It's an occupational hazard, but I've been suffering a bit more informational overload lately, so I'm going to drop some worthy links on you to settle some psychic accounts:

♦ University of Minnesota Journalism prof Gary Schwitzer released a report on the state of health journalism today. As you can imagine, the nation's health journalists say their coverage is getting sicker. Half say they've been laid off or expect to be. They also say lifestyle stories overwhelm policy coverage. (I think the Strib has been an exception to the coverage trend, by the way.)

Schwitzer has a pretty engaging 4-minute debrief here:

♦ Promoted from the comments: I've neglected to publicize a very thoughtful piece by former PiPress reporter Lee Egerstrom on a possible co-op future for Minnesota's endangered newspapers. Egerstrom, who covers rural economic development for Minnesota 2020, leverages his knowledge of farm co-ops to suggest particularly Minnesotan survival scenarios.

♦ If you read my screed earlier today about online journalist access to the Minnesota House, my bosses kicked in their response here.

♦ Help a brother out: A few weeks ago, I wrote about the debt-battered Sun chain killing its community paper that serves South St. Paul and environs. This week, an ex-Sun journalist named Blair Reynolds started a local news site to help fill the gap. It's called South Metro Source and you can check it out here.

♦ Local pub Finance and Commerce got linked from the White House blog today. By the way, F&C added former PiPress reporter Scott Carlson to its staff last month; good going.

♦ What am I rocking out to as I write this? A 1985 Replacements concert at 7th Street Entry:

The drunkeness (theirs, not mine) seems just about right. My pal Dean Carlson says this came from a five-night stand in support of "Tim," so we're talking shank-of-career stuff. Good recording quality and a nice KISS cover at about the 33 minute mark that segues into "Help Me Rhonda."