MuRrAy HiLL

^^Love the Letterman clips:

Thanks for the report EC -- I'm really, really hoping I can make it up there once during the next three weekends. They'll for sure be a pent up demand on my end if this doesn't happen!

*cracking knuckles* DINNER: ETNA -- most authenic Italian food in the neighborhood. owner/head chef Pepe Pilumeli is an great person and interesting character. Recommended -- anything seafood! DESSERT: Presti's Bakery DRINKS: Mia Bella -- just opened up, coolest bar in the neighborhood. Or, just sit outside at a table on the street anywhere (Angelo's Nido Italia, Maxi's, La Dolce Vita, Mia Bella....etc) GALLERIES: If you can get there early enough, the old converted Murray Hill elementry school has some very cool places. Most of the galleries on are Murray Hill Rd: http://www.littleitalycleveland.com/gallery.html OTHER IDEAS: - pop into the authentic Smoke Shop on Mayfield RD. - Bocci Ball courts at the Alta House (you can contact them to play) - Tony Brush Park - Algebra Tea House (if you want something different and off the beaten path ...Palestinian- Mediterrian) - Angelo's Nido Italia generally has live music inside most weekends - July 17: Branch-out with HEART at Tony Brush Park -- FREE community event PARKING: - Random Rd generally has spots - Valet is $5

In honor of Harvey Pekar: Anthony Bourdain meets Harvey Pekar Bourdain no rez Cleveland Sokolowski's He was a great resident of Cleveland Hts. Poor guy was suffering from cancer for a while.

Does anyone have an idea when the winner is announced? Will it be this year? EDIT: After a little google research, Denver found out in Jan 2007...for their August 25-28, 2008 event. http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=62996

From Medcity: Selling Cleveland’s medical mart: Q&A with MMPI’s sales chief It’s Greg Sanker’s job to sell the Cleveland medical mart to the world. Or at least that part of the world that needs to buy into the concept for it to be a success–medical device makers, health information technology vendors, and less-sexy members of the healthcare ecosystem like hospital bed manufacturers. Now that the project appears to be picking up some momentum, Sanker’s role is among the most important in ensuring that the medical mart idea becomes a reality. Sanker, a Lakewood, Ohio, resident for the last 15 years, is the vice president of leasing for Chicago-based MMPI, the property developer for Cleveland’s $425 million, 520,000-square-foot medical mart project, which is on track for an October groundbreaking. Not only must Sanker sell Cleveland to prospective tenants, but he needs to create believers in the untested medical mart concept–the idea that hospital purchasing managers and other buyers will be attracted to a one-stop location of showrooms that feature a wide variety of medical products from a vast array of vendors. http://www.medcitynews.com/2010/07/selling-clevelands-medical-mart-qa-with-mmpis-sales-chief/

From Litt: A new Group Plan Commission for Cleveland has a chance to revise Daniel Burnham's historic vision for downtown Published: Monday, July 12, 2010, 9:45 AM Steven Litt, The Plain Dealer CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Chicago architect Daniel Burnham left a colossal imprint on Cleveland more than a century ago with his 1903 Group Plan for downtown. Now, in 2010, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson is asking a new Group Plan Commission to revisit the grand but sterile mall and the zone around it. The area has never lived up to Burnham's original vision, in part because the train station ended up in the Terminal Tower complex. Inspired by more than $1 billion in new downtown projects on the horizon, including a casino, medical mart and convention center, Jackson sees an opportunity to improve a large swath of downtown, from Public Square to the Lake Erie waterfront, including the mall. The question is whether the new commission, which meets for the first time Thursday at 7:30 a.m. in Room 514 at Cleveland City Hall, can rise to the occasion or whether it caves to pressures that have led to mediocre planning and civic design in the city's recent past. http://blog.cleveland.com/architecture/2010/07/group_plan.html

John Mayer mocking Lebron James: Announcement

I really hope we can find a way to bring this back before it's too late: Is time running out on reviving Cleveland's tradition of open-wheel racing? Published: Sunday, July 11, 2010, 1:30 AM Elton Alexander, The Plain Dealer CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Change is coming to the Indy Racing League. However, will Cleveland be a part of it? By 2012, the IRL will unveil a new chassis and engine package that figures to be cutting edge. With new internal management and an aggressive new title sponsor in Izod, the IRL is out to jump-start its image and its open-wheel product. All parties -- the city of Cleveland, the IRL and Mi-Jack Promotions -- agree, it's about money. Specifically, finding a title sponsor willing to offset what industry sources say can be a $6 million project annually to set up, tear down, pay fees and administrative costs, and more for the race at Burke Lakefront Airport. http://www.cleveland.com/autoracing/index.ssf/2010/07/is_time_running_out_on_revivin.html

Nice...

We seem to be in good hands with William Friedman: http://www.wkyc.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=139311&catid=45

I've never heard of this -- Thanks!!

NASA Glenn Research Center will fare well under Obama's plan, space agency Administrator Charles Bolden says Published: Friday, July 09, 2010, 2:46 PM Tom Breckenridge, The Plain Dealer CLEVELAND, Ohio -- President Barack Obama's controversial plan to turn away from a moon mission and focus instead on new space-exploring technologies will "significantly raise the profile" of NASA Glenn Research Center, says Charles Bolden, head of the space agency. Bolden, speaking today at the City Club of Cleveland, said NASA Glenn, between its Brook Park campus and spacecraft-testing facility near Sandusky, will benefit "quite a bit" from efforts to bolster advanced propulsion, communications and astronaut health in deep space. He noted that NASA Glenn would lead two programs under Obama's new mission. One is the Exploration Technology Development and Demonstration Program, to be funded at $223 million in 2011 and at $1.8 billion over five years. The other is the Space Technology Research Grants program. NASA Glenn would manage $70 million next year and $350 million over five years. http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2010/07/post_56.html

Cavs have agreed with a sign and trade with the heat. http://www.cleveland.com/cavs/index.ssf/2010/07/cleveland_cavaliers_settle_emo.html

Critics Grow as James Arrives in Miami By JONATHAN ABRAMS and CATHARINE SKIPP Published: July 9, 2010 As the fans and players of the 29 other N.B.A. franchises cringed at the union of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, South Beach did what it does best — partied. “He is the best player in the league; can we put him now in the same category of Michael Jordan, who never left Chicago, Larry Bird, who never left Boston or Magic Johnson, who has four or five rings, in the same breath? No,” said the TNT analyst Reggie Miller. “If he would have stayed in Cleveland and won one championship built around him, we would have put him on Mount Rushmore.” The N.B.A. TV analyst Chris Webber said, “I’m never mentioning him and Jordan in the same sentence ever again.” “As great an athlete as he is, I think he brought himself back to the pack in the eyes of many consumers,” said David M. Carter, the director of the Sports Business Institute at the University of Southern California. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/10/sports/basketball/10heat.html

A very interesting perspctive...and this doesn't include the $70+ million the Chinese investors would have put into the Cavs had he resigned, which would have ment "free" advertising in China. Did LeBron James Just Cost Himself $150 Million? by Nate Silver @ 1:39 AM In the meantime, there are signs that public opinion on James has soured significantly. In an unscientific poll conducted by SI.com, 81 percent of respondents now claim to have a negative opinion of James, whereas 78 percent had a positive opinion prior to free agency. http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/07/did-lebron-james-just-cost-himself-150.html

Maybe a lot of money wasted... July 9, 2010, 1:11 pm James’s Sponsors (and ESPN) Seem Short of Heat, Buzz-Wise By STUART ELLIOTT The company, Zeta Interactive, reported on Friday that most of the sponsors experienced little or no buzz impact. Two, however, suffered declines in the tone of the conversations about them, Zeta said, as did ESPN itself. Nike, which had no visible presence during “The Decision,” lost 4 percentage points in its positive buzz, Zeta reported, which fell to 82 percent from 86 percent on Wednesday. (That still far outweighs its negative buzz, at 14 percent.) Vitaminwater, which had a much more prominent role during the show, suffered a larger decline in its positive buzz, according to Zeta, which fell to 76 percent from its recent 60-day average of 91 percent. Before the special, three of the most popular words and terms used online in connection with ESPN, owned by the Walt Disney Company, were neutral terms like “sports,” “network” and “show” or “shows,” Zeta reported. After the show, however, Zeta said, the most popular words and terms used online to describe ESPN were “pathetic” and “dirty,” along with “LeBron.”

"Fathead" is now offering Lebron James wall graphic at a discount price......DRUMROLL.......Benedict Arnold's date of birth: $17.41. http://www.fearthesword.com/2010/7/9/1561183/lebron-james-fat-head-drastically?ref=yahoo (psst...anyone know who owns Fathead by the way?)

Also, it regards to the Dan Gilbert letter: "Gilbert said James never returned a single phone message or text since the end of the season and that the Cavs were not informed of James' decision until he went on the air. " http://www.cbc.ca/news/pointofview/2010/07/cavs-owner-slams-lebron-james-did-james-make-the-right-move.html I'd be pretty pissed off too...

RATINGS....too bad so many Clevelanders had to tune in to witness their hearts getting ripped out on National Televsion. Seriously, I haven't seen such a high rating for the Cleveland area since, what...the Super Bowl? James decision draws big ratings for ESPN In Cleveland, "The Decision" drew a staggering 26 rating — meaning more than one in four homes had TVs tuned to ESPN to see James say he was leaving his hometown Cavaliers for the Miami Heat. In Miami, the show had a 12.8 rating. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iPhmfL2Mt1wMPYEnEFnqkF4jAMGwD9GRK12G0

And pending renovations/expansions from the Cleveland Museum of Natural History being guided by its new director: Evalyn Gates takes helm at Cleveland Museum of Natural History as expansion plans gel Published: Friday, July 09, 2010, 4:00 AM John Mangels, The Plain Dealer CLEVELAND, Ohio — In the cool hush of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History's "rare book room," a wood-paneled nook overseen by lifelike statues of water buffalo, giraffes and other exotic animals, Evalyn Gates is brainstorming. A major traveling exhibit on climate change is coming, and though it won't arrive until next summer, the museum's new executive director thinks a year isn't too early for her staff to start thinking about how to improve it for Cleveland audiences. Perched on the edge of her chair at the head of a long conference table, Gates gently prods a half-dozen division heads for suggestions. In its 90th year, the venerable institution is at a pivotal moment, poised for a top-to-bottom makeover of its exhibits and an expansion of its Wade Oval campus. The changes, which will take years and could cost $30-50 million or more, are the most significant in the museum's long history. At completion, its sleek, modern facade will be sheathed in limestone and glass, shedding the stodgy "dentist office" look that has suffered in comparison to the renovated Cleveland Museum of Art just down the road. In keeping with the project's focus on sustainability, the building's re-design will include storm water recycling, energy-efficient heating and cooling, and a new parking deck with a plant-covered "green" roof and outlets for electric cars to recharge. http://www.cleveland.com/science/index.ssf/2010/07/gates_takes_helm_at_cleveland.html

I've had 4 people personally come up to my desk this morning (in NC) and give me condolences. I guess much of the county does truly feel bad for Cleveland fans....

We lend Miami our world-class Orchestra, let them build a Cleveland Clinic down there.....and now they take our superstar....Miami just loves Cleveland....! My Lebron hangover is almost over. BTW, that's my girlfriend crying at like the 40 min mark on Sportscenter today (the blonde in the Lebron jersey for like 3 secs @ RJ Boland's)...anyone see that?

National coverage thus far: http://www.nationalpost.com/sports/James+makes+ruthless+play+Miami/3253303/story.html

^^ I've heard similar horror stories from servers.