Miranda Lambert: Dog Betty Is a Daddy's Girl

People Pets

By Jessica Herndon

01/29/2013 at 09:05 AM EST

As a busy mom of six – to pooches, that is! – Miranda Lambert often makes time for her furry brood by bringing some of her and husband Blake Shelton's pets on the road.

"I have two small dogs, Delta and Cher, so they are usually the ones who go on tour," she told PEOPLE.

Though sometimes, it's not always her the dogs want to be with.

"Betty is one of our dogs that we take on tour with us as well, but she's kind of a daddy's girl," Lambert said, "so she hangs out with Blake a lot."

But while the couple's pooches tend to play favorites, the Grammy nominee says she has no such preferences, referring to her home as a "full-on farm." "I have a huge passion for rescuing animals," she notes.

That attitude is part of why on Jan. 23 in Glendale, Calif., the singer helped launch The Pedigree Feeding Project, a new initiative by the company to supply one pet shelter in a worthy community with a year's supply of dog food. And having rescued a shelter pup herself, Lambert personally understands the campaign's importance.

"I have a Chihuahua that I got at a shelter at 4 weeks old and I have to remind her of her roots," she said. "I tell her that she did not grow up in Bel Air. She came from a shelter in east Texas. I have to keep her humble."

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Soldier talks about his new arms after transplant

BALTIMORE (AP) — A soldier who lost all four limbs in an Iraq roadside bombing has two new arms following a double transplant at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Twenty-six-year-old Brendan Marrocco along with the surgeons who treated him will be at the Baltimore hospital on Tuesday to discuss the new limbs.

The transplants are only the seventh double-hand or double-arm transplant ever conducted in the United States.

The infantryman was injured by a roadside bomb in 2009. The New York City man also received bone marrow from the same dead donor. The approach is aimed at helping his body accept the new arms with minimal medication to prevent rejection.

The military is sponsoring operations like these to help wounded troops. About 300 have lost arms or hands in the wars.

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Wall Street little changed ahead of data

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks were little changed at the open on Tuesday as investors were cautious following a recent rally and before consumer confidence data.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 10.09 points or 0.07 percent, to 13,892.02, the S&P 500 <.spx> gained 0.05 point to 1,500.23 and the Nasdaq Composite <.ixic> dropped 8.27 points or 0.26 percent, to 3,146.03.

(Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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Toyota Returns to No. 1 in Global Auto Sales

TOKYO — Toyota Motor sold a record 9.75 million vehicles last year, according to an official tally released Monday, roaring past General Motors and Volkswagen to reclaim its title as the world’s top automaker in 2012.

General Motors, which held the top spot in 2011, mustered 9.29 million vehicles in global sales last year. The U.S. company had been the top-selling automaker for decades before losing its lead to Toyota in 2008.

Volkswagen sold 9.1 million vehicles last year, a record for the German automaker, which has expanded its presence in emerging markets. VW also outsold Toyota in 2011.

Toyota estimated last month that it sold 9.7 million vehicles for the year, and final figures released Monday were slightly higher.

By confirming its No. 1 title, Toyota cements a strong comeback from several years of tumbles.

A sharp slowdown in exports during the global economic crisis led to the automaker’s biggest loss in decades, while controversy over its handling of recalls greatly tarnished its image for quality and reliability.

In 2011, the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, as well as widespread flooding in Thailand later that year, severely disrupted production, weighing on sales in important markets like the United States and pushing Toyota to No. 3 in global sales.

Toyota had a bumper year in 2012, however, as production rebounded and the automaker went on an offensive to win back market share. Toyota sales in the United States surged 27 percent, to 2.08 million vehicles. In Japan, sales rose 35 percent, to 2.41 million units, helped by government incentives for fuel-efficient cars.

Those increases were enough to offset a decline in sales in China, where Japanese businesses have been hurt by consumer boycotts amid a bitter territorial dispute between the two countries. In Europe, sales of Toyota cars rose by 2 percent. Toyota’s sales figures include deliveries from its subsidiaries Hino Motors and Daihatsu Motor.

The other automakers among Japan’s big three also sold more cars in 2012 and are set for even higher sales this year on the back of a weaker yen, which makes Japanese-made cars and parts more price competitive. Honda Motor said global sales jumped 19 percent to 3.82 million vehicles, while Nissan Motor logged a 5.8 percent sales growth to 4.94 million vehicles.

This year, Toyota aims to improve on its record for this year to sell 9.91 million cars worldwide.

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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West

New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.

Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.

There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.

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CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

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Wall Street flat after rally, Caterpillar advances

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks were flat on Monday, with investors reluctant to make big bets following an extended equity rally, though strong data and results from Caterpillar kept a positive tone in markets.

The S&P 500 is coming off a streak of eight sessions of gains, the longest winning streak for the index in eight years. On Friday, it closed above 1,500 for the first time in more than five years.

Caterpillar Inc rose 1.8 percent to $97.24 after the Dow component reported adjusted fourth-quarter earnings that beat expectations, though revenue was slightly below forecasts. The heavy machinery maker also said it expects China's economy to improve, though not at the rates of 2010 and 2011.

The results continued the trend of major firms posting strong quarters, contributing to major averages rising for four straight weeks.

"You can't find more of a global bellwether than Cat, and people are pleased with the number, which suggests there could be less concern about slowing growth in China after this," said Wayne Kaufman, chief market analyst at John Thomas Financial in New York.

Thomson Reuters data through Friday showed that of the 147 S&P 500 companies that have reported earnings so far, 68 percent exceeded expectations. Since 1994, 62 percent of companies have topped expectations, while the average over the past four quarters stands at 65 percent.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 18.07 points, or 0.13 percent, at 13,914.05. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was down 0.07 points, or 0.00 percent, at 1,502.89. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 7.25 points, or 0.23 percent, at 3,156.97.

The S&P 500 on Friday closed at its highest since December 10, 2007, and the Dow ended at its highest since October 31, 2007. Over the past four weeks, the S&P has jumped 7.2 percent, suggesting markets may be vulnerable to a pullback if news disappoints.

Durable goods jumped 4.6 percent in December, a pace that far outstripped expectations for a rise of 1.8 percent.

"We continue to have a parade of better-than-expected economic reports. All-in-all it's a good picture. I think there's a good chance we've reached a point of recognition where people don't think the economy will crater," Kaufman said.

In addition to earnings, equities have also risen on an agreement in Washington to extend the government's borrowing power. On Monday, Fitch Ratings said that agreement removed the near-term risk to the country's 'AAA' rating.

Previously, the agency said the lack of an agreement would prompt a review of the sovereign rating.

In company news, Keryx Biopharmaceuticals Inc said a late-stage trial of its experimental kidney disease drug met the main study goal of reducing phosphate levels in blood, sending shares up 43 percent to $4.91.

Bargain hunters may look to Apple Inc in the first session after the tech giant lost its coveted title as the largest U.S. company by market capitalization to Exxon Mobil Corp . Apple rose 0.7 percent to $443.06.

On Friday, Apple's market cap fell to $413 billion, down roughly $250 billion from its September peak. Apple's fall is about equal to the entire value of Google Inc .

"Apple is pretty attractive right now, so you may see an opportunity here," said Chris Bertelsen, who helps oversee $1.5 billion as chief investment officer of Global Financial Private Capital in Sarasota, Florida. "Those who think the stock is dead have made a big mistake."

(Editing by W Simon, Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)

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IHT Rendezvous: 'Real' Life in North Korea

BEIJING — With North Korea in the headlines again amid concerns it could explode a third, more powerful nuclear device, many people around the world may be wondering: What are they like?

North Korea is “a real country with real people,” wrote John Everard, a former British ambassador to Pyongyang, in The Independent on Sunday.

“Above all, North Koreans are sharply differentiated human beings, with a good sense of humor and are often fun to be with,” wrote Mr. Everard, who lived in the North Korean capital from 2006 to 2008 and is the author of a recent book about his time there, titled, “Only Beautiful, Please.”

Their everyday concerns “are often not so very different from our own: their friends, how their children are doing at school, their jobs and making enough money to get by.”

Mr. Everard’s stay in Pyongyang took in the time of North Korea’s first nuclear test. This article on 38 North, a Web site that follows the country closely, shows how the rest of the world is watching to see whether another nuclear detonation is imminent.

Tensions have grown since North Korea launched a rocket in December, provoking a new U.N. Security Council resolution last week condemning the launching and calling for a tightening of sanctions against the country. In a sign it’s really serious, even China, the North’s longtime ally, voted for the resolution.

In response, North Korea “bluntly threatened the United States, saying North Korea had no interest in talks on denuclearizing itself and would forge ahead with its missile and weapons development, with the goal of attaining the capability to hit American territory,” my colleagues Choe Sang-hun and Rick Gladstone wrote.

Against this nasty background, Mr. Everard shows the human dimension of citizens living in Pyongyang, focusing on a group of people he says he got to know fairly well; not the inner circle of power, but not the poor of the countryside, either. “They were executives rather than leaders.”

As nknews.org wrote last year, “Foreigners are allowed within a 35 km radius of Pyongyang, and Everard took every opportunity to visit and document within this area.”

So what were they like?

Over all, “Their lives would seem very dull to most Westerners,” Mr. Everard wrote. “They revolved around daily rituals of carefully phased breakfasts in overcrowded flats, tedious journeys to work (often prolonged because Pyongyang’s rickety public transport so often broke down), and generally tedious work days.”

Tedious, maybe, but “relaxed.” Yet, working day done, getting home wasn’t always easy. “Some of my contacts refused to use the Pyongyang metro because of the risk of a power cut while they were in a tunnel.” Some chose to walk home.

They were curious about the world. “I once lent one a set of DVDs of ‘Desperate Housewives’ and met the same person the next day with big rings under their eyes. They had sat up all night and watched the entire series in one sitting,” he wrote.

More fun, perhaps, than a visit home: “My contacts spoke of their parents with respect rather than affection, and chafed at the Confucian authority that they exercised. Visits to their homes seemed to be a duty rather than a pleasure, particularly when they involved dressing children up in their best and crossing Pyongyang (especially in autumn, when the city gets muddy – a difficult time to deliver clean children to grandparents),” he wrote.

Intriguingly, “Alcoholism and prostitution were rampant within the capital,” nknews.org reported, from a talk Mr. Everard gave last year.

And, “Although they all had access to showers, none could remember when they had last had one with hot water. Taking a cold shower in the Pyongyang winter, when temperatures can fall to -20C, is not fun,” Mr. Everard wrote in The Independent.

Most people he mingled with had enough food – but it wasn’t varied or tasty. “These people did not eat well, but at least they ate regularly,” mostly rice and boiled vegetables. And kimchi.

“Evening life at home revolved around chatting with family members and watching TV,” he wrote. “Sometimes there would be a film on. Even though North Korea had hardly produced any new films for some years before my time there, so that my contacts had seen almost all the national repertoire several times, they would still sometimes watch repeats. But the best time was the half-hour of (heavily edited and slanted) international news on Sunday evenings. Everyone watched that, and questioned me about what they had seen.”

While the anti-American propaganda the state puts out is powerful, not everyone believed it, Mr. Everard wrote.

“They had been taught to hate Americans, but most of them did not. One of them told me that they had worked with Americans during one of the thaws in relations with that country, had liked them and hoped that they would return,” wrote Mr. Everard. Of course this all was based on experiences that ended in 2008, but it’s unlikely attitudes have changed fundamentally since then, despite the latest round of threats to target the United States.

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SAG Awards: Watch Live with PEOPLE

01/27/2013 at 09:30 AM EST

Happy Screen Actors Guild Awards!

On a night when the biggest stars of TV and film honor each other, we will be covering every inch of the red carpet beginning at 6 p.m. ET (3 p.m. PT) on our live pre-show, hosted by PEOPLE's Deputy Managing Editor Peter Castro and PEOPLE StyleWatch Managing Editor Susan Kaufman, right here on PEOPLE.com.

Join our @StyleWatchMag and @peoplemag Twitter party on Sunday to discuss the best dresses, the hottest hair and makeup and the most eye-popping jewels that nominees like Claire Danes, Jessica Chastain and Jennifer Lawrence will be wearing. Just use hashtag #PeopleSAG and your comments could appear on PEOPLE.com.

Once the show starts at 8 p.m. ET (5 p.m. PT), the fun continues as we track the winners, losers and best speeches of the night. PEOPLE editors and the stars, including Busy Phillips, will be Tweeting commentary, exclusive photos, behind-the-scenes tidbits and more on one of Hollywood's most heartfelt nights.

The 19th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards will air live on TNT and TBS on Sunday, Jan. 27, at 8 p.m. ET (5 p.m. PT) from the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. Be sure to join us!

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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West

New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.

Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.

There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.

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CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/

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Wall Street Week Ahead: Bears hibernate as stocks near record highs

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks have been on a tear in January, moving major indexes within striking distance of all-time highs. The bearish case is a difficult one to make right now.

Earnings have exceeded expectations, the housing and labor markets have strengthened, lawmakers in Washington no longer seem to be the roadblock that they were for most of 2012, and money has returned to stock funds again.

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> has gained 5.4 percent this year and closed above 1,500 - climbing to the spot where Wall Street strategists expected it to be by mid-year. The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> is 2.2 percent away from all-time highs reached in October 2007. The Dow ended Friday's session at 13,895.98, its highest close since October 31, 2007.

The S&P has risen for four straight weeks and eight consecutive sessions, the longest streak of days since 2004. On Friday, the benchmark S&P 500 ended at 1,502.96 - its first close above 1,500 in more than five years.

"Once we break above a resistance level at 1,510, we dramatically increase the probability that we break the highs of 2007," said Walter Zimmermann, technical analyst at United-ICAP, in Jersey City, New Jersey. "That may be the start of a rise that could take equities near 1,800 within the next few years."

The most recent Reuters poll of Wall Street strategists estimated the benchmark index would rise to 1,550 by year-end, a target that is 3.1 percent away from current levels. That would put the S&P 500 a stone's throw from the index's all-time intraday high of 1,576.09 reached on October 11, 2007.

The new year has brought a sharp increase in flows into U.S. equity mutual funds, and that has helped stocks rack up four straight weeks of gains, with strength in big- and small-caps alike.

That's not to say there aren't concerns. Economic growth has been steady, but not as strong as many had hoped. The household unemployment rate remains high at 7.8 percent. And more than 75 percent of the stocks in the S&P 500 are above their 26-week highs, suggesting the buying has come too far, too fast.

MUTUAL FUND INVESTORS COME BACK

All 10 S&P 500 industry sectors are higher in 2013, in part because of new money flowing into equity funds. Investors in U.S.-based funds committed $3.66 billion to stock mutual funds in the latest week, the third straight week of big gains for the funds, data from Thomson Reuters' Lipper service showed on Thursday.

Energy shares <.5sp10> lead the way with a gain of 6.6 percent, followed by industrials <.5sp20>, up 6.3 percent. Telecom <.5sp50>, a defensive play that underperforms in periods of growth, is the weakest sector - up 0.1 percent for the year.

More than 350 stocks hit new highs on Friday alone on the New York Stock Exchange. The Dow Jones Transportation Average <.djt> recently climbed to an all-time high, with stocks in this sector and other economic bellwethers posting strong gains almost daily.

"If you peel back the onion a little bit, you start to look at companies like Precision Castparts , Honeywell , 3M Co and Illinois Tool Works - these are big, broad-based industrial companies in the U.S. and they are all hitting new highs, and doing very well. That is the real story," said Mike Binger, portfolio manager at Gradient Investments, in Shoreview, Minnesota.

The gains have run across asset sizes as well. The S&P small-cap index <.spcy> has jumped 6.7 percent and the S&P mid-cap index <.mid> has shot up 7.5 percent so far this year.

Exchange-traded funds have seen year-to-date inflows of $15.6 billion, with fairly even flows across the small-, mid- and large-cap categories, according to Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at the ConvergEx Group, in New York.

"Investors aren't really differentiating among asset sizes. They just want broad equity exposure," Colas said.

The market has shown resilience to weak news. On Thursday, the S&P 500 held steady despite a 12 percent slide in shares of Apple after the iPhone and iPad maker's results. The tech giant is heavily weighted in both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 <.ndx> and in the past, its drop has suffocated stocks' broader gains.

JOBS DATA MAY TEST THE RALLY

In the last few days, the ratio of stocks hitting new highs versus those hitting new lows on a daily basis has started to diminish - a potential sign that the rally is narrowing to fewer names - and could be running out of gas.

Investors have also cited sentiment surveys that indicate high levels of bullishness among newsletter writers, a contrarian indicator, and momentum indicators are starting to also suggest the rally has perhaps come too far.

The market's resilience could be tested next week with Friday's release of the January non-farm payrolls report. About 155,000 jobs are seen being added in the month and the unemployment rate is expected to hold steady at 7.8 percent.

"Staying over 1,500 sends up a flag of profit taking," said Jerry Harris, president of asset management at Sterne Agee, in Birmingham, Alabama. "Since recent jobless claims have made us optimistic on payrolls, if that doesn't come through, it will be a real risk to the rally."

A number of marquee names will report earnings next week, including bellwether companies such as Caterpillar Inc , Amazon.com Inc , Ford Motor Co and Pfizer Inc .

On a historic basis, valuations remain relatively low - the S&P 500's current price-to-earnings ratio sits at 15.66, which is just a tad above the historic level of 15.

Worries about the U.S. stock market's recent strength do not mean the market is in a bubble. Investors clearly don't feel that way at the moment.

"We're seeing more interest in equities overall, and a lot of flows from bonds into stocks," said Paul Zemsky, who helps oversee $445 billion as the New York-based head of asset allocation at ING Investment Management. "We've been increasing our exposure to risky assets."

For the week, the Dow climbed 1.8 percent, the S&P 500 rose 1.1 percent and the Nasdaq advanced 0.5 percent.

(Reporting by Ryan Vlastelica; Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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