Way To Go Jersey! Great Falls Named National Historic Park

A small patch of lush oasis just 15 miles from Manhattan has been named a national historic park.

President Barack Obama signed the legislation regarding Paterson’s Great Falls in northeastern New Jersey.

The state has long sought national park status for the Great Falls in hopes that it would help attract tourists and boost the economy of Paterson, a one-time industrial powerhouse.

The 77-foot waterfall is the second largest on the East Coast. It once provided power to run factories that produced silk, locomotives and firearms.

The national park designation makes the 35-acre site eligible for federal funds. Exactly how much the state will get has yet to be determined.

Miss Universe And Miss USA Tour Gitmo

The war on terror briefly became a fashion parade when Miss Universe and Miss USA took a firsthand look at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay.

The beauty pageant winners took part in a VIP tour to entertain American military personnel at the prison for terrorism suspects in Cuba the Associated Press reports.

Miss Universe Dayana Mendoza who was formerly Miss Venezuela blogged on the pageant website about her visit with Miss USA Crystle Stewart.

The beauty queen said the pair toured recreation and classroom areas of the prison and described the experience as interesting.

The women later saw the high-security perimeter fence and went to the beach.

Detention centre spokesman Navy Lieutenant Commander Brook DeWalt told AP he didn’t know if any prisoners were “out and about” when the two women were inside the prison camp.

Church Uses Lemon Cola As Baptism Water

A Norwegian church used lemon-flavoured cola instead of water in a baptism ceremony after its taps were temporarily turned off because of freezing temperatures, daily Vaart Land reported.

Priest Paal Dale from the town of Stord, about 150 miles west of the capital Oslo, improvised during a recent cold-spell by dabbing the lemon fizzy water on a baby during a baptism ceremony, it said.

“It had gone flat,” Dale was quoted as saying by the newspaper. “Only the lemon smell made this unusual.”

Dale said the child’s family were informed about the switch only after the ceremony because the priest “had a need to inform” them about the lingering lemon scent.

“They didn’t say much, but I assumed they smelled the aroma as well,” Dale told Vaart Land.

Man Fires Shot Into McDonald’s Over Breakfast Menu

Police said a customer fired one or two shots into a Salt Lake City McDonald’s after the driver of the car he was in was told the restaurant was not serving lunch yet. Police said the female driver of a white Dodge Intrepid pulled up to the drive-thru and ordered from the lunch menu early Sunday but was told only breakfast was available.

Police said two men then got out of the car and one pulled a sawed-off shotgun from the trunk, shooting into the drive-thru window once or twice, The Salt Lake Tribune reported. No one was injured.

The car then left the scene.

Dumb Criminal Pulls A Hold-Up At A Cop Convention

A retired police chief said he was robbed by “probably the dumbest criminal in Pennsylvania,” at a police officers’ convention.  John Comparetto said as he came out of a stall in the men’s room, a man pointed a gun in his face and demanded money. There were 300 narcotics officers from Pennsylvania and Ohio at the gathering.

Comparetto gave up his money and cell phone. But when the man fled, Comparetto and some colleagues chased him. They arrested a 19-year-old man as he was trying to leave in a taxi.

The suspect is also awaiting trial on four previous robbery charges.

The suspect was arraigned and taken to Dauphin County Prison. When a reporter asked the suspect for comment as he was led out of court, he said, “I’m smooth.”

Mexican-Made Kosher Tequila To Hit The Market

A New York businessman is launching a new kosher tequila in time for Cinco de Mayo. Martin Silver says Agave 99 will be on the market in time for the holiday that celebrates Mexico’s defeat of French forces on May 5, 1862. Silver, president of Long Island-based Star Industries, says he wants to satisfy the craze for high-end tequila with one that observant Jews can drink.

Silver says a half million cases of the 99-proof kosher tequila are being produced at a Mexican plant using methods certified by a rabbi. It will retail for $41.95 a bottle.

The product launch — with Mexican songs sung in both Yiddish and Spanish — is set for May 5, but it will also be sold earlier for Passover, which starts at sundown on April 8 this year.

Diners ‘Have A Ball’ At Annual Testicle Festival

The fundraising idea may seem a little nuts, but Oakdale‘s annual Testicle Festival is always a big hit. Volunteers with the town’s Rotary Club plan to fry up 400 pounds of the private parts of bulls and serve them to diners who pay $50 apiece for the sit-down meal.

The event, whose proceeds also benefit the Oakland Cowboy Museum, has drawn an average of 450 people and last year raised $28,000.

It’s common practice on cattle ranches for young male bovines to be castrated into steers, which after the initial loss, eventually makes them more docile and easier to handle. Fans of the delicacy, also referred to as “mountain oysters”, come from around the state.

According to Rotarians, everyone who buys a ticket is guaranteed to “have a ball.”

Greetings From The Emerald Isle

Your Daily Andy Editor-In-Chief is off for a few days.  Publication will resume on March 30.

Well Known Radio Reporter George Weber Found Slain

New York City police are searching for the killer of longtime radio reporter George Weber, who was found dead in his Brooklyn apartment with a stab wound to his neck.

Police have released few details on Weber’s death. His body was found on Sunday after he failed to show up for work.

A spokeswoman for the city medical examiner’s office says autopsy results are expected Monday.

Weber, who was 47, worked at WABC for 12 years as the on-air reporter for popular shows such as “Curtis and Kuby.”

The station let him go amid programming changes last year, and he had since worked as a freelancer for ABC News Radio, the national network. His last newscast was on March 15.

The Next Vacation Hot Spot: Iraq

Iraq has received its first group of Western tourists since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, the Tourism and Antiquities Ministry said.

The group of eight holidaymakers — five Britons, two Americans and a Canadian — arrived on March 8 and toured Iraq’s landmark historic sites, including the Biblical city of Babylon, fabled home to the Hanging Gardens.

Their three week trip was organized by a British adventure tour operator, ministry spokesman Abdul-Zahra al-Telagani said, but he declined to name the company.

“This is the first group since the regime’s fall,” he said. “We expect these tourists will convey a positive message to their citizens back home that the situation in Iraq is good.”

Their itinerary included the Castle of Arbil — a relic of the medieval Ottoman empire in Iraq’s northern Kurdish region — as well as the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh, in Mosul, a dangerous city still crawling with Sunni Arab insurgents.

They visited the al-Askari mosque in Samarra, one of the holiest sites of Shi’ite Islam, whose devastation in a bomb attack in 2006 unleashed a wave of sectarian violence that brought Iraq to the brink of civil war.

In the south, the tourists saw the holy Shi’ite shrines of Kerbala and Najaf, which are already popular with religious pilgrims from Iran, and the southern oil-hub Basra.

They will finish with a visit to the Iraqi National Museum. The building was re-opened last month for the first time since looters pillaged it after the U.S.-led invasion.

Iraq, part of a region known as the cradle of civilization, has countless archaeological and religious sites but decades of war have shut the doors to foreign tourist groups.