The king of American Scrabble has kept his crown, as Nigel Richards spelled his way to the 2011 National Scrabble Championship title and a $10,000 prize. Richards, 44, is a former world champion from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Let's begin with some well-worn advice: Moderation is key. So go ahead and eat that hot dog at the state fair or some bacon on vacation. But take note: People who eat lots of processed meats over their lifetime seem to have a higher risk of developing Type 2 diabetes (and heart disease).

I've been dancing flamenco for years. I love it. Flamenco's got attitude. It makes me feel like I've got attitude. Dancing is like letting out a scream from the feet up, all emotion and passion. I need it after the work I do every day. As a public defender in Manhattan, I deal with clients stuck in desperate situations.

Flamenco recharges me. It's exotic, and fun, and I'm good at it. But no matter how long I've been dancing, I'm never as good as I want to be. Maybe because I'm not a professional, or maybe because I'm not a Gypsy.

At the end of the summer exam season in Indonesia, education officials announced extraordinary results: a 99 percent pass rate for national high school entrance exams.

But among many Indonesians, the claim aroused scorn and suspicion of the country's education system, thanks in part to a young man named Alifah Achmad Maulana.

Alifah rides home from school most days on the back of his dad's motorbike. The pair tool past banana trees and hanging laundry to their small house in Gadel village outside Indonesia's second-largest city, Surabaya.

In Pakistan, family planning is an uncomfortable topic fraught with religious overtones.

But in one of Asia's fastest growing populations, a story of women giving birth challenges stereotypes, including what Islam has to say about women's health and family planning.

According to a new government survey, Pakistan is producing nearly 4 million babies every year, and most are born into poverty. The World Bank says 60 percent of Pakistanis live on less than $2 a day.

The U.S. budget deficit stood at $1.1 trillion through July, the Treasury Department says, making 2011 the third consecutive year that the deficit has hit at least $1 trillion. The federal government's budget year begins in October, leaving two more months in which the deficit might rise.

Looking at the numbers for July alone, the U.S. budget shortfall was $129 billion — a drop in spending from July 2010, according to Bloomberg.

As the AP reports:

Here's a piece of biology news that escaped us, last month, but was brought to our attention by a story in the BBC today: Biologist have found the reason house mice in Spain and Germany have grown immune to warfarin, a commonly used poison.

The idea of a poison-resistant mouse is a bit unsettling, but how it came to be is fascinating tale of cross-species sex. The BBC reports:

You may not have realized it, but a piece of U.S. property was recently driving around on the surface of Mars. Tens of millions of miles away from the debt crisis, the heat wave and other big events of the summer, NASA's rover Opportunity just completed a 13-mile trip to allow scientists to examine a Martian crater.

Kentucky's General Fund tax receipts for July, the first month of fiscal year 2012, were more than $638 million, a 6.9 percent increase compared to July 2010 figures.  "Kentucky has seen a strengthening of General Fund revenue collections for the past five quarters and the Commonwealth’s economic recovery is continuing into the new fiscal year," state Budget Director Mary Lassiter said in a press release Wednesday. “The Consensus Forecasting Group last week affirmed that revenue growth is ahead of pace by predicting that General Fund receipts will exceed the budgeted levels by $192.0 million,” she said. “While we are cautiously optimistic about the revenue outlook, we still have a challenge ahead to balance the budget this fiscal year.”

Proponents of organic meat often make the case that it's inherently better for people's health and the environment than meat raised by conventional farming methods. But the actual impacts of organic production can be tough for scientists to prove.