Leaders and their feeders

A favorite question at entrepreneurship conferences is which world city has the entrepreneurial dynamism to become a major start-up capital on par with Silicon Valley. London, Singapore, Tel Aviv, New York and Berlin are usually cited.

Seldom, however, do you hear anyone propose Boulder, Colo.

That is, unless you are in the company of Brad Feld, an early-stage investor, technology entrepreneur and author of "Startup Communities: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Your City," published by Wiley.

Feld is a regular speaker on venture capital investing and entrepreneurship, having founded his first company in 1987. Twitter is not a perfect measure of the quality of a person's opinions, but you do not get 113,000 followers without having a degree of respect from your peer group.

He is a Texan who co-founded his first company in Boston and for 20 years has been proud to call Boulder his home.

To him, this city of just 100,000 people, nestled near Rocky Mountain National Park and a short drive from Denver, is not just the best place to live. He also sees Boulder as an excellent example for those who wish to turn their own town into a start-up community.

"Although I don't have the data to support it, Boulder may have the highest entrepreneurial density in the world," he writes.

Having said that, Feld wants to make clear that all sorts of cities across the world can become home to job-creating new businesses if only they foster the necessary culture.

He sets out a framework for a successful start-up community — that it be led by entrepreneurs with a long-term commitment to the area, that the community be inclusive of anyone who wants to participate and that there be a constant stream of activities that engage all the parties.

Feld differentiates between the entrepreneurial "leaders" of a community and the "feeders," who must support but not try to take charge.

Feeders include government agencies, lawyers, accountants, local universities and angel investors. Problems often occur and areas fail to become start-up communities, he notes, when feeders, rather than the people creating the businesses, try to control the development of an entrepreneurial ecosystem.

This should serve as a warning to Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration in New York, which is trying to nurture the city's collection of fast-growing Web businesses, nicknamed Silicon Alley.

The book is also an insight into why the U.S. is such an entrepreneurial nation. The generosity of spirit still prevalent in U.S. society shines through Feld's writing. It is a key reason why so many have felt it is where they can achieve their dreams.

"Give before you get" is a mantra repeated several times by Feld. A key message is the power of community, which relies on people committing to their neighborhood for a couple of decades at least.

He also has a short answer for the people who ask how they can create the next Silicon Valley: They can't.

"Trying to create the next Silicon Valley is a fool's errand," he writes. "If that's really your goal, save yourself a lot of heartache and simply move to Silicon Valley."

It is clear from the way he writes about Boulder that Feld has no intention of moving farther west himself any time soon. "I can't imagine a better place to live," he says.

My only criticism is that almost all of his frame of reference is the U.S. His only mention of anywhere else in the world is a brief account of a trip to see some start-ups in Iceland.

But if more people loved and contributed to the places they live, as Feld and others have evidently done in Boulder, we probably would have more start-up communities around the world for him to visit.

Moules is the enterprise correspondent of the Financial Times of London, in which this review first appeared. He is also author of "The Rebel Entrepreneur," published by Kogan Page.

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Surgeon infected patients during heart procedure, Cedars-Sinai admits

A heart surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center unwittingly infected five patients during valve replacement surgeries earlier this year, causing four of the patients to need a second operation.

The infections occurred after tiny tears in the latex surgical gloves routinely worn by the doctor allowed bacteria from a skin inflammation on his hand to pass into the patients' hearts, according to the hospital. The patients survived the second operation and are still recovering, hospital officials said.

The outbreak led to investigations by the hospital and both the L.A. County and California departments of public health. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was also consulted.

Hospital officials called it a "very unusual occurrence" probably caused by an unfortunate confluence of events: the nature of the surgery, the microscopic rips in the gloves and the surgeon's skin condition. Valve replacement requires the surgeon to use thick sutures and tie more than 100 knots, which can cause extra stress on the gloves, they said.

Nevertheless, the hospital's goal is to have zero infections, said Harry Sax, vice chairman of the hospital's department of surgery. "Any hospital-acquired infection is unacceptable," he said.

The infections raise questions about what health conditions should prevent a surgeon from operating and how to get the best protection from surgical gloves. Surgeons with open sores or known infections aren't supposed to operate, but there is no national standard on what to do if they have skin inflammation, said Rekha Murthy, medical director of the hospital's epidemiology department. She added that there were also no national standards on types of gloves used, whether to wear double gloves or how many times surgeons should change those gloves during a procedure.

Healthcare-acquired infections are very common throughout the United States. Each year, infections cause 99,000 deaths in the country, including about 12,000 in California. Hospitals in the state are required to report certain infections to the California Department of Public Health. That reporting makes the public more aware of the quality of care provided at local hospitals and is an important tool for reducing infections, said Debby Rogers, deputy director of the department's Center for Health Care Quality.

Cedars-Sinai has low rates for hospital-acquired infections compared with the state and national average but has not performed as well on other surgical quality measures recently, according to the Leapfrog Group, an employer-backed nonprofit focused on healthcare quality. The organization gave the hospital a C rating last month on its national report card, down from an A in June, though it was not related to the infection outbreak.

"Clearly this hospital is making attempts to reduce infections, but they have more work to do," said Leah Binder, Leapfrog's chief executive.

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center conducts about 360 valve replacement surgeries each year and said infections occur in fewer than 1% of its cases — lower than the national average.

The hospital learned about the problem in June after three patients who had undergone valve replacement surgery showed signs of infection. Doctors diagnosed the patients with an infection called endocarditis. Concerned there might be a connection among the cases, epidemiologists analyzed the bacteria, staphylococcus epidermidis, and determined that it was an identical strain and therefore must have come from a single source. "It led to the question of gee, I wonder where it came from?" Murthy said.

Epidemiologists homed in on the surgeon with the skin inflammation. The bacteria matched, and then they made a surprising discovery: microscopic tears in the gloves typically worn by surgeons after performing valve replacement surgery. The surgeon, whose name was not released, was not allowed to operate again until he healed. He is still a member of the medical staff but no longer performs surgeries at the hospital.

The hospital soon found the same infection in two more patients. Officials also reached out to 67 patients who had heart valve replacements with the same surgeon but didn't find any other cases. One of the five infected patients was treated with antibiotics, and the other four had new valve replacement surgeries. Sax said the hospital apologized to the patients and has continued to monitor their health. The hospital has also covered the cost of their care, including follow-up treatment and all the related surgeries.

All surgeons doing valve replacements are now required to change gloves more frequently, officials said. Some surgeons are wearing double gloves during the operations, Sax said.

Following the outbreak, Cedars-Sinai did the proper follow-up to ensure the safety of their patients, said Dawn Terashita, a medical epidemiologist with L.A. County, who was notified in September. What occurred at Cedars-Sinai was an unintentional consequence of the surgery, she said.

"There is no way to keep a room entirely sterile and all the people in it sterile," she said. "You will always have risk of infection."

anna.gorman@latimes.com

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Google launches Snapseed photo editor on Android, makes iOS version free

After acquiring the makers of Snapseed in September, Google (GOOG) on Thursday released the popular photo application for Android smartphones and tablets. Google also updated the iOS version of the app to add Google+ integration and some new filters, and it cut the price of the original app from $ 4.99 to free. Snapseed is a simple yet powerful photo editor from Nik Software that allows users to enhance images with various tweaks and gesture-based touch ups, along Instagram-like filters. Snapseed is available now for the iPhone, iPad and Android smartphones and tablets.

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Rolling Stones hit NY for 50th anniversary gig

NEW YORK (AP) — "Time Waits for No One," the Rolling Stones sang in 1974, but lately it's seemed like that grizzled quartet does indeed have some sort of exemption from the ravages of time.

At an average age of 68-plus years, the British rockers are clearly in fighting form, sounding tight, focused and truly ready for the spotlight at a rapturously received pair of London concerts last month.

On Saturday, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts hit New York for the first of three U.S. shows on their "50 and Counting" mini-tour, marking a mind-boggling half-century since the band first began playing its unique brand of blues-tinged rock.

And the three shows — Saturday's at the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn, then two in Newark, N.J., on Dec. 13 and 15 — aren't the only big dates on the agenda. Next week the Stones join a veritable who's who of British rock royalty and U.S. superstars at the blockbuster 12-12-12 Sandy benefit concert at Madison Square Garden. Also scheduled to perform: Paul McCartney, the Who, Eric Clapton, Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Eddie Vedder, Billy Joel, Roger Waters and Chris Martin.

The Stones' three U.S. shows promise to have their own special guests, too. Mary J. Blige will be at the Brooklyn gig, as well as guitarist Gary Clark Jr., the band has announced. (Blige performed a searing "Gimme Shelter" with frontman Jagger in London.) Rumors are swirling of huge names at the Dec. 15 show, which also will be on pay-per-view.

In a flurry of anniversary activity, the band also released a hits compilation last month with two new songs, "Doom and Gloom" and "One More Shot," and HBO premiered a new documentary on their formative years, "Crossfire Hurricane."

The Stones formed in London in 1962 to play Chicago blues, led at the time by the late Brian Jones and pianist Ian Stewart, along with Jagger and Richards, who'd met on a train platform a year earlier. Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts were quick additions.

Wyman, who left the band in 1992, was a guest at the London shows last month, as was Mick Taylor, the celebrated former Stones guitarist who left in 1974 — to be replaced by Wood, the newest Stone and the youngster at 65.

The inevitable questions have been swirling about the next step for the Stones: another huge global tour, on the scale of their last one, "A Bigger Bang," which earned more than $550 million between 2005 and 2007? Something a bit smaller? Or is this mini-tour, in the words of their new song, really "One Last Shot"?

The Stones won't say. But in an interview last month, they made clear they felt the 50th anniversary was something to be marked.

"I thought it would be kind of churlish not to do something," Jagger told The Associated Press. "Otherwise, the BBC would have done a rather dull film about the Rolling Stones."

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Associated Press writer David Bauder contributed to this report.

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Auto execs share insights on the industry and what's next

It's hard to get America's most senior auto executives together in the same building to address the same topics, but we managed to do it with Mark Reuss, president of General Motors Co.'s North American operations, and Mark Fields, the newly appointed chief operating officer of Ford Motor Co.

They came to town for the Los Angeles Auto Show, which ends Sunday. Even then, they weren't in the same room — so we just asked them identical questions, in separate interviews, to create this virtual debate.

Both executives address key issues facing the industry, including the future of in-dash technology, fuel economy, electric cars and the prospects for the industry at large. They don't always agree.

Do vehicle embedded features such as MyFord Touch or Cadillac Cue make sense when smartphones can do many of the same tasks with fewer glitches? Why not use architecture that allows people to use phone apps for vehicle infotainment?

Reuss: There is no way that the auto industry in the long haul should be carrying all that technology in a car. Phones will move faster in technology than anything we can put into a car. Embedding those functions in a car and then trying to guess where phones are going is not a solution. We will experiment with technology in Cadillac, but that's not where the mainline brands will be going.

Fields: It is very clear that for younger consumers, staying connected in their lives is hugely important whether they are in their bedrooms, walking outside or in their cars. That's why we started Sync and MyFord Touch.

In the future, you might end up seeing a hybrid of embedded technology and smartphone connectivity. There are certain things that we want to ensure, such as safety and integration into the rest of the vehicle. There could be some issues with just plugging in a smartphone and allowing it to do a lot of vehicle functions. We're already engaging in those discussions, thinking like a technology company.

The U.S. auto industry has been one of the better-performing segments of the U.S. economy recently but is still well below the 16 million to 17 million vehicles it once sold regularly. Can it shift to a higher gear?

Fields: We expect the market to continue to improve based on two factors. One is the age of the car park out there. [Registration data show the average age of vehicles on the road today is 10 to 11 years.] Cars are old and trucks are old. Look at that, combined with the fuel economy consumers can get from new cars right now, and there are some good reasons to buy. And then there is the gradual improvement of the economy.

This is a great business … but when you look out on the horizon in North America, do I think we will go back to the days of 18 million units anytime soon? No. But when you look at the components that set demand, I think it is very encouraging. The opportunities and growth in front of us are pretty substantial.

Reuss: It can happen based on population growth and the car-park age. But sales are throttled by the variance in consumer confidence and in jobs.

The industry is in a place it has never been in before. It has a break-even point of just 11 [million] to 12 million units. [Automakers are expected to sell about 14.5 million vehicles in the U.S. this year.] That's providing profits to invest in good cars, even if we haven't seen that quick sales growth.

That's a great place to be…. You could really be happy driving 98% of the stuff that is on display here.

What's the deal with electric vehicles? They garnered a lot of attention when automakers started selling them again two years ago, but sales are poor.

Reuss: The range has to grow and the cost of the battery and the car has to come down. The quickest way for the cost to come down is to build a platform-specific electric vehicle. Otherwise, you will always have a battery that is heavier than what you want and have less range than you want.

Our Spark EV will work, because it is already small and lightweight and close to what you want to do in a platform-specific vehicle.... We will sell a few thousand, and we are doing it in California, where there already is interest and some infrastructure for electric vehicles.

I don't think you will see bigger people-carrier EVs. It's just a harder sell. Who wants to be stranded with your family [because the battery drained down] and pay a lot of money to do it?

Fields: The simple answer is that we don't know what percentage of the marketplace battery-electric vehicles will occupy next year or even five years from now. Our strategy is to align our manufacturing so that wherever it goes, we will be able to flex.

Demand for full-electric vehicles depends on a lot of factors, including getting the cost down lower, and the price of fuel and the infrastructure to be able to support mass EVs with charging stations, etc.

It is so dynamic right now. At gas at $3.40 a gallon, will sales of EVs bump up appreciably? If gas is $5 a gallon, you would get another answer. Whatever the continuum, we will be able to meet the demand.

What single feature or attribute of a vehicle is the consumer most focused on right now?

Fields: I think fuel economy is now embedded in people's minds, no matter what the price of oil is. In the 1970s to get fuel economy you had to get really small, inconvenient vehicles, but now you don't have to compromise on size or performance.

Reuss: It is reliability and durability. You can do the styling right, the technology right and price right. But if you don't have the durability and reliability, you won't get retention. People won't buy your car again. No one wants to be accused of buying something stupid. Fuel economy would be the next reason to buy.

jerry.hirsch@latimes.com

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U.S. economy adds 146,000 jobs in November

The U.S. economy added 146,000 jobs in November and the unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent, the lowest since December 2008. The government said Superstorm Sandy had only a minimal effect on the figures.

The Labor Department's report on Friday offered a mixed picture for the economy.

Hiring remained steady during the storm and in the face of looming tax increases. But the government said employers added 49,000 fewer jobs in October and September than initially estimated.

And the unemployment rate fell to a four-year low in November from 7.9 percent in October mostly because more people stopped looking for work and weren't counted as unemployed.

There were signs that the storm disrupted economic activity. Construction employment dropped 20,000. And weather prevented 369,000 people from getting to work — the most in almost two years. They were still counted as employed.

Stock futures jumped after the report. Dow Jones industrial average futures were down 20 points in the minutes before the report came out at 8:30 a.m., and just after were up 70 points.

As money moved into stocks, it moved out of safer bonds. The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note, which moves opposite the price, rose to 1.63 percent from 1.58 percent just before the report.

Since July, the economy has added an average of 158,000 jobs a month. That's a modest pickup from 146,000 in the first six months of the year.

The increase suggests employers are not yet delaying hiring decisions because of the “fiscal cliff.” That's the combination of sharp tax increases and spending cuts that are set to take effect next year without a budget deal.

Retailers added 53,000 positions while temporary help companies added 18,000 and education and healthcare also gained 18,000.

Auto manufacturers added nearly 10,000 jobs.

Still, overall manufacturing jobs fell 7,000. That was pushed down by a loss of 12,000 jobs in food manufacturing that likely reflects the layoff of workers at Hostess.

Sandy forced restaurants, retailers and other businesses to close in late October and early November in 24 states, particularly in the Northeast.

The U.S. grew at a solid 2.7 percent annual rate in the July-September quarter. But many economists say growth is slowing to a 1.5 percent rate in the October-December quarter, largely because of the storm and threat of the fiscal cliff. That's not enough growth to lower the unemployment rate.

The storm held back consumer spending and income, which drive economic growth. Consumer spending declined in October and work interruptions caused by Sandy reduced wages and salaries that month by about $18 billion at an annual rate, the government said.

Still, many say economic growth could accelerate next year if the fiscal cliff is avoided. The economy is also expected to get a boost from efforts to rebuild in the Northeast after the storm.

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‘Post-PC’ is more than just marketing buzz for Apple CEO Tim Cook

Apple (AAPL) is no stranger to ditching technologies when it deems them to no longer be useful. The company dropped the floppy disk for a CD-ROM drive on the first iMac and most recently has shifted to building MacBooks and iMacs without any physical disc drives. In his first televised interview on NBC’s Rockcenter with Brian Williams, Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed that he has “ditched physical keyboards” now that he spends 80% of his time using his iPad “authoring email” and “working on things.” Cook says he’s gotten quite good at typing on the screen and advises people to trust auto-correction as it’s “quite good” — though it’s a feature we still blast iOS for some five years after the first iPhone launched. But what does it mean when the boss of the country’s most valuable company and the most revered technology company in the world doesn’t even use physical keyboards anymore? Perhaps the “post-PC” era will become mainstream sooner than we thought.

For years, Apple has touted the idea that we’re entering the “post-PC” era – a period when touchscreen-equipped smartphones and tablets will eclipse desktops, notebooks and complex operating systems as they slowly fade away into a niche reserved for professionals.

While there will still be a need for notebooks, Windows PCs and Macs, the increasing numbers of smartphones and tablets sold and continued decline of worldwide PC sales support Apple’s claim that mobile is where the next tech battleground is, even if Microsoft (MSFT) thinks otherwise.

The term “dogfooding” is often thrown around between tech blogs and Cook is doing exactly that — using his “own product to demonstrate the quality and capabilities of the product.”

As Steve Jobs once said, Apple only builds products its own engineers and designers would use themselves.

Cook’s not saying, “iPads are great” for some people and some tasks. The fact that Cook uses his iPad for 80% of his work and an iPhone all the time suggests he and Apple are serious about this post-PC era. Apple wants iPads and iPhones to be great for all of your computing needs.

Apple is serious enough about it that the big boss has shifted his habits from old-school typing on actual keyboards to using virtual keyboards. And for all we know, Cook could be using even more natural human interfaces such as more voice recognition (ex: Siri in iOS and built-in dictation in OS X Mountain Lion).

Will physical keyboards go the way of the dodo in the next handful of years? It’s doubtful, but don’t be surprised if you see fewer and fewer offices with QWERTY keyboards attached to PCs and more desks and execs just carrying tablets and a smartphone on the side.

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Long-sealed Notorious B.I.G. autopsy released

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Notorious B.I.G. was killed by a single bullet that pierced several vital organs in a 1997 drive-by shooting, a long-sealed autopsy report released Friday shows.

The rapper was hit four times in the shooting, which 15 years later remains one of Los Angeles' highest-profile unsolved murders.

The report had been sealed at the request of detectives until last week, Chief Coroner Investigator Craig Harvey said. The 23-page report details the trajectory of each of the shots that hit the rapper, whose name was Christopher Wallace. Investigators determined that a single shot that hit his left lung, heart and colon led to the 24-year-old's death.

No drugs or alcohol were found in his system, the report states.

The rapper from Brooklyn, N.Y., had just left a music industry event when he was shot. Los Angeles police and the FBI have investigated the killing, but no arrests have ever been made. Neither agency had any immediate comment on the release of the report.

A lawyer for Wallace's family and widow Faith Evans did not immediately return a phone message seeking comment.

Federal agents conducted a bi-coastal search for Wallace's killer, but federal prosecutors determined in 2005 that there wasn't enough evidence to pursue a case. Agents looked into whether any Los Angeles police officers had been involved in the shooting, which came months after another rap superstar, Tupac Shakur, was shot dead in Las Vegas.

In March 2011, the FBI electronically released files on its investigation, which were heavily redacted but shed new light on the efforts that investigators took to try to find those responsible for the rapper's death. Agents conducted surveillance and interviews in Los Angeles, San Diego and New York, the files showed.

The deaths of Wallace and Shakur have been the subject of rampant speculation about the motives. The one-time friends became rivals and instigators in an East Coast-West Coast rap rivalry during the mid-1990s.

Wallace's family filed a federal lawsuit against Los Angeles, and a 2005 trial ended with a mistrial after attorneys for Wallace's family discovered the city had withheld a trove of LAPD documents.

The family dismissed the lawsuit in 2010. Their attorney said that was done in order for the FBI and other agencies to pursue new leads in the case.

The civil case could be refiled, although that has not yet occurred.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP .

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The New Old Age Blog: A Son Lost, a Mother Found

My friend Yvonne was already at the front door when I woke, so at first I didn’t realize that my mother was missing.

It was less than a week after my son Spencer died. Since that day, a constant stream of friends had been coming and going, bringing casseroles and soup, love, support and chatter. Mom hated it.

My 94-year-old mother, who has vascular dementia, has been living in my home in upstate New York for the past few years. Like many with dementia, mom is courteous but, underneath, irascible. Pride defines her, especially pride in her Phi Beta Kappa intellect. She hates to be confronted with how she has become, as she calls it, “stupid.”

The parade of strangers confused her. She had to be polite, field solicitous questions, endure mundane comments. She could not remember what was going on or why people were there. It must have been stressful and annoying.

That night, like every night since the state troopers brought the news, I woke hourly, tumbling in panic. As if it were not too late to save my son. Mom knew something was wrong, but she could not remember what. As I overslept that morning, she must have decided enough was enough. She was going home.

In a cold sky, the sun blazed over tall pines. As I opened the door, the dogs raced out to greet Yvonne and her two housecleaners. Yvonne often brags about her cleaning duo. They were her gift to me. They were going to clean my house before the funeral reception, which was scheduled for later that week. This was a very big gift because, like my mother before me, I am a very bad housekeeper.

Mom’s door was shut. I cautioned the housecleaners to avoid her room as I showed them around. Yvonne went to the kitchen to listen to the 37 unheard messages on my answering machine; the housecleaners went out to their van to get their instruments of dirt removal.

I ducked into Mom’s room to warn her about the upcoming noise. The bed was unmade; the floor was littered with crumpled tissues; the room was empty.

Normally, I would have freaked out right then. I knew Mom was not in the house, because I had just shown the whole house to the cleaners. Although Mom doesn’t wander like some dementia patients, she does on occasion run away. But I could not muster a shred of anxiety.

“Yvonne,” I called, “did you see my mother outside?”

Yvonne popped her head into the living room, eyebrows raised.“Outside? No!” She was alarmed. “Is she missing?”

“Yeah,” I said wearily, “I’ll look.” I stepped out onto the front porch, tightening the belt of my bathrobe and turning up the collar. Maybe she had walked off into the woods. The dogs danced around my legs, wanting breakfast.

I had no space left in my body to care. Either we would find her, or we would not. Either she was alive, or she was not. My child was gone. How could I care about anything ever again?

Then I saw my car was missing. My mouth fell open and my eyeballs rolled up to the right, gazing blindly at the abandoned bird’s nest on top of the porch light: What had I done with the keys?

Mom likes to run away in the car when she is angry. She used to do it a lot when my father was still alive — every time they fought. Since Mom took off in my car almost a year ago, after we had had a fight, I’d kept the keys hidden. Except for this week; this week, I had forgotten.

I was reverting to old habits. I had left the doors unlocked and the keys in the cupholder next to the driver’s seat. Exactly like Mom used to do.

“Uh-oh,” I said aloud. Mom was still capable of driving, even though she did not know where she was going. I just really, really hoped that she didn’t hurt anybody on the road. I pulled out my cellphone, about to call the police.

“Celia!” Yvonne shouted from the kitchen. She hurried up behind me, excited. “They found your mother. There are two messages on your machine.”

At that very moment, Mom was holed up at the College Diner in New Paltz, a 20-minute drive over the mountain, through the fields, left over the Wallkill River and away down Main Street.

Yvonne called the diner. They promised to keep the car keys until someone arrived. By that time, Yvonne had to go to work. She drove my friend Elizabeth to the diner, and Elizabeth drove Mom home in my car.

Half an hour later, they walked in the front door. Mom’s cheeks were rouged by the chill air and her eyes sparkled, her white hair riffing with static electricity. “Hello, hello,” she sang out. “Here we are.” She was wearing the flannel nightgown and robe I had dressed her in the night before. It was covered by her oversized purple parka, and her bare feet were shoved into sneakers.

I started laughing as soon as I saw her. I couldn’t help it. Elizabeth and Mom started laughing too. “You had a big adventure,” I said, hugging them both. “How are you?”

“I’m just marvelous,” said my mother. Mom always feels great after doing something rakish. We settled her on the sofa with her feet on the ottoman. By the time I got her blanket tucked in around her shoulders, she had fallen asleep.

Elizabeth couldn’t stop laughing as she described the scene. “Your mother was holding court in this big booth. She was sitting there in her nightgown and her parka, talking to everybody, with this plate of toast and coffee and, like, three of the staff hovering around her.”

The waitress said Mom seemed “a little disoriented” when she got there. Mom said she was meeting a friend for breakfast, but since she was wearing a nightgown and didn’t know whom she was meeting or where she lived, the staff thought there might be a problem. They convinced Mom to let them look in the glove compartment of the car, where they found my name and number.

It was then that I realized I was laughing – something I’d thought I would never be able to do again. “Elizabeth, Elizabeth, I’m laughing,” I said.

“Ha, ha, ha,” laughed Elizabeth, holding her belly.

“Ha, ha, ha,” I laughed, rolling on the floor.

And she who gave me life, who had suffered the death of my child and the extinction of her own intellect, snoozed on: oblivious, jubilant, still herself, still mine.

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Dodgers meet with Time Warner Cable

It looks like the Dodgers are checking out another pitcher.

After negotiating exclusively with Fox Sports on a new TV deal to keep the team on its Prime Ticket network, the Dodgers have taken a meeting with Time Warner Cable, which wants the team on its SportsNet and Deportes channels. The news was first reported Thursday night by Los Angeles Times Dodger beat writer Bill Shaikin.

Fox Sports is still seen as the likely favorite to land the team. Not only does it already have a long relationship with the Dodgers, it is offering more than $6 billion for a 25-year deal. Fox Sports' current contract is up at the end of next season and will cost about $40 million. That would more than double in 2014 under the contract being discussed.

But Time Warner Cable, which shelled out more than $3 billion to snag the Lakers away from Fox Sports, also has a big bank account for sports rights. The Dodgers are at least curious to hear what Time Warner Cable has to say.

Fox Sports had an exclusive window with the Dodgers, but that expired at the end of November. Now it up to the Dodgers to make an offer to Fox by today (Friday). Fox Sports then has a month to make up its mind.

If the Dodgers go with Fox Sports, a stake in Prime Ticket is likely to be part of the agreement. That may not be something Time Warner Cable can provide since the Lakers do not have an ownership stake in SportsNet. If the Dodgers did go with Time Warner Cable and receive a piece of the channel, the Lakers may want a stake as well.

The Dodgers could also decide to launch their own regional sports network.

News Corp.'s Fox Sports and Time Warner Cable's sports turf war is not limited to Los Angeles. In New York, Fox Sports bought a big stake in the Yes Network, the regional sports channel owned by the Yankees. In Cleveland, Fox is expected to buy a network owned by the Indians baseball team.

ALSO:

Dodgers talk TV with Time Warner Cable

Rising sports rights means bigger cable TV bills

NFL is friend and enemy to its television partners

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