Slideshow of 12 AP photos by Richard Drew from the 26th Annual New York International Orchid Show in Rockefeller Center last weekend.

Google Maps: Street maps for all of Europe (as corrected by readers of that Google Maps Mania link).

R.I.P:

My beloved rests in peace: Blogger and former TV newsman Terrry Heaton:

My precious and beautiful wife, Allie, passed away during the night. I found her lifeless body on the floor of the bathroom at 3:30 a.m. The paramedics did everything they could, but she was already gone. We have no idea what happened. She was young (41). She was fit. She was so full of life that it's, frankly, very hard to believe she is gone.

I'm in shock and obviously grieving, but I wanted to let you know and write a few words about what she meant to me. It's my way...

Terry had earlier this month written 10 Days That Unexpectedly Changed Me, in response to the History Channel series 10 Days That Unexpectedly Changed America.. Number 10 begins,

On August 18, 2003, I got an e-mail from a gal who used to work for me at WAAY-TV in Huntsville, Alabama. Alicia Smith wrote these words:

Today will undoubtedly, excruciatingly, be Number 11.

He writes that he'd like to fill the church -- First Baptist Church of Lawrenceburg, Tenn., on Springer Road -- with flowers for her funeral Friday "She loved them in life and spent most of the last month planting them around the outside of our house."

Jane Jacobs in 2000. (AP)
Urban thinker Jane Jacobs dies. She was 89. Financial Times:

Jane Jacobs, a giant among urban critics and enthusiasts who died on Tuesday aged 89, spent her entire career fighting for one deceptively simple principle: leave the cities alone and let them develop by themselves.

In many ways, Jacobs's tireless fight for the organic, spontaneous city - for wide sidewalks, old buildings, a mix of businesses, semi-supervised children at play, and trees - was ahead of its time.

But in retrospect, Jacobs's message initally surfaced as a final warning, nearly coinciding with the dawn of government-sponsored neighbourhood-razing and cement-pouring. Today, her first and most important book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961), reads as a tragedy of sorts: Jacobs's countless suggestions about preserving street life were ultimately ignored....

In 2001, Jim Kunstler led her through her life story in this interview. (Her first job: secretary in a candy manufacturing company.)

Her titles at Amazon.

Who they were: MyDeathSpace.com: Obits for MySpace users, including the cause of death and links to their MySpace profiles. Most are young; many die in auto accidents.