IMAGE: KATHY MURPHY

* Last Thursday, FOX-12 morning meteorologist Andy Carson was caught on camera taking a big bite out of Portland Oregon Visitors Association sales assistant Lillian Hannon at the 12th annual "Grapestomp" in Pioneer Courthouse Square. Hannon's "Big Apple" costume was in keeping with this year's New York event theme, as was the choice of Carson, a former David Letterman intern, as emcee.

* In keeping with the neighborhood uplift going on around it, the historic St. Johns Theatre (8704 N Lombard St.) is undergoing a renovation and now featuring kiddie matinees, soon to be followed by suds-accompanied first-runs at night. To promote its Oct. 9 reopening, its answering-machine message last week announced the new gentrification-friendly format but had some unfortunate background audibles: real-life sirens.

* If you, like Murmurs, can't wait for doorbells and ringing phones to stop interrupting your afternoon nap for political reasons, here's the trick: Vote early. It's not well-known, but political parties in Oregon keep track of who's turned in their ballots--once you vote, they will leave you alone.

* "Screenwriter," Charles D'Ambrosio's award-winning short story about a screenwriter who hooks up with a self-mutilating ballerina in a New York psych ward, has launched the Portland writer into the rarefied pages of the newest edition of Houghton Mifflin's annual collection, 2004 Best American Short Stories, where he joins the likes of John Updike and Alice Munro. For more of D'Ambrosio, check out "The Scheme of Things," a story about grifters posing as Christian charity workers, in the Oct. 11 New Yorker.

* The hot Internet rumor last week was whether a mysterious bulge in Bush's back indicated that he wore an earphone to coach him in the first debate (see Salon.com for details and a startling photo). Well, the speculation was presaged in Portland. In August, when Bush spoke at Beaverton's Southridge High School, the notoriously syntax-challenged prez astonished national and local reporters on the scene with 90 minutes of eloquence--causing widespread speculation that Bush was wired. "We were going, 'Wow, he didn't even make one flaw,'" says one Portland reporter who was on the scene. Adding to the press corps' suspicion, the president seemed to know how long he needed to speak to outlast the speech Teresa Heinz Kerry was giving at Waterfront Park. Said the reporter: "He kept going as long as he needed to in order to maximize his television time."

* Portland State University was plagued by sleazy signature-gatherers stalking students on Broadway last week. Two students told Murmurs the sig-stalkers were asking them whether they opposed higher tuition and child molesters. If the students did--and who doesn't?--they were urged to sign a petition to the governor. The catch? For their signatures to count, they needed to register to vote--as Republicans. One student, Todd Davis, says that when he declined to do so, the operative told him, "If you don't vote Republican, well, then you're probably for these issues."