Residents in Madera had less than 24 hours notice that their Post Office was closing and starting Wednesday morning they would have to pick up their mail in Houtzdale. More: continued here

Fate of Oysterville PO undecidedChinook ObserverOYSTERVILLE — Oysterville Church was packed Oct. 24 as David Boos, manager of post office operations for the Portland District, discussed possible closure of the state's oldest operating post office. Boos made it clear he was there to hear what they …and more » More: continued …

New Yorker (blog) Slide Show: Qaddafi Postage StampsNew Yorker (blog)Libyan postage stamps, like the ones in the collection below, are among the symbols left over. These particular stamps were acquired by Henry Schuler, a former American Foreign Service worker who had been based in Benghazi before Qaddafi assumed …and more » …

San Mateo Daily Journal Some 15% of US Uses Food StampsWall Street Journal (blog)Nearly 15% of the US population relied on food stamps in August, as the number of recipients hit 45.8 million. Food stamp rolls have risen 8.1% in the past year, the Department of Agriculture reported, though the …

Congresswoman Jackie Speier plans to spend the next five days limiting herself to eating on a budget of $4.50 per day — which she says is the budget of a typical food stamps recipient.    At a community roundtable in Millbrae, Speier, D-San Francisco/San Mateo, said she hopes her experience …

Wink News Melbourne Beach Post Office is off the list of outlets slated for closure- 6:50 amFlorida TodayThe Melbourne Beach Post Office has been removed from the list of post offices nationwide being considered for closure. Town Manager Bill Hoskovec sent out an email this afternoon saying that Rep. Bill …

Daily Mail Researchers defeat CAPTCHA on popular websitesComputerworldOther interesting results were registered on eBay, whose CAPTCHA implementation failed 43% of the time, and on Wikipedia, where one in four attempts was successful. Lower, but still significant, success rates were found on Digg, CNN and Baidu — 20, …CAPTCHA Security Weak …

Christian Science Monitor Food stamp participation on the riseChristian Science MonitorBy SoldAtTheTop, Guest blogger / November 1, 2011 This chart shows the rate of participation in the Federal food stamp program since 2005. Participation is strongly correlated to the unemployment rate, and both have been high over the past three …

Artists File Lawsuits To Retrieve RoyaltiesNew York Times… suits brought this month by artists that include Chuck Close and Laddie John Dill and the estate of the sculptor Robert Graham against the auction powerhouses Sotheby's and Christie's and the online auction site eBay for failure to pay royalties. …Artists Sue …

U.S. Food-Stamp Use Reaches Record 45.8 Million, USDA SaysBloombergThe number of Americans receiving food stamps reached a record 45.8 million in August, the government said. The figure was 1.1 percent higher than the previous month and 8.1 percent more than a year earlier …and more » More: continued here