PODCAST: Animal tracks and T-Mobile pacts

Today police in Tehran fought with money changers and other protesters in front of the country's central bank. Inflation in Iran is running at a shocking clip: the Iranian rial has lost 25 percent of its value against the dollar in just the past week, and there is lots of blame to go around -- including some directed at the U.S.

The Mortgage Bankers Association says applications for home mortgages surged last week. Interest rates are at record lows, thanks in part to the Federal Reserve's latest stimulus operations, and data from the payroll processing company ADP says private employers added 162,000 jobs last month -- still slow, but more than economists had expected.

T-Mobile, America's struggling fourth-place wireless company,  says it has finally reached a merger deal -- but not with one of the big guys.

We all get to watch tonight's first presidential debate, but to some extent the candidates are speaking to a much smaller group of us -- folks who live in the so-called "swing states" that will tilt the electoral college and determine a winner. Maybe the swinging-est of swing states is Ohio, which regularly oscillates between the parties and has gone the way of the winner in every presidential election since 1964. Ohio Gov. John Kasich and former Gov. Ted Strickland share their take on the election and Ohio's rebounding economy.

There is the Florida woman caught on camera riding a manatee. Now if you're swimming in Florida, and you see a manatee, it's not complicated, there's really only one rule you've gotta remember: don't ride them. Her close encounter with nature could land her a misdemeanor for violating the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act.

And finally, it is man versus mountain goat in Washington's Olympic National Park. The weapons-of-choice: sharp pointy horns, of course, and paintball guns. Hikers reported aggressive mountain goats this summer, and so the Forest Service closed a popular trail and sent biologists out to scare the herds into a more distant relationship with humans. According to KING5-TV, that involved chemical repellents and shooting them with paintballs. The trail just re-opened. Rangers don't recommend carrying your own paintball gun, but if you are charged by an aggressive mountain goat, you're supposed to yell really loud -- that should come naturally.