Things are slow in the newsrooms in the Mohawk Valley. This made the top headline at RomeSentinel.com:

The state’s canal system had increased usage in 2007 compared to the last two years, and the three locks in Oneida County had increases of about 50 percent each compared to 2006, according to state Canal Corp. statistics.

"We had a very good year this year," said Canal Corp. Director Carmella Mantello. There were dry conditions throughout most of the boating season, she noted, which are best for fishing and cruising.

The 524-mile canal system had 150,126 lockings for recreational vessels through its locks from May 4 to Nov. 15. Even more boats are not counted because they do not travel through locks, but rather they launch and stay between locks. The number was up significantly from 2006, when only 114,516 lockings were recorded. In 2005, which Mantello said was a good year, 143,516 lockings were recorded. Mantello said there were more commercial vessels on the canal in 2007 as well, though exact numbers were not immediately available.

Locally, Lock 20 in Marcy and Locks 21 and 22 in New London were busy with recreational traffic.

In Marcy, there were 1,771 lockings — up from 1,165 the year before but down from 1,821 in 2005.

Uh huh. Wow. Amazing.

Who's the poor guy who had to look up all those numbers and statistics for the news story?

When I worked in radio, we called these kinds of stories "fluff." You know, the PSA, celebrity, human interest stories. Because the murders and bank robberies were few and far between. The real good news is that the crime is down, not that things are so very, very interesting in the Erie Canal's ledger books.

But I am happy to hear that the canal did well this year.