Random thoughts today:

* Does anyone else find it ironic that Yankees closer Mariano Rivera tore his ACL in Kansas City, MO?

* The story about New Jersey mom Patricia Krentcil being charged with child endangerment for bringing her 5-year-old daughter into a tanning booth got me thinking: Should criminal charges be filed against vacationing parents who let their children lie in the sun on the beach all day? I think not.

* I was amused to hear New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan call John A. Coleman Catholic High School in the town of Ulster "one of our wonderful Catholic schools" when he visited there on Wednesday — "our" referring to the New York Archdiocese. Perhaps someone needs to remind Dolan that the archdiocese defunded Coleman a decade ago and announced plans to close it. If not for the efforts of parents and community volunteers to keep the school open, Coleman today would be a vacant building surrounded by weeds.

* Note to town of Saugerties Republican Chairman Joe Roberti: Publicly admonishing Ulster County Legislator Bob Aiello, R-Saugerties, for taking a stand against Legislature Chairwoman Terry Bernardo, R-Accord — and threatening to pull the party's endorsement of Aiello in the next election — probably was not a good idea. The GOP holds only a razor-thin 13-12 majority in the Legislature, and Aiello always has been an on-the-fence kinda guy when it comes to politics. Anger him enough, and it seems to me that he just might jump ship — and put the Democrats in control.

*  Did Newt Gingrich really think the media would pay him much attention during his seven-day "farewell to my campaign" tour? What an egomaniac. His impending exit  from the GOP presidential race was announced in the middle of the last week of April, but he didn't formally bow out until May 2, figuring his every move in the interim would be reported. Sorry, Newt. No way. We news folks have better things to do with our time than report the exact same story day after day after day. And when his actual departure finally happened, our newspaper ran it as a news brief on a page inside the B section, which probably was more attention than it deserved.

* Edvard Much's famous painting "The Scream" sold at auction this week for nearly $120 million. I guess beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder, because to me, "The Scream" looks it was drawn with crayons by an 8-year-old.