Simulations

A strip club where two dancers performed simulated oral sex with dollar bills violated state liquor regulations barring lewd acts, Missouri's Supreme Court ruled in Jefferson City, Mo. The seven-member court unanimously rejected arguments that the meaning of simulated "oral copulation" in the regulation is too vague. The court said the term is commonly understood to mean oral sex.

Canadian defense contractor CAE Inc. said Friday that it had lost a U.S. Army contract for aviation simulation services worth as much as $1.1 billion to a group led by Computer Sciences Corp. of El Segundo. The news sent CAE's stock plunging 15%. Shares of CSC, which declined to comment on the announcement, fell 1.4%. The Flight School XXI simulation training services contract would be worth $1.

Even in this age of interstate highways and supersonic flights, few ways of getting from place to place inspire as much romance or adventure as trains. So what could be better than a game that promises trains, power and money? The popular computer game A-Train from Maxis delivers on this triple promise once again in a nicely done version for Sony PlayStation--a simulation game that points up how intelligent and challenging set-top console games can be.

Two teen-agers wore Ku Klux Klan costumes and pretended to lynch another boy wearing blackface at a high school Halloween party. All three should have been turned away, their principal said. "All of a sudden it happened, and we had to make a quick decision," Yosemite High School Principal Bob LaBelle said. "If I had to make (the choice) again, they wouldn't get in. We screwed up."

This is a re-creation: Anchors Maria Shriver, Mary Alice Williams and Chuck Scarborough were in the screening room, watching footage of themselves from the premiere of the new NBC News program, "Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow." And they were euphoric. Scarborough: "God, I'm a commanding figure. Notice how I speak deeply and earnestly, my granite chin thrust toward the camera just so, implying strength and authority. My eyes have never sparkled like this before.

In a small computer laboratory in downtown Chicago, epidemiologist Colleen Monahan is playing a video game designed to terrify the city's public health workers. The scenario is grim: Someone has unleashed an unknown biological agent in several skyscrapers. Clouds of noxious gas are billowing in the streets, poisoning the air and seeping into the soil. The millions of sick and dying overwhelm the city's hospitals and clinics. What happens next?

Sheryl Luera, a healthy, 29-year-old lifeguard, was described as a decrepit man with a dislocated knee. A small cabin cruiser bore a sign proclaiming it a jumbo jetliner. And the news media were squired to the event on a palatial, 85-foot yacht while being treated to a breakfast that featured raspberries, slivered melon and fresh croissants. If it all sounds a bit unreal, it was.

First came the thunderous rumble. Then, the small room began to shake. The children looked at each other knowingly as the tremble roared louder. "Earthquake!" bellowed 11-year-old Maynard Lee, before he wrapped his arms around his stomach . . . and laughed. His friends, too, were chuckling. "I wasn't scared for one minute," Tony Ulloa, 11, said afterward as he stepped out of a van whose loud engine had been running.

Two air show planes simulating the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor collided and crashed Saturday, killing both pilots. At least 1,200 spectators witnessed the crash about 150 feet above Keystone Air Park, said Capt. Tim Martin of the Clay County Sheriff's Office. The victims were part of the Valiant Air Command, a group of four pilots and planes that fly mostly in Florida and Georgia, Martin said.

All my life I've loved things that fly. At age 9, I used to put live lizards in little plastic tubes with silk parachutes attached. Hanging a parachute over the string of a high-flying kite, I'd trudge to the top of Signal Hill overlooking my hometown of Long Beach, find a scenic spot near the edge and let the kite soar over the city.