McAfee Antivirus Software Pioneer Arrested in Guatemala City

MEXICO CITY — The antivirus software pioneer John McAfee was arrested in Guatemala City on Wednesday after he slipped over the border from his home in Belize where police want to question him in their investigation of the murder of his neighbor.

Jorge Dan Lopez/Reuters

John McAfee spoke during an interview in Guatemala City on Wednesday.

The interior minister, Mauricio Lopez Bonilla, told The Associated Press that Mr. McAfee, 67, had been arrested on charges of entering Guatemala illegally. He said that Mr. McAfee had been arrested at a hotel in the capital and taken to a detention center for migrants who are in the nation illegally.

Mr. McAfee had been on the run for almost a month since his neighbor, Gregory Faull, on the Belizean island of Ambergris Caye was found dead at his home on Nov. 11. Police there cited Mr. McAfee as a “person of interest” in their investigation, but Mr. McAfee disapppeared.

But he did not disappear from the Internet. He kept up a continuous stream of comment on his blog and on Twitter, accusing the Belizean authorities of persecuting him.

On Tuesday, he resurfaced in Guatemala, dressed in a suit, his blond curls dyed dark brown.

Accompanied by his 20-year-old Belizean girlfriend, Samantha Venagas, and his Guatemalan lawyer, Telésforo Guerra, Mr. McAfee said that he would seek political asylum in Guatemala. Mr. Guerra, a former Guatemalan attorney general, told reporters at a chaotic news conference outside the Supreme Court that his client was being persecuted because he refused to pay Belizean authorities off any longer.

Mr. McAfee has not been associated with the software company that bears his name since 1994, when he sold it and began to pursue his other interests. He ran a yoga retreat and then built a complex in New Mexico to indulge his hobby of flying motorized ultralight airplanes.

He moved to Belize about four years ago, buying properties on the mainland and on Ambergris Caye. It was there that he clashed with Mr. Faull, who complained about the unleashed dogs that Mr. McAfee kept on his property.

On Nov. 9, several of the dogs were found dead. They had been poisoned.

During his time in Belize, Mr. McAfee had apparently become interested in developing a designer drug called MDPV. He posted extensively about his experiments on a Web site.

But he attracted the attention of Belizean authorities, who raided one of his properties in April. He spent a night in jail, but law enforcement officials found no evidence that he was producing methamphetamine and dropped the charges.

After that experience, though, Mr. McAfee appeared to become increasingly convinced that he was being persecuted by the Belizean government. Officials deny that they are persecuting him.

Mr. Guerra told Guatemalan reporters late Wednesday that since there was no warrant for Mr. McAfee’s arrest and since his client was not a fugitive, he would seek to have his client released and returned to the hotel where he would remain under guard.

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Typhoon Kills Hundreds in Philippines

Bullit Marquez/Associated Press

A resident hung clothing amid fallen trees and debris on Wednesday, a day after Typhoon Bopha made landfall in the village of Andap, in southern Philippines.

MANILA — With many roads and bridges washed away, rescue teams struggled on Wednesday to reach isolated villages in the southern Philippines after a powerful out-of-season typhoon tore through the region, leaving more than 270 people dead and hundreds more missing, officials said.

Typhoon Bopha packed winds of up to 100 miles per hour when it struck on Tuesday, bringing torrential rains that flattened entire villages and left thousands homeless.

The deaths were concentrated in the Compostela Valley, a mountainous gold mining area, and the neighboring province of Davao Oriental, on the eastern coast of the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, Lt. Col. Lyndon Paniza, a military spokesman, said in a telephone interview late Wednesday afternoon.

A national disaster official, Benito Ramos, said at a news conference on Wednesday afternoon that 274 people had died, 339 were injured and 279 were missing. Those figures were likely to rise, he suggested, since rescue workers had not yet reached several villages in the hardest-hit areas and the casualties there were not known.

Most of the dead appeared to have drowned or been hit by falling trees or flying debris, officials said.

“There is debris in the road, so our soldiers are moving by foot,” Colonel Paniza said. “They are crossing rivers and landslides. I don’t want to speculate, but we don’t know what they will find when they reach those cut off areas.”

Three soldiers are known to have died, and eight are missing, he said. Several soldiers died when a landslide washed-out their patrol base, and others disappeared while on search-and-rescue operations.

Local television crews broadcast grisly footage of mud-covered bodies being loaded into trucks in villages that appeared flattened by the storm. In some areas, not a single structure could be seen standing.

In areas where roads were washed-out, the government dispatched seagoing vessels to take relief goods from the provincial capital of Mati to remote coastal areas.

“I have thus authorized the local government of Mati, its mayor and the provincial governor, to use their calamity funds to hire all available large, local fishing boats for an immediate sea-lift transfer of goods to the affected areas,” Manuel Roxas, the interior secretary, said in a statement.

The eastern coast of Mindanao, which was the area hardest hit by the storm, is a remote, impoverished agricultural area. Mr. Roxas told reporters on Wednesday that during his visit to the area, he had seen tens of thousands of coconut trees downed and many acres of destroyed banana plantations.

In New Bataan, the town hit hardest by the storm, Virgilia Babaag had been waiting nervously in her home before dawn Tuesday as hard rain from the approaching typhoon pounded her small village.

“My neighbors started yelling, ‘The water is coming fast! Run! Run!” she said Wednesday by telephone.

Ms. Babaag gathered up her three young nieces staying with her and ran through the night toward high ground. There she stayed with dozens of others as winds ripped through the town.

“When I came back, my roof was gone,” she said from her devastated home. “The houses around my place are destroyed. There are so many who have died here. The soldiers are still finding more.”

The Philippines is hit by as many as 20 powerful tropical storms each year, but this one struck remote communities south of the usual typhoon path.

“This is the first time that the people in this area have experienced a storm like this,” Colonel Paniza said. “They aren’t accustomed to big storms.”

Last December, Tropical Storm Washi — another out-of-season storm that hit south of the usual Philippine typhoon belt — killed more than 1,200 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

This year, officials put out strong warnings days in advance and implemented mandatory early evacuations of vulnerable communities.

President Benigno S. Aquino III, stung by criticism last year that the national government had not done enough to prepare for Tropical Storm Washi, went on television the day before the storm hit and pleaded with people to follow the instructions of local government officials.

“I am facing you now because the incoming storm is no laughing matter,” Mr. Aquino said, adding later: “We expect the cooperation of everyone so that nobody gets in harm’s way.”

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Jets going with Mark Sanchez as starting QB

NEW YORK (AP) — Rex Ryan is sticking with Mark Sanchez as the New York Jets' starting quarterback.

The team announced Wednesday morning that Sanchez, benched last Sunday against Arizona, will get the start this week over Greg McElroy and Tim Tebow when the Jets play the Jaguars at Jacksonville.

Sanchez was pulled late in the third quarter, and McElroy came in and led the Jets to the only touchdown of the game on his first NFL drive and helped New York to a 7-6 victory. Sanchez was 10 of 21 for 97 and three interceptions, while McElroy was 5 of 7 for 29 yards and the score, and appeared to spark the team.

Ryan, who was scheduled to speak later Wednesday, said Monday that he needed "a little more time" to consult with his staff before making the decision for this week. It was perhaps the biggest call in Ryan's nearly four years as coach of the Jets, considering the sensitivity of the situation and the possible ramifications.

Sanchez, whose confidence was shaken with Sunday's miserable performance, gets a chance to bounce back from the first benching of his NFL career and to regain the trust of his teammates. He has struggled the last several weeks, with two touchdowns and five interceptions in his last four games. He'll likely be on a short leash against Jacksonville — with McElroy possibly ready to go.

"I'll just keep working, go study this film and keep trying to improve," Sanchez said Sunday after the game. "I need to understand where the mistakes came from, keep studying, keep preparing, be ready to play next week and see what happens."

It's uncertain if Tebow will be active against his hometown Jaguars after sustaining two broken ribs. He was medically cleared by team doctors to play, but Ryan chose to keep him active but not play against New England on Thanksgiving night and then made him inactive against Arizona.

If Ryan went with McElroy, a seventh-round pick in 2011 out of Alabama, it would have been a clear message that the franchise is moving on from Sanchez.

However, money could have played a role, too, with Sanchez owed $8.25 million next year in guarantees. The Jets are likely stuck with Sanchez and his contract, so they need to see if he can rebound. If he can't, it will be an intriguing offseason for New York, especially since Tebow has not played much since being acquired from Denver in March and might not be back next year.

It didn't appear that Tebow was much of a factor in Ryan's decision. Ryan said all three quarterbacks would be in the mix, but didn't want to speculate as to whether he would have pulled Sanchez in favor of Tebow last Sunday if he were active.

Tebow was expected to have a major role in the offense, but instead has been just a spare part averaging about seven offensive snaps per game. He has been listed as the No. 2 quarterback on the depth chart, but if the Jets turned to McElroy, it would have meant that the No. 3 guy leapfrogged Tebow to start for the Jets.

Although Ryan said it wouldn't factor into his decision, the fact the team is playing on the road for the next two games should also help Sanchez.

He was booed mercilessly by the MetLife Stadium crowd last Sunday, particularly after each interception, and chants for McElroy were heard throughout the game. McElroy was cheered as he warmed up late in the third quarter, and there was growing sentiment among some fans and media that he earned a start after lifting the team.

The Jets are hoping he also sparked Sanchez, whom they deemed the face of the franchise just a few years ago when they traded up in the draft in 2009 and took him with the fifth overall pick. He helped lead New York to consecutive trips to the AFC championship game for the first time in team history, but it has been a bumpy ride since. Sanchez has been criticized the last two seasons for failing to take the next step in his development, and Ryan has been knocked for sticking with the quarterback for too long.

The two have been joined at the hip, and stand side-by-side during the national anthem before every game. Ryan was seen in the locker room consoling Sanchez after the game, his arm on his shoulder as the two spoke for a few minutes. Until last Sunday, the threat of being benched — even with Tebow on the roster — didn't appear to be a real possibility.

Now, Ryan has sent the message to Sanchez: Perform or else. And, Sanchez gets one more shot to save his job this season — and his status as the Jets' franchise quarterback.

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Well: For Athletes, Risks From Ibuprofen Use

Phys Ed

Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness.

Many active people use the painkiller ibuprofen on an almost daily basis. In surveys, up to 70 percent of distance runners and other endurance athletes report that they down the pills before every workout or competition, viewing the drug as a preemptive strike against muscle soreness.

But a valuable new study joins growing evidence that ibuprofen and similar anti-inflammatory painkillers taken before a workout don’t offer any benefit and may be causing disagreeable physical damage instead, particularly to the intestines.

Studies have already shown that strenuous exercise alone commonly results in a small amount of intestinal trauma. A representative experiment published last year found that cyclists who rode hard for an hour immediately developed elevated blood levels of a marker that indicates slight gastrointestinal leakage.

Physiologically, it makes sense that exercise would affect the intestines as it does, since, during prolonged exertion, digestion becomes a luxury, said Dr. Kim van Wijck, currently a surgical resident at Orbis Medical Center in the Netherlands, who led the small study. So the blood that normally would flow to the small intestine is instead diverted to laboring muscles. Starved of blood, some of the cells lining the intestines are traumatized and start to leak.

Thankfully, the damage seems to be short-lived, Dr. van Wijck said. Her research has shown that within an hour after a cyclist finished riding, the stressed intestines returned to normal.

But the most common side-effect of ibuprofen is gastrointestinal damage. And since many athletes take the drug for pain before and after a workout, Dr. van Wijck set out to determine the combined effect of exercise and ibuprofen.

For the new study, published in the December issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, researchers at Maastricht University in the Netherlands recruited nine healthy, active men and had them visit the university’s human performance lab four times.

During two of the visits, the men rested languorously for an hour, although before one of the visits, they swallowed 400 milligrams of ibuprofen the night before and also the morning of their trip to the lab. (Four hundred milligrams is the recommended non-prescription dosage for adults using the drug to treat headaches or other minor pain.)

During the remaining visits, the men briskly rode stationary bicycles for that same hour. Before one of those rides, though, they again took 400 milligrams of ibuprofen the night before and the morning of their workout.

At the end of each rest or ride, researchers drew blood to check whether the men’s small intestines were leaking. Dr. van Wijck found that blood levels of a protein indicating intestinal leakage were, in fact, much higher when the men combined bike riding with ibuprofen than during the other experimental conditions when they rode or took ibuprofen alone. Notably, the protein levels remained elevated several hours after exercise and ibuprofen.

The health implications of this finding are not yet clear, although they are worrying, Dr. van Wijck said. It may be that if someone uses ibuprofen before every exercise session for a year or more, she said, “intestinal integrity might be compromised.” In that case, small amounts of bacteria and digestive enzymes could leak regularly into the bloodstream.

More immediately, if less graphically, the absorption of nutrients could be compromised, especially after exercise, Dr. van Wijck said, which could affect the ability of tired muscles to resupply themselves with fuel and regenerate.

The research looks specifically at prophylactic use of ibuprofen and does not address the risks and benefits of ibuprofen after an injury occurs. Short-term use of Ibuprofen for injury is generally considered appropriate.

Meanwhile, the Dutch study is not the first to find damage from combining exercise and ibuprofen. Earlier work has shown that frequent use of the drug before and during workouts also can lead to colonic seepage. In a famous study from a few years ago, researchers found that runners at the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run who were regular ibuprofen users had small amounts of colonic bacteria in their bloodstream.

Ironically, this bacterial incursion resulted in “higher levels of systemic inflammation,” said David C. Nieman, a professor of health and exercise science at Appalachian State University who conducted the study and is himself an ultramarathoner. In other words, the ultramarathon racers who frequently used ibuprofen, an anti-inflammatory, wound up with higher overall levels of bodily inflammation. They also reported being just as sore after the race as runners who had not taken ibuprofen.

Animal studies have also shown that ibuprofen hampers the ability of muscles to rebuild themselves after exercise. So why do so many athletes continue enthusiastically to swallow large and frequent doses of ibuprofen and related anti-inflammatory painkillers, including aspirin, before and during exercise?

“The idea is just entrenched in the athletic community that ibuprofen will help you to train better and harder,” Dr. Nieman said. “But that belief is simply not true. There is no scientifically valid reason to use ibuprofen before exercise and many reasons to avoid it.”

Dr. van Wijck agrees. “We do not yet know what the long-term consequences are” of regularly mixing exercise and ibuprofen, she said. But it is clear that “ibuprofen consumption by athletes is not harmless and should be strongly discouraged.”

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Storm Hits Hiring in November; Service Sector Expands

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Private-sector hiring took a hit in November due to the impact of storm Sandy that ravaged consumers and businesses in the northeastern United States, but the huge services sector continued to expand albeit at a modest pace.

The ADP National Employment Report, which is closely watched as it comes two days ahead of the government's monthly employment report, showed that the private sector added 118,000 jobs during the month, below expectations for a gain of 125,000.

The report largely confirmed economists' forecast for a weak reading in the Labor Department payrolls report on Friday. Economists expect the economy added 93,000 jobs in November, down from 171,000 the month before, according to a Reuters poll.

"It's close to what the market was expecting. If Friday's employment report from the U.S. Labor Department comes in similar to this, that would be a good outcome," said Terry Sheehan, economic analyst at Stone and McCarthy Research Associates in Princeton, New Jersey.

A separate report on the U.S. services sector showed a similar dip in hiring during the month. But forward-looking indicators pointed to faster growth as a rise in new orders and business activity helped offset a slowdown in employment and prices.

The Institute for Supply Management said its services index rose to 54.7 last month from 54.2 the month before, with 50 being the divide between growth and contraction. The reading topped economists' forecasts for growth of 53.5, according to a Reuters survey.

"The much larger service side of the U.S. economy remains relatively healthy," said Joseph Trevisani, chief market strategist at Worldwide Markets, Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey.

"It has so far avoided the contraction in manufacturing, but worse is probably coming in the first quarter of next year as the economy continues to slow."

A separate report on Monday showed that the manufacturing sector contracted after two months of growth.

U.S. stocks were little changed after the data but drifted lower by midmorning. The S&P 500 index, a broad measure of U.S. stocks, traded down 0.4 percent at 1,401.74 points.

Also on Wednesday, a report showed new orders received by U.S. factories unexpectedly rose in October as demand for motor vehicles and a range of other goods offset a slump in defense and civilian aircraft orders, a hopeful sign for the manufacturing sector.

That chimed with another report showing U.S. nonfarm productivity increased at a much faster clip than initially thought in the third quarter as businesses held the line on hiring even as output surged, with unit labor costs falling at their fastest pace in almost a year.

Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics, who helps compile the ADP report, said underlying jobs growth was closer to 150,000 in November after discounting the impact of the storm as well as seasonal jobs brought forward at the start of the holiday season.

"Abstracting from the storm, the job market turned in a good performance during the month," he said. "Superstorm Sandy wreaked havoc on the job market in November, slicing an estimated 86,000 jobs from payrolls."

Zandi said he was seeing little indication that budget negotiations in Washington aimed at averting the so-called "fiscal cliff," a series of automatic tax hikes and spending cuts due in 2013, were having a significant impact of hiring.

"I don't sense that businesses have pulled back on their hiring or increased their layoffs as a result of the angst surrounding the fiscal issues," said Zandi.

The current impasse over the fiscal cliff, which could impact the economy to the tune of $600 billion next year, has been blamed for fueling uncertainty and causing corporate managers to delay business decisions.

(Reporting By Edward Krudy; Editing by Clive McKeef and Chizu Nomiyama)

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Royal Baby a ‘Delight,’ Especially to Britain’s Tabloids

LONDON — The speculation began virtually the moment Kate Middleton said “I will” to Prince William in April 2011, leaving an industry of tabloid newspapers and gossip magazines with a big black hole where their wedding coverage used to be.

Why, they asked, was the former Ms. Middleton, now the duchess of Cambridge, drinking water instead of wine at an official dinner, in what appeared to be a deliberate manner? And those photographs in which her stomach seemed microscopically less flat than normal — what was that about?

On Monday, everyone who had incorrectly guessed what was going on before could now finally claim to be right. Yes, St. James’s Palace announced, the duchess had become pregnant.

The news should help everyone forget the previous big news about the duchess this year: the embarrassing publication of a series of topless — and one or two bottomless — photographs taken illicitly while she and the duke were on vacation in France.

Announcing the news on the royal Web site, the duke and duchess said they were “very pleased.” Meanwhile, other members of the royal family, which is not prone to effusions of public emotion, allowed that they were “delighted.”

On Twitter, Prime Minister David Cameron declared that he, too, was delighted.

The pregnancy is in its very early stages and has not yet reached the three-month threshold that would normally have prompted the announcement. But the duchess is in the hospital suffering from “acute morning sickness,” the palace said, and hospitalizations are hard to keep secret.

“Her royal highness is expected to stay in hospital for several days and will require a period of rest thereafter,” the palace said.

There are many interesting things about a future royal baby. First, it will be third in line to the throne, even if it is a girl; the laws of succession are poised to be changed for this very reason, with the new rule applying to Kate and William’s child. Second, its presence would make the chances of the current No. 3, Prince Harry, becoming king ever more remote, barring some bizarre development in which four generations of his family — his grandmother, his father, his brother and his future niece or nephew — all stepped aside.

Also, it gives Britain something to be excited about at a time when life here has not been so exciting, what with austerity and widespread flooding across huge parts of England after a period of nearly biblical rainfall.

“A royal baby is something the whole nation will celebrate,” the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, observed on Twitter. “Fantastic news for Kate, William and the country.”

In addition to being delighted, the prime minister revealed that in his opinion, the duke and duchess of Cambridge would be “wonderful parents.”

But few people could be more excited than the editors of the newspapers and magazines that cover the royal family, who with any luck will have months of things to write about: What will it be, boy or girl? How fat will the duchess look in her pregnancy clothes? What is happening behind closed doors?

Already, The Daily Mail has revealed a gaggle of purportedly insider-ish details about what is really going on, including the news that the duchess began feeling sick over the weekend and was “unable to keep any food or water down.”

It continued, “Sources suggested that the duchess was hooked up to an intravenous drip to increase her fluid and nutrient levels.”

The papers have also made much of a retrospectively significant incident from last Wednesday, when a member of the public handed Prince William a baby outfit decorated with a helicopter and the words “Daddy’s little co-pilot” — and William smiled as he accepted it.

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Chiefs had given counseling to Belcher, girlfriend

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Kansas City Chiefs officials knew that linebacker Jovan Belcher and his girlfriend were having relationship problems, and the team provided the couple with counseling in an effort to help, a police official said.

Belcher fatally shot Kasandra Perkins, 22, at their Kansas City home Saturday before shooting himself in the head in the Arrowhead Stadium parking lot in front of team officials who were trying to stop him, including general manager Scott Pioli and head coach Romeo Crennel.

Police Sgt. Richard Sharp told The Kansas City Star for a Tuesday story (http://bit.ly/SDwg9m ) that the couple had been arguing over relationship and financial issues for months and that the team had been "bending over backward" trying to help them. Sharp didn't specify how long the couple had been undergoing counseling.

When Belcher arrived at Arrowhead on Saturday, he encountered Pioli in the parking lot and told him the assistance the team had offered hadn't fixed the couple's problems and now "it was too late," Sharp said.

Pioli tried to persuade Belcher to put down his gun as Crennel and linebackers coach Gary Gibbs arrived at the scene.

Belcher thanked the men for everything the team had done for him and asked if Pioli and team owner Clark Hunt would take care of his daughter, The Star reported.

After that, Belcher reportedly said, "Guys, I have to do this."

"I was trying to get him to understand that life is not over," Crennel said Monday. "He still has a chance and let's get this worked out."

When Belcher heard police sirens approaching, he knelt behind a vehicle and shot himself in the head.

Investigators believe Belcher killed himself because he was distraught over shooting Perkins, Sharp said.

"He cared about her," Sharp said. "I don't think he could live with himself."

The night before the killings, Perkins had attended a concert downtown with friends and Belcher had been out at the Power and Light District, police said, while Belcher's mother was watching their 3-month-old baby. Detectives don't know exactly what the couple was arguing about but The Star reported that Belcher was upset that Perkins had stayed out so late.

Autopsies with toxicology tests were performed on both bodies but it could be weeks before results are known, police said.

Police spokesman Darin Snapp said Monday that Belcher's mother was given temporary custody of the couple's daughter.

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Well: New Meaning and Drive in Life After Cancer

When people hear the words “You have cancer,” life is suddenly divided into distinct parts. There was their life before cancer, and then there is life after cancer.

The number of people in that second category continues to grow. In June, the National Cancer Institute reported that an estimated 13.7 million living Americans are cancer survivors, and the number will increase to almost 18 million over the next decade. More than half are younger than 70.

A new book, “Picture Your Life After Cancer,” (American Cancer Society) focuses on the living that goes on after a cancer diagnosis. It’s based on a multimedia project by The New York Times that asked readers to submit photos and their personal stories. So far, nearly 1,500 people have shared their experiences — the good, the bad, the challenging and the inspirational — creating a dramatic photo essay of the varied lives people live in the years after diagnosis.

For Susan Schwalb, a 68-year-old artist from Manhattan, a diagnosis of early-stage breast cancer at the age of 62 led to a lumpectomy, followed by a mastectomy and then failed reconstruction surgery. She discovered that cancer was not only a physical challenge but a mental one as well, and she turned to friends and support groups to cope with the emotional strain. When she saw the “Picture Your Life” project, she submitted a photo of herself wearing a paint-splattered artist’s apron.

“What cancer made me do in my own professional life is to pedal faster,” Ms. Schwalb said in an interview. “I’ve encountered some people who decide to enjoy life, retire, work in a garden. I decided I had to have more of what I wanted in life, and I better move fast because maybe I don’t have the long life I imagined I would have.”

Indeed, a common theme of the “Picture Your Life” project is that cancer spurs people to take long-delayed trips, seek out adventure and spend time with their families. Photos of mountain climbs, a ride on a camel, scuba diving excursions and bicycle trips are now part of the online collage.

Dr. David Posner, associate program director of pulmonary medicine at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, says a diagnosis of metastatic colon cancer at the age of 47 has helped him relate to his own patients with cancer. The past decade has included nine operations, six recurrences and three rounds of chemotherapy, but Dr. Posner said he never missed more than three weeks of work.

“My salvation has been my family and my work,” he said. “When I was at work I wasn’t thinking about myself, and it was very therapeutic. I see my share of cancer patients, and I motivate them and they motivate me.”

Dr. Posner said he decided to be part of “Picture Your Life” because he wants to get the word out that a cancer diagnosis — even a dire one like his — doesn’t have to define your life.

“I think about someone asking me, ‘So how was your last decade — was it wasted or was it a life filled with a lot of happiness and joy?’ ” he said. “The cancer thing was a pain, but for the most part I’ve had a pretty good time.”

The “Picture Your Life” collage includes photo after photo of survivors with their pets. Sandra Elliott, 59, of Claremont, Calif., submitted a picture of herself with her two golden retrievers, Buddy and Molly. They were just puppies when she received a diagnosis of Stage 2 breast cancer in 2003. During her recovery from surgery and chemotherapy treatments, she took the dogs to romp on the Pomona College campus, near her home, and one day a professional photographer snapped the picture.

“No matter how bad I felt that day, no matter how many chemo treatments or doctors appointments, those two little puppies with these big black eyes would look at me with their tails wagging as if to say, ‘It’s time. It’s time. It’s time to go out!’  ” Ms. Elliott recalled.

“I felt so physically horrible, and I’d look at them and the pure joy on their faces and in their bodies for just being out in nature and being able to smell the air, smell the trees, chase a squirrel — that sheer in-the-moment love of life they showed me really lifted my spirit on a daily basis.”

Ms. Elliott still lives with chronic pain as a result of nerve damage from her cancer treatment, and she can relate to others in the “Picture Your Life” project who worry that their cancer will recur or that they’ll never feel completely normal again. But she says a stronger theme runs through all the pictures and stories.

“We have all been forced to find the joy in the smallest things,” she said. “I’m sitting here looking at a geranium about to bloom. These things are out there — we just have to be reminded to look at them. And cancer is a big reminder.”

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Pope Starts Personal Twitter Account

Osservatore Romano, via Reuters

Pope Benedict XVI using an iPad at the Vatican last year.

On Monday, the Vatican announced that the 85-year-old pontiff would begin posting messages on Twitter next week under the handle @pontifex, a term for pope that means bridge-builder in Latin. Within hours, he had more than 100,000 followers.

Benedict is expected to hit “send” on his first post at a general audience at the Vatican on Dec. 12 — a response to questions about matters of the faith that he is now accepting via the hashtag #askpontifex, officials said.

The Vatican acknowledged that it had chosen the @pontifex handle not only because of its meaning but also because many other handles had been taken.

The move is aimed at drawing in the church’s 1.2 billion followers, especially young people. “The pope’s presence on Twitter can be seen as the ‘tip of the iceberg’ that is the church’s presence in the world of new media,” the Vatican said in a statement.

Just do not expect the pope to start following you on Twitter or retweeting your posts, Greg Burke, a former Fox News correspondent in Rome who was named a Vatican communications adviser this year, said at a news conference. “He won’t follow anyone for now,” Mr. Burke added. “He will be followed.”

Benedict’s posts will go out in Arabic, English, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Other languages are expected to be added in the future. The messages will mostly feature the contents of the pope’s speeches at his weekly general audience and Sunday blessings, as well as homilies on major holidays and reaction to major world events, like natural disasters.

Aides will write the texts of Benedict’s posts, but the pope himself will “engage and approve” the content. The pope will post messages however often he feels like it.

“The pope is not the kind of person like the rest of us who in a meeting or a lunch is looking at their BlackBerrys to see if any messages have come in,” Mr. Burke said. “He is not walking around with an iPad, but all the pope’s tweets are the pope’s words.”

The pope’s account will not have special security, the Vatican said, but precautions have been taken to make sure the pope’s certified account is not hacked. All the posts will come from one computer in the Vatican’s Secretariat of State.

The prospect of the pope’s using Twitter has raised some puzzling theological questions. Asked whether the pope’s posts would be infallible, Msgr. Claudio Maria Celli, the president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, laughed and said that they would be part of the church Magisterium, or collective teaching, but should be considered “pearls of wisdom,” not exactly doctrine.

“In any case, it’s a papal teaching,” Monsignor Celli said. “The message is just entrusted to a new technology.”

A shy theologian who directed the Vatican’s doctrinal office for 25 years before becoming pope in 2005, Benedict is best known for complex theological positions that require far more than 140 characters to explain. His book “Jesus’s Childhood,” the last in his three-volume biography of Jesus, appeared last month and is a best seller in Italy.

The Catholic Church may be one of the slowest-changing institutions in the world, but when it comes to communicating with the faithful, it has generally been a pretty early adopter. In 1896, Pope Leo XIII became the first pope to appear on film. In 1931, Vatican Radio was founded, and Pope Piux XI was the first pope to make a radio broadcast. In 1949, Pope Pius XII was the first to appear on television.

In 2009, a Vatican Web site, www.pope2you.net, went live, offering an application called “The pope meets you on Facebook,” and another that allows readers to upload the pope’s speeches and messages to their smartphones. In 2011, the Vatican started its own news Web site, Newsva.va.

Last year, Benedict wrote that new media and social networks offered “a great opportunity,” but he also warned that they carried the risk of alienation and self-indulgence.

Gaia Pianigiani reported from Vatican City, and Rachel Donadio from Rome.

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Ruppert, O'Day, White elected to baseball Hall

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Former New York Yankees owner Jacob Ruppert, longtime umpire Hank O'Day and barehanded catcher Deacon White have been elected to the baseball Hall of Fame for their excellence through the first half of the 20th century.

The trio was picked by the Hall's pre-integration committee. The announcement was made Monday at the winter meetings.

Induction ceremonies will be held July 28.

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