Ice, buses, John Edwards, coffee shops, ethanol, farmers, ice, darkness ... is it any wonder the national press corps is having a group nervous breakdown in Iowa? Here are some grim blind-item examples of people with broken hearts and broken minds:

* A "major photographer" went berserk on a hapless hotel bellboy.

* All the gay reporters are picking up gay people at a gay bar called "The Blazing Saddle."

* There is some kind of fisting going on in John Edwards' bus toilet.

* Some loser reporter from a second-tier paper is stuck in Iowa without an expense budget.

Low Temperatures, High Drama: Inside the Iowa Press Corps [NY Mag]