More news you may have missed

The news reaches us this afternoon that Arizonans favor putting the Grand Canyon on the state's commemorative quarter, due to be released in 2008 by the US Mint. This news comes to us via a poll from the Social Research Laboratory at Northern Arizona University (where, we hasten to add, 19 Minutes World Headquarters is also located).

The 423 Arizonans polled put the Grand Canyon on top with 28%, easily outpolling the saguaro cactus (19%), "state symbols" (9%), "Native American theme" (8%), and a few others. Amazingly "hand guns" did not show up on the survey, as the state's residents apparently favor putting them everywhere else. Also not making the list, but in the 19 Minutes staff's opinion, deserving consideration, are: RVs with Canadian license plates, freeways closed for construction, and Californians buying houses. At least the US Mint hasn't already lined up the Grand Canyon for Colorado's quarter. (And yes, we referenced that story last week, too.)

But the most interesting part of the survey came a little later, as we learn that Arizonans' current favorite state quarter is the 2004 Wisconsin quarter, featuring a cow's head, a wedge of cheese, an ear of corn, and the slogan "Forward". (Personally, we like this proposed Wisconsin quarter better.) Frankly, we have no idea what this tells us about our fellow Arizona citizens. We're cheesy? We're corny? "Forward" is our favorite Internet Explorer icon? We also aren't sure why Delaware's quarter (3%) comes in above the much spiffier Maine quarter (2%). Another example of the power wielded by the all-powerful Delaware Quarter Cartel.

Onward to our final item from the news today:

Unless you've been lurking on the Colorado AP wire, you may have missed this item, from the "Exactly What Kind of Blizzards are They Serving?" category:

Focus on the Family says it didn't organize protest of Dairy Queen

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) - Focus on the Family says neither it nor its lobbying arm organized a protest against the business of Senator Ken Salazar's wife -- or the senator himself.

Salazar has accused about 30 protesters from the conservative Christian group of showing up yesterday outside the Dairy Queen store owned by his wife in Westminster. Some protesters carried signs with pictures of fetuses or the slogan "Boycott Salazar D-Q," and impeded traffic to the store.

But Focus on the Family says today that they have no way of knowing whether any protesters are constituents of the organization. It says some people actually were there protesting its group.

If nothing else, this represents a nice change from the people protesting outside Wendy's with those big foam #1 fingers.