Stuns

I am sitting on the balcony of the Grand Hotel Timeo eating almond-flavored granita (a kind of Italian sherbet) for breakfast and thinking about Lady Chatterley. More accurately, I am thinking about the real-life inspiration for Lady Chatterley — an upper-class Englishwoman who had come to Taormina and carried on a steamy (think R-rated behavior in an olive grove) affair with a Sicilian farmer. Part of the reason I am thinking about this uninhibited British woman is that D.H. Lawrence wrote part of his frequently banned novel while staying at this very hotel.

Jean Simmons, a radiant British actress who as a teenager appeared opposite Laurence Olivier in "Hamlet" and emerged a star whose career flourished in the 1950s and 1960s in such films as "Guys and Dolls, "Elmer Gantry" and "Spartacus," has died. She was 80. Simmons, who won an Emmy Award for her role in the 1980s miniseries "The Thorn Birds," died Friday evening at her home in Santa Monica, said Judy Page, her agent. She had lung cancer. "Jean Simmons' jaw-dropping beauty often obscured a formidable acting talent," Alan K. Rode, a writer and film historian, told The Times in an e-mail.

The mystery surrounding last month's slayings of six Pomona residents began to unravel Thursday when police revealed that they had arrested two gang members and charged them with murder in connection with four of the shootings. For several weeks since an alleged gang rampage took the lives of apparently unconnected residents, police reported that they had no suspects, no motives and no leads.

OAKLAND - Klay Thompson had just outdone himself and nearly everyone else in recent NBA playoffs. The shooting guard scored 29 points for the Golden State Warriors in the first half of a Western Conference semifinal game against San Antonio earlier this month. He finished with 34 points, 14 rebounds and three steals in a victory. Someone in the family wanted more, though, and you probably don't need two guesses if you're even vaguely familiar with the Thompson family's picky patriarch.

The cause of a sickness that affected 30 people on Disneyland's Pirates of the Caribbean ride over the weekend has not been determined, a spokeswoman for the park said Sunday afternoon. But two of the six persons who were treated Saturday night at a hospital for coughing, tight chests, burning eyes, skin blotches and nausea said a doctor told them that "a gas, something like Mace" apparently caused their symptoms.

This soup makes a good supper when served with warm tortillas. Put small dishes of sour cream, chopped green chiles and fresh cilantro on the table. You can add any or all of these condiments to the soup or sprinkle them on the tortillas, which you can then fold in quarters. Tips * If you are using fresh corn, pull the husks and silks (silks are the shiny thread-like strings that are under the husks) off the cobs and discard.

WE'VE finally found the answer to the age-old riddle: What happens when you mix the eye-popping world of graphic artist Maurits Cornelis Escher -- he of the stairways placed at impossible angles -- and the classic video game Doom, with its first-person mutant-shooting action and creepy, foreign environments? The answer: The brilliant, surreal masterpiece Prey, the first must-have game exclusively on the Xbox 360.

I was pleasantly surprised to learn from your article (Dec. 18) that our defense Establishment is endeavoring to perfect weapons that will "stun and strand" rather than "kill" the enemy. As commendable and refreshing as this concept appears, given our focus over the years on the enemy's destruction and annihilation by nuclear and other means, it does nonetheless evoke some concern by me and others involved with the medical care of our veterans. As one struggles with the pathologic consequences of toxic exposures during the Vietnam conflict and later with Desert Storm (multiple chemical sensitivity syndrome)