering firm, has been elected president of the statewide Lathing & Plastering Contractors Assn. Other contractors elected to office were James Johnson of San Francisco, first vice president; Vincent Panzarella of San Diego, second vice president, and Herbert Shearer of Bakersfield, secretary-treaurer.

Former Chancellor Helmut Kohl was hit in the face by a cream pastry during a book signing session Thursday. Police said they detained the suspected assailant. A spokesman for the Dussmann bookstore in Berlin said Kohl, 70, was not injured and didn't miss a beat. "The chancellor reacted calmly, wiped the pastry remains from his face and kept on autographing," store spokesman Thomas Greiner said. "He didn't say a word."