Cheers and jeers from around the news:

• Cheers for Halloween and cheers for our annual Sun Journal editorial reminder to not do anything crazy or unsafe during Saturday’s activities. Watch out for open flames around costumes. (That person is not trick-or-treating dressed as the Human Torch. He is on fire and needs help.)

Wear reflective material when trick-or-treating after dark. Ensure everything collected is vetted by an adult, especially if a child has sensitive food allergies. For kids, bring a flashlight. Watch for traffic. Look both ways. And don’t get into cars with people you don’t know.

(We’d say don’t take candy from strangers, but that would be missing the whole point of Halloween.)

Most of these warnings are common sense, the kind we should practice each and every day. We just hope everyone does, to make today another safe and enjoyable Halloween.

• And speaking of food allergies, cheers to Nicco the peanut-sniffing dog, who is helping 5-year-old Ethan Rines of Turner with his allergy. One thing that should be mentioned, though: No matter how cunning and adorable a service dog like Nicco is, they’re essentially canine professionals and shouldn’t be treated like normal dogs.

There’s a certain way they should be treated. So before approaching a service dog, ask the owner about the right way to do so. And if they politely ask you not to pet the dog, please do what they say.

• Cheers to the demolition of the vacant service plaza on the Maine Turnpike in Lewiston. We’ve harped on this before; the plaza (closed since the wicked fancy one in West Gardiner opened) was a miserable roadside eyesore on the way into the city.

Well, now it’s gone. We watched yellow bulldozers erase it from existence over a couple of days this week. Good riddance.

• Jeers to spoiled bipartisanship. After all the hubbub about Sen. Snowe’s vote on health care reform, majority Democrats are pushing forward with plans for a public option, despite her clear resistance to it. Instead of compromise, we’re getting the expected heavy-handed politics.

We’ve said it before: We fear the public option, if insisted, could split the parties and doom heath care reform overall. Although it enjoys strong public support, this is not a referendum. The votes in Congress are key. And health care reform is too important to hinge on one single point.

We’d trade the public option for the suite of other reforms that are proposed. That would be progress.

• And finally, cheers to skateboarder extraordinaire Tony Hawk, who shredded a very ordinary day in Lewiston this week by showing up at the downtown skate park and signing autographs for fans. For many kids around L-A, Hawk’s visit was the peak of the week.

Thanks for coming.

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