One more great thing about plunging earnings, rampant unemployment, and the nation's overall economic malaise: If you're traveling this Labor Day weekend, you can expect to find airports and roads a lot less congested! Air travel is expected to fall 20 percent this year compared to last, and the AAA is predicting a 13 percent drop in the number of people taking road trips. [AP, DF]

The strange and mysterious music of the Real Housewives of Atlanta returned last night. These women are so inspiring, they unlock the muse and all her mysteries. The only thing for us to do? Write poetry, of course.

Its the last weekend of summer — a time for Hollywood to scratch their heads in amazement that they fell for it again.

Oh, the art world! Like any insular set of people, it's always swirling with the best rumors. The mystery that arty people are currently exploring: has Matthew Barney left his hipster elf wife Björk for sometimes-lesbian painter Elizabeth Peyton?

• Who's going to replace Diane Sawyer now that she's leaving GMA? No one knows, really, but expect the changes to the show to be significant. [NYT]
• Time is shutting down its fashion-centric spin-off, Time Style & Design. Editor Kate Betts will remain with Time; six other staffers have been let go. [WWD]
• Magazine publishers are bending over backwards and offering to design ads themselves in order to keep their advertisers from fleeing. [NYT]
• A frontrunner may have emerged to acquire the Boston Globe. [NYP]
• ABC and CBS have agreed to air President Obama's address to a joint session of Congress next Wednesday. Fox, however, probably will not. [THR]
• Hollywood writers just aren't earning the cash they used to, it seems. [NYT]
• Simon Fuller, the man who brought you American Idol, now has his sights set on fashion: He's one of the people behind a new site called Fashionair. [VF]
• One more reason to hope Jay Leno's new nightly show on NBC fails: If it succeeds, you can expect every other network to dump pricey one-hour dramas and replace them with crappy live events and even crappier reality TV. [Time]

The S&P 500 is up slightly since the start of June, rising one percent, but we're told Peter Thiel's Clarium Capital is having a much worse time. In fact, the Pay Pal co-founder should avoid thinking about work this weekend.

The Way We Live Now: Falling through the safety net. Instead of "doctors," we have EMTs. Instead of "vacations," we have the park. Instead of "new Trapper Keepers," we have your new Trapper Keeper, that we stole. From you.

The State Department announced today that eight of the security contractors in Kabul who were featured drinking "buttshots" of vodka off one another in photos we published Tuesday have been fired, and two more quit.

In your nearly-over Friday media column: The New York Post is shameless about stealing stories, the AP's criticized for taking a good photo, Jon Capehart in more hijinks, and Brian Tierney's clock is ticking.

Plum TV's Nick Leighton gave himself a tour of Bernie Madoff's house in Montauk this week, which can now be yours for $8.75 million. Leighton isn't all that impressed by the decor, not surprisingly. ("I think this was last renovated before I was born," he says). But he does uncover some better news in the master bath: There's great water pressure in the shower! [PlumTV]

The White House today decided to start publishing the names of White House visitors, ending two lawsuits seeking Secret Service visitor logs under the Freedom of Information Act. It's a nice gesture, but that's just about all it is.

Hollywood's screaming shut-in Nikki Finke is making waves in her own bathtub this morning with a fresh new look — which bears a striking resemblance to the old look — and promises of the imminent roll-out of a worldwide network.

With the fall of Michael Cera, the hipsters who run the world have gone into overdrive searching for the sexiest Man/Boy Alive. The landscape is littered with contenders but no clear frontrunner has yet emerged.

The story of how the President's Special Advisor for Green Jobs became the biggest, scariest villain of the right wing (this week, anyway) is also the story of how the right wing information delivery process works now.

Fancy Georgetown University is being stalked by a sex criminal (nicknamed the "Georgetown Cuddler," cute) who breaks into women's bedrooms and assaults them as they sleep. Police have not been able to track down a suspect of this description:

In an act of publishing cowardice, Condé Nast has gone to extraordinary lengths to prevent Russians from reading a GQ article criticizing Vladimir Putin. As a public service, we're running it here and ask for your help in translating it.

You'd think the average grad student at Harvard would know how to use the bathroom by now, wouldn't you? Well, just to be on the safe side, Harvard's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences hands out a "bathroom etiquette guide" to all incoming students moving into university-owned housing, which is conveniently divided into what is considered "appropriate" and "inappropriate" behavior when you're using the toilets, showers and sinks. A sample is below. Prepare to be stunned.

Campy Jewish Self-Defense Squad to the rescue! Of the news cycle! Where does today's instantly classic New York Post cover of NYC's most self-serious gun-totin' rabbis rank in the canon of Pop Culture Jews With Guns?

Project Runway is all about vision and delusion. The vision to craft an episode around surf wear, the delusion it won't be the worst episode ever. The vision of picking a strong teammate , the delusion that it will save you.

Since Obama has been on vacation lately, and Biden has the temerity to continue to make public appearances, the Washington Times' Joseph Curl has declared a coup. Now that we're 12 days into Biden presidency, how's he doing?