The Empire State Building will celebrate the Olympics by illuminating each of its sides with the colors of a different nation's flag throughout the sixteen days of the Summer Games. This will be the first time the skyscraper will have separate color schemes on each side as it will represent the 66 nations with the most athletes sent to Beijing. A typical color change at the Empire State Building takes six electricians six hours to switch out whichever of the 182 lights needs altering. Good thing there were so many electricians nearby during last night's power outage! more ›

Last night during the opening ceremonies in Beijing, the U.S. flag was carried by Lopez Lomong, one of the "Lost Boys of Sudan" who now hails from the upstate town Tully, NY. Governor Paterson issued a statement on his web site praising Lomong for not only "the joy and dedication he brings to the sport, but because of the amazing story of how he came to represent our State and Nation." Lomong is one of 75 other Olympians part of a group called Team Darfur that seeks increased recognition of the situation in his homeland. Once having fled from bullets all the way across the Sudanese border to Kenya, he will run in the 1500-meter event in Beijing. more ›

Two Americans were stabbed in Beijing today by a crazed Chinese man who then immediately committed suicide. The victims were a man who was killed and a woman who was injured, both relatives of a U.S. Men's Volleyball Coach. The stabber, a 47-year-old man from Hangzhou, then threw himself from the second story of the site of the attack, the 13th-century Drum Tower three miles from the main Olympics site. more ›