Jun. 20--MAKING HEADLINES: It was a close call here in the rush to get out the pages the other day. We almost mixed up our headline on the federal government's old automobile trade-in incentive program with our editorial on the gridlock in the State Senate. If we hadn't caught it in time, the work of the taxpayer-funded senators might have been headlined, "Cash for clunkers."

Hey, wait a minute . . .

ON THE FLY: President Obama was doing a television interview in the White House this week, and a pesky fly kept intruding. After waving it off several times, the president watched it land on his arm, stared it down and then dispatched it with a swift swat.

And immediately, of course, PETA--People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals--weighed in with a lament that Obama is not Buddha (thank goodness that's clarified) and that humanity obviously has a long way still to go.

We'll try to remember that, next time we're camping in the Adirondacks.

WE'RE MELTING: Well, OK, we're not. In fact, we're still waiting for summer, because what we've seen so far doesn't look anything like that. Yet.

But when it does get here, we want to see the ice cream bike on city streets--and that means City Hall should get off its collective duff and make it easier for James Karagiannis and others to peddle--or is that pedal--their wares.

Karagiannis is the energetic entrepreneur who started riding around the city with a 400-bar freezer attached to a bike, until his business cycle ran smack into the city's permit system, which requires special permits for different parts of the city.

The mayor says he wants to encourage this sort of thing, although that will take tweaking the permit system. When? January?

MAXIMUM EDUCATION: And it's worth adding some admiration here for another achiever. Matt Allinson of Starpoint High School even skipped senior skip day to keep his record intact--13 years of schooling, from kindergarten through high school graduation, without missing a single day.

That's 2,300 days for a rare, although not unprecedented in this region, perfect attendance record. Way to go, Matt. We'd show up for your graduation ceremony, but we plan to call in sick that day.

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