default text if no specials available

[earmsby]

To be clear though, you are wanting to address the condition where the uri looks something like: index.php?main_page=specials and there are no specials currently available, correct? Not other areas where specials appear?

Yes, the uri is exactly as you've shown. I think for now I will just deactivate the EZ page I used to add it to the header EZ-Page menu. Then, there won't be any visible link to it. If I want to run a special, I can just re-activate the EZ-Page.