FLYING HIGH: U.S. astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria, a...

FLYING HIGH: U.S. astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria, a 1976 Mission Viejo High School graduate, will remember home when he blasts off Tuesday on the space shuttle Columbia from the Kennedy Space Center. He’ll take the city flag and two school flags with him. . . . “He approached us, and asked if we had a flag he could take with him,” says City Manager Dan Joseph. “He felt this was one way of honoring the city he grew up in.”

WHO’S COUNTING? How hot were tickets to mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli’s recital Thursday at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa? (F1) One Bartoli enthusiast who drove 50 miles from Brentwood said she had called a ticket broker before landing two tickets at face value thanks to a late cancellation. The broker told her she’d have to pay $300 for two seats in Row U of the center’s fourth tier. . . . That’s pricey--especially considering that there are only three tiers at the arts center.

BEYOND MOSES: Charlton Heston, who’s speaking Tuesday at the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace in Yorba Linda, is a rock-solid Republican. But when asked on a recent TV talk show the historic figure he enjoyed playing most, his answer was Thomas Jefferson, a Democrat-Republican whose party preceded today’s Democratic Party. . . . “He’s the only true genius ever to occupy the White House,” says Heston. . . . The actor will be at the library touting his autobiography, “In the Arena.” By coincidence, that’s the name of one of Nixon’s post-presidency books.

TOP DOGS: The county’s top police canines will strut their stuff today at a benefit (11 a.m. to 3 p.m.) at Glover Stadium in Anaheim. Huntington Beach police officer Jeff Huss, whose partner Fox will be among them, says it’s amazing to watch the dogs apprehend a drug suspect. The K-9, he says, not only becomes the officer’s best friend, “It’s a true partnership”. . . . Money raised will benefit families of officers killed in the line of duty or help retired or injured police dogs.