There was a profusion of exceptions, including religious holidays like Ash Wednesday and the Solemnity of the Ascension, but nobody, including ticket agents, seemed to know them all.

FORBES: The Ticket Fixer

But even veterans like Mike Ash of Minnesota will vote for McCain because he is one of them.

NPR: In Phoenix, McCain Touts Health Care For Vets

The operator should use an independent risk evaluator for weather and other environmental conditions like volcanic ash or even heavy pollutants which can effect helicopter operation and pilot visibility.

FORBES: 10 Essential Checks Before You Step Into A Helicopter

The streets are full of some odd ash-like dust.

FORBES: Dispatches From Post-Sandy New York: The Darkness of Lower Manhattan

They scoured eBay for oddball items like stuffed unicorn, key chains, ash trays, and old knitting magazines.

WSJ: Enhanced E-Books: Blowing Up the Book

Afterwards Mr Cai and his assistants damp out the fire using long poles tipped with sponges, and then smudge the lines of ash so that the portrait looks like a huge charcoal drawing on the wall of the museum's reception hall.

ECONOMIST: Firework chaos theory from a latterday Prospero

The electric guitar is still seen as a male instrument, despite great exponents in recent years like Nancy Wilson of Heart and Charlotte Hatherley of Ash, she says.

BBC: Why don't girls play guitar?

Questions like those are at the heart of a new book by Timothy Garton Ash, a British historian of Eastern Europe, describing a nine-month stay during 1980 in what was then East Berlin.

ECONOMIST: Cold-war spies

Organizations like Waterkeeper and ILoveMountains have fought against companies like Massey Energy, while lobbying for tougher federal restrictions on strip mining and so-called ash ponds.

FORBES: Written by Michael d��Estries