FRANCE TO TELL STORY OF 9/11

On the shores of Normandy where thousands of Americans died in the cataclysm that was D-Day, a museum that aims to be more than a collection of rusting relics is preparing to commemorate another day that changed the world: Sept. 11, 2001.

More than 120 mementos, from building keys to a smashed-up vehicle, are being shipped from New York to the French city of Caen for the first such exhibition outside the United States -- and the largest anywhere on the attack, its roots and aftermath.

That France is playing host to the exhibit might surprise Americans who remember the "freedom fries" uproar that greeted Paris' opposition to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. But the director of the Caen Memorial, a museum of conflict and peace, said the exhibit would have neither an American nor French take on events.

"The people who died in those buildings were from 16 countries and every religion," museum director Stephane Grimaldi said. "It was an attack against America. It was an attack against democracy and human rights. We want to tell that story."

The exhibit, "A Global Moment," is expected to open June 6 at the museum, which was built to remember those who died on D-Day in 1944 and in the Battle of Normandy that followed.

FOR PARENTS, TEXTING IS GR8

OMG. Dat u mom?

Yes, it is. Parents are horning in on their teenagers' lives through text messaging. Sending shorthand cell phone messages used to be the province of the younger set. Now, parents are responding with their own quick dispatches -- "RU there," "Running L8" -- and becoming the fastest-growing demographic in text messaging, which is one of the biggest areas of the mobile-phone industry.

In the past two years, use of the technology by those ages 45 to 54 increased 130 percent, said M:Metrics, a market-research firm. By comparison, those 13 to 17 increased their text messaging by far less, 41 percent.

Sprint Nextel said teens and adults ages 40 to 50 were the most active text-message users from June 2006 to June 2007. Of adults, mothers are driving the growth, the company said. Overall revenue from data services on cell phones, including text messages, surged 53 percent last year to $23 billion, said CTIA, the wireless-industry trade group.

"Parents like the immediacy of it and that it is not intrusive," said Ralph de la Vega, chief executive of AT&T Mobility, the nation's largest wireless carrier. Carriers have tried to aid parents. AT&T, for example, offers a four-page guide on lingo. Verizon Wireless' Quick Text feature lets parents to choose from a menu of such phrases as "What's up?" and "On my way," so they don't have to type each letter.

KILLER ASTEROID DOWNSIZED?

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs may not have been the whopper scientists thought. An analysis of the chemical remains of the asteroid that can still be found in sediments under the sea shows the rock was about 2.5 miles wide, said Francois Paquay, a geology graduate student at the University of Hawaii. That's significantly less than the up-to-12-mile-wide space boulder that researchers have suggested was the dinosaur-killer, said the research published Friday in the journal Science.

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