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On some French trains, the conductor's whistle signals more than just a departure. For commuters traveling on an express train from Reims to Paris — a 90-mile, 45-minute ride — it means the beginning of English class.

"Before the course, we were sleeping in the train in the morning," says passenger-student Gilles Hallais. "So I prefer practicing English."

Hallais, 44, is a journalist at French public radio. He says while he doesn't need English for his work, he does need it for his life. "I think it could be a handicap if I don't speak fluent English."

Rail officials hope these classes, called English on Track, will become more popular, especially after a recent study ranked France at the bottom in Europe in English proficiency, which is one offshoot of the country's efforts to protect French culture and language.

In France, unlike in some other European countries, the law mandates that foreign shows on television must be dubbed into French, not just subtitled. So young people don't have the chance to beef up their English while watching American shows.

Learning On The Rails

David Potier, head of commercial relations with France's state rail company, the SNCF, says when a high-speed rail link opened between Reims and Paris a few years ago, the number of regular passengers quadrupled to 1,000 a day. He says it makes sense to offer such professional customers special services at competitive prices.

Jerome Paillot, a 37-year-old native of Reims, recently began working at the French headquarters of an Italian coffee company. He believes improving his English is important for his career.

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Would March Madness be terribly different if the players were paid?

Probably not. The college basketball tournament might become more professionalized, but it wouldn't look much different from what we're seeing right now.

"I don't see it changing one iota," says ESPN basketball analyst Jay Bilas.

Last week's National Labor Relations Board ruling that football players at Northwestern University should be able to form a union triggered dire warnings from the NCAA that the ideal of the student-athlete would be forever corrupted if players were treated as employees and paid as such.

But for fans, the reality is that the game wouldn't change. The real question is how the pie would be sliced, with players suddenly demanding a share of the take.

"It's another NCAA scare tactic," says Bilas, who played basketball at Duke University. "They're saying it's going to crumble when they talk about giving the athletes a penny over their expenses, and it's wrong."

The Game's Already For Sale

It's hard to imagine March Madness getting any more commercial.

The tournament is already a billion-dollar event, with as many Burger King and AXE body wash commercials as television can carry.

"Any time we cover an NCAA tournament event, the NCAA will not allow you to sit courtside with beverages that do not have the label from one of their sponsors," says Kenneth Blackistone, a sportswriter who teaches journalism at the University of Maryland.

Fans would still be able to buy jerseys emblazoned with team names and the numbers of their favorite players — with those players maybe seeing a cut.

It's possible that ticket prices could go up, but that's been happening for years anyway, as coaching salaries have soared into the multi-million-dollar range.

And it's not like the pro version of the sport will suddenly be dominated by big-money programs — the Stanford Facebookers or the Kansas Koch Brothers — or at least no more than it's dominated by big money programs already.

The Two-Way

Labor Board Rules Northwestern University Players Are Employees

Washington state, with its many steep slopes, streams and rivers and some of the heaviest annual rainfall in the country, is a mudslide waiting to happen. Add in soil erosion from logging, as was reportedly the case near the community of Oso before last week's tragedy, and the probability of such an event increases.

And, as we now know, this was just the latest in a string of mudslides in the area over the years as well as (apparently unheeded) official warnings about the potential for such a disaster.

As the death toll from last week's tragedy rises, we take a closer look at mudslides — what they are, where they are and what causes them:

What's the difference between a landslide and a mudslide?

Landslides occur when masses of rock, earth or debris move down a slope. Debris flows, also known as mudslides, are a common type of fast-moving landslide that tends to flow in channels, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention fact sheet.

What causes landslides/mudslides?

Unstable soil, heavy rain, especially following droughts, earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. Mudslides occur when the soil becomes saturated on steep slopes.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the conditions that make mudslide most likely are:

— Areas where wildfires or human modification of the land have destroyed vegetation

— Areas where landslides have occurred before

— Steep slopes and areas at the bottom of slopes or canyons

— Slopes that have been altered for construction of buildings and roads

— Channels along a stream or river

— Areas where surface runoff is directed

In Oso, for example, the area received up to twice the normal rainfall for the 45 days before the mudslide — 15 inches above the norm for this time of year.

"As the moisture gets more and more it's pushing the particles apart. It makes them slippery and has less friction. The force of gravity is constantly trying to pull things down," Brent Bower, hydrologist, was quoted as saying by King 5 TV.

To make matters worse, a 7-acre forest clear-cut "went right up to the edge of the groundwater danger zone" near Oso, Aaron Everett, a Washington state forester, tells NPR member station KUOW.

How often do these events occur?

The U.S. Geological Survey says that landslides are not uncommon. As recently as November, there was one in Colorado that injured several people and killed one man who was "buried beneath significant amounts of debris."

The CDC says landslides and mudslides kill an average of about 25 to 50 people in the U.S. each year. Having said that, it's already clear from the Oso mudslide that 2014 will not be an average year.

Where are they most likely to happen?

The states considered most vulnerable are Washington, Oregon, California, Alaska and Hawaii.

When and where did the biggest landslide/mudslide occur?

The largest mudslide in recorded history occurred just 140 miles south of Oso, on the slope of Mount St. Helens, when the volcano erupted in May 1980. The intense heat from the eruption "instantly turned more than 70% of the snow and glacial ice on the mountain to water. This massive movement of rock, ash, water and downed trees swept into Spirit Lake and down the north fork of the Toutle River Valley at speeds in excess of 175 miles per hour," according to a website on the history of the eruption.

The volume of mud and debris put in motion by Mount St. Helens was 3.3 billion cubic yards, or the equivalent of 1 million Olympic-sized swimming pools, the USGS says.

The Mount St. Helens eruption killed 57 people in total, but it's hard to say how many of them were killed by the mudslide itself.

In 1969, a landslide in Nelson County, Va., killed 150 when Hurricane Camille, downgraded to a tropical storm by the time it hit the region, nonetheless dumped heavy rain. According to Yahoo:

"The soils of Nelson County had already been saturated from previous rain. The storm's east side reached as far as Fredericksburg, and it kept dumping more water — a total of 31 inches in six hours. With that water came flash-floods and landslides."

This month, millions of Americans picked winners and losers in college basketball games, hoping to make money from wise bets.

But you can play for much higher stakes by placing sensible bets with your savings. If you wager well, you can have a much more comfortable retirement.

Economists, though, are making forecasts that make it tough to guess which way growth is going.

What's the best bet: protect your money by stuffing it into a mattress or invest in the stock market?