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who has to be outdoors for an extended period should keep well hydrated and wear loose fitting cool clothing. The best way to deal with the heat is to spend as much time indoors, especially in air conditioning. Remember to check on elderly friends and neighbors.
The sizzling heat will be a factor in the 2008 Belmont Stakes taking place in Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y., this evening. The high there is expected to reach 90 degrees for the final leg of the Triple Crown, but the humidity will make it feel even hotter.
The East Regional News story reports the peak of the heat will come Sunday and Monday. Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., will surge into the upper 90s by the beginning of the week. Parts of the Carolinas will continue to surpass the century mark into the first part of the week.
Along the northern extent of 90-degree heat, damaging storms will erupt from the central Plains to the Great Lakes. The Midwest Regional News story reports that storms will spark through the evening from Nebraska to Wisconsin. Moisture and warmth will continue to surge into the area, helping to fuel the severe storms.
According to the Severe Weather Center, the strongest storms will produce damaging winds, hail, and the potential for a tornado. Especially with recent storms, flash flooding will affect some areas.
Overnight, strong and severe storms will continue to pound the region from northern Kansas into lower Michigan. As a storm exits the eastern Rockies and heads toward the Great Lakes through Sunday, severe storms will continue to affect portions of the Midwest.
The Midwest was already a target of the nasty storms on Friday as a storm moved into southern Canada. Detroit, Chicago and St. Louis were all affected by the strong storms.
A tornado was reported in Poplar Grove, Ill., less than 2 hours to the west of Chicago. High winds and storms caused flight delays and cancellations in the city. Dozens of flights at O’Hare International Airport were canceled, while delays averaged 90 minutes. Midway International Airport reported some flights were delayed up to an hour.

accuweather.com

“My date can’t make it, away on a business trip. I’m a nice looking, normal guy, blond/blue, 37, corporate professional. As I am 6′3″, prefer you are at least 5′7.”
“Two sexy Californians seeking tix for Sex and the City…We are a mother and daughter from California who have never missed a single episode of Sex and the City. We desperately want to go to the premiere at Radio City Music Hall. We have the dresses for it but not the tickets. Does anyone have extra tickets they might want to part with?”

defamer.com

In the Caribbean, summer is always a steal. But this year, it may be even more appealing that usual.
You know the drill: When New York temperatures rise, Caribbean hotel rates melt. Airline seats are cheaper, crowds thin out, and those same resorts that block out winter rooms for A-list Hollywood crowds are suddenly wooing mere mortals with serious discounts.
Thanks to this year’s economic blues and increased air service to the Caribbean overall, you might be able to snag an even better bargain than in years past. Look for rates 30, 40, even 50 percent cheaper than in high season — and be sure to ask when you book if other packages or savings might be available. Hint: New lodgings and those under rennovation often offer the best savings.
Here are six of my favorite stealth bargains for the coming months.
BELLS AND WHISTLES
The U.S. Virgin Island St. Thomas is famous for cruise ships and shopping bargains, but I like it for the resplendent views from the shoulders of muscular mountains — panoramas that spill down steep slopes and across the bays to neighboring islands. The view from The Ritz-Carlton, the island’s top hotel, is closer to sea level but no less stirring, and a sublime infinity pool drinks in the panorama of Turquoise Bay and nearby St. John.
Originally lavished with Italian Renaissance touches, the 180-room resort completed a $40 million renovation in 2007 that included gently updating decor and modernizing rooms while expanding the excellent spa. Bougainvillea is draped around the peach-colored buildings and lush gardens dividing them. There’s a pristine beach, tennis courts, well-maintained health club and a dive shop with an array of watersports. Four dining options range from poolside to sophisticated. And every morning there’s Shop Talk, a class coaching guests on where to find the island’s best buys in handcrafts and jewelry, and a free shuttle into town for deal-seekers.

miamiherald.com

Deadly crane collapse…Georgia storms kill 2…Student pilot dead
NEW YORK (AP) Searchers are going through piles of rubble at the site of a construction crane collapse in Manhattan that has, according to the mayor, killed at least four people. At least 10 people were injured. The crane demolished parts of several buildings and appears to have reduced one small brick apartment to dust.
ATLANTA (AP) Officials in Atlanta insist tens of thousands of Basketball fans at two arenas were perfectly safe even though the crowds apparently weren’t warned about an approaching Tornado. The twister ravaged downtown skyscrapers and injured dozens last night.
Storms elsewhere in the state have killed at least two people.
PARKER, Ariz. (AP) The Air Force says the student pilot of an F-16 fighter jet has died in a crash in western Arizona. A spokeswoman for Luke Air Force Base says crews found the pilot’s parachute and some of his gear near the wreckage about 80 miles northwest of Phoenix.
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) Five Americans are among the 11 people injured in a bomb explosion in the back garden of an Italian restaurant crowded with foreigners in Pakistan’s capital. A Turkish woman was killed in the Islamabad blast.

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A TOWERING construction crane crashed on to a New York residential building today, killing at least four people and injuring four others.
US media reported that some remained trapped inside the Manhattan building after the massive white crane struck it in the early afternoon, NY1 News television and The New York Times reported.
A furious neighbourhood association president, Scott Singer, told reporters that residents had complained of security violations at the construction site since January.
"We lost four persons, four innocent victims on a sunny afternoon. Enough is enough," Singer said.
New York police chief Raymond Kelly was at the scene of the accident while Mayor Michael Bloomberg was on his way there.
People at the scene told NY1 that they heard a loud explosion, smelled a strong gas odour and saw a thick yellow dust cloud.
"People were shouting: run, run!" a woman living near the building told the station.
The crane split in half at a construction site of a 25-storey building on East 51st Street and Second Avenue in Manhattan’s Upper East Side, NY1 reported.
A small building was crushed while the crane also struck the top corner of another, taller building, television images showed.
Huge chunks of rubble were scattered all over the site, while the accident left a BMW crushed and several other cars damaged. Rescuers were seen removing an injured person on a stretcher.

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I don’t know which is more surprising: That caped crusader Eliot Spitzer allegedly had sex with a call girl, or that he paid her $4,300.
If you haven’t been in the market for a prostitute lately, that might sound like a lot of money. But it’s pretty typical for a high-priced call girl in a big city.
The Emperor’s Club VIP, the New York agency Spitzer allegedly used to hire a prostitute, charged $1,000 to $3,100 per hour for its so-called models, depending on their “education, sophistication and ambience created,” according to a cached version of the club’s Web site, which has been taken down.
The club’s “most valued clients” were offered membership in the Icon Club, which allowed them access to “the most highly ranked prostitutes whose fees started at $5,500 per hour,” according to a complaint filed in federal court for the southern district of New York.
Spitzer allegedly arranged a four-hour date with “Kristen” - identified by the New York Times on Wednesday as Ashley Alexandra Dupre - in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 13. It was the night before Valentine’s Day and his testimony before Congress on bond insurance.
His $4,300 payment appeared to include $1,500 to be put on deposit with the Emperor’s Club for his next rendezvous.

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Lloyd Blankfein and Sanford Weill are among the current and former Wall Street heavyweights who have recently bought into 15 Central Park West, New York’s uber-luxurious new condominium complex.
But James Cayne, the chairman and, until recently, chief executive of Bear Stearns, has chosen a different trophy address. Documents filed with the city of New York on Friday show that Mr. Cayne and his wife, Patricia, closed this month on an apartment at The Plaza, the storied former hotel that has been converted into high-end condos. At $2.4 million, the sale price is rather modest compared to what some other pads at The Plaza have fetched. In November, Kenneth Moelis, the former head of investment banking at UBS, paid $11 million for an apartment there.
In September, Ronald L. Sargent, the chairman and chief executive of Staples, paid $5.8 million for a 1,212-square-foot one-bedroom apartment in The Plaza. That same month, David Barger, the chief executive of JetBlue, paid $10 million for his 2,600-square-foot two-bedroom apartment on a higher floor.
Harry Macklowe, the real-estate mogul who has been under a bit of financial pressure lately, shelled out nearly $60 million in June for virtually all of the Plaza’s seventh floor.
City records show Mr. Cayne went to contract on his apartment in The Plaza nearly two years ago, before the mortgage-related problems that forced two Bear Stearns hedge funds into bankruptcy, vaporizing about $1.5 billion of investors’ money and dealing a serious blow to the firm’s reputation.
The sale closed Feb. 5, less than a month after Mr. Cayne agreed to step down as Bear’s chief executive.

dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com

February 20, 2008 - The internet is like a genie’s lamp: You rub it enough via Google searches, and it grants wishes. At least that was the case yesterday, when many a man typed in the ol’ past time “lindsey lohan naked” and was granted some serious jpeg goodness.
On Tuesday, actress Lindsey Lohan bared nearly all in a soon-to-be-infamous photo spread in New York magazine. The photos, originally intended as part of a tribute to Marilyn Monroe’s photo shoot for the magazine, are quickly becoming the stuff of “Right Click, Save As” legend.
Many press outlets - both online and print - are asking why New York magazine, and not the “Read ‘Em Just For the Articles” pages of Playboy. According to Radar Online, the nude pics were not supposed to appear in the mag, but rather in an art piece, showcasing the photographer’s work at a later date. Lohan’s camp has not released an official comment as of press time.
Bless you, Internet, provider of hi-res, naked goodness. We never have to sift through photoshopped-fakes, or sit through Lohan’s cinematic coma-enducing escapades again.
Ya done good, World Wide Web. Real good.

stars.ign.com