Vintage grad is

Young people in St. Helena who are dealing with substance abuse, either personally or in their family, now have one more place to turn.

Golden retrievers Roz and Rincon were ready for their debut. The two were excited, wagging their whole bodies.

Toys 4 Tots drive

Napa's education community has lost an icon.

If the streets of Napa could sing they probably would have sung "It's Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas" as 51 Christmas-themed floats made their way down First Street Saturday evening during the city's 44th annual Christmas Parade.

WASHINGTON -- In the three months since thousands of U.S. forces poured into Baghdad to quash escalating violence, far more American troops have died in the volatile western Anbar province than in the capital city.

WASHINGTON -- The war in Iraq has now lasted longer than the U.S. involvement in the war that President Bush's father fought in, World War II.

WASHINGTON -- The Justice Department on Saturday asked the Supreme Court to refrain from stepping into another First Amendment battle featuring federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald and the New York Times.

Zach Plante is close with his parents -- he plays baseball with them and, on weekends, helps with work in the small vineyard they keep at their northern California home.

NEW YORK -- Police opened fire early Saturday on a car full of men driving away from a bachelor party at a strip club, killing the groom on his wedding day in a shooting that drew a furious outcry from family members but little immediate explanation from police.

The shorter days and longer shadows that signal the end of summer also bring us the beginning of a long harvest season that continues into November, long after the peaches and plums have disappeared from the farmers markets. There are several crops you can grow in the home garden that are both ornamental and delicious and which stretch the harvest season into winter, providing a nutritious diet of fresh fruits.

BAKERSFIELD -- You'd think it was Texas. Dusty roads course the scrubland toward oil tanks and warehouses. Beefy men talk oil over burritos at lunch. Like grazing herds, oil wells dip nonstop amid the tumbleweed -- or even into the asphalt of a parking lot.

Los Angeles Times Writers

JERUSALEM -- Israel and the Palestinians agreed to a cease-fire Saturday to end a five-month Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip and the firing of rockets by Palestinian militants into the Jewish state, officials from both sides said.

PARIS -- Nacera Berrouba, a young Algerian in Paris, says she couldn't get the job she dreamed of until she dyed her hair blond.