New York, Oct. 21 : Democratic presidential nominee and White House frontrunner Barack Obama has announced that he will suspend his campaigning for 36 hours to visit his ailing grandmother Madelyn Dunham in Hawaii.

According to the New York Times, Dunham, 85, is gravely ill. Campaign spokesman Robert Gibbs declined to specify the nature of her illness, other than to say it was quite serious. Dunham lives in Honolulu.

New York - Toy producers Mattel Inc and Hasbro Inc were bracing for one of the worst holiday sales seadons in a generation, saying Monday the squeeze of high costs and reduced consumption spell trouble for the coming months.

The world's two largest toy manufacturers posted slow sales. Mattel's third quarter sales trailed analysts' estimates, while Hasbro posted the slowest sales growth in seven quarters.

New York - With some tickets priced at 25,000 dollars, the seminal concert last week by legendary rockers Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel was always destined to be a huge fundraiser for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

On Monday the New York Daily News reported that the concert Thursday at New York's Hammerstein Ballroom raised a staggering 7 million dollars for the campaign.

New York, Oct 19 : When it comes to surfing the Web, men and women have completely different approaches, according to a new study.

The research on of Internet habits led by USC Annenberg Centre for the Digital Future found that while a majority of Internet users – 55pct - said they "feel as strongly" about their online communities as they do about their real ones, men feel a stronger connection to their cyberspace friends and are more likely to meet up with someone they met on the Net.

New York, Oct. 18 : United Nations climate chief Yvo de Boer has said that the present meltdown on Wall Street should be seen as an opportunity to create and enforce policy which stimulates private competition to fund clean industry.

Talking to reporters here, de Boer said the chance to grow a greener world economy will come this December in Poznan, Poland, where governments will begin to formulate a successor to the Kyoto Protocol to combat global warming.

The deadline for a final agreement is December 2009.

De Boer pointed out that global demand for energy is expected to surge by 50 per cent by 2030, so investment in clean technologies must start now.

New York, October 18 : U. S. Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin has hinted that she will appear on the NBC comedy show ‘Saturday Night Live’ this weekend.

"I haven''t seen a script - not at all. Haven''t been hinted about what that script is going to say," the New York Daily News quoted the hockey mom as telling syndicated radio host Neal Boortz on Friday.