Jottings

Barry B*nds hits #756
I take a little East Coast pride in that the guy who ended up with Bonds's 756th home run ball last night was from NY. Not only that, he and his buddy attended the game wearing Mets and Yankees jerseys - respectively. How soft is it in Northern California that they let a NY boy come in and steal their home run ball? Either way - heck of a payday for this 22 yr old kid, experts say he can unload it for around $400,000. A far cry from the 3 Million Mark McGwire's 70th home run fetched (that ball is now worth $100,000.)

Erin Burnett - my new infatuation
If I have the tv on during the day, pretty much the only channel I watch is CNBC, and the new jewel of the network is Squawk on the Street host Erin Burnett. Lots of networks hire the good looking anchor, but usually with no brains to go with the package. But Erin is a double threat - with looks and smarts. She was previously an investment banker with Goldman Sachs, and a VP with Citigroup before making the leap to CNBC. Since she began hosting, ratings are up 142% (this is likely because male stock market geeks like me can't get enough).

Tornado hits Brooklyn
A confirmed tornado hit Brooklyn overnight - maybe the first one ever. My place pretty much just had pelting rain and lightning. I think the most entertaining part of the whole event was hearing all the locals on the news saying the word 'Twista' in their New York accents. Has anyone since The Wizard of Oz called it a twista?

Tiger a sure thing?
Apparently Jim Nantz has already declared Tiger Woods a 4-shot favorite to win the PGA Championship this weekend. These days, the networks just pray that Tiger is in the hunt on Sundays....if not, ratings plummet. They say it'll be 100+ degrees all week in Oklahoma, so if it's a bunch of nobodies in contention this weekend - at least the announcers can kill some time discussing the ins and outs of the 'heat index'.

More hot golf action
East Coast Mark is headed to Arizona this weekend for some golfing with the fellas. The courses pretty much shut down from 11am-2pm because it's so hot, so we're teeing off around 6:30am every day. Monday - Wednesday I've got some meetings in Scottsdale, where I'll demand the air conditioning be set at 62. Odds-on favorite for the most overused phrase of the week? "But, it's a dry heat."
Yeah, and so is sticking my head in an oven.