Today's weather & top news

Today, partly sunny. Highs in the lower 40s. Winds becoming southeast 5 to 15 mph. Tonight, mostly cloudy. Lows in the mid-20s. East winds 10 to 15 mph shifting to the north 5 to 10 mph after midnight. Saturday, windy, colder, cloudy. Patchy light freezing drizzle or a slight chance of light freezing rain in the morning then a slight chance of snow in the afternoon. Highs around 30. North winds 15 to 20 mph increasing to 20 to 30 mph in the afternoon. Chance of measurable precipitation 20 percent. ... LINCOLN (AP) �” Nebraska drivers can ring in the new year by shelling out a little more at the pump.

The variable portion of the state gas tax increased Thursday to 26.4 cents per gallon, up from 26 cents.

The variable portion of the tax is adjusted twice a year so the state Department of Roads receives no more, and no less, money than the Legislature has budgeted for the department. The American Petroleum Institute says combining federal and state taxes, Nebraska drivers will pay almost 46 cents per gallon in taxes. The national average is 48.4 cents as of Oct. 1. AAA Nebraska said Wednesday the statewide average price for a gallon of unleaded was just over $1.65. That’s down from more than $3.09 a year ago. ... ASPEN, Colo. (AP) �” They rang in 2009 a day late in Aspen after a former resident unhappy that his hometown has become a resort playground for the wealthy vowed “mass death” and left four bombs around downtown before killing himself. Aspen police say James Chester Blanning, a 72-year-old who skied competitively as a teen but had grown bitter about his hometown, walked into two downtown banks Wednesday afternoon and left gift-wrapped bombs made of gasoline and cell phone components. Blanning also left notes demanding cash and saying “Aspen will pay a horrible price in blood” if his demands were not met. The typewritten notes said he was targeting four banks, police said, but only two �” a Wells Fargo Bank and a nearby Vectra Bank �” received the packages. Later, police found two similar packages atop a black sled in a downtown alley. Blanning sent a copy of the notes to The Aspen Times newspaper. “We believe the suspect abandoned his plan halfway through,” said Assistant Aspen Police Chief Bill Linn. Police found Blanning dead in his Jeep Cherokee a few hours later in a rural area east of Aspen. In his Jeep, they found a rifle and a handgun that Linn says Blanning used to kill himself. Blanning’s bombs caused the evacuation a 16-block area �” nearly all of downtown Aspen. The evacuation lasted until 4 a.m., meaning the resort’s hallmark mountaintop firework display and ritzy downtown parties were canceled. Aspen restaurants and high-end stores tried to recapture the holiday spirit Thursday night with a rescheduled fireworks display. Revelers even started chanting a New Year’s Eve-style countdown. But the party numbered in the hundreds, not the thousands.