Beckham hopes to finish best MLS season with title

CARSON, California (AP) — If David Beckham's five-year football odyssey in the United States is about to end, he'll go out playing at his highest level in five years.

The English superstar hasn't decided where he'll play next season, but he's determined to lead the Los Angeles Galaxy to a Major League Soccer championship this month.

"Obviously, if you look at statistics and the games I've played, it is the best season since I moved to L.A.," Beckham said Wednesday after the Galaxy prepared for the home leg of their playoff matchup with New York. "It's nice to have that at 36 years old, because people start to doubt you, but it's the best season I've had since I moved here. The …

F1 in 2011 needs more show, less hype

PARIS (AP) — Give the drivers push-button rockets, give them tire-slashing blades like on James Bond's Aston Martin, give them something, anything, to make Formula One more interesting next season. Please.

What a crushing anticlimax. The much-hyped but ultimately tedious season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix delivered more proof, as if more proof was needed, that the sport's fatal flaw is a continued shortage of exciting overtaking.

With four drivers in contention for the world title at this supposedly grand finale in the exotic surrounds of the Middle East, with long-shot Lewis Hamilton blustering that he was ready to drive his wheels off to win because he had nothing to lose, …

FULL-SCALE CHANGE

Fresh meat for plaintiffs' lawyers."

This is the colorful phrase Fred Sullivan summoned to describe employers in Massachusetts - and, more specifically, what he believes they will become after (and perhaps even before) July 13. That's the date when new legislation regarding the state's wage-and-hour statutes will take effect.

In a way, the measure involves a simple change of one word in one sentence of a statute. But the shift in terms, from 'may' to 'shall' with regard to the awarding of triple damages for violations of those wage-and-hour laws, could have some serious ramifications for area employers and perhaps for the state's economy as well, said Sullivan, a principal …

Jazz Beat Mavericks 116-110

Deron Williams had 20 assists and 17 points, and Utah rallied for a 16-0 run late in the fourth quarter to beat the Dallas Mavericks 116-110 Monday night after the Jazz blew a huge lead.

The Jazz took a 21-point lead shortly after forward Andrei Kirilenko was knocked out of the game with a hip injury on a flagrant foul by Dallas' Dirk Nowitzki in the first quarter. But they allowed the Mavericks to creep back and take a late lead before Utah's rally at the end.

Utah made all 18 free throws in the fourth quarter and improved to 26-3 at home, the best home record in the league.

Mehmet Okur had 20 points and 12 rebounds and Carlos Boozer scored 28 …

Geithner facing own stress test amid economic woes

In any other year, Timothy Geithner already would have spent a week at tennis camp in Florida, sharpening his skills and kicking back with a group of friends that includes the mentor who helped put him on the fast track to the top of the Treasury Department.

Instead, Barack Obama's 47-year-old treasury secretary is in his office before dawn most days, grabbing lunch at his desk and juggling three Blackberries as he tries to untangle the wreckage of a financial system gone sour.

He's been pilloried for lousing up his tax returns, battered by bad reviews of his earliest policy pronouncements and pelted with resignation calls from congressional critics.

…

When home is where the job is, woes attend

When Jennifer Beaver's son, Jamie, reacted fussily to his firstround of immunizations at 3 months, she tucked him into a carrierstrapped across her chest and kept him close to her all day.

"He got the nurturing he needed and I finished the project I wasworking on," said Beaver, a writer and public relations consultantwho works out of her Long Beach, Calif., home.

With her fax machine, portable personal computer, two telephonelines and an answering machine, Beaver easily keeps in touch with herclients, who include some very large corporations.

"Working at home makes me more productive," said Beaver. "Idon't waste three hours every day dressing formally and …

Facebook moving HQs in California

NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook is moving its headquarters out of Palo Alto, California, to the former campus of Sun Microsystems in Menlo Park.

The online social network, which has about 2,000 employees worldwide and 1,400 in Palo Alto, said Tuesday it will begin the move in June or July. But the company will continue to occupy its Palo …