1. Summer isn't over yet, and neither is highway construction season. Those familiar orange traffic cones will be installed today on the southbound Route 219 Expressway, limiting traffic to one lane between the Mile Strip Road exit (Route 179) and the Big Tree Road exit (Route 20A) in the Town of Orchard Park. Work crews will be doing bridge maintenance. The state Department of Transportation says it will take about a week, weather permitting.

2. Manhattan-based Amor Towles, whose debut novel, "Rules of Civility," was The Buffalo News Book Club's August selection, will read from it and answer questions when he appears from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. in the Ring of Knowledge at the Central Library on Lafayette Square in downtown Buffalo. It's free and open to the public. Copies of Towles' book will be available for purchase.

3. Sen. Charles E. Schumer comes to Praxair, 175 East Park Drive, Town of Tonawanda, for an 11 a.m. news conference to announce his support for a plan to stop the closing next year of the Federal Helium Reserve in Amarillo, Texas. The Helium Stewardship Act would guarantee a stable supply of the gas at reasonable prices to companies like Praxair, for which helium is a critical part of their business.

4. Erie County Executive Mark C. Poloncarz will be joined by officials from the state, county, City of Buffalo and the Niagara Greenway Commission for a tour of the new Black Rock Canal Park, formerly the Ontario Street Boat Launch, at the foot of Ontario Street. The county-owned park is undergoing a $1.2 million upgrade that includes more green space, a dog park and environmentally friendly features, including LED lights and landscaping designed to filter water.

5. It's a busy day in the local literary world. Andrew Terranova, sponsor of the Dale Carnegie training course here, reviews Susan Cain's acclaimed "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking" for the Bistro Bookers series at 5:30 p.m. in Chef's Restaurant, 291 Seneca St. Sisters Claire and Lauren Gay are featured in the Wordflight reading series at 7 p.m. in the Crane Branch Library, 633 Elmwood Ave. at Highland Avenue. Claire is winner of the 2011 Arthur Axelrod Memorial Award from the University at Buffalo, and Lauren is a poet and small-press publisher.

6. Erie County officials will hold the first of three citizen forums this evening to get public input on what to apply for when they ask for 2013 community development block grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to serve low- and moderate-income people, the elderly and the handicapped. It begins at 7 in the Courtroom in Tonawanda City Hall, 200 Niagara St., City of Tonawanda. The second one will be held at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday in the Lackawanna Public Library.

7. Television news anchor Katie Couric debuts as a talk show diva today. The inaugural edition of her new show, simply called "Katie," kicks off at 4 p.m. on WKBW, Channel 7, in Oprah Winfrey's old time slot. Her arrival has touched off a shake-up in the whole afternoon lineup at Channel 7. "General Hospital," formerly at 3 p.m., moves to 2, displacing "Good Afternoon America," while Ricki Lake's new talk show airs at 3.