A close colleague of the pilot of the doomed tourist helicopter says it can be dicey in the skies over the Hudson River--and Saturday's disaster that killed nine was "inevitable." "We were borderline surprised that it took so long for a crash like this to happen," said Ben Lane, 34, who frantically radioed his pilot pal Jeremy Clarke that a plane was bearing down on him. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has said the lack of controls is a "serious safety and security risk to New Yorkers." "The FAA ... must take a longlook at toughening up flight restrictions," said Schumer. Mayor Bloomberg said any change in regulations would be up to the feds, and he added that the choppers are important to visitors and corporations. "Helicopters are very important to the city and used all the time," the mayor said. "Tourists seem to love it, and for commerce." http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2009/08/10/2009-08-10_air_disaster_was_inevitable_.html?page=0

Lexicus is an online web dictionary and thesaurus with eight to ten word definitions and sample word usage. See at http://www.lexic.us/

Ban on Texting While Driving Expands to 17 States
Follow up to July 28, 2009 posting New Data On Cell Phone Use and Driving Distraction, news that Illinois became the 17th state to ban text messaging while driving.
CNN: "Illinois will join a growing list of states looking to curb accidents linked to texting. Oregon and New Hampshire banned texting drivers in July, and Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Washington and the District of Columbia already have laws in place. Four U.S. senators announced their plan to push for a federal ban on July 29. U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said the Obama administration will convene a summit to discuss how it can end accidents caused by distracted drivers.

A sign at Naidre's, a small neighborhood coffee shop in Brooklyn, N.Y., begins warmly: "Dear customers, we are absolutely thrilled that you like us so much that you want to spend the day..." But, it continues, "...people gotta eat, and to eat they gotta sit." At Naidre's in Park Slope and its second location in nearby Carroll Gardens, Wi-Fi is free. But since the spring of 2008, no laptops have been allowed between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. weekdays and 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. weekends, unless the customer is eating and typing at the same time. Amid the economic downturn, there are fewer places in New York to plug in computers. As idle workers fill coffee-shop tables--nursing a single cup, if that, and surfing the Web for hours--and as shop owners struggle to stay in business, a decade-old love affair between coffee shops and laptop-wielding customers is fading.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124950421033208823.html

Rolling Stone first approached artist Shepard Fairey about creating an original image of Barack Obama just after the 2008 election, for use with the magazine’s inauguration coverage. He declined the assignment because he already had another high-profile magazine cover in the works. When the publication came calling about creating an Obama image to mark his six-month anniversary as president, however, he was more than happy to oblige. http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2009/08/06/shepard-fairey-takes-on-obama-again/?mod=rss_WSJBlog?mod=

Wentworth Place, where John Keats lived for 17 months, and produced such works as “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” “The Eve of St. Agnes” and “Ode to a Nightingale,” and whose brilliance still inspires thousands to journey to this nook of London, has been restored.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204886304574308681606221044.html

Winners of annual word contests in Washington Post—you will find 16 alternative meanings for common words, for instance Coffee (noun) the person upon whom one coughs--and 14 altered by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and with a new definition, for instance Hipatitis (noun) terminal coolness
http://theyrodeon.blogspot.com/2009/01/neologism-contest.html

Food is certainly a central theme of the Wisconsin State Fair. Cream puffs and foods on a stick lead the way. The fair’s Web site lists 38 different foods you’ll find on a stick, and Harris said 11 of the items are new this year. “People love foods on a stick,” Harris said. “There’s your basic cotton candy and your berries on a stick but we have more unusual items.” Among those are chocolate-covered bacon on a stick, chilled cookie dough on a stick, Reuben on a stick, deep fried crab cakes on a stick and deep fried peanut butter and jelly sandwich on a stick.
http://greenbayhub.greenbaypressgazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090806/GPG05/90806057
See all food on a stick at the fair: http://www.wistatefair.com/09_web/food/food_stick.html

Barbequed beaver served at Indiana State Fair
Jim Mahoney, who prepares the barbecued beaver, spends late December through March trapping beavers. Following one simple rule--whatever he kills, he eats--Mahoney usually catches 15 to 20 a year and prepares five or six for the cookout. He seasons the meat, puts it in big roasters and cooks it for five to six hours until the meat begins to fall off the bone. He then chills it, shreds the meat and cooks it again, adding the barbecue sauce to neutralize some of the "wild game taste." "Most people don't know this, but it has been a food source of our country since the beginning," Mahoney said.
http://www.indystar.com/article/20090809/NEWS15/908090375/