Overnight Briefing & General Reality Check

BP oil spill update:

Is BP's "top kill" method working? We won't know until later today at the earliest.
   BP has been forcing heavy drilling mud into the pipe that's been gushing oil for well over a month now. It amounts to a huge pushing match between oil gushing out of the crippled well and the mud that engineers are pushing into it, followed by cement on top of it.
   The method has worked on land but has never been tried a mile under the sea.
   One problem: The pressure of the oil out of that well may be six times higher than it was over the weekend, which was when BP was supposed to have initiated the top kill effort.
   It was postponed several times before yesterday. BP officials say they wanted to get it right rather than risk failure.
   The heavily choreographed procedure involves several drill ships, 16 underwater robots. And it has a 60 percent chance of success. What no one is saying is what will happen next if the effort fails. (Maiman)

Filling a need:

You can negotiate the price of a new car or your mortgage. How about your health care?
   People are doing that through a website called PriceDoc.com.
   Doctors subscribe to the website which patients can access for free. There, you can negotiate the cost of treatment directly with the physician, bypassing insurance companies. (Maiman)

Guilty Pleasures:

No winner in Wednesday night's drawing for the Powerball Lottery. That means Saturday night's drawing is valued at $220 million ($114.6 million cash value). Powerball is played in 41 states, Washington DC and the U-S Virgin Islands. Chances of winning the grand prize (all five numbers plus the powerball) are 1 in 195.2 million.

Stars and their movies:

TIM BURTON's 3D "Alice in Wonderland" becomes the sixth movie to make $1 billion in worldwide box office sales sometime today.
   The Disney cartoon, which was recently released on DVD, is still in some theatres after its release in early March. The other films which have pulled in $1 billion are: "Avatar," "Titanic," "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King," "Dead Man's Chest" and "The Dark Knight."

Grace notes:

THE FACES will reunite this summer, but without ROD STEWART. The legendary 70's rock band is set to headline the Vintage at Godwood festival in Sussex, England in August with a full blown tour in January of 2011.
   So, who will be the lead singer? MICK HUCKNALL of SIMPLY RED. OK, easy now, deep breath. It's not as riduculous as it sounds. Mick kind of sounds like Rod, if you think about it, and he was an early punk rocker. In fact, Mick was at that historic SEX PISTOLS gig in Manchester back in 1976. And, oddly enough, playing bass for the Faces now will be GLEN MATLOCK, the Pistols' original bassist.
   The rest of the band includes surviving members RON WOOD on guitar, keyboard player IAN McLAGAN and drummer KENNEY JONES. Original bassist RONNIE LANE died in 1997 of M.S.
   FYI: The Faces broke up in 1975 when Rod resumed his solo career and Ron joined THE ROLLING STONES. (Marino)

50 CENT has lost 50 pounds. It's for his starring role in a movie called "Things Fall Apart" which has the rapper playing a football star who is diagnosed with cancer. Fitty used to be a big and brawny guy, but this dramatic weight loss is scary. He posted photos yesterday on his Facebook page, but be warned, they are very disturbing. (Marino)