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ATLANTA (AP) -- John and Patsy Ramsey pledged their cooperation with police Monday as they arrived at their lawyer's office to answer investigators' questions about the 1996 death of their daughter, JonBenet.

The couple, who now live in Atlanta, arrived about 8:10 a.m. for the meeting with police from Boulder, Colo., where the 6-year-old beauty queen was slain in their home in 1996.

"They say they need our help. We're here to help," Patsy Ramsey said as the couple arrived.

"They may never clear our names till they find the killer," her husband said. "We're not here to prove our innocence or clear our name. We're here to find the killer of our daughter."

Mrs. Ramsey was to go first in the questioning, followed separately by her husband. It was the first time in more than two years they had faced questions from Boulder authorities.

The seven-member investigative team from Boulder was being led by Police Chief Mark Beckner, who said the questioning would focus on evidence developed over the past two years and statements the Ramseys made in their book, "The Death of Innocence."

Beckner said the Ramseys are still under suspicion.

"Either they're involved or they're witnesses," he said. "They're critical to this investigation. Certainly, there are going to be some tough questions, but we're not going to be confrontational. The more time that passes, the more difficult this is to solve."

McEnroe becoming fan of women's tennisP>

NEW YORK (AP) -- Has John McEnroe mellowed enough to become a fan of women's tennis?

With all the excitement surrounding Grand Slam-winning sisters Venus and Serena Williams, "the men may eventually have to sue for equal pay," McEnroe told The New Yorker magazine for a story Monday.

Still, the former champ -- who has sometimes denigrated the quality of the women's game -- said "any good male college player could beat the Williams sisters and so could any man on the senior tour."

Venus Williams won this year's Wimbledon title. Her younger sister, Serena, won last year's U.S. Open.

Tennis commentator Mary Carillo, a McEnroe friend, says he's recently become far more respectful of women's tennis. Once, she recalled, he told her "he had no interest in calling women's tennis because he's not a woman."

McEnroe, who plays on the senior tour, says he still responds to hecklers and slams his racket around during games, partly because he believes fans enjoy his on-court antics.

Crowe had reasons for doing movie

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (AP) -- Cameron Crowe said he felt driven to make his semi-autobiographical new movie "Almost Famous" because he thought it could reunite his mother and estranged sister.

He said his mother and sister -- who had not spoken for nearly a decade -- eventually joined him to watch an early edit of the film, set for release Sept. 13.

"In our family, we're ever so gently moving toward some kind of resolution," he said Sunday.

After the death of his father in 1989, Crowe, director of the Oscar-nominated "Jerry Maguire," said he has tried to calm the battles within his family.

"Almost Famous," about a teen-age rock journalist in the 1970s, stars Jason Lee, Billy Crudup, Kate Hudson, Frances McDormand and Anna Paquin.

She has quick answer about men

SHREVEPORT, La. (AP) -- The new Miss Teen USA drew thunderous applause after she was asked to describe men with three words.

Jillian Parry, of Newtown, Pa., said Saturday that men are always "causing trouble, being confusing while still being irresistible." A little wordy, but the audience of 3,500 loved it.

Parry also got an animated response for saying she would prefer to eat rats rather than eels during part of the contest that rated answers to questions based on CBS' "Survivor." Parry said she believes rats would taste more like chicken than eels.

Parry, 18, won more than $150,000 in cash, jewelry, clothes and cosmetics, along with a new Pontiac Firebird convertible. After her one-year stint as Miss Teen USA, she wants to study law.

Teens from all 50 states and the District of Columbia competed in the contest.

Ex-band aide dies

NEW YORK (AP) -- A former bassist for the Allman Brothers Band was found dead in a New York City motel, police said.

A chambermaid found Douglas Allen Woody's body Saturday morning. There were no visible signs of trauma and the cause of death is still unknown, police said.

Woody joined the Allmans as a bassist in 1989, in one of the '70s supergroup's later incarnations. He left with slide guitarist Warren Haynes in 1997 and the two formed a trio called Gov't Mule, with drummer Matt Abts. The band released several albums.

Woody, who was 44 and lived in Nashville, Tenn., is survived by his wife and their 3-year-old daughter.

Princess Diana's sons move on; fans still pay public respects

LONDON (AP) -- Princess Diana's survivors have moved on. Three years after her death, Prince Charles has brought Camilla Parker Bowles out of the shadows, and Diana's sons are on the brink of adulthood. They all remember her in private.

But many of the millions of people who had never met Diana, yet grieved her loss, still pay their respects in public ways.

They visit Kensington Palace and pose for snapshots at the ornate gates where a mourning nation heaped flowers after the princess died in a car wreck Aug. 31, 1997, in Paris.

They still arrive by the busload at Althorp House, the Spencer family estate where Diana's brother, Earl Spencer, assembled an exhibition in her memory.

In its third year, the exhibition has had little press attention, "yet the visitors are still coming," said Althorp spokeswoman Shelley-Anne Claircourt. "It's really remarkable that the numbers are still so high."

The opening day gathering this year, as in previous years, included some of Diana's most devoted admirers.

Dale Kramer, 47, from Ohio, told The Sunday Express that he had saved his earnings as a restaurant table cleaner so he could be at Althorp on what would have been Diana's 39th birthday, July 1.

"She was my inspiration," Kramer said. "I look at her picture when I drive and I look at her picture when I eat."

Farmers' Almanac sticks with 'secret formula' in predicting mild winter

LEWISTON, Maine (AP) -- Keep those mittens, snowblowers and heavy coats in storage: We might be in for a balmy winter.

The publishers of the Farmers' Almanac, using a formula known to only two people, predict another moderate winter as a follow-up to last year's warmest winter on record.

"The winter of 2000-01 should get off to a late start and turn out to be milder than average, even less severe than this last one," forecaster Caleb Weatherbee writes in the almanac that hits newsstands Tuesday.

Editor Peter Geiger admitted that last year's prediction -- of a stormy November and December to be capped by more than a foot of snow at year's end in the Midwest and Northeast -- was way off the mark.

There actually was a dearth of snow. Portland, Maine, for example, recorded its longest stretch of snowless days -- 305 -- before getting its first measurable snowfall on Jan. 16.

The effects of La Nina likely were to blame for the late arrival of snow, said Geiger, who noted that the almanac did better in predicting the biggest East Coast snowstorm of the season on Jan. 24.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also blamed La Nina for making the winter the nation's warmest in the 105 years that records have been kept.

The phenomenon of changing ocean temperatures known as La Nina and El Nino, along with the controversy over whether greenhouse gases are causing global warming, led to Weatherbee's declaration that he will stick by the almanac's traditional formula for predicting the weather.

"Many people have asked us if we plan to alter the 'secret formula' used for producing our annual weather forecasts. The answer is an unequivocal 'no,"' Weatherbee writes in this year's almanac.

After 184 years, some of the almanac's secrets have spilled: The formula is based on sunspots, the position of the planets and tidal action caused by the moon.

Although it isn't always right, the Farmers' Almanac, along with the Old Farmer's Almanac published in neighboring New Hampshire, which is 24 years older, is used to plan outdoor weddings, cookouts and vacations.

The National Weather Service contends weather can't be predicted with any certainty so far in advance. But the Farmers' Almanac says its long-term predictions are right about 80 percent of the time.

For the record, Weatherbee predicts a wet fall to be followed by two big December snowstorms. More snow is predicted, but overall the season will be mild.

On the Net:

http://www.farmersalmanac.com

National Weather Service: http://iwin.nws.noaa.gov/iwin/graphicsversion/bigmain.html