Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe HISTORY FORECASTS WEATHER If you're heading over the river or through the woods this Thanksgiving, and you're not too sure about your local weatherman, consider the historical forecast. Advertisement The holiday falls on Nov. 28 this year, and for the northern parts of the northeast United States, that means a good chance of snow, says Cornell University's Northeast Regional Climate Center. It's predicting a 67 percent likelihood of an inch of snow on the ground in Caribou, Maine, on Thanksgiving morning, and a 34 percent possibility in Burlington, Vt. Not far behind is Concord, N.H., with a 29 percent chance. Keith Eggleston, senior climatologist, bases his predictions on a 30-year average of Northeast snowfall, from 1971 to 2000. "Even though Thanksgiving this year is late in November, the chances are we won't see snow in places like New York City, Baltimore and Philadelphia," he notes. Each of those cities has a zero percent chance of snow on Nov. 28, which means that snow has not fallen on that date in the past three decades. Advertisement GREEN SPACE ADDS TO LONGEVITY Three thousand people born in Tokyo were studied during the first decades of the last century and it was found those living close to a park, grass field or avenues lined with trees, tended to live longest, The Glasgow Herald reports. Takehito Takano, of Tokyo Medical and Dental University, says his research, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, shows for the first time that parks and gardens did not just improve quality of life for people living in cities, but also were important to the health. "The quality of the physical environments near a residence -- observed as the space for taking a stroll and tree-lined streets, showed a positive association with the longevity of senior citizens," Takano says. STILL DEPENDENT ON SAUDI OIL Nearly a dozen years after the Persian Gulf War, when reliance on Saudi supplies prompted calls for the United States to diversify its sources of oil, America remains as dependent as ever on the Saudi oil, according to government and industry officials. The Saudis supply about one-sixth of U.S. oil imports. What gives Saudi Arabia its considerable political strength is its role as the only producer with the spare capacity to replace millions of barrels a day of lost oil, The New York Times reports. Advertisement "The Saudis have by far the largest amount of unused capacity," says Guy Caruso, the head of the Energy Department's Energy Information Administration. FOR THOSE WHO HAVE EVERYTHING A different kind of gift certificate is on tap this holiday season from Colorado Heart and Body Imaging, which opens its second location in Denver's premier shopping district, Cherry Creek, by year's end. The high-tech heart and body scanning facility is offering diagnostic imaging gift certificates for heart, lung, total body and bone density scans plus virtual colonoscopy. "It is a bit unusual, I'll admit, but when you think about it, there's really no better way to show a loved one, friend, or valued employee how much you care," Dr. James Ehrlich, medical director and founder of CHBI says in a statement. Prices range from $225 for a bone density scan to $975 for a virtual colonoscopy.
