Friday,  Nov. 29, 2013 • Vol. 16--No. 136 • 19 of 31

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apart a couple of days later.
• "This is what makes science interesting," said Fitzsimmons, who specializes in comets and asteroids. "If we knew what was going to happen, it wouldn't be interesting."
• ISON's slingshot toward the sun left astronomers puzzled and excited at the same time.
• Made up of loosely packed ice and dirt, the space rock came from the Oort cloud, an area of comets and debris on the fringes of the solar system.

Washington dog found after 9 days under rubble

• WASHINGTON, Ill. (AP) -- A dog and his owner have been reunited after the animal was found under a pile of rubble more than a week after a tornado ripped through a central Illinois city.
• Jacob Montgomery of Washington and his dog Dexter were separated when the Nov. 17 tornado damaged Montgomery's third floor apartment.
• Montgomery is a member of the Illinois National Guard.
• A guard spokesman says a neighbor sent Montgomery a Facebook message nine days later to tell him Dexter had been found under debris where the apartment used to be.
• An animal rescuing organization had coaxed the 6-month-old puppy out of the rubble with hot dogs.
• A veterinarian found Dexter to be malnourished, but without any major injuries.
• Montgomery says as soon as the dog saw him "his tail started going."

Should you worry or is US military at the ready?
PAULINE JELINEK, Associated Press

• WASHINGTON (AP) -- Warnings from defense officials and some experts are mounting and becoming more dire: The nation's military is being hobbled by budget cuts.
• "You'd better hope we never have a war again," the House Armed Services Committee chairman, Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon, R-Calif., said of the decline in what the military calls its readiness.
• So should Americans be worried?
• A look at what the Pentagon means by "ready" and where things stand:
• READINESS
• It's the armed forces' ability to get the job done, and it's based on the number of

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