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Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times/TNS

America's four most polluted national parks are in California, study finds

Health / Lifestyles /

LOS ANGELES -- Some of California’s most treasured parks are threatened by blight caused by pollution and climate change, according to a pair of new reports.

The four national parks with the highest ozone levels are all in California, with Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks topping the list of parks struggling with air that’s dangerous...Read more

DREAMSTIME/TNS

Erika Ettin: The secret sauce of text convos: playful reciprocity

Health / Lifestyles /

Do you often find yourself stuck in an endless loop of lackluster text chains with potential matches?

It’s a common dating app woe, but thankfully, it’s one that you have the power to turn around to work in your favor. Whether you like texting or not, it’s an integral part of modern-day courtship. The sooner you accept that and engage ...Read more

Alejandro A. Alvarez/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

This Philly bus driver is also a substitute teacher and public transit activist

Health / Lifestyles /

PHILADELPHIA -- Marcus McKnight’s fascination with public transportation began when he was growing up on a quiet block in the city’s Logan neighborhood. Riding SEPTA gave him a window to the world, or at least, to Philadelphia.

Sure, that window may have been scratched and smudged sometimes, but it never dulled McKnight’s curiosity.

“...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

Ask Anna: Is it time to break up? Understanding unrequited love in relationships

Health / Lifestyles /

Dear Anna,

For the past four months, I've been seeing someone wonderful. They are kind, thoughtful and truly everything one could ask for in a partner. However, despite their undeniable goodness and the time we've spent together, I've come to the harsh realization that I'm not in love with them. I love them as a person, but not in the grand ...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

Ex-etiquette: Holiday disagreement

Health / Lifestyles /

Q: My ex and I do not have a formal holiday schedule because we both followed a religion that did not celebrate holidays. Our children, now 12 and 14, have been brought up that way. Over the last year I have met and married someone who is Christian and I converted. She does not approach Easter as religiously as some, but Easter dinner is a huge ...Read more

Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times/TNS

Investors bought a historic Los Angeles home. Sisters who have lived there since childhood are fighting to stay

Health / Lifestyles /

LOS ANGELES -- Lupe Breard remembers coming to live in the Queen Anne Victorian house in Echo Park with her mother and siblings when she was a child. The memory is still vivid decades later, she says, because she didn't want to move there — until she saw the chimney and told herself Santa Claus could bring presents down it at Christmas. She'd ...Read more

Heather Khalifa/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

Got a parrot with osteoporosis? A turtle with an infected ovary? Call Doc Tyson

Health / Lifestyles /

PHILADELPHIA -- Susan Tyson’s fourth patient of the day needed his (previously problematic) zinc level checked, so Tyson leaned over the tiny blue lovebird, inserted a needle into his jugular vein, and withdrew a few drops of blood. The bird, whose full name is Archibald Whitmore Macleish, weighs just 49 grams. For him, any blood loss is a lot...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

The Kid Whisperer: How to stop taking away recess as a punishment

Health / Lifestyles /

Dear Kid Whisperer,

We are having a disagreement at our elementary school. We used to be able to take away recess as a punishment. Now, we can’t. I understand our principal’s point of view: We had probably 20% of our students staying inside for recess because of behavior. On the other hand, student behavior became worse when we stopped ...Read more

Dania Maxwell/Los Angeles Times/TNS

Out-squatted: Handyman Flash Shelton will squat with your squatters -- until they leave

Health / Lifestyles /

LOS ANGELES -- On a winter morning in Woodland Hills, the “Squatter Hunter” slowly approaches a posh two-story home dressed in all black, armed with a Glock 26 pistol, stun gun, pepper spray and baton. His body camera is on. His two-man squad lurks behind him.

They’ve spent four days in surveillance, learning the habits of the man ...Read more

Paul Kitagaki Jr./The Sacramento Bee/TNS

These Black barbers bring mental health care to the styling chair, one client at a time

Health / Lifestyles /

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Brothers Marichal and Rodney Brown follow in their father’s footsteps at their HAIRitage barbershop on Sacramento’s Broadway.

Earlie D. Brown was a certified master barber in their Bay Area hometown who counted San Francisco Giants’ players among his clientele — he even named son Marichal for family hero and ...Read more

Kritchanut/Dreamstime/TNS

Debra-Lynn B. Hook: The personal and universal of modern loneliness

Health / Lifestyles /

Two friends take turns on alternating mornings making eggs and toast for me.

They straighten my bed, wash my linens and take out the trash.

They go to the grocery store, fill the bird feeder, water the plants and make lunch and enough food for dinner.

They talk and laugh and share life with me, from 9 to 3.

At which point I am alone.

For ...Read more

DREAMSTIME/TNS

Lori Borgman: Forgiving and forgetting, the hardest thing you may ever do

Health / Lifestyles /

My grandma used to say she could forgive, but she couldn't forget. This was always in reference to a comment made by a neighbor about pickles my grandmother had entered at the fair. The neighbor criticized the pickles for being sliced as rounds instead of spears, or maybe it was the other way around.

Grandma was a good woman. Hard worker. ...Read more

Edgar Barbosa/Edgar Barbosa/TNS

Jerry Zezima: The diamond's in the details

Health / Lifestyles /

As a guy who gets pooped at the mere thought of washing bird droppings off a car, I never figured I would wax poetic over my amazing ability to clean and wax my wife’s wheels. But it turns out I am a gem.

That is the expert opinion of a guy who not only owns a car wash, but who knows all about gems because he used to work in a diamond mine.

...Read more

E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Illinois will soon be cicada central when 2 broods converge on state in historic emergence

Health / Lifestyles /

When his youngest daughter was born early in the summer of 2004 in Washington, D.C., John Lill and his wife could hear cicadas singing from inside the hospital.

“That’s how loud it was,” he said. “So my daughter, who was just an infant at the time, didn’t get to experience it. She missed it. She was just a baby. But 17 years later, ...Read more

Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times/TNS

New rooms, tours, activities: Queen Mary is royal again, Long Beach says. But at a whopping cost

Health / Lifestyles /

LOS ANGELES -- Repairs for the Queen Mary have cost the city of Long Beach more than $45 million over the last eight years, according to city records obtained by The Times, a hefty bill as the city looks to keep the historic ship on a fledgling path toward profitability.

Repairs have included more than $3 million for rust and hull repairs, and ...Read more

Alejandro A. Alvarez/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

North Philly is home to one of DoorDash's busiest pickup spots in the world

Health / Lifestyles /

PHILADELPHIA -- In the parking lot of the Share Food Program warehouse in Phildadelphia's Hunting Park neighborhood, stacks of food boxes marked for low-income area seniors were being loaded into the cars of drivers for DoorDash, the online food-ordering and delivery service.

After one car was filled, the next one rolled up, the operation rapid...Read more

Adam Rose/TNS/TNS

Heidi Stevens: A nation hooked on 'Love Is Blind,' but divided on 'Don't Say Gay.' Make it make sense

Health / Lifestyles /

I finally started watching “Love Is Blind,” the Netflix reality (I guess?) series where men and women go on a bunch of dates and get engaged without ever seeing each other.

All of their interactions, including the marriage proposal, happen in separate, windowless pods. If they agree to marry each other, they get to meet and hug and kiss and...Read more

Mel Melcon/Los Angeles Times/TNS

Column: Is that graffiti or art? How LA draws the lines

Health / Lifestyles /

LOS ANGELES -- Some acquaintances from Ireland were in town, and we were having lunch in their 20th-floor downtown hotel suite. I was being an armchair tour guide — out the windows, there's L.A. Live, and back behind those skyscrapers, City Hall, by fiat once our tallest building.

One of them pointed and said, "What's THAT?"

I didn't even ...Read more

DREAMSTIME/TNS

Stephen L. Carter: What leash laws for dogs tell us about humans

Health / Lifestyles /

Pity the poor dog owners! As warm weather descends, communities from California to Arizona to Michigan have announced stricter enforcement of leash laws.

I don’t have a dog in this particular fight, but I do have an interest in bits of social history that tend to be overlooked. And a glance at the history of leash laws tells us why they’re ...Read more

Chris Brown/Chris Brown Photography/TNS

On Gardening: This summer head to Rockapulco for shady color

Health / Lifestyles /

The past couple of weeks gardeners have been writing to me asking for ideas for colorful combinations in baskets, window boxes and containers for shady environments. I like to quip back in humor and ask how they would like a rose? Everyone would, of course, except for the thorns, but the rose I am talking about is for the shade, has no thorns ...Read more