December 25, 1998

Four-day freeze destroys more than third of California's annual citrus crop, inflicting half-billion dollars in damage and raising prospect of tripled orange prices in supermarkets by next week; farmers frantically run wind and irrigation machines in effort to keep treees warm, but lemon crop is near total loss and half of state's orange crop is lost; citrus industry accounts for over $1 billion of state's $27 billion agricultural output; cold is threatening other crops as well; photo; map (M)

Many Europeans are eager to use the euro--worth $1.17--and expect to see benefits in cost and efficiency in travel and personal finance as a result; by one estimate, about 35 million Europeans use several currencies on a daily basis, and more than a quarter of 372 million people in 15-nation European Union travel each year, for business or pleasure, to another European country; Louis Harris poll in six euro countries in November shows 58 percent of Europeans expect single currency to have positive effect on their daily lives; photos (M)

Interview with Betty Comden and Adolph Green, composers of musical On the Town, which is being revived on Broadway by Public Theater; photo (M)

More than four million Americans who have Flexible Spending Accounts--tax-free savings set aside by employers for health care expenses not covered by insurance--must use up their totals each year or forfeit them; use-it-or-lose-it rule can lead to unusual spending binges at year's end, often on goods and services people do not need; providers of nonemergency care love program, but some health care advocates say program may not be good for efforts to make health care more accessible to all Americans; flexible spending accounts, created by Congress in 1984, were designed to give workers relief from ever-shrinking health care coverage; health care experts say growth of program has been hampered by employees' fear of losing money at end of year (M)

Article on Randy Moss, rising star with Minnesota Vikings; photos; statistics (S)