NOTEBOOK

By ELIZABETH L. BLAND, JANICE M. HOROWITZ, NADYA LABI, LINA LOFARO, ALAIN L. SANDERS AND JOEL STEIN

WINNERS & LOSERS

THEY ARE DEEPLY TOUCHED

[WINNERS]

TONY BLAIR His canny understanding of the public's grief will boost plans for political modernization

PETE ROSE JR. After nine years in the minors, the legend's namesake singles in his big-league debut

REV. HENRY LYONS A little confession is good p.r.: Baptist head thwarts challenge

[& LOSERS]

QUEEN ELIZABETH II Though she made up ground at week's end, the earlier remoteness will be hard to forget

AL GORE Did somebody say independent counsel? Looks like the Veep will tote baggage into 2000

THE BLEEPIN' RAIDERS Coach is down on profanity. What's next--the eye patch?

ALL THE PRESIDENT'S HATS

That President Clinton sure does like hats: He wore at least seven different ones during his three-week vacation. Not since Eisenhower has a Commander been so fond of haberdashery. Thus far the White House has no gimme-cap room (Who would pay to stay there?), but if the past seven years are any indication, the best inedible gift to give Bill is a baseball cap with something manly printed on it. Above, some of the best hat moments of the Clinton presidency.

A GUIDE FOR THE FRUGAL FOOTBALL FAN

Last year in the N.F.L., the price of an average ticket ranged from the New York Jets' low of $25.33 to Oakland's high of $51.41, according to Team Marketing Report, Inc. But buying a high-priced ticket was no guarantee of seeing the home team win. Some teams offered better value than others in that regard. With a perfect win record at home, for example, Green Bay gave fans at each home game the full value of the relatively inexpensive average ticket price ($30.61). In contrast, no amount of money could have purchased a ticket to a Jets win at home, as there were none. Here are the best and worst home-ticket buys:

BEST BUYS

Team Cost per Win

1. Green Bay $30.61 2. Denver $35.83 3. Buffalo $38.24 4. Carolina $39.26 5. Pittsburgh $40.87

IN THE MIDDLE

10. Chicago $50.91 11. Dallas $51.00 15. Washington $57.10 17. San Francisco $60.00

WORST BUYS

26. Oakland $102.82 27. Houston* $125.32 28. Atlanta $125.96 29. New Orleans $139.36 30. New York Jets [infinity symbol]

*now Tennessee

HEALTH REPORT

THE GOOD NEWS

MEN, BONE UP For the first time, a study shows that older men, like women, can stave off bone loss--and even increase bone mass--with calcium and vitamin D supplements. Just 500 mg of calcium and 700 IUs of vitamin D a day seem to do the trick.

NOW HEAR THIS A new, portable device called Audx enables doctors and nurses to quickly assess a newborn's hearing. Audx works by transmitting sound waves into a baby's ear and measuring whether the ear produces any vibrations in response.

LICK YOUR WOUNDS! Here's why: saliva contains nitrite, which on skin seems to convert to nitric oxide--a potent antimicrobial agent.

Sources: New England Journal of Medicine; Bio-logics Systems; Lancet

THE BAD NEWS

MISSING THE BEAT Though stethoscopes offer an easy way to identify heart abnormalities, young doctors don't always know how to use them. In a study, residents failed to tell a murmur from a normal beat 80% of the time.

SNOOZE ALARM Shaving off just a couple hours of sleep a night for a week causes huge lapses in mental performance--doubling the response time to stimuli, for instance. To regain mental agility, two eight-hour nights of sleep are needed.

A PLAGUE UPON US A strain of plague in Madagascar is resistant to standard antibiotics, raising fears that other strains--including those found in the U.S. Southwest--could become resistant too.

Sources: Journal of the American Medical Association; Sleep; New England Journal of Medicine

NUMBERS

5: States that require bounty hunters to be licensed

49: States that require barbers to be licensed (all except Alabama)

22: Number of summer-vacation days taken by President Clinton

32: Number of days Congress was in recess this summer

10: Number of annual vacation days allowed by 82% of U.S. employers

30: Number of vacation days workers get in Austria and Brazil

5%: Percentage of three-year-olds who attended school in 1965

36%: Percentage who attended school in 1995

14%: Percentage of sober drivers involved in fatal crashes in 1995 who were speeding

42%: Percentage of drunken drivers involved in fatal car crashes in 1995 who were speeding

Sources: Covington & Burling, Nat'l. Assn. of Barber Boards, White House, U.S. Congress, U.S. Dept. of Labor, U.S. Dept. of Educ., NHTSA

22 YEARS AGO IN TIME

Sainthood is an honor conferred after death, although in a few rare cases, a person's spiritual uniqueness is acknowledged while he or she is alive. A report in TIME about MOTHER TERESA on Dec. 29, 1975, explored her world and works.

Today Mother Teresa of Calcutta, 65, is slightly bent from hardship, her man-size hands are gnarled, her Albanian peasant face is seamed. From her solitary, seemingly foolhardy labors have grown two orders of women and men willing to take risks and make sacrifices... Between her travels to the order's far-flung outposts, Mother Teresa rises at 4:30 a.m., prays, sings the Mass with her sister nuns, joins them for a spare meal of an egg, bread, banana and tea, then goes out into the city to work. Age and authority have not changed her; she is at ease these days with Pope and Prime Minister, but she still cleans convent toilets. She has won an array of international honors, including India's Order of the Lotus...but sees them only as "recognition that the poor are our brothers and sisters, that there are people in the world who need love, who need care, who have to be wanted." Especially in a season that celebrates God's goodwill toward man, Mother Teresa's own loving luminosity prompts many to bestow on her a title that she would surely reject. She is, they say, a living saint.