NSO starts season with a new face in Shakespeare

palette with which to depict an overweight, elderly man. Still, Elgar keeps his illustration fresh by avoiding sonic cliches — turning sometimes to the lower strings of the violin, or sketching the knight’s finalbreaths in a rattle of percussion rather than wind instruments. Unfortunately the orchestra wasn’t always together, which distracted, in the piece’s closing measures, from the delicate vulnerability of the music. For the Walton suite, and for the Tchaikovsky “Romeo and Juliet” overture that concluded the program, the NSO brought in actors. Matthew Rauch had the particularly tough assignment of declaiming a speech from “Henry V” between the last two movements of the five-movement suite; the episodic nature of the suite, and the fact that the music was composed with the idea of accompanying speech, made this less of an intrusion than it might have been, but the whole evening had to abruptly change gears when he began talking, and it was a little hard to follow. Before the Tchaikovsky, Audrey Bertaux and William Vaughan presented a balcony scene in which Romeo wandered among the musicians on stage while Juliet declaimed from the chorus balcony above; together, and with a whole scene to work with, they were able to be more effective, if a little overwrought. I’m not sure these interpolations actually did much more than emphasize the fall’s Shakespeare theme (there are two more Shakespeare concerts this season), but they were at least less distracting than the Baltimore Symphony’s unsuccessful juxtaposition of the Prokofiev ballet score and Shakespeare text last year. The Tchaikovsky was the most familiar, most accessible, and least successful piece of the night. Gardner is a capable conductor and showed his dramatic mettle in the Elgar, in particular, but the Tchaikovsky seemed like a temperamental mismatch, and he wasn’t able to rein in the orchestra and keep it from sounding, often, like it was about to fall apart. Tchaikovsky, to borrow a cliche, is a harder composer than he sounds like, and this overture, particularly its well-known ending, is better served by a no-holds-barred approach than by the slightly urbane, slightly decorous air that even at his most abandoned Gardner couldn’t help projecting. The piece is inevitably a crowd-pleaser, but it didn’t show Gardner or the orchestra at their best. The program repeats Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. The NSO offers two more “Shakespeare at the Symphony” programs Oct. 6-8 and Nov. 3-5.


Rasika review: A national treasure in D.C.

A collection of stars from Rasika: butter chicken, fiery lamb curry, creamed spinach and cauliflower with peas. (Goran Kosanovic/For The Washington Post) The following review appears in The Washington Post’s 2016 Fall Dining Guide as No. 9 on Tom’s Top 10. A collection of stars from Rasika: butter chicken, fiery lamb curry, creamed spinach and cauliflower with peas. (Goran Kosanovic/For The Washington Post) 9. Rasika Hard as I try, I can’t find an Indian restaurant in the country better than this one. A national treasure, Vikram Sunderam is a chef who never rests on his laurels and constantly refreshes his menu. Calling to me these days are roasted cumin-spiked corn cakes set on a brilliant red onion puree; Dover sole slathered in cilantro, mint and coconut and cooked in a banana leaf on the tawa (griddle); and ruddy chunks of lamb cloaked in a sauce that’s warm with cloves and hot with chilies. But even the chef’s oldies — crispy baby spinach (palak chaat), mango tart — remain goodies. Flattering the food are a gem-colored dining room and attention that bridges Secret Service watchfulness with Miss Manners’s decorum. The rare four-star establishment open for lunch as well as dinner, and offering a pre-theater menu for $35, Rasika will be even more accessible come next fall. That’s when Sunderam plans to share some of his secrets, in the form of a cookbook. I, for one, can’t wait to repeat some of Rasika’s magic tricks at home. 4 stars Rasika: 633 D St. NW. 202-637-1222. rasikarestaurant.com . Prices: Sound check: The Top 10: No. 10 Komi No. 9 Rasika No. 8 Little Serow No. 7 Inn at Little Washington No. 6 Minibar No. 5 Convivial No. 4 Kinship No. 3 Bad Saint No. 2 Pineapple and Pearls No. 1 All-Purpose


En vigor nueva ley contra conductores ebrios en Maryland

El 1 de octubre entra en vigor la ley Noah, que lleva el nombre del oficial Noah Leotta, muerto cuando fue atropellado por un conductor ebrio en diciembre de 2015. (N/A/N/A) A partir de este sábado 1 de octubre, los conductores que manejan bajo la influencia del alcohol en el estado de Maryland se enfrentarán a una medida más fuerte. El Acta de Reducción de Manejo en Estado de Ebriedad —conocida también como la Ley Noah— obliga a los conductores ebrios a instalar un bloqueador de arranque en sus vehículos, conocido en inglés como “igniton interlock”. Los bloqueadores de arranque son unos dispositivos que se instalan en los autos. Para encender el vehículo, el conductor debe soplar. Si los niveles de alcohol en la sangre superan los establecidos por la ley, el auto no enciende. La legislación lleva el nombre del oficial Noah Leotta, un policía de 24 años de edad, del condado de Montgomery, que murió en diciembre, tras ser atropellado por un conductor ebrio, cuando precisamente realizaba un chequeo de rutina de alcohol durante las fiestas de fin de año. La ley impone también períodos más largos en la suspensión de sus licencias a los conductores que manejan en estado de ebriedad.


If we’re not alone, how will we know?

that the flying-saucer craze, which had begun after World War II, was still in full swing. Before the 20th century, however, the notion that life existed beyond Earth wasn’t nearly so controversial. The idea, which dates as far back as the ancient Greeks, was championed by, among others, the astronomer William Herschel, the philosopher John Locke and the polymath Benjamin Franklin. And in the 1960s — largely as a result of the bold vision laid out by Drake and a small group of colleagues, including a young Carl Sagan — the idea once again began entering the scientific mainstream. Just how firmly reestablished it has now become is richly evident in “All These Worlds Are Yours: The Scientific Search for Alien Life,” by Jon Willis. In it, Willis, a cosmologist at the University of Victoria, in Canada, lays out the current state of astrobiology — the broad, interdisciplinary field of science that has drawn some of the most talented astronomers in the world. "All These Worlds Are Yours: The Scientific Search for Alien Life," by Jon Willis (Yale Univ.) The rigorous scientific enterprise Willis describes made talking about aliens respectable again, but that didn’t keep UFO believers from dropping their own convictions about visitations, abductions and other fringe ideas as Ben Mezrich’s “The 37th Parallel: The Secret Truth Behind America’s UFO Highway” makes clear. It’s a breathless, gripping — and credulous — tour through the wacky world of E.T. enthusiasts. In his much more mainstream book, Willis explains that Frank Drake was afraid right from the start that he’d be lumped in with the saucer people. He needn’t have worried: His approach to this risky topic was rigorously scientific. Drake guessed that alien civilizations probably existed (although he didn’t believe they were visiting), but he didn’t know if enough of them were sprinkled around the Milky Way to make the search for their radio broadcasts worthwhile. If the aliens were few and far between, he might have to look for a thousand years before he stumbled on one. If they were a dime a dozen, by contrast, one of their broadcasts could pop up in his radio receiver at pretty much any time. So Drake, preparing for a small conference he’d convened to discuss the matter, stepped up to a blackboard and wrote down what is now known as the Drake Equation to help astronomers figure out whether there was


In Maryland, Alex and Calvin’s Law and other statutes are taking effect

An ignition interlock prevents a vehicle from starting if it detects a certain level of alcohol on the driver’s breath and retests the driver at random points while driving. A separate law requires that all drivers have with them or in their vehicle a current insurance identification card issued by their insurance company. The card may be on paper or plastic or in an electronic format. Starting July 1, anyone without a card faces a $50 fine. In addition, vehicles may no longer be registered as historic if they are used for employment, “commercial purposes,” or commuting to and from a job or school. Also, vehicles with a historic registration that are a model year 1986 or newer may be issued roadside safety equipment repair orders by law enforcement officers. Several laws aimed at helping the homeless also take effect, including one that prohibits the state from charging a fee for homeless individuals to obtain their birth certificates, and another that waives the GED testing fee for homeless youth. Employers in the state will be barred from providing less-favorable employment opportunities based on sex or gender identity, and they will not be allowed to forbid workers from discussing or disclosing wages. Another new law requires the state to reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions by 40 percent compared with 2006 levels over the next 14 years, enhancing a previous law that required the state to reduce the levels by 25 percent by 2020. Home poker games, which are commonplace but technically illegal, are allowed in Maryland starting Saturday, as long as they don’t involve wagering of more than $1,000 in a 24-hour period and don’t take place more than once a week. In Montgomery County, a law is taking effect that requires all county employers to provide earned sick and “safe” leave, including time off to care for a family member who has been a victim of sexual assault or domestic violence. Companies with five or more employees must provide paid leave. Firms with fewer than five can offer unpaid leave. In Prince George’s County, the minimum wage will rise from $9.55 to $10.75, with some exceptions, including tipped employees, those younger than 16 working less than 20 hours a week, close relatives of an employer and certain agricultural workers. The county’s minimum wage will increase to $11.50 one year from now. Bill Turque and Arelis R. Hernández contributed to this report.


New musical voices at BSO, but program at Strathmore a disappointment

The Baltimore Choral Arts Society sang well in concert with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra on Thursday at Strathmore. (Courtesy of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra) The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra is sporting quite a number of new faces this year, and fresh blood always brings fresh playing. Music Director Marin Alsop has chosen some strong musicians who appear to have spurred their colleagues to up their game as well. At Thursday’s performance at Strathmore, Alsop and the BSO carried off Stravinsky’s difficult “Symphony in Three Movements” with confidence and depth at all positions. There was nary a flub in the woodwinds, the brass didn’t overblow and the strings played with bold sinew. This augurs well for such upcoming challenges as the Mahler Sixth and Shostakovich 10th symphonies and Strauss’s “Till Eulenspiegel,” works that would have overtaxed the orchestra I had been hearing the past few years. It is a shame, then, that with a finer instrument to work with, Alsop phoned it in with Orff’s “Carmina Burana.” Yes, the piece is going to get a standing ovation no matter how often or how indifferently it’s done; yes, it ain’t Beethoven’s Ninth. But that doesn’t excuse routine. “O Fortuna” had no hint of the underlying three-against-two meter, and the tempo left no room for the sudden speed-up at the end. In the strophic numbers, Alsop ignored the example pointedly set for her by the very fine baritone soloist Elliot Madore, who shaped each verse of his solo numbers slightly differently. The slow interlude before the “Round Dance” nearly put me to sleep, and many nuances right there in the score (“hairpin” dynamics and tempo changes) were done uninterestedly if at all. The disappointment was compounded because the singing, overall, was at a high level. The Baltimore Choral Arts Society, though looking a little understaffed, sang lustily and accurately. Soprano Anna Christy, although not pitch-perfect in “Stetit puella,” had a luscious, refulgent tone. Tenor Matthew Plenk sang every tortured note of his short solo with aplomb. All three soloists were making their BSO debuts. The program opened with the premiere of “Unsung” by Lori Laitman, a BSO commission. It was just the right length and style to be played as the credits rolled for a Disney adventure movie.


Near is relative, but this is still quite a distance

The 10-meter South Pole Telescope and the BICEP (Background Imaging of Cosmic Extragalactic Polarization) Telescope at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station is seen in August 2008. (Keith Vanderlinde/National Science Foundation/Reuters) According to the Sept 21 front-page article “40 years later: The murder of Orlando Letelier, ” Dawson Island, Chile, is “near the South Pole.” Not sure how you define “near,” but Dawson Island is closer to Bolivia than to the South Pole. Bruce Ellisen, Washington


Implication of sabotage adds intrigue to SpaceX investigation

to refurbish rocket motors known as the SMARF, is just more than a mile away from the launchpad and has a clear line of sight to it. A representative from ULA ultimately denied the SpaceX employee access to the roof and instead called Air Force investigators, who inspected the roof and didn’t find anything connecting it to the rocket explosion, the officials said. The interaction between SpaceX and ULA has not been previously reported. It is the latest odd development in the mystery surrounding the explosion of SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Sept. 1. The rocket blew up while it was being fueled ahead of an engine test fire, creating a huge fireball that charred the launchpad and rattled buildings miles away. From launches to floating in space, a look at SpaceX through the years. Elon Musk, SpaceX’s founder and chief executive, has called the failure “the most difficult and complex” the company has ever had. About a week after the explosion, he pleaded with the public to turn in video or audio recordings of the blast and said that the company has not ruled out sabotage as a factor. “Particularly trying to understand the quieter bang sound a few seconds before the fireball goes off,” he wrote on Twitter. “May come from rocket or something else.” Since then, SpaceX, which is leading the investigation with help from the Air Force, NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration, said it is narrowing down on the cause of the explosion, focusing on a breach in a second-stage helium system. At a conference in Mexico this week, Musk said that finding out what went wrong is the company’s “absolute top priority,” but he said what caused the explosion is still unknown. “We’ve eliminated all of the obvious possibilities for what occurred there,” he said. “So what remains are the less probable answers.” He didn’t say what those might be. The Air Force’s 45th Space Wing, which is helping SpaceX with the investigation, declined to comment because the investigation is ongoing. A SpaceX statement said that the “Accident Investigation Team has an obligation to consider all possible causes of the anomaly, and we aren’t commenting on any specific potential cause until the investigation is complete.” SpaceX and ULA are heated rivals that are competing over national security contracts that together are worth hundreds of millions of dollars. For nearly a decade, ULA had a


Beer of the Week: Founders Brewing’s Breakfast Stout

(Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) Michigan’s Founders Brewing makes two of the most highly rated stouts in the beer world: Kentucky Breakfast Stout, which is aged for a year in bourbon barrels, and Canadian Breakfast Stout, aged in maple syrup barrels that previously held bourbon. Honestly, though, I’m just as happy to drink Founders’ basic Breakfast Stout, which is world-class in its own right. The label describes it as a “double chocolate coffee oatmeal stout,” made with Kona and Sumatra coffees and a blend of chocolates. The nose is reminiscent of freshly brewed mocha java, and the silky-smooth body tastes of bittersweet chocolate, espresso, roasted malts and caramel, with just a hint of vanilla. Breakfast Stout hit the market in September and should be on shelves until December. I recommend stashing a four-pack or two in your beer cellar, because it’s the perfect brew to relax with on crisp autumn weekends. — Fritz Hahn Founders Breakfast Stout. foundersbrewing.com. $12 to $13 for four 12-ounce bottles. More from Food: Beer Column archive


Perennial wheat is an ecologist’s dream. Soon it may be what’s for dinner.

everywhere, some subtle, some not: The central piece of art in the modern, light-filled room is a pair of watercolors: one of a billowing tangle of Kernza roots, the other, the plant above ground. When the bill is presented, customers receive one of three illustrated postcards, including one that shows how Kernza sequesters carbon. It’s the food, says co-owner Karen Leibowitz, that needs to speak loudest. And it does. The bread, made with 20 percent Kernza, is a little spongy, perhaps because it needs a very wet dough to get a good rise. But it has a subtle malty flavor and was spectacular topped with both sweet summer tomatoes and cultured butter. Patagonia Provisions’ new Long Root Ale is brewed with Kernza instead of regular wheat. (Amy Kumler Photography/Patagonia Provisions) Jeff Casper of Minneapolis’s Dumpling & Strand, which focuses on “curious noodles,” says the future of Kernza lies in unleavened foods such as crackers, tortillas, cookies and, not surprisingly, pasta. Last month he began selling noodles made with 51 percent Kernza at local farmers markets. The pasta, he says, has a distinct nutty flavor and an attractive yellow color. “Looking at the eating characteristics, in combination with the environmental benefits of the crop, it’s a great match,” he said. Birgit Cameron, senior director of Patagonia Provisions, agrees that taste is the way to spread the gospel of Kernza. That’s why she decided to make beer with it. “People relate to beer,” she said with a laugh. With the resources of its parent company behind it, Patagonia Provisions has taken the lead in trying to scale up production of the grain. It worked with the Land Institute to have Kernza recognized by federal agencies as safe for commercial production. It has contracted with a Minnesota farmer to grow 125 acres of Kernza. If Long Root Ale, a partnership with Hopworks Urban Brewery in Portland, Ore., takes off this fall at Whole Foods Markets on the West Coast, Patagonia Provisions will make more of it. The company is also experimenting with new products, including crackers. For Cameron, imitation would be the most sincere form of flattery: “If we can take something like Kernza and show it can be a viable product, we can only hope that Coors or other beer companies would do the same.” Black is a food writer living in Washington. More from Food: Have questions about cooking? Join our


The central piece of art in the modern, light-filled room is a pair of watercolors: one of a billowing tangle of Kernza roots, the other, the plant above ground. When the bill is presented, customers receive one of three illustrated postcards, including one that shows how Kernza sequesters carbon. It’s the food, says co-owner Karen Leibowitz, that needs to speak loudest. And it does. The bread, made with 20 percent Kernza, is a little spongy, perhaps because it needs a very wet dough to get a good rise. But it has a subtle malty flavor and was spectacular topped with both sweet summer tomatoes and cultured butter. Patagonia Provisions’ new Long Root Ale is brewed with Kernza instead of regular wheat. (Amy Kumler Photography/Patagonia Provisions) Jeff Casper of Minneapolis’s Dumpling & Strand, which focuses on “curious noodles,” says the future of Kernza lies in unleavened foods such as crackers, tortillas, cookies and, not surprisingly, pasta. Last month he began selling noodles made with 51 percent Kernza at local farmers markets. The pasta, he says, has a distinct nutty flavor and an attractive yellow color. “Looking at the eating characteristics, in combination with the environmental benefits of the crop, it’s a great match,” he said. Birgit Cameron, senior director of Patagonia Provisions, agrees that taste is the way to spread the gospel of Kernza. That’s why she decided to make beer with it. “People relate to beer,” she said with a laugh. With the resources of its parent company behind it, Patagonia Provisions has taken the lead in trying to scale up production of the grain. It worked with the Land Institute to have Kernza recognized by federal agencies as safe for commercial production. It has contracted with a Minnesota farmer to grow 125 acres of Kernza. If Long Root Ale, a partnership with Hopworks Urban Brewery in Portland, Ore., takes off this fall at Whole Foods Markets on the West Coast, Patagonia Provisions will make more of it. The company is also experimenting with new products, including crackers. For Cameron, imitation would be the most sincere form of flattery: “If we can take something like Kernza and show it can be a viable product, we can only hope that Coors or other beer companies would do the same.” Black is a food writer living in Washington. More from Food: Have questions about cooking? Join our live chat Wednesdays at 12.


Neville Marriner, who led renowned Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, dies at 92

and others. From 1956 to 1958, he was the principal second violinist in the London Symphony Orchestra. The decision to name the ensemble the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields was a practical one. “It was the place where we gave our first ever concert back in 1958, so there’s significance in that,” Mr. Marriner told the London Daily Telegraph in 2014. “But the real reason we took the name was that the vicar let us rehearse there for free so long as we publicized the church. That was the deal. And it was his idea that we should be an ‘academy’ rather than the ‘chamber orchestra’ we’d originally planned to call ourselves.” St. Martin’s was originally intended to be led solely by Mr. Marriner from the violin, but as it grew in size and began to play more complicated works, closer control was necessary. “Having been refugees from the tyranny of someone waving a stick, they made me turn from poacher to gamekeeper, and I did it,” he said. Mr. Marriner had by then visited the United States, where he studied conducting with Pierre Monteux at a summer retreat the older man established at his home in Hancock, Maine. “The actual mechanics of conducting are not difficult,” Mr. Marriner decided. “It’s getting the confidence. It’s like taking a driving test.” After recordings made him famous, Mr. Marriner gradually expanded his conducting career beyond the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. In 1969, he became the first music director of the newly established Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, a position he held until 1978. He was the music director of the Minnesota Orchestra from 1979 to 1986 and enjoyed a long association with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, in Germany, culminating in three years as principal conductor, from 1986 to 1989. As Mr. Marriner’s orchestral career grew busier, the Academy was often led by other musicians, notably Iona Brown, Murray Perahia and, most recently, Joshua Bell, who was named the group’s second music director in 2011. But Mr. Marriner kept up his ties with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields to the end and was eventually named life president. He conducted the group in May 2015, when he led a benefit concert in London for victims of the Nepal earthquake. Mr. Marriner was named a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1979 and knighted


Dozens killed in Ethiopia after police use tear gas on protest at festival

What started as a holiday celebration for Ethiopia's Oromo people turned into a deadly protest as demonstrators tried to flee police firing tear gas and warning shots into the crowd. It triggered a stamped that killed dozens. ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA — Opposition leaders estimated at least 100 dead. Late Sunday, the regional government said 52 had been killed in the crush. The Irreecha thanksgiving festival of Ethiopia’s Oromo people takes place in October every year, at the conclusion of the rainy season, at a sacred lake in the town of Bishoftu, about 25 miles southeast of the capital, Addis Ababa. The Oromo, Ethiopia’s largest ethnic group, making up about a third of the population, have for the past year been protesting their marginalization and the confiscation of their land for factories. Feyisa Lilesa, a silver medal winner at the Summer Games in August, is Oromo and called attention to his people’s struggles when he crossed his arms in an X as he ran across the finish line in Rio de Janeiro. That same gesture was flashed by thousands of Oromos in Bishoftu during the festival, which participants this year said was more overtly political than usual. “I’ve been coming to this for years. There was always some small chanting, but I’ve never seen something like this. It was totally political,” one witness said at the rally that turned into a stampede. He spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of arrest. Estimates of the number of people flocking to the town for the festival have been as high as 2 million, but there were probably about 10,000 people in a field facing a podium where government-aligned tribal elders and party leaders were giving speeches. Authorities had tolerated the chants calling for “freedom and justice” and condemning the government and its Oromo political party throughout Saturday, but that ended Sunday morning. “The crowd started moving toward the podium. I heard the sound of a tear-gas bomb, and I saw police throwing them at the crowd as well,” the witness said. He said he also heard a few warning shots fired by the Federal Police, whose members wear a distinctive blue-camouflage uniform. People fled into the bushes behind the field, but they encountered a deep ravine, and it was here where many died, piling on top of each other in panic. “I saw people mourning in there, some trying to pull


Black Friday for orchestras — three strikes, and music’s out

even the arrival of a popular and aggressively populist music director, Yannick N é zet-Séguin, has been able to significantly boost ticket sales or help resolve the budget deficit of several million dollars. Musicians, who have taken a number of pay cuts and freezes, voiced concern that the decline in their base pay was compromising the orchestra’s ability to attract top talent. Pittsburgh, too, has been facing long-term challenges and a declining audience. With a gifted but micromanaging music director in Manfred Honeck, the orchestra has seen significant administrative changes in the past couple of years; when the new management assessed the orchestra’s current situation it discovered, the orchestra’s board chairman told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “that we were facing an imminent financial crisis.” The musicians argue that the situation is not as bad as management claims. The bottom-line argument remains largely the same for most of the recent and ongoing labor unrest in classical music institutions. Musicians are in high-pressure jobs that require years of training, the purchase and maintenance of expensive instruments, and irregular working hours, and they want to be compensated accordingly. Management finds that the money is harder and harder to get — depending, of course, on the community. (San Francisco, whose symphony last year signed a contract with base pay of $150,000 a year, is more affluent than Baltimore.) The Pittsburgh Symphony’s base salary is $107,000 a year, according to the Post-Gazette, and the Philadelphia Orchestra musicians’ is about $128,000. The base pay at the National Symphony Orchestra, for comparison, is $139,260, according to an NSO spokesman. Under the Philadelphia Orchestra’s new contract, the musicians’ base pay will rise to about $138,000 by the contract’s end — still not quite what the musicians were hoping for, although when talks broke down, the two sides were allegedly only half a percentage point apart. Pittsburgh’s situation is less easy to resolve; the musicians struck after management proposed a 15 percent reduction in salary. Similarly, Fort Worth musicians are striking after a proposal to reduce their annual contracts by three weeks. Still, one could hope that the rapid ending of this weekend’s Philadelphia story might inspire other orchestras to find equally swift resolutions. And in Philadelphia, Simon Rattle will be able to come in on schedule this week to start rehearsing the Mahler Sixth — a good way to put a double-bar line on labor stoppage, and move on.


Rice that cauliflower and spiralize that zucchini all you want. You’ll still miss your carbs.

the shelves. Wegmans, too, has a house version, and Green Giant is diving into the market. And Whole Foods sells spiralized zucchini and squash and riced cauliflower in its produce section. “If this gets people to eat more vegetables, and they’re willing to pay for the convenience, it’s a good idea,” said Michelle Tam, author of “Nom Nom Paleo.” At the same time, she admitted that when she first heard about the mainstream Green Giant line jumping on the trend, “I was like, ‘Ugh.’ ” Getting people to eat more vegetables is a virtuous goal but, Tam says, probably not the main reason companies are catering to the Paleo crowd. People who are interested in the diet tend to have disposable income and are willing to invest in a new lifestyle. “The people who go Paleo are just all in,” said Tam. “You’re willing to change your eating habits and your buying habits, you’re prioritizing paying for healthy, sustainable foods.” Boulder Canyon Foods is introducing four types of frozen riced vegetables — sweet potato, carrot, cauliflower, and broccoli — each available plain or seasoned, in flavors such as caramelized onion or cilantro lime. They looked into zucchini noodles, too, but those are more complicated to produce as a frozen food. Trader Joe’s began selling frozen riced cauliflower last year and a fresh version this year. (Candice Choi/Associated Press) “One of the things we saw going on in the market was that carbs weren’t cool anymore,” said Steve Sklar, senior vice president and general manager of Boulder Canyon. As of last year, sales of dried pasta have fallen 6 percent since 2009 and are projected to continue the decline. “People are just starting to get into this in a packaged-goods convenience category.” They’re getting into it in the home goods category, too. Oxo’s spiralizers have sold so well, the company plans to introduce two more models this fall. Mack Mor, senior product engineer at Oxo, said the company was wary of jumping on something too trendy, but after testers tried making zucchini noodles in the Oxo test kitchen, “We were like, ‘Wow, this actually scratches the pasta itch.’ Once we figured out it was something we’d all be happy eating, then we knew that this was something that was going to be around for a while.” Oxo’s spiralizers have sold so well that the company plans to introduce two more models


Ethiopia has a lot riding on its new, Chinese-built railroad to the sea

the China Global Investment tracker, Beijing has poured more than $20.6 billion into Ethiopia since 2005, much of it in low-interest loans to build infrastructure, such as roads, rail lines and telecommunication. On the train, with its clean, blond-wood interiors, loudspeakers announce the stations in three languages: Amharic, English and Chinese. All the attendants are Chinese. For its first five years, the new railway will be managed by a Chinese company to allow time to train enough Ethiopians to take over running it. The train line is a key part of the government’s strategy to industrialize the country by luring foreign investment — and the 70-mile trip last weekend between Addis Ababa and Adama attests to the plan’s success so far. From the window, the view includes not just traditional farms but also greenhouses marking the country’s burgeoning commercial flower industry and distant plumes of smoke from new factories. Chinese cement and shoe companies, Indian painting and textile firms, and numerous Turkish enterprises have set up shop here in recent years, attracted by Ethiopia’s cheap labor and electricity — and eventually, the government hopes, by its superior infrastructure. Foreign direct investment has grown from just $108 million in 2009 to an estimated $2 billion in 2016. A report by the World Bank last year, though, warned that Ethiopia still had far to go in its quest to move labor from agriculture to industrial jobs. About 80 percent of the jobs in the country are still in farming. Meanwhile, unemployment is at 17 percent nationally and at 24 percent in the capital. The economy remains closed and state-controlled, and the small and medium enterprises that would probably produce the most jobs are having trouble getting financing. Even foreign firms, which are given preferential treatment, complain about bureaucracy, red tape and the difficulty of repatriating profits and acquiring hard currency. The new factories are also being built on confiscated farm land, which helped spark the protests in the Oromo region that began in November and later spread north to the Amhara region. International rights groups estimate that some 500 people have been killed in the repression that ensued. Just on Sunday, police fired tear gas at a political protest taking place at an Oromo cultural festival in Bishoftu, the next station on the train line after Addis Ababa, and provoked a stampede that killed 52 according to the government — with the


of smoke from new factories. Chinese cement and shoe companies, Indian painting and textile firms, and numerous Turkish enterprises have set up shop here in recent years, attracted by Ethiopia’s cheap labor and electricity — and eventually, the government hopes, by its superior infrastructure. Foreign direct investment has grown from just $108 million in 2009 to an estimated $2 billion in 2016. A report by the World Bank last year, though, warned that Ethiopia still had far to go in its quest to move labor from agriculture to industrial jobs. About 80 percent of the jobs in the country are still in farming. Meanwhile, unemployment is at 17 percent nationally and at 24 percent in the capital. The economy remains closed and state-controlled, and the small and medium enterprises that would probably produce the most jobs are having trouble getting financing. Even foreign firms, which are given preferential treatment, complain about bureaucracy, red tape and the difficulty of repatriating profits and acquiring hard currency. The new factories are also being built on confiscated farm land, which helped spark the protests in the Oromo region that began in November and later spread north to the Amhara region. International rights groups estimate that some 500 people have been killed in the repression that ensued. Just on Sunday, police fired tear gas at a political protest taking place at an Oromo cultural festival in Bishoftu, the next station on the train line after Addis Ababa, and provoked a stampede that killed 52 according to the government — with the opposition saying twice as many died. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, assistant secretary of state for african affairs, last week described the government response as an “intense and somewhat harsh crackdown.” “We think it could get worse if it’s not addressed — sooner rather than later,” she told Voice of America. The unrest poses a threat to Ethiopia’s vision of foreign-driven industrialization. On Aug. 29, in the Amhara region, mobs attacked at least seven flower farms belonging to Israeli, Italian, Indian and Belgian companies. In a statement on its website, the Dutch-owned Esmeralda Farms said its entire $11.2 million investment, including machinery and greenhouses, was destroyed. In the first-person statement, the unnamed author laments how Ethiopia was once a safe country. “Last year I traveled 24 times to Ethiopia to start up the farm,” the statement said. “It was one of the most peaceful countries in Africa.”


Hints From Heloise: Stopping super lice

Dear Readers: What are the first signals that you may have a lice problem? Itchiness and white or gray flakes in the scalp. These are some hints to follow: If you notice symptoms, begin at the drugstore. Look for lice remedies and shampoos that contain permethrin and pyrethrin. Talk to your doctor and/or pharmacist about trends. They will know, from past and current patients, what is working and what is not. You must follow a two-step process to fight lice: You need to kill the lice, then repeat the treatment to kill any remaining lice and eggs. Daily combing with a special fine-tooth comb is critical. Wash all bedding/towels/clothes in the hottest water possible. Prevent a reinfestation: No sharing of hats, combs, clothing, etc. If lice continue, visit your doctor. Remember, someone who has lice is not dirty or of poor hygiene. Get help in fighting lice. Talk to your child’s school personnel — they can be a real help. Hello, Heloise: I read your hints every day in the Ventura County (Calif.) Star. My hint: I grab a hand wipe on my way out of the store. After putting my groceries in the car, I wipe my hands! Why use one upon entering the store? Everyone has handled everything at least several times. After getting home and putting things away, I wash with hot, soapy water. Willadean D., Oxnard, Calif. Dear Heloise: I’ve found an unbelievably simple and economical way to eliminate the juggling act during grocery shopping. Retrieve a legal-size envelope from recycling that has been opened lengthwise. Write your grocery list on the blank, unprinted side, and place your coupons inside the envelope. It turns out to be an easy maneuver. Thank you for all the great hints! Carol E., Annapolis Dear Heloise: To mash bananas in a snap, put them in a zip bag and roll with a jar, can, rolling pin or simply your hands. Also, for a stable, sturdy drink holder for car or home, for little hands or big ones, keep a roll of duct tape handy. A soft-drink can fits the hole easily. Rebecca M., Moss Point, Miss. Dear Heloise: When I’m out and I need something I don’t normally carry in my handbag (such as a sewing needle, an adhesive strip for a small cut or a black felt-tip marker), I always go to the woman in the room who has


Russia suspends plutonium deal with U.S.

Russian Federation.” It also cited an “inability of the United States to ensure the implementation of its obligations to utilize surplus weapons-grade plutonium.” State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau gives a statement on the U. S. suspending plans for coordinating counterterrorism strikes in Syria with Russia and negotiations over a cease-fire. The list of conditions for restarting the nuclear accord included items that have vexed Moscow for years: The 2012 Magnitsky Act, which punishes Russians seen by Washington as violators of human rights; the 2014 sanctions against Russia introduced after Putin’s annexation of Crimea; and the deployment of NATO forces in the Baltics and former Warsaw Pact countries that joined the alliance after 2000. Commenting on Putin’s move, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Monday that the United States has “done all it could to destroy the atmosphere encouraging cooperation.” The ultimatums prompted an angry reaction from Eliot Engel, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs committee. “If President Putin thinks he can bully the United States, he’s sorely mistaken,” said Engel, of New York. “Once again, we are reminded that American sanctions are having a significant impact on Russia’s economy and that Mr. Putin can’t resist threatening others and acting against his country’s own best interests.” Ed Royce, of California, the top Republican on the committee, blamed President Obama: “Years of empty words from this administration, from Syria to Ukraine, seem to have convinced Putin he can get away with anything.” The suspended nuclear accord, signed in 2000 and updated in 2010, required both countries to dispose of 34 tons of weapons-grade plutonium, enough to make approximately 17,000 nuclear weapons, according to a State Department document released after the 2010 signing. Russia had already soured on the deal over differences with the United States on how to dispose of the plutonium. Moscow says it has already opened a plant that converts the weapons grade material into fuel know as MOX, which can be used in commercial reactors; construction of a similar U.S. plant in South Carolina has been plagued by delays and cost overruns. The U.S. side has been split between those who want to build a plant as a way to encourage the Russians, and those who believe it safer and cheaper to dilute the plutonium into less harmful material and dispose of it, said George Perkovich, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Putin’s


How to get justice after the Wells Fargo scandal

give federal regulators the power to break up banks that pose a systemic risk. Wells Fargo may not pose the biggest risk or be the worst offender, but it is a good place to start. Third, customers should start voting with their accounts, moving them out of Wall Street banks and into smaller and better-managed credit unions and community banks. Bloomberg reports that since the financial crisis, credit unions have grown steadily, with millennials flocking to them. Customers could also pick progressive banks such as the Amalgamated Bank. Started by the Ladies Garment Workers Union in 1923, Amalgamated champions responsible banking, and is now campaigning to raise the minimum wage. Not surprisingly, it often finds itself at odds with the bank lobby in Washington skirmishes. Finally, Wells Fargo’s abuse of its customers should give a boost to postal banking, a sensible reform championed by Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and now part of the Democratic Party’s 2016 platform. The Federal Reserve estimates about half of the U.S. population can’t cover a shortfall of $400 due to an unexpected expense without borrowing the money. More than one in four Americans — 88 million — are either unbanked or underbanked — meaning that they rely on alternative financial services such as payday lenders and pawn brokers that gouge routinely. As Mehrsa Baradaran reported in the Nation, the unbanked pay a significant portion of their paychecks — around 10 percent — to use and move their money. This is more than the average low-income family spends on food. Low-income workers would be best served by allowing the post office to provide core banking services — savings and checking accounts, money transfers, and small loans in order to escape the predators in the cash economy. The post office has the infrastructure to do this across the nation, even in rural and low-income neighborhoods largely abandoned by both big banks and savings and loans. What the Wells Fargo scandal reveals is that when big banks don’t abandon these customers, they are likely to fleece them. None of this is complicated. Prosecute the lawbreakers; claw back ill-gotten gains; break up unmanageable and lawless banks; and encourage sensible alternatives. Fines large and small aren’t enough. Bankers need to be held personally accountable, and banks need to be broken up when they are too big to manage. Wells Fargo offers the Obama Justice Department one last chance to


Toyota switches gears, builds baby-like robot

Kirobo Mini, a tiny humanoid communication robot created by Toyota, sits during a news conference in Tokyo, Japan. (Shizuo Kambayashi/AP) The newest design from Toyota doesn’t have four wheels, or any wheels at all. The Japanese automaker on Monday showed off a tiny robotic companion called Kirobo Mini. The four-inch talking robot will be on store shelves in Japan in early 2017. Priced at $392 and small enough to fit into a car cup holder, Kirobo was created to respond to human emotions while engaging in conversation and moving its head and hands. “He wobbles a bit, and this is meant to emulate a seated baby, which hasn’t fully developed the skills to balance itself,” said Fuminori Kataoka, Kirobo Mini’s chief design engineer. It also comes with a “cradle” that doubles as its baby seat designed to fit in car cup holders. Toyota also says Kirobo may make driving safer. The robot may shout “Oops!” when its owner slams on the brakes, start speaking to perk up a sleepy driver and offer praise once it’s arrived home after a long drive. Kirobo connects via Bluetooth to a smartphone app costing users about $3 per month. Naoki Mizushina, researcher at Tokyo-based MM Research Institute, which studies the robotics market, said the robot was too much like talking toys, on sale at cheaper prices, and it seemed to lack concrete functions to make it a big hit, such as linking to online shopping or furnishing convenient information. “Will this take off? It might be tough,” Mizushina said. Toyota sees Kirobo Mini as a stepping stone to more advanced robots that will be able to recognize and react to human emotions. A larger version of Kirobo spent 18 months onboard the International Space Station on a journey that ended in February 2015. Before returning to Earth, Kirobo became the first robot to speak in space, including with Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata. Kirobo will start selling in Japan roughly a year and a half after SoftBank’s Pepper robot, which initially cost about $1,900 along with a $145-per-month service plan that gave users access to cloud-based voice-recognition and an app store. Pepper has flown off store shelves in Japan; it is expected to be sold in the United States next year.


Retail sales should rise this holiday, trade group says

Arkansas, New Mexico and Texas. The Labor Department announced the settlement Tuesday. The department alleged that the Springdale, Ark.-based company’s hiring processes and selection procedures at the six plants discriminated on the basis of sex, race or ethnicity. Tyson, which did not admit liability, agreed to pay back wages, interest and benefits to 5,716 applicants turned down for jobs as laborers from 2006 to 2012 at plants in Rogers and Russellville, Ark.; Santa Theresa, N.M.; and Amarillo, Houston and Sherman, Tex. Tyson will extend job offers to 474 of the affected workers as positions become available. It also will revise its hiring and training practices. — Associated Press Also in Business ● Some airlines are letting passengers change travel plans without penalty if their trip might be affected by Hurricane Matthew. United Airlines said Tuesday that it will waive change fees and any fare difference for customers scheduled to fly Wednesday through Friday into and out of five Florida airports. Delta Air Lines is waiving change fees on trips through Wednesday in the Caribbean and through Thursday at eight Florida destinations; fare differences would still apply. American Airlines will waive change fees on trips scheduled through Thursday in several Caribbean nations, including Cuba. ● PepsiCo is accused in a lawsuit of misleading shoppers into believing its Naked juices and smoothies primarily contain “high-value” ingredients, such as kale, when the main ingredient is often less nutritious apple juice. According to a complaint filed Tuesday in federal court in Brooklyn, PepsiCo cites healthy fruits and vegetables on Naked labels and says the drinks have “no sugar added,” although they contain about as much sugar as a can of Pepsi. In a statement, PepsiCo called the lawsuit “baseless.” The suit was filed by a nonprofit group, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, on behalf of three shoppers. ● Krispy Kreme Doughnuts agreed to buy the brand’s U.K. business from its private-equity owner, consolidating ownership on both sides of the Atlantic. Closely held Krispy Kreme will make the purchase from private-equity firm Alcuin Capital Partners, which canceled a planned initial public offering of shares in the British doughnut baker. The companies did not disclose the price in a statement Tuesday. — From news services Coming Today ● 8:30 a.m.: Commerce Department releases international trade data for August. ● ● 10 a.m.: Commerce Department releases factory orders for August. ● Earnings: Yum Brands.


NASA puts finishing touches on telescope to look to back at first stars

2018. The kite-shaped object beneath the telescope's mirror is its sun shield, which protects the Webb’s instruments from the sun’s heat. (Northrop Grumman) Looking at that infrared light will allow the unmanned telescope to pull back the curtains of the universe and see stars too distant even for the Hubble, the Webb’s powerful predecessor. The $8.7 billion Webb project, named for a NASA administrator who helped launch the Apollo moon program in the 1960s, began 20 years ago as a collaboration between NASA and the European and Canadian space agencies. The telescope is designed to work for at least five years and has enough fuel to operate for a decade. Central to its design is a set of 18 gold-coated mirrors that are sensitive enough to reflect the light of a single match struck on the moon. The light is analyzed and recorded by instruments that are protected from the sun’s rays by an umbrella as large as a tennis court. Known as a sun shield, the paper-thin layer of plastic keeps the instruments as cool as 400 degrees below zero. “In terms of sunscreen,” Durning said, “the shield has an SPF of about 1 million.” And just like an umbrella or a Transformer robot, the sun shield — and the rest of the telescope — folds up, allowing the 15,000-pound Webb to fit snugly inside a rocket. Once the Webb is launched, it will take about two weeks for the telescope to unfurl and another two weeks for it to begin orbiting the sun — at a point in space that is a million miles from Earth. By comparison, the Hubble is orbiting about 340 miles from Earth. The Webb still needs to undergo final tests and additions. It will be flown to Houston, Texas, in March and eventually shipped to South America for launch from French Guiana. Technician Marc Sansebastian will be there to make sure nothing goes wrong. He recently spent four hours inside the telescope, painstakingly applying a small device that will measure the Webb’s movements during a motion test. He said that working on something that has cost billions of dollars and years of effort is a little bit stressful, but also exciting. With a tool in hand, he said, stepping inside the Webb is like playing “the ultimate game of Operation.” IF YOU GO What: Where: When: How much: Special events: For more information:


Hong Kong student leader Joshua Wong stopped from entering Thailand

Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Joshua Wong shouts slogans outside a magistrate's court in Hong Kong in August. Wong was recently detained by Thai officials after arriving to give a talk at a university, his political party has said. (Vincent Yu/AP) BEIJING — The bespectacled former student leader was invited to Thailand to give a speech about his campaign for democracy in Hong Kong, but he was detained at Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport, according to a Facebook post by the political party he founded, Demosisto. Wong, 19, was later put on a flight back to Hong Kong. Chinese authorities have not commented on the issue. The Thai student activist who was scheduled to meet Wong, Netiwit Chotipatpaisal, told Demosisto that Thai authorities had received a “letter” from China. Wong last year was blocked from entering Malaysia, where he was due to speak on Hong Kong’s struggle for greater autonomy from China. Wong’s detention raises fresh questions about Beijing’s ability to exert control well beyond its borders. Last winter, the disappearance and apparent abduction of five Hong Kong-based booksellers rocked the semiautonomous territory, deepening fears that China will no longer respect the “one-country, two-systems” arrangement. One of the booksellers, Gui Minhai, was taken from his beachside condominium in Thailand. He emerged months later to deliver a chillingly incoherent “confession” on Chinese television. Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, said Wong’s detention showed a worrying willingness by Thailand’s military government to cooperate with Chinese authorities. “Thailand’s arrest of Joshua Wong, a well-known pro-democracy activist in Hong Kong, sadly suggests that Bangkok is willing to do Beijing's bidding,” she said.


How Walmart plans to transform the way we buy groceries

With its pickup service, Walmart is testing whether its best weapon in the fight for online grocery shoppers is its most old-school — and hardest to replicate — asset: a network of more than 4,600 stores. (Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg News) FRANKLIN, Tenn. — But she never sets foot in the store. The mother of three tapped out her order on her smartphone earlier while lying in bed. Now, she parks in a designated spot during a time slot she selected, and Walmart workers load up her car with the goods they picked and packed for her. Walmart is America’s largest grocer, and its aggressive expansion of pickup services has turned its parking lots into a laboratory for the future of online grocery shopping — one of the trickiest puzzles in all of retail. Plenty of companies have tried to carve out a market for this. Instacart, along with tech titans Google and Amazon.com, have put their muscle behind doorstep grocery-delivery models that are similar to what Peapod has offered for decades. And yet, despite an e-commerce stampede that has upended sales of items such as books, electronics and clothes, researchers estimate that online shopping accounts for 2 percent or less of U.S. grocery sales. With the pickup model, Walmart is testing whether its best weapon in this digital fight is its most old-school — and hardest to replicate — asset: a network of more than 4,600 stores. It is counting on a different idea of convenience, one that caters to time-starved suburbanites who spend hours each day in their cars. Maybe for them swinging into a parking lot for a few minutes makes more sense than waiting around the house for a delivery. Kroger and Giant are also touting pickup services, and even Amazon is said to be considering opening bricks-and-mortar locations with grocery pickup capabilities. Pickup programs, not delivery, were the main driver of growth in habitual online grocery shopping in the past year, according to Tabs Analytics, a firm that studies the consumer products industry. Walmart does not disclose sales figures for online grocery pickup, but it has taken the program from five markets to more than 80 nationally in the past year. “We see a huge opportunity through pickup, particularly in grocery,” Doug McMillon, Walmart’s chief executive, told investors last year. “The combination of digital relationship and stores is a winner.” The grocery business overall is an extremely


one actually feels really good,” Gilmore says, noting that the root vegetable’s brown skin is smooth to the touch. Workers are taught to look for signs that a particular item is past its peak freshness. Walmart holds produce tastings for team members so they know what they’re selecting for customers. There’s a reason that the instruction focuses so heavily on getting fresh foods right: Gilmore says that, for shoppers, letting Walmart pick out their fruit, vegetables and meat is “the trust fall,” the moment when they count on a stranger to understand what they want. Of shoppers who have never bought groceries online, 67 percent say it’s because “I like to select fresh products for myself,” according to research by Morgan Stanley. This is why the personal shoppers show customers items such as produce and eggs before packing them into the car. The idea is that if someone saw an avocado that wasn’t quite ripe or an egg that was cracked, a substitution could be made on the spot. Personal shoppers also are supposed to get to know the preferences of repeat customers, so they might learn, for example, if someone likes their bananas a little on the green side. They might also slip your dog a biscuit or your child a lollipop. Personal shopper April Styers gathers the orders, making her way through the store pushing a wheeled cart outfitted with four rows of blue bins that allow her to keep each order separate. As she stops in front of the Honeycrisp apples, she spins each one in her hand and gives it a gentle squeeze before bagging it and placing it in the cart. “If I’m not going to eat it,” Styers said, “then I’m not going to give it to anybody else.” Walmart has allocated parking spaces for online grocery-pickup customers so that they may get in and out of the lot quickly. (Sarah Halzack/The Washington Post) The value of the store In Walmart’s version of pickup, which is not yet available in the greater Washington area, shoppers have about 30,000 items to choose from — mostly groceries, but also general merchandise such as pet products or printer cartridges, all priced the same as in-store merchandise. To fill the orders, the personal shoppers make their way through the store’s grocery aisles, guided by a handheld device that takes them on the most efficient route to collect all


Montgomery County Animal Watch

MONTGOMERY COUNTY This case was received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Dog bites dog on neck: Cats at no-kill shelter Cats and kittens will be available for adoption through the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County’s no-kill shelter at the following location. For information, call 301-740-2511 or visit awlmc.org.Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County no-kill shelter, 12 Park Ave., Gaithersburg. Hours: 6 to 8 p.m. Friday; noon to 3 p.m. Saturday; 6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday. Humane Society adoptions The Montgomery County Humane Society’s private rescue shelter has dogs, puppies, cats and kittens available for adoption. Call 240-252-2555 or visit mchumane.org.MCHS Adoptions and Education Center, 601 S. Stonestreet Ave., Rockville. Hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, except holidays. Reduced FEES FOR CATs Cats and kittens will be available for adoption at the next open house of Friends of Montgomery County Animals at the following location. Call 301-977-4833 or visit fmca.org or facebook.com/fmcainfo.PetSmart at Milestone Center,20924 Frederick Rd., Germantown. Hours: 2 to 5 p.m. Saturday. — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


3 win Nobel Prize in chemistry for world’s tiniest machines

Dutch scientist Bernard “Ben” Feringa, shown in 2013, was one of the three scientists who won the Nobel Prize in chemistry Wednesday for developing the world's smallest machines. (Jeroen Van Kooten/University of Groningen via AP) Three scientists won the Nobel Prize in chemistry Wednesday for developing the world’s smallest machines. Known as molecular machines, they are one-1,000th as wide as a human hair and have the potential to revolutionize computers and even medicine. Frenchman Jean-Pierre Sauvage, Scottish-born Fraser Stoddart and Dutch scientist Bernard Feringa share the $930,000 prize, which is given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Practical applications are far away, but the potential is huge. Feringa, who developed the first molecular motor in 1999, said he could think of all kinds of potential applications, including smart materials that adapt to external conditions or “tiny robots that the doctors in the future will inject in your blood veins and then go to search for a cancer cell or . . . deliver a drug.” Nobel prizes are given annually to honor the highest achievements in science, literature and peacemaking. France's Jean-Pierre Sauvage will share the $930,000 prize for his part in discovery of molecular machines. (Jean-Francois Badias/AP) The medicine prize went to a Japanese biologist who discovered the process by which a cell breaks down and recycles its contents, and the physics prize was shared by three British-born scientists whose discoveries shed light on strange states of matter. The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded Friday, followed by the economics honors next week. — Associated Press


Bumblebees can learn and then teach despite tiny brains

This bumblebee looks for food on a flower. Scientists in Britain trained bumblebees to pull strings to get food from an artificial flower. Those bees were able to pass on the skill to others in their colony. (Shaun Curry/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Scientists in Britain have managed to teach bumblebees to pull strings to get to food and then pass on what they have learned to others in their colony — showing a high level of intelligence despite their tiny brains. Researchers at Queen Mary University of London said the experiments, often used to test the intelligence of apes and birds, showed for the first time that some insects are up to the task, and can also pass skills on through several generations. The findings add to a growing body of evidence suggesting the capacity for “culture spread” — the ability to learn and pass on knowledge and skills — may not be exclusive to humans, but may also be in most animals, including insects. “Cultural transmission does not require the high cognitive sophistication specific to humans, nor is it a distinctive feature of humans,” said Clint Perry, who co-led the study. In the research, published in the journal PLOS Biology on Tuesday, the scientists were able to train 23 out of a group of 40 bees to pull strings with their legs and feet. The strings were attached to discs — or artificial “flowers” — containing food at their center but positioned under a transparent screen. The bees, detecting the food beneath the screen, learned to pull the “flowers” out by tugging on the string with their legs and feet to be able to get to it. From another group of bees given the chance to solve the task without any training, only two of 110 were successful. Another group of bees was then allowed to observe the trained bees pulling the strings — and 60 percent of them successfully learned the skill. Finally, trained bees were put in colonies, and the scientists found the technique spread successfully to a majority of the colony’s worker bees. Lars Chittka, a Queen Mary University professor who supervised the project, said the team is ultimately interested in figuring out the brain processes behind the bees’ learning and teaching skills. “How can they do it with such small brains, and how can their miniature nervous systems manage such a diversity of behaviors


Let’s toast Beers Elementary by supporting the D.C. school with our Giant cards

four times table. Students Jace and Gracie had squared off and were racing by fours — four! eight! 12! 16! — to see who could reach 40 first. It was a tie. Beers is beloved by those inside the community and outside. The Drinker Biddle law firm has been a longtime supporter, organizing an annual coat drive and bake sale. Recently, judges and probation officers from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia donated a washer and dryer. On Oct. 14, a school garden, created with a grant from Hilton Hotels, is being dedicated. New this year is the Reading Partners program, offering one-on-one literacy tutoring for kids. (Currently, five volunteers are working with 17 students. Principal Payton would like to triple that.) Students from Georgetown and George Washington universities also volunteer in classes. Principal Payton is especially proud that last year not a single Beers student was suspended. Lord knows some could have been, she said, but that would have been counterproductive. Suspended students sit at home, watching TV. They get yelled at by their parents. “They come back to school, and they’re angry,” she said. “No, we own it. They’re our kids. We have to figure this out.” The school that Post readers supported last year — Turner Elementary — received nearly $15,000 from Giant. That would be great for Beers. It lost its dedicated computer lab after a renovation three years ago, switching to a cart system that brings Dell laptops to the students for instruction and testing. But the life expectancy of an elementary school laptop is only a couple of years. More laptops are on Principal Payton’s wish list. So is funding more after-school activities, including possibly a martial-arts class. Here’s how you can help: Giant’s program, A+ School Rewards, starts Friday and runs through March 16. You must re-enroll your Giant card if you wish to change the school you’re supporting. You can do that at giantfood.com/aplus. In the “for customers” box, click on “register your card.” Put in your 12-digit Giant card number and the first three letters of your last name, then enter the Beers identification number: 00239. If you don’t know your Giant card number, call 877-366-2668, Option 1. Beers is in the process of registering with Harris Teeter. I’ll have that information in a future column. And in case you were wondering, the school is named after Anne


Yes, NASA has cinematographers. Here’s what that’s like.

Nasreen Alkhateeb is a transmedia artist and producer at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. (Andre Chung/for The Washington Post) Nasreen Alkhateeb, 35, is a transmedia artist and producer at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. She is NASA’s cinematographer of the year for 2016. She lives in Washington. NASA has cinematographers? At Goddard, they have their own television studio. There are about 25 producers there. This particular mission, my job was to expose NASA content to a non-science audience. Summarize the three awesomest things you’ve done in your career. I was able to accompany NASA’s IceBridge Mission and document— What is that? IceBridge is a mission that goes out twice a year to the Arctic and Antarctic. They measure the ice from the sky. These are really intense missions. Sometimes they’re in the air between 8 and 15 hours straight, never landing. And where were you? Also up in the air. I was there soaking in what it was like to be up there with them. The start of their day ‘til the very end. How many days is that? Ten days. To the Arctic. Greenland. I’d never worked in an environment that was so foreign. So desolate and so extreme in temperature. My camera equipment didn’t work the way it does here. One night the aurora borealis showed up, and everyone was rushing outside, and I got my camera and ran outside. I started to change my [camera’s] F-stop and shutter speed, and about 90 seconds in my fingers started to slow down. Are you a science person? I am not. I’m the only one on the [Goddard production studio] team with a fine art background. I’m kind of like a one-off. What’s that like? Other producers that had documented IceBridge prior years spent a lot of time on the science and interviewing people and talking heads. I went a totally different direction. Second coolest thing? I did special effects makeup for “The Walking Dead.” They came to D.C. to do a promo for the show: zombies taking over D.C. and protesting in front of the White House. And more recently I’ve been a producer and storyteller on JWST, which is the largest NASA mission right now. The JWS — The James Webb Space Telescope, sort of the next-generation Hubble. Right now all 18 segments of the primary mirror have been installed, and it’s halfway there. It’s the largest clean


How a small D.C. record label became a hotbed of modern Ethiopian sounds

can take from us, and we can take from you, we’re all on the same planet,” Eklund says. “It’s not this charity thing — ‘we need to protect tribal peoples’ — it’s definitely a pride point, it feels really good.” “It’s more of a give-and-take than just a take,” 1432 R co-founder Sami Yenigun says. That give-and-take is key to 1432 R’s entire operation. Co-run by D.C. residents Eklund, Yenigun and Joyce Lim, 1432 R is a passion project for the three music obsessives. At the beginning of the joint venture, Eklund, the son of an Ethiopian mother and an American father, reached out to Seifu, with whom he had bonded over music-making while attending high school in Addis Ababa. Seifu’s music was so impressive that the three knew they were on to something new and exciting, and it reinforced their decision to start a label; 1432 R had suddenly uncovered a pipeline to a world of Ethiopian electronic music that no one was paying attention to, Lim, 27, says, “and we couldn’t find a single sound in the entire world that sounded close to it.” “This is a specific sound that I haven’t encountered before,” says Andrew Field-Pickering, co-founder of D.C. label Future Times, who advised the 1432 R principals to launch a label. “[There is a] pretty high ‘wow’ factor when listening to these records.” In delivering that sound to a global audience, the label has tried to keep the connection between artist and listener as pure as possible. They have provided minimal touches when it comes to the music, limiting their input to the technical (how many songs fit on each side of the record) and the business-minded (helping assemble cohesive records). “Everything we’ve put out so far, we’ve given zero [musical] feedback,” Yenigun, 28, maintains. “We will talk with the artist about ordering, but not like ‘up the drums’ or anything.” Seifu, 29, describes working with 1432 R as a “brilliant” experience. “I couldn’t have asked for a better environment as an up-and-coming artist,” he says. “They are so supportive, and they really let me go all out with what I was doing; that’s really commendable.” The principals of 1432 R have grown as artists, as well. As the label’s in-house designer, Lim finds herself using her art history degree in a way she didn’t expect. Her black-and-white, organic-meets-inorganic cover art reimagines Ethiopian folk art as


Army Ten-Miler: Olympian Paul Chelimo defends a title that has special meaning

leading up to the Olympic Games. Capt. Matthew Hickey, the WCAP commander since September 2015, was in the stadium in Brazil when Chelimo won the silver medal and speaks in awe of the runners in WCAP — not just of their talents but of their backgrounds. “I think the runners are the epitome of what we look for in a soldier,” Hickey said. “They really tell the American story unlike anything else. . . . [Chelimo’s] story really tells what it’s all about, being a soldier, an athlete and an Olympian to go from Kenya all the way to the [Olympic] podium.” The Army also played a role in reviving Sgt. Hillary Bor’s running career. Bor, a 26-year-old native of Eldoret, Kenya, graduated from Iowa State in May 2012 and figured he was done with competitive running after a poor performance in his last collegiate race. A four-time all-American for the Cyclones, Bor enlisted in the Army in July 2013 and took a year off from running before deciding to test the waters again at the 2014 Army Ten-Miler. He finished seventh and immediately became one of the best runners on the all-Army team. Bor was fifth in the race last year. “I wanted to be part of the United States,” said Bor, who finished seventh in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in Rio. “And the only way that I was going to do it was sign up for the U.S. Army and give back what they gave me because if I had stayed in Kenya, I would have not gone to school.” With two more Rio Olympians — Spec. Leonard Korir (14th in the 10,000 meters) and Spec. Shadrack Kipchirchir (19th in the 10,000) — and several highly accomplished runners on the team, the all-Army team looks to repeat or exceed last year’s performance of placing in the top five male individual spots and winning the team title by more than an hour. “The Army Ten-Miler is the best way to finish off the year,” Chelimo said. “Last year, I was really pumped. Going home I was happy because it was mission accomplished. . . . We don’t want to be in an Army race and get smoked. It’s good that when we represent, we want to go for the win.” 32nd annual Army Ten-Miler The Army Ten-Miler road race began in 1985 and is one of the largest 10-mile races


Colombian leader Santos wins Nobel Peace Prize

war that has killed more than 200,000 people in the South American country. The award came just days after Colombian voters narrowly rejected the peace deal that Santos helped bring about, and Nobel judges left out his counterpart, Rodrigo Londono, the leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), from the honor. “The referendum was not a vote for or against peace,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee said, insisting the peace process wasn’t dead. “What the ‘No’ side rejected was not the desire for peace, but a specific peace agreement.” Colombian voters rejected the deal Sunday by the narrowest of margins — less than a half percentage point — over concerns that the rebels, who were behind scores of atrocities, were getting a sweetheart deal. Under the terms of the accord, rebels who turn over their weapons and confess their crimes will be spared jail time and the FARC instead would be given 10 seats in congress through 2026. Santos says he’s deeply honored by the Nobel Peace Prize, which he dedicated to the people of his country. “I receive this with great emotion,” Santos told the Nobel Foundation in an audio interview posted on its Facebook account. “This is a great, great recognition for my country,” he said. “I am eternally grateful.” “I receive this award in their name: the Colombian people who have suffered so much in this war,” he said. “Especially the millions of victims that have suffered in this war that we are on the verge of ending.” Santos and Londono, better known as Timochenko, signed the peace deal last month after more than four years of negotiations in Cuba. Six days later, Colombians rejected it in the referendum. The Norwegian Nobel Committee said it believes that Santos, despite the “No” vote, “has brought the bloody conflict significantly closer to a peaceful solution.” Prize committee chair Kaci Kullmann Five said Santos has made it clear that he will continue to work for peace in Colombia. “The Committee hopes that the peace prize will give him strength to succeed in this demanding task,” she said. A record 376 candidates were nominated for this year’s award, which carries a prize of about $930,000. The 2016 Nobel Prize announcements continue with the economics prize Monday and the literature award Thursday. All awards will be handed out on December 10, the anniversary of prize founder Alfred Nobel’s death in 1896.


Michelin does a disservice to Bad Saint, surely the country’s best Filipino restaurant

Would-be diners line up at Bad Saint in hopes of scoring a table. (Goran Kosanovic/for The Washington Post) Ahead of its publication of starred restaurants in Washington Oct. 13, the Michelin Guide on Thursday revealed the names of 19 establishments it considers both delicious and reasonably priced. Having eaten in all but one of them (the Ethiopian-themed Das in Georgetown, not exactly ground zero for meals eaten with injera), I can only wonder if the famously anonymous inspectors included a single local voice. Michelin’s collection of cheap eats gives a thumbs-up to some beloved destinations, including Maketto on H Street NE, Pearl Dive Oyster Palace near Logan Circle, and Jaleo in Penn Quarter. I have no quibble with their inclusion. All are good-to-great spots for Taiwanese/Cambodian fare, seafood and Spanish tapas, respectively. On the other hand, even though Bad Saint co-owner Genevieve Villamora called her restaurant’s inclusion “really thrilling,” I think the place deserves better. Outside of a home, I doubt there’s better Filipino cooking anywhere in the country. If the long lines and raves from local critics aren’t evidence enough, Bon Appétit hailed Bad Saint as its No. 2 best new restaurant in the country this summer. To lump the gem, as gracious as it is luscious, in this category is to deprive it of a star or more; Bib Gourmand restaurants can’t appear on the starred list, and no starred restaurant (even if it’s affordable) can be named one of the Bib Gourmands. (The cheaper places can “graduate,” though, as Pok Pok NY did in Michelin’s New York City guides, moving from Bib Gourmand to one star in 2015.) Braised chicken with pumpkin at Bad Saint. (Dayna Smith/for The Washington Post) The list also promotes some head scratchers. Bidwell in Union Market? Royal in Ledroit? Having encountered fried (!) deviled eggs and disappointing roast chicken at the former and blank arepas and acrid fish at the latter, I’m not inclined to return to either venue. Neither one is the best source of fuel in its neighborhood, let alone the city. Other names on the roster suggest the inspectors ate at the restaurants in their prime rather than recently. Both Thip Khao (Laotian) and Two Amys (pizza) show signs of resting on their laurels these days. Then there’s the matter of price. Michelin defines Bib Gourmand choices as restaurants where diners can have two courses plus a glass of


The 10 best places to eat cheap food in the Washington area

Spicy-sour soup with pork spare ribs at Baan Thai. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post) When people say Washington has finally become a restaurant town, what they really mean is that it’s finally become a chef-driven restaurant town. For years, the area has had an embarrassment of riches when it comes to mom-and-pop eateries founded by immigrants or by locals hungry for something cheap and good. Here are my favorites, in descending order: 1. Baan Thai Located in an upstairs space that once hawked only Americanized sushi, Baan Thai has evolved into a destination for those who crave the authentic, clear-channel flavors of Thailand. 1326 14th St. NW. 202-588-5889. baanthaidc.com. El Sol's cueritos tacos. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post) 2. El Sol Restaurante Tequileria Siblings Alfredo and Jessica Solis, vets of Passion Food Hospitality kitchens, have combined the technical obsessiveness of a chef-driven restaurant with the unadorned charms of a family-run taqueria. 1227 11th St. NW. 202-815-4789. elsol-dc.com. Karaagedon at Donburi. (Joseph Victor Stefanchik/For The Washington Post) 3. Donburi When Donburi opened in 2013, it introduced a serious counter-service Japanese restaurant to a neighborhood once known mostly for its cheap thrills. 2438 18th St. NW. 202-629-1047. facebook.com/donburidc. The Moto white pizza at Pizza CS. (Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post) 4. Pizza CS A certified member of the Associazione Pizzaiuoli Napoletani America, Ankur Rajpara keeps a tight focus on the pies at this five-year-old Rockville pizzeria. 1596-B Rockville Pike, Rockville, Md. 240-833-8090. pizzacs.com. Spicy potato noodles at Northwest Chinese Food. (Farrah Skeiky/For The Washington Post) 5. Northwest Chinese Food Go for the spicy potato noodles — a glistening pile of strands ignited with chili oil, garlic and aged Shaanxi vinegar — and stay for everything else at this rare spot for Liaoning Province cooking. 7313 Baltimore Ave., College Park, Md. 240-714-4473. No website. Yassa chicken at Chez Dior. (Deb Lindsey/For The Washington Post) 6. Chez Dior The owners behind this suburban restaurant have made Senegalese cooking — a complex cuisine that draws from French, North African and Vietnamese cultures — at once approachable and irresistible. 5124 Baltimore Ave., Hyattsville, Md. 240-696-5907. chezdior.com. The Spicy ’Shroom Taco at Taco Bamba. (Marge Ely/For The Washington Post) 7. Taco Bamba Chef Victor Albisu recently opened a second location in Vienna with more space and a full bar, but I still love the Falls Church original for its agenda: delivering creative tacos to an area dominated by


Beer of the Week: Maine Beer’s Hop Program Beer V

Maine Beer's Hop Project Beer V, a lager brewed with an experimental mix of hops. (Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) Maine Beer is known for its bright, clean ales, such as Another One — the champion of this year’s Beer Madness blind-tasting competition — and A Tiny Beautiful Something. The latest beer from Freeport, Maine, to catch my attention is one that unfortunately won’t show up on shelves in every beer store. The intriguingly named Beer V is the fifth release in the brewery’s experimental Hop Program series, which launched in February 2015. This time, Maine is tackling a lager, a style that’s not in its usual repertoire, and it doesn’t taste like any lager I’ve had recently. Beer V uses four kinds of hops: Saphir and Perle, which are suited beautifully to German lagers, and Citra and New Zealand-born Wakatu, both more often found in pale ales and IPAs because of their tropical-fruit flavors. The resulting beer finds lime and citrus notes cutting through a dank, grassy base while the dry, malty body swirls with a complex mix of spice and juicy tangerine from the hops. The taste is not as clean as you might expect from a lager, but the earthiness and the lingering bitterness in the finish are pleasant. Beer V isn’t the first lager-IPA hybrid (the style sometimes cringingly known as India pale lager), but it’s certainly one of the most interesting. Folks whose taste in lager runs to Bud and Stella won’t know what to make of this. But I do: When you see one of the 500-milliliter bottles, which are limited in Washington to the extent that Craft Beer Cellar on H Street NE has a one-per-customer policy, grab it and enjoy. — Fritz Hahn Maine Beer’s Beer V. mainebeercompany.com. $8.25 for a 16.9-ounce (500-ml) bottle. More from Food: Beer Column archive


Taliban explosives are becoming more powerful. Afghan soldiers are paying the price.

An Afghan amputee practices walking with her prosthetic leg at one of the International Committee of the Red Cross hospitals for war victims and the disabled in Kabul on April 3. (Shah Marai/AFP/Getty Images) KABUL — But when he stands, strapping himself into plastic supports and steel leg posts and pulling himself erect between two exercise bars, there is a gleam of triumph in his eyes. For a moment, he looks like the soldier he once was. Afghanistan has been at war for a long time, long enough to produce three generations of battlefield victims. Thousands of them have lost limbs, mostly to Soviet-made land mines and other explosive devices. Older military amputees are a familiar sight on the streets, begging on crutches at traffic intersections or holding up strings of cellphone cards on handless arms. A few push themselves about on low wooden dollies, grabbing at pedestrians’ hands and asking for change. Mohammed Javed, 26, lost both legs to a land mine when he was on an Afghan army patrol. He holds a photo of himself just before that mission. (Pam Constable/The Washington Post) But the past decade of war against the Taliban has produced a new generation of disabled men, almost all still in their 20s. Many were injured during fighting in places such as Kunduz and Helmand provinces, which are in the news as targets of renewed Taliban offensives. And most are far more grievously wounded than the older veterans, because the explosive devices used by today’s insurgents are much more powerful. “We used to see a lot of patients with one leg amputated. Now we see many with both gone. And they are so young,” said Alberto Cairo, an Italian doctor who has been working with disabled war victims here since 1988. He now heads the orthopedic program at a Kabul hospital run by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Since he began his work 26 years ago, during the Afghan-Soviet war, Cairo has assisted more than 12,000 soldiers and police with amputations. Last year, his program helped 275 amputees from the security forces, providing them with 945 prostheses. Every day, ambulances from Kabul’s military and police hospitals deliver patients to Cairo’s program, where they do exercises, practice using artificial arms and legs, receive counseling on social reintegration and learn to play wheelchair basketball. Mahmoodi, 26, is one of them. He lost both legs in


police officer, he was shot last spring during a firefight with the Taliban in Khanshin, a volatile border district in Helmand that was overrun by insurgents again last week. “I feel weak and sad, but my real worry is my family,” he said, explaining that his salary of about $200 a month was the only income for his family of 12. “The ministry told me they will keep paying me for 10 months, and it is almost up. I served for seven years, and I hope they don’t forget me.” Many of these young, severely disabled vets end up living at home, isolated and idle, unacceptable as prospective sons-in-law and dependent on their brothers or parents for nursing care, feeding and dressing. Nevertheless, a few seem to have found a purpose in life. One is Mohammed Javed, 26, a former soldier who lost both legs and parts of both arms to an explosive device during a patrol in Helmand in 2013. He received extensive medical care through the Afghan and U.S. military, but he was never fitted with artificial limbs. He lives with his family in a poor section of the capital, where he powers through the dirt alleys in a motorized wheelchair. “I used to be much taller,” he said one recent day at home, grinning wryly as he sipped water from a cup his brother held. He pointed to a photo on the wall, taken in a dusty village. It showed a swaggering young man in uniform, wearing dark glasses and carrying a rocket launcher on his back. “That was my last mission,” he said. These days, he has a new one — crossing the city in his wheelchair to the Ministry of Defense and sitting outside a gate for hours, carrying a petition and telling anyone who asks that the government should do more for him and other disabled veterans. Under army policy, Javed still earns half-pay at $120 a month and was awarded a piece of land, but he still thinks it’s not enough. “I don’t regret what I did for my country, but I’m disappointed,” he said. “I don’t want to be a burden. Sometimes when people see me, it ruins their day. But there are so many guys I fought with who were injured, too, some even worse than me. I try to look on the good side. At least I’m not a beggar.”


Another rotten prison in Maryland

U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein announces indictments in a widespread bribery and drug conspiracy inside the Eastern Correctional Institution, Maryland’s largest state prison. (Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post) WHAT LESSONS were learned from the stunning scandal in 2013 at Baltimore’s main city jail, where dozens of inmates and their prison guard accomplices ran a cash-and-sex for drugs smuggling enterprise that turned the facility into a symbol of mismanagement and corruption? Three years after that travesty, an even bigger federal investigation has yielded 80 indictments at Maryland’s largest state-run prison, the 3,300-inmate Eastern Correctional Institution. The similarities between the criminal enterprises at the facilities in Baltimore and the Eastern Shore are so striking that they suggest a corrections system that even now struggles to police or reform itself. In both instances, guards became middlemen in a vast scheme to smuggle drugs, tobacco, cellphones and other contraband into the prison from contacts outside. In both instances, vigilance at facility entrances was inadequate to the task of detecting the contraband that guards carried as they passed through security on a daily basis. In both instances, prison guards took their sworn obligations as officers so lightly that they engaged in sex with inmates, who had effectively taken control of the institution. Gov. Larry Hogan (R) and his top corrections officials cite the indictments, in which state and federal investigators cooperated, as a “clear victory” against corruption and proof of their determination to crack down. Yet if a major scandal is uncovered every few years – and before the Baltimore jail indictments in 2013, there was another major bust in 2009, at yet another state-run corrections facility in Baltimore — that suggests the problem is systemic, not that it is being solved. Any large prison system faces the challenge of permeable walls and imperfect security, but Maryland seems an acute case. Among those indicted Wednesday were 18 guards; that’s a lot of bad apples for one facility, even a big one. The scale of the scheme is mind-boggling. Among those indicted were one inmate’s father and another’s mother, along with each of their sons. In both cases, the parent on the outside was part of the conspiracy to convey drugs – heroin, cocaine, Suboxone – to prisoners on the inside. Inmates paid guards $500 per bag of narcotics; payment was rendered over contraband cellphones, using PayPal. The routinization of criminal enterprises within state prisons cannot continue.


After making millions off the granola crowd, he pivots to pinball and pizza

metrics and the bottom line now after all these years,” he told his team. “So we did that.” “I was always focused on revenue, and not enough on the bottom-line profits,” he said during a second interview. “So I was forced to really focus on profits and rally the troops to make money.” He now sees MOM’s as a cross between Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. “We carry much more than Trader Joe’s and less than Whole Foods. But we have strategy with our business that we believe is the reason people come and shop with us,” he said. “And we make money by not wasting money. We pay very well here. We have a $12 minimum wage and lots of benefits. So we invest in people. And we realize that they are the most valuable asset to us.” Like most companies in the low-margin supermarket business, MOM’s makes its money on volume. To keep those profit margins alive, he searches for dirt-cheap leases and obsessively watches the overhead. The stores are clean and bright, but utilitarian. His brother helps build the store interiors with basic fixtures, finishes and furniture, which saves millions of dollars. Nash is no doctrinaire proselytizer when it comes to organic food. He loves candy, and eats the occasional Berger Cookie, a Baltimore-baked, chocolate-covered heart-stopper that is as Maryland as the soft-shell crab. He sources his organic food from everywhere, including California, Mexico, Florida and Colorado. As he puts it: “I’m glad [the local food movement] exists, but I think it’s overrated, to a degree. I get it. Know your farmer and all that stuff. But you go to farmers markets and most of the stuff is not organic. So they’re dumping chemicals on land nearby that goes right into the Chesapeake. In other words, organic is more important to me than if it’s local. And if you can get local organic, that’s great. We really get our produce from all over the country.” Top selling items? Bananas. Before we left, I asked Nash — as I do everyone — to tell me his biggest mistake. “Probably holding on to stuff too long,” he said. “I worked every day, except major holidays, from 1987 until 2003 or 2004. So it was a good 17 years or something where I only got major holidays off. Also: “I remember at our Rockville store the first time I hired


cross between Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. “We carry much more than Trader Joe’s and less than Whole Foods. But we have strategy with our business that we believe is the reason people come and shop with us,” he said. “And we make money by not wasting money. We pay very well here. We have a $12 minimum wage and lots of benefits. So we invest in people. And we realize that they are the most valuable asset to us.” Like most companies in the low-margin supermarket business, MOM’s makes its money on volume. To keep those profit margins alive, he searches for dirt-cheap leases and obsessively watches the overhead. The stores are clean and bright, but utilitarian. His brother helps build the store interiors with basic fixtures, finishes and furniture, which saves millions of dollars. Nash is no doctrinaire proselytizer when it comes to organic food. He loves candy, and eats the occasional Berger Cookie, a Baltimore-baked, chocolate-covered heart-stopper that is as Maryland as the soft-shell crab. He sources his organic food from everywhere, including California, Mexico, Florida and Colorado. As he puts it: “I’m glad [the local food movement] exists, but I think it’s overrated, to a degree. I get it. Know your farmer and all that stuff. But you go to farmers markets and most of the stuff is not organic. So they’re dumping chemicals on land nearby that goes right into the Chesapeake. In other words, organic is more important to me than if it’s local. And if you can get local organic, that’s great. We really get our produce from all over the country.” Top selling items? Bananas. Before we left, I asked Nash — as I do everyone — to tell me his biggest mistake. “Probably holding on to stuff too long,” he said. “I worked every day, except major holidays, from 1987 until 2003 or 2004. So it was a good 17 years or something where I only got major holidays off. Also: “I remember at our Rockville store the first time I hired someone to do the produce. I tried to explain to her, you do this and this. I was really micromanaging. And she didn’t want to hear it because she had produce experience. So she just went and did it. And I liked it. So I learned in that moment that people can do the job as well as me.”


Virtual inspections: A solution to Metro’s late-night service cuts?

The vehicle — dubbed the “Mad Max machine” by a frustrated Metro board member — has become standard for many transit systems. But a report released in August by the FTA criticized Metro for not using its track geometry vehicle more frequently, and suggested that there are few Metro employees who understand how to use it properly. Metro’s track geometry vehicle was manufactured by Ensco, a Northern Virginia-based technology company that specializes in automated inspection equipment for rail, as well as for airplanes and for national security. Boris Nejikovsky, president of Ensco Rail, declined to comment on Metro’s inspection challenges, or whether his company had been approached by the agency about purchasing a track imaging system. But he said that the high-definition cameras could be mounted on a transit agency’s track geometry vehicle. Such an imaging system, he said, increases the quality of inspections and also makes them more convenient. “Eventually, these kinds of inspections will happen more and more from the office,” Nejikovsky said. “People will be able to walk the track [virtually], sitting in an office, looking at images on a computer.” His company also is developing algorithms that will be able to identify defects on tracks — a missing bolt, for example, or a tiny crack — without needing human eyes. Nejikovsky says the imaging technology eventually will help railroads better predict where, when and what maintenance work will be needed, allowing them to address small problems before they become larger, more costly ones. “It’s predictive maintenance,” said Jeffrey M. Stevens, vice president for Ensco Rail . “They want to get ahead of it before it becomes a safety problem.” Of course, there are still benefits to having humans do the work. Stevens recalled an imaging test in which a computer had flagged a defect on the rails — a potential crack. It turned out to be the leg of a spider that had been squashed by a train. In addition, even with imaging technology, Metro would not be allowed to eliminate walking track inspections, which are federally mandated. Those regulations could change, however, as the technology becomes more widely accepted. And although the technology is expensive, Lou Sanders, senior director of engineering services at the American Public Transportation Association, argued that there are significant long-term savings. “Having properly maintained tracks will save you money in the long run,” Sanders said. “Derailments are horrendously expensive and disruptive.”


Please pass the Russian Parmesan: Cheesemakers celebrate sanctions, and hope they continue

Oleg Sirota, 28, holds a wheel of cheese he says he is saving for Russian President Vladimir Putin at his creamery in Dubrovskoye, Russia. (Andrew Roth/The Washington Post) DUBROVSKOYE, Russia — When Russian President Vladimir Putin banned most food imports from Europe in 2014 in response to Western sanctions, Russian dairy farmers rejoiced as deliveries of French and Italian cheeses ceased. Now, they believed, they could compete. Since then, they have tried to duplicate all sorts of famous varieties, from Camembert to Emmenthal. But one global delicacy remains largely beyond reach, a product of rich milk, know-how and at least 18 months of aging. “It would be like winning the Olympics,” said Oleg Sirota, an entrepreneur turned cheesemaker so enchanted with the idea that he named his new creamery “Russky Parmesan,” or Russian Parmesan. Then, in a jab at competitors substituting palm oil for real milk, he added: “It’s hard to win without doping.” Cheese is more than just cheese in Russia these days. For travelers carrying up to five kilograms, or 11 pounds, of permitted “zapreshyonka” — contraband — back from European vacations, it is a defiant, smelly reminder of Russians’ adoption of European tastes in recent years despite a deepening political conflict with the West. “We aren’t afraid of sanctions,” goes the conservative battle cry, repeated by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and printed on patriotic T-shirts, but some upscale restaurants and cheese-importing websites are still doing a brisk, quiet business in European goudas and cheddars (all at a healthy markup). For Sirota, a stout 28-year-old with the wispy beard common among Russian Orthodox believers, cheese is a symbol of national revival, and Putin’s retaliatory sanctions are his gospel. An agronomist by education, he was running an IT business with 30 employees when Russian troops quietly seized control of Crimea in February 2014. Customers wait for samples of Oleg Sirota’s cheese during a festival at his creamery in Dubrovskoye, Russia. (Andrew Roth/The Washington Post) He had wanted to travel to Crimea, then eastern Ukraine, as a volunteer to fight in the conflict there but “got scared,” he said. Then, that spring, the United States and the European Union began to impose sanctions against key Russian officials, and in retaliation Putin banned most agricultural imports from Europe. His goal was to create pressure within Europe to adopt a more conciliatory stance toward Moscow — but also to bolster Russia’s own