BEACHWOOD, Ohio - Beachwood yoga instructor Carmela Mandel competes on the season 2 premiere of 'Let's Ask America.'

Let's Ask America" is the TV game show that airs on NewsChannel5 where contestants can win up to $50,000 from home. Four contestants are chosen to play the game via Skype from their home, answering questions about fun and irreverent topics to find out what people are thinking.

Mandel, who is currently on maternity leave after welcoming a baby girl four weeks ago, is a yoga instructor and lives in Beachwood with her husband William Mandel, stepdaughter Julia, and the family's latest addition, 4-week-old Alexandra.

Mandel said it was a surprise when the show contacted her to be a contestant.

"One of my yoga students applied for me. I actually dont know who did it to this day," explained the 31-year-old mother.

To prepare for the show, Mandel said she watched multiple episodes with her husband.

"And I tried to at least wash my face ( laughs), which is hard to do with a newborn," she said.

The day of the competition, Mandel said she was able to Skype and chat with the other contestants before the game started.

"It was really cool. I got to meet the other contestants from Denver, Arizona and West Hollywood," she said.

Mandel said although it was tough competing on the show while taking care of her newborn baby, she is glad she did it.

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Yoga instructor to compete on 'LAA'

The Lenovo Yoga was a flip in the right direction for Ultrabooks when it was first released.

But it offered in style points - the ability to bend the laptop to your viewing preference - it didn't really match in spec appeal.

Having an Ivy Bridge processor inside and given a rather low-res 1,600 x 900 display means you are never going to win any awards in the power stakes.

But the wait is finally over for a new and even bendier Yoga - the Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro.

Shown off at IFA 2013, the Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro has been given a screen that's twice the quality of its stablemate. At 3,200 x 1,800, the 13.3-inch screen is one of the best on the market, and one of the brightest too at 350 nits.

Lenovo has also given the chassis a little bit of a makeover. It may look similar but it is thinner - 1.5mm instead of 17.1mm and it has gone through more weight loss than a Bikram Yoga addict, weighing in at an impressive 1.4kg. To put the weight into context: this is around the same weight as Ultrabooks that don't have the flip factor.

Couple this with an Intel Haswell processor - up to Core i7, up to 8GB or RAM and a 512GB SSD - and what you have is a better and beefier computing setup.

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Hands-on review: Lenovo ThinkPad Yoga 2 Pro

Matched in tree pose, Barbara Steinke (left) and Sue Julian have matched their friendship and interests in a pilot yoga outreach program that begins tomorrow with women in the state prison system.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- On one level, it's a simple partnership between two dear friends, just retired.

"We're older women starting a whole new journey," Barbara Steinke says of Laotong Yoga, a nonprofit organization begun in earnest earlier this year with Sue Julian.

On another level, their new effort is devoted to the larger picture of what yoga and meditation can offer to people who might otherwise not have access to some life-affirming instruction and guidance.

Steinke, 59, and Julian, 61, head off to Lakin Correctional Center in Mason County onSept. 10to launch a pilot program of yoga allied with meditation for women at the only state prison for women. (The Alderson prison camp, made famous by Martha Stewart, is a federal institution.)

Steinke retired in April after 30 years as a federal court reporter with U.S. District Judge John T. Copenhaver, while Julian retired in June as coordinator of the W.Va. Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

"We started thinking about what it would be like working together. With our love of yoga and having that social justice piece that's a part of both of us, we thought we'd combine it and create this nonprofit," Steinke said.

Steinke is a registered yoga instructor, certified in Shake Your Soul and Kripalu YogaDance, while Julian is a professional level Kripalu Yoga teacher also certified in Kripalu YogaDance. Both are also certified in "trauma-sensitive yoga," oriented toward working with individuals and groups dealing with past trauma.

As for the word Laotong, it refers to an ancient Chinese relationship that bonded two girls together for eternity as kindred sisters.

"That's what we thought. 'Wow, that's what we are! We're laotongs,'" Steinke said. "'Laotong Yoga' just felt right to us -- meaning kindred spirits, we're all connected. It's not just best friends. To us, it's being connected to everyone."

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Local duo takes yoga and meditation behind bars