Transcripts For WRC Today 20100624 : vimarsana.com

captions paid for by nbc-universal television and welcome to today on this thursday morning, i m meredith vieira. and i m matt lauer. confirmation of army general david petraeus as the new top commander in afghanistan is expected to come pretty quickly, after president obama accepted the resignation of general stanley mcchrystal during that brief meeting at the white house on wednesday. general petraeus is credited with turning around the war in iraq, and now president obama is banking on the fact that he can do the same thing in afghanistan. how are u.s. troops on the ground there reacting to shake-up in leadership? and does the man who wrote the rolling stone article that led to mcchrystal s firing, how does he feel about it all? we ll ask him when he joins us live from kabul straight ahead. also friday, tomorrow, marks the one-year anniversary of farrah fawcett s death. this morning we will look back at her courageous battle against cancer and talk to her longtime love ryan o neal and her best friend alana stewart. they will join us live. we mentioned that record-setting match taking place at wimbledon. we re going to have an exclusive, live interview with john isner, the american involved in that incredible competition. and it is not the day s only big event at the all-england club. queen elizabeth making her first trip there in more than 30 years. we re going to have more on that, as well. but let us begin with the change in command in afghanistan. chuck todd is nbc s chief white house correspondent. good morning, chuck. good morning, meredith. well, after a rare set of personnel moves by this white house, the president is now back focused on trying to make his complicated afghanistan strategy work, rather than fixated on who is going to implement it. this is a change in personnel, but it is not a change in policy. reporter: general petraeus by his side and general mcchrystal headed out a side door, the president signaled to his team, no more firestorms like this one will be tolerated. i ve just told my national security team that now is the time for all of us to come together. i welcome debate among my team, but i won t tolerate division. reporter: the president s aides don t expect there will be much division in the senate, either, where some are predicting petraeus will have the fastest confirmation in history and the praise of both parties. i admire him and others that respond to that kind of a call from the president. i don t think he even had a chance to talk to his wife. dave petraeus is our best hope. if things don t change, nobody can pull it out in afghanistan. reporter: but the hearings are expected to re-ignite the very divisive debate among the two parties about the question of a timetable for withdrawing troops from afghanistan. scheduled to begin next july. whether that is, quote etched in stone, as the president s spokesperson mr. gibbs stated, or whether it will be conditions based. reporter: still, the swiftness of the president s action is a commander in chief moment at a time when the public is having doubts about his ability. according to a new nbc/ wall street journal poll just 45% approve of the job he s doing as president. 44% believe he s firm and decisive in his decision making. that s down from 63% 18 months ago. and just under half the country, 49%, believe he has strong leadership qualities. that s down a whopping 12 points from the month he took office. and as the list of domestic problems like unemployment and the oil spill pile up on the president s desk, some say it was vitally important the president buy time on afghanistan. it does give the president a strategy and it does buy him time. he s putting a leader out there that will not be questioned. today, the focus stays on foreign affairs, as the president meets with the president of another country who s familiar with a quagmire-like situation in afghanistan, russian president dmitry medvedev visits the white house today. the two will hold a joint press conference, and afghanistan is likely to come up, matt. all right, chuck todd at the white house this morning. thank you very much. so how are u.s. troops reacting to the change in command? nbc s chief foreign correspondent richard engel is in kabul, afghanistan. richard, good morning. are you hearing reaction yet? yes, i ve spoken with soldiers and commanders. the reaction is generally positive. troops here respect success. no one here likes that general mcchrystal s career, which has been so important, and so respected, ended in this way. but they want that they hope that petraeus can bring the momentum, and the success, that he had in iraq here. so there is a bit of excitement that this change of command is coming, especially at a time when the war isn t going very well. but, richard, should they expect any real, concrete changes in what they do on a daily basis there because of the change in command? no. general petraeus is not being brought in to change policy. this is a continuation of the policy. that said, he is his own man. he has his own ideas. he has his own personal relationship. and there is that hope that he can come in with a different set of eyes, and change the course of what has been a very, very difficult policy. this, after all, is one of the deadliest months since the start of the war, and is on track to get even more painful. let me ask you about a different kind of policy, richard, is there a sense that in the wake of the stanley mcchrystal fiasco, that the military will change its policy in terms of giving reporters like you access to military leaders, and even troops? right now, access is very, very tight. we are not allowed to interview soldiers on camera about this story. we were told specifically that there is a media blackout on the subject. we ve been able to contact them by phone, e-mail, but they re not putting soldiers out right now. once this crisis gets over, i think that we will continue to have access. whether we will be allowed to be a fly on the wall with top generals for weeks at a time, i think that s very, very unlikely going forward. all right, richard engel in kabul for us this morning. richard, thanks very much for your time. i appreciate it. what does the man who wrote the runaway general for rolling stone magazine think about all this? michael hastings is in afghanistan where he has been embedded with the u.s. troops. michael, good morning to you. good morning. thanks for having me. it s good to have you here. so general mcchrystal is out. and he is out because of what he told you in this article you wrote for rolling stone. what s your reaction to that? well, i think it s not as important what my reaction is, as important as what the troops and how the troops are reacting to the story and the news that general mcchrystal is out. and from everything i ve heard from them, i got an e-mail from a marine just this morning saying, they were pleased with the decision because they did not agree with general mcchrystal s policies here. perhaps it obviously is more important what the troops think, but i want to go back to you for a second. at some point during your reporting process, based on what general mcchrystal and members of his inner circle were telling you, did you have that moment where you said, this could be career changing for the general, and leadership changing for afghanistan? i did not think general mcchrystal would be fired. in fact, i thought his position was basically untouchable. so, i thought it would give them a headache for maybe 72 hours, some of the material that i was going to publish. but i thought, based on past experience, and that they survived these mia crises before, that would fall into the same book as that. i m curious, michael, after you parted company with mcchrystal and these other people on his team, did anyone reach out to you from that group and say, hey, michael, you know, we said a lot of things during our time together, take it easy, we were blowing off steam? anything like that? yes. one of the members of general mcchrystal s team and i had a number of long conversations about what was going to be in the story. and they tried to pressure me not to write about some things that were on the record, and i told them i can t really play that game. one of the things that happened in journalism is that, especially with powerful figures, they give journalists access in exchange for favorable coverage and future access. and that dynamic didn t apply to me and the story i was writing or just my general style of journalism. let me ask you, michael, a question i just asked richard engel, do you think as a result of this situation, with your article, and stanley mcchrystal, that the rules of the game, the rules of engagement between the military and reporters like you will be changed? well, i think what this is saying is that it was almost a throwback to the old days, fly on the wall reporting. where nowadays access is almost so controlled, it s always very so controlled. it was very rare to get this kind of access anyway. so i don t i don t see any sort of significant change. and i apologize to my colleagues if they re not getting any interview requests with general petraeus over the next couple of days. michael hastings, joining us from afghanistan, writer for rolling stone magazine. thank you very much for your time. i appreciate it. be safe. thanks for having me, sir. all right. nine minutes after the hour. here s meredith. matt, thank you. now to day 66 of the disaster in the gulf. bp said it began recapturing oil from that busted pipe at the bottom of the gulf overnight. this, after reattaching the containment cap that was damaged when an underwater robot crashed into it. nbc s chief environmental affairs correspondent anne thompson is in venice, louisiana, with the latest. anne, good morning. good morning, meredith. the containment cap, indeed, is back on. although we are still seeing big, black clouds of oil escape from it. this comes after a harrowing day of setbacks. wednesday night, engineers used remote operated vehicles to reattach the containment cap. it was one of those vehicles that started this mess some 24 hours ago. officials say while spraying dispersants the vehicle hit the containment cap, accidentally closing one vent, and sending natural gas up another vent that brings warm water down to prevent breaks. those ice-like crystals that can clog vents and create pressure inside the cap. as a precaution, bp took off the containment cap. before they decided to move it back in, they had to check and see if there were any hydrates there, if there were hydrates they had to pull the drill pipe and reinsert it. reporter: with the cap gone, oil gushed out at an alarming rate, perhaps as much as 50,000 barrels a day. as much as 10,000 barrels could still be collected by the q-4000 system, taking the oil to the surface to be flared off. something, but not nearly enough. the relentless oil now mars florida s pensacola beach. its sugar white sand blanketed with crude as far as you can see. the skimmer boats tried to pick it up, before the pollution made its way to shore. setting beachgoers we re heartbroken. we were all crying this morning. now there s oil all over the place, and reporter: and helpless wild life from the dolphins to a tiny crab. seeing a live crab kind of half in, and half out of the oil, it really makes you sick to your stomach. reporter: and we have some bad news, that dolphin apparently died after it was rescued. and they are going to do what they call a basically an autopsy on an animal to determine if oil was the cause of death. as for the fishermen, there s actually some good news this morning. federal government has reopened about 8,000 square miles of federal fishing waters. mostly south of mississippi, and small portions off the coast of louisiana and central florida. meredith? anne thompson in venice, louisiana, for us this morning. thank you so much, anne. all right, let s get a check of the rest of the morning s top stories. ann is off this week. we have rescued savannah guthrie from the white house. she s joining us over at the news desk. good to have you with us. good morning, matt and meredith. you re on message. i ve been saved. let s get to the news. american gary faulkner is back in the u.s. this morning after returning from pakistan, where he wanted to hunt osama bin laden. referring to bin laden he said, quote, we can t let people like this scare us. after arriving overnight in denver he said it s good to be back and said he plans to return to pakistan. today, five americans were convicted on terror charges in pakistan and sentenced to at least ten years in prison. the five are from the washington, d.c. area. tragedy in spain, where a train hit a group of young people crossing the tracks to get to a beach party, killing at least 12 people and injuring 14. some damage, but no serious injuries following a magnitude 5 earthquake wednesday in canada near ottawa. it was also felt from michigan to vermont. mexico is said to have begun the extradition process for bruce beresford-redman, the hollywood producer accused of murdering his wife in cancun. details now from nbc s miguel almaguer. reporter: although bruce beresford-redman was at his california home on wednesday, the wheels are now in motion to send him back to mexico. authorities there have reportedly submitted their request to u.s. officials to have him extra dated back to cancun. but like their homicide investigation, this, too, will take time. first he goes to the state department, because technically this involves the secretary of state. then it will go to the justice department. then it will go to a federal court. reporter: it was back on april 8th when police in cancun discovered monica beresford-redman s body in a hotel sewer. her husband was the only suspect in the murder. detectives took beresford-redman s passport and told him not to leave the country. but as the investigation dragged on, he suddenly turned up in los angeles. mexican authorities have since charged him with murder, though beresford-redman s attorney says bruce never committed one, and will fight extradition. i would guess that behind the scenes his lawyer has been trying to work out something with the justice department folks. but ultimately, he s going to have to make his presentation in court. reporter: legal experts say, first in california, then possibly one in mexico. miguel almaguer, nbc news, los angeles. overseas markets are mostly down this morning. cnbc s erin burnett is at the new york stock exchange. good morning, erin, what are you watching today? well, good morning to you, s savannah. the fed warns the u.s. economy is getting weaker. but we got terrible housing news yesterday with new home sales at a record low. last night bed, bath & beyond the retailer came out and side high unemployment is pressuring the company and they re not going to open as many stores as previously hoped. one sort of bright spot, ford is expanding, although the news today isn t about expanding in the u.s., it s actually in thailand. but they are investing half a billion dollars because people want more cars. back to you. erin burnett, thanks. and the u.s. is on to the next round of the world cup. the team will play ghana on saturday. on wednesday landon donovan scored late in the game to give the u.s. a dramatic 1-0 win over algeria. some are calling it the miracle on grass. it s now 7:16. back to meredith and matt. and matt, i thought that s what you called your golf game. no, that s what matt calls his college years. miracle on grass. if i remember correctly. meanwhile, savannah and i, we are ready to take over for these tennis players in wimbledon. i think we all color coordinated. it s going to be 95 out there today. we re doing al s job for him. he s made his way to memphis, tennessee. day four of his lend a hand today show. mr. roker, good morning. good morning, matt, meredith. savannah guthrie, bringing the thunder. all right. we are on day four of lend a hand today and we ve got a great charity in memphis. for the first time we re doing two cities in one day. nashville hit with that historic flooding. we re also going to lend a hand today in nashville, as well. two cities, one day. and another historic moment for our lend a hand today tour. but yesterday, we had some historic weather move through chicago and the midwest. strong storms firing up. even train service was suspended as these storms moved in. well, ahead of that system, we ve got trouble here in the northeast, as hot, humid air funnels up along the eastern sea board, record-breaking temperatures, richmond, washington, new york, boston. that front will push through and that s going to create a risk of strong storms from roanoke all the way to bangor, maine. tornadoes possible in the afternoon and evening. look for big airport delays. as you see on the future cast radar, during the morning and hours, strong storms fire up. the big problem is going to be the wind and also some damaging hail out of this system. later tonight. it will be in place friday, highs near 90 tomorrow. saturday, getting more humid. hot and steamy sunday, could get storms. and that s your latest weather. matt? all right, al, thank you very much. there are epic battles, and then there s the tennis match going on at wimbledon. the longest in history. and you know what? it s not over yet. mary carillo of nbc sports is at wimbledon. mary, good morning to you. you are pumped up over this one. matt, this was crazy. i mean, they say the third time is a charm. general john isner and nicolas mahut of france are begging that that s true because this is day three of a first-round match that is not over yet and it s already gone ten hours. when they resume play today, it s 59-59 in the fifth set. we ve had epic battles before, but nothing like this. unbelievable. uncanny, isn t it? reporter: after two days ten hours of play standing ovation. reporter: and 118 games in the fifth set alone. john iz nra, nicolas mahut. a test of wills. reporter: the match between john isner of the u.s. and nicolas mahut of france has already reached a certain status here at wimbledon. epic. epic. amazing. awesome, epic. amazing. it was amazing, yeah. really long. i think we re going to run out of digits at some point. look at that. reporter: that s exactly what happened to the scoreboard. which stopped working at 47-47. it s given up. reporter: and then was turned off completely. a true sign of just how unprecedented this match has been. this will overshadow everything for the rest of this tournament. reporter: the thing is, it s not over yet. continuing to a third day today, because, on tuesday, and wednesday, the daylight ended before the match could. i know what you re saying mary about the court. the court is so beat up. we could see how it started and now, that court is chewed up. we re just fighting like we never did before. someone has to win. nothing like this will ever happen again. ever. reporter: the nicest part about this, not only is the preposterousness of the match, but the spirit in which it s being played. one more thing today, for the first time in 33 years, the queen of england is making an appearance at wimbledon. mary, is there any chance, i know she s going to be over in the centre court area, is there any chance she might get over to court 18 where this is taking place? reporter: i don t think so. honestly, she s not a great fan of tennis. i don t think she wants to sit down for what could be an even longer than ten-hour match. but that match won t start until at least 3:30. they re giving the guys a break. she s supposed to be gone by about 4:00. before i let you go, can you at least speculate as to physically how these guys are going to feel when they attempt to roll out of bed today? i mean they re world-class athletes. but the body is not trained for something like this. it s really not. i d love to ask dr. nancy synderman just how much lactic acid has been building up over the night. these two have taken ice beds. they ve tried to rehydrate. they re doing everything they can. this is equivalent to a pitching battle, you know, with the starting pitchers. they re in their 34th inning. there s no middle relief. there s no close. they can both, matt, conceivably hit over 100 aces before this match is finally over today. mary carillo at wimbledon for us. mary, i can see on your face how much you re enjoying this. and i get as big a kick out of that as anything. i love it. you got to watch. you got to watch. ear going to be on this this weekend, as well. this is just one of the great wimbledons i ve been a part of in a long, long time. all right, mary, thanks for your time this morning. great seeing you. a couple of things strike me. one is someone told me that the fifth set alone, took it away from the match, it s now the longest tennis match in history. exactly. and the level of play. these guys played so well. well, it s all about their serves, right? how powerful they are. amazingly well. the question is, which one can recover best when they get out there today and not only be a part of the longest match in history, but win the longest match in history. end the longest match in history. coming up, we re going to head back to wimbledon for an exclusive live interview with american john isner. but first, this is today on nbc. just ahead, ryan o neal and alana stewart remember farrah fawcett nearly a year after her death. good morning. i m aaron gilchrist. 7:26 on this thursday morning. thanks for being with us. we re following a developing story out of pakistan where five men from northern virginia have been convicted on terror charges. they were arrested in december, after their families here in d.c. reported them missing. prosecutors say the men were plotting terror attacks in pakistan. they were each sentenced to ten years in prison. they have the right to appeal that sentence. weather and traffic coming up next. we hope you ll stay with us. good morning. i m jerryedwards. an accident jamming things up until moments ago. 3:95 northbound duke street. now, everything is over to the shoulder but jammed from before the capital beltway. top side of the belt weigh a broken down vehicle, outer loop headed towards silver spring. it was broke down in the middle of the roadway after new hampshire avenue. that s going to be out of the roadway as well. tom? another hot day. highs reaching mid 90s. scattered afternoon and evening thunderstorms. between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m., isolated storms could produce damaging winds and hail, but lower humidity moves in tonight. it will be in place on friday. highs tomorrow upper 80s to near 90 with sun. saturday, cloudy, humid, 90s. 90s sunday, more humid with a chance of scattered afternoon storms. aaron? thank you, tom. coming up on news4 midday at 11:00, the fourth of july is almost here. almost here. how to throw a there s a movement afoot in this country. a student-led revolution. a rallying cry for change in an otherwise unchanged educational system. people like me have something to say. people like me demand to be heard. people like me think it s time higher education was held to a higher standard. because it s time all people with talent were recognized. it s time technology transformed the way universities teach. and tradition no longer stood in the way of getting an education. people like me want a choice. people like me want to make a difference. people like me demand a different kind of university. one that puts my talent first. one that learns how i learn. to challenge me. to support me. a mind. on campus. on my terms. it s time a university recognized people like me. people like me. people like me. thursday morning, the 24th of june, 2010. you re looking at a nice group of people gathered outside our window on the world here in the heart of midtown manhattan. kind of a steamy day. 92, 39 degrees here in new york city. we re we re going to go outside and say hi to them in just a little while. meanwhile inside studio 1a, i m matt lauer alongside meredith vieira. just ahead a new reason to be concerned about the housing market. new home sales have dropped to a record low. so, a lot of people are wondering are home prices going to follow suit? what does that mean for you? we re going to have some advice coming up with jean chatzky. also ahead, why you eat more of some foods and not others? we re going to investigate what scientists are doing to make certain unhealthy foods so irresistible. and we told you about that epic struggle at wimbledon. the longest tennis match ever. tied at 59-59 in the fifth and final set. coming up, an exclusive live interview with 25-year-old john isner, that is the american who is taking part in this unforgettable showdown. trying to win that match now for a third straight day. and tomorrow marks the one-year anniversary of farrah fawcett s death. in a moment we re going to talk with farrah s longtime love ryan o neal and her best friend alana stewart. first, her heartbreaking battle with cancer. she is known for her pearly white smile and her trademarked winged hairdo was copied in salons across the country. overnight farrah fawcett went from texas beauty to hollywood icon. you never tell me reporter: from the time she arrived in los angeles, fawcett found work but her big break came in 1976 when she landed the role of jill monroe on the hit show charlie s angels. along with fame came love. and for the next three decades, she was involved in a tu muteous relationship with hollywood hot shot ryan o neal. the pair separated in 1998 but rekindled their romance in 2001, after o neal was diagnosed with leukemia. but the biggest challenge was just around the corner. in 2006, farrah was diagnosed with anal cancer. her 2 1/2 year fight played out in a documentary made by and her best friend alana stewart called farrah s story. cancer is my own private war. reporter: the raw footage chronicling her surgery, treatment, and the side effects of the chemotherapy. sadly, on june 25th, at the age of 62, farrah fawcett lost her battle with cancer. the outpouring of love from family, friends and fans who paid tribute was a testimony to farrah s character. talking to today shortly after farrah s death, ryan o neal spoke about what he would miss most. so much, but her smile wasn t bad. beautiful. i ll take that. ryan o neal and alana stewart are with us now. stewart is the author of my journey with farrah, a story of life, love and friendship. good morning to you both. hi, meredith. how are you? great to see you. ryan, if i could start with you, the last time we spoke was about a month after farrah passed away, and at the time you said, i m the new rock. i m using what she taught me to survive, to go on. so how are you doing? well, i it s harder than i thought. i miss her. we all miss her. your son redmond was incarcerated at the time of her passing. he was dealing with felony charge, drug charges, and at that time you told me, about a month after her passing, again, that he had a wonderful plan in mind to restore order in his life, and he will, with my help. so how is he doing today? he s doing extremely well. i say that with pride. progress in the he is living in a sober living situation in pasadena, and we see him all the time, and he s beautiful. and his mother would be proud of him. ryan, how much of this do you think, what s happened with redmond and his ability to stay sober has to do with that promise that he made to his mom in the last few weeks of her life? well, i m sure a great deal. i m sure a great deal. he he was thunderstruck to lose her. it really scared him and, and he turned his life around immediately. immediately. i ve never seen such a focus and success. he s had great success. one little mistake. but he is in love. and he s going to go and see her gravesite soon. he has not been there. he hasn t seen it yet. i know you told me at the time, as well, that he had said to you that he was unable to grieve when he was in the hospital. you said to him when he was in jail, when you get out, we will grieve together. so he s still in that process? yes, he is. and we haven t done it together yet. i know he grieves, and i grieve, but we haven t really put our heads together. we thought maybe we should take a trip and do it that way. but that hasn t happened. he s not allowed to leave the state. he still has responsibilities to the to the state of california, and that will go on for another few months, but he has good reports. he sees a judge once a month and gets, you know, he s getting everything in order. then we will go, and we have a lot to say to each other. alana, you were farrah s best friend, and your journal chronicles the 2 1/2 years that you spent together helping her battle cancer. the trip she took to europe, of the doctors that you met, the treatments that she underwent. can you believe it has been a year since her passing? i can t believe it, meredith. i speak to her, other close friends, all the time and we always say the same thing, i can t believe a year has passed. it s hard to believe she s gone. she was such a powerful presence in all of our lives. what is it about her that you miss the most when you think of her? i miss talking to her on the phone. and laughing. i miss her sense of humor. she had the most amazing sense of humor. and i think her sense of humor was what got her through that battle with cancer. you know, in the darkest time she would find something to laugh about. and, in all the trips to germany, as brutal as some of them were, we found so many things to laugh about. she was a fun-loving person. you know, she liked to have fun, and everything was always more fun when she was there. tomorrow you re opening the doors to the farrah fawcett foundation. what do you hope to accomplish? oh, i think she d be very pleased with that because she started the foundation before she died. and it meant a lot to her. and we re hoping to carry out her wishes, and she basically wanted to do something to fight this terrible disease. you know, she wanted to fund research for alternative methods of treatment. she strongly believed in alternative methods. she did very much so. she thought there was a cure out there somewhere, in some of these cutting-edge things that they re doing. the kind of treatment that she had in germany, i believe, i could be going out on a limb, but i still think that that was the most beneficial treatment that she had, and it kept her alive longer than she would have been. and she wanted to help other people with cancer, which is why she did the documentary. you know, she shared that courageous struggle with everyone. and she wanted to help children with cancer, pediatric cancer. and to look into the kind of cancer she had that a lot of research really hasn t been done in the years. so i hope that we ll be able to do some really good things with the foundation, and i think she d be proud of what we re doing. ryan, when you think of farrah s legacy, what do you think? what do you think of? well, i miss her cooking. i haven t had a good meal since she left me. you know, i live in the same home that we lived in together, and so i see her silhouette, i hear her voice, and it s i m mixed. in one way it s kind of wonderful she s still around, in the other way it hurts that not enough of her. she ll certainly live on in the foundation and her son, who is doing so much better. ryan o neal, thank you so much for joining us. alana stewart. thank you, meredith. hi alana. now let s switch gears and check in with al, who is i good morning. we ve got one more day with excessive heat, high humidity, then relief on the way waiter tonight. but before then, we ll seal our temperatures climb out of the 70s where we are now to the mid 90s by midafternoon. and then, as the drier air pushes in, it will likely trigger scattered thunderstorms between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m. some of which could produce damaging winds and hail, and perhaps even an isolated tornado. after that, though, lower humidity moves in for tonight into tomorrow with cooler temperatures. and that s your latest weather. if you want to make sure you get the weather any time of the day or night go to the weather channel and check weather.com online. wow. meredith? all right, al, thank you very much. and up next, home sales plunge to a record low. so is it the start of a new housing bust? we re going to get into that right after this. this morning on today s real estate a record plunge in the housing market. new home sales plummeted to the los heest level on record in may, the first month since the home buyer tax credit expired. what does it mean for you? jean chatzky is today s financial editor. good morning. 50% decline in the west. 30% or higher in the northwest. 25% drops in south and the midwest. these are staggering declines. but because we were witnessing the expiration of that credit is anyone really shocked? i think people were surprised. these were greater declines that people were expecting. but that $8,000 credit allowed people to feel a little bit comfortable with the fact that home prices may go down a little further. if the government s giving you $8,000, you re not feeling you can absorb that loss. right, exactly. consumer confidence plays a huge role in this. for awhile consumers seemed to be feeling pretty good about things. are they not feeling that way anymore? interestingly they re still feeling pretty good about smaller purchases. we re still taking more trips. we re still going to the stores more. consumer confidence picked up in june. but i think there s a big difference between spending a few hundred dollars on a vacation and buying a house. now if sales dropped the way they dropped last month, prices have to follow, don t they? prices are expected to come down this year. the recent survey that i took a look at showed about 1.5% of a decline in home price is expected. now that s nationally this year. but then they ll start to climb up again, another percent and a half next year. it will start and ten years down the road you re looking at or five years down the road you re looking at approximately 10%. but if you re trying to sell your house right now and prices are going down, you re going to have to wait a little while before those prices get back to where you want them to be. or you re going to have to look at what you paid for that house and think rationally about whether it s time to just get out. all right. you ve got some consumer tips here. these are things people should keep in mind while they re involved in this situation. traditionally americans are not good at this. we re really bad at saving. our brain doesn t like saving. it doesn t feel as good as spending money. right now it s a really important thing to do because we can t count on some of the safety nets that have traditionally been there. we don t know exactly what to expect in social security and medicare and we can t expect double digit escalation in prices of our 401(k)s. this next tip is spend rationally. this can be a double-edged sword. we want people to be thoughtful about what they re spending but we don t want people to stop spending altogether. no. if consumers stop spending altogether the economy will go into somewhat of a freefall. so what we re seeing is if you ve got a watching machine that s on the fritz and you need to replace it, yes, go ahead. but don t sink yourself into a debt hole just because you feel like that s the right thing to do. make sure this time you keep your credit rating in tip-top shape. and that s because right now is actually a really good time to buy real estate. not just for living there, but if you want to invest in real estate, right now you can actually buy a place and then rent it out and make some money. in order to do that, you need a really good credit score. so pay your bills on time. don t overborrow. if you ve got additional cards in your wallet, it s not time to close those accounts. jean chatzky. thanks very much. sure. coming up the american iron man still playing in the longest tennis match ever. we re going to talk to john isner live from wimbledon. but first these messages. tomorrow on today, maxwell will make a summer day even hotter. next friday, maroon 5. and coming july 9th, lady gaga. the toyota summer concert seri series only on today. just ahead the royal box at wimbledon s centre court where the queen will take her seat any moment. and we re expecting the arrival of another big name, john isner. we ll talk to him after your local news. if you haven t been outside just yet, you re in for another very hot day. already 82 degrees here in upper northwest d.c. this morning, and it s just 7:56. good morning, on this thursday june 24, 2010. i m aaron gilchrist. in the news4 today, governor o malley is riding the mark train this morning. he s doing it days after a train broke down on the tracks in prince george s county. o malley calls the incident outrageous. an investigation is under way to figure out what caused the train to break down on mound night at the height of the evening rush. hundreds of passengers were stranded in sweltering heat for hours. many complained it took more than an hour before told what was going on. weather and traffic next. stay with us. good morning i m tom kiernan. it s warm and humid. hitting low 80s. we ll hit low 90s by afternoon with hazy sunshine and storms between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m., some could produce damaging wins and hail. lower humidity moving in tonight. it will be here tomorrow, with highs near 90, sun. getting humid over the weekend. take a live look through bethesda. an incident at or near the bethesda metro station, so along 355 wisconsin avenue, heads up for that. we ll continue to follow that. quick check of virginia, int interloop the beltway, not typically bad we see it up toward i-66. today on news4 midday at 11:00, the fourth of july is almost here, how to throw a party to make your neighbors jealous, that s at 11:00 8:00 now on this thursday morning, june 24th, 2010. you are looking live at the royal box at wimbledon centre court. the queen has just arrived. it is her first visit to wimbledon in more than 30 years. we understand she s not a huge fan of tennis. but it s a great day to be at wimbledon because of that other match. i m meredith vieira along with matt lauer. the other match i m talking about is one not taking place on centre court. american john isner is in the middle of that marathon match, the longest ever, and before he takes the court this morning, he s actually in a car on his way to wimbledon right now. he is going to spend a little time chatting with us. i have to tell you something, nothing against the queen, i think john isner and nicolas mahut got a bigger standing ovation than the queen got after their match yesterday, which is still going. exactly. which is just incredible. i hope they are still standing after the epic seven hours of tennis. anyway, tomorrow you were talking about farrah fawcett, the anniversary of her death. it s also the anniversary, coming up tomorrow, of michael jackson s death. and we re going to be live at neverland tomorrow. how are his children doing? what s the latest on his estate? we re going to talk about all that tomorrow. the one-year anniversary of michael jackson s passing. can i just say something? i was looking at your outfit today no, no, no. particularly the shoes. because i don t think a lot of folks here know that before matt lauer was in television, he had a huge movie career. some of the posters from those former movies of yours. yeah, yeah, yeah. that was your big add venture. nice to hear that. just you said good morning these days. let s go inside, ann s off, savannah guthrie has a check of all the headlines. savannah, good morning. don t you start. i know. i don t want to make this my first and last appearance on the today show. in the news this morning, bp says the main system that s been capturing oil from a leaking well in the gulf of mexico is working again. a containment cap was removed for much of wednesday after an undersea robot bumped into it. oil gushed unchecked into the gulf until that cap was repositioned last night. a major crib recall this morning. the consumer products safety commission said seven companies, including evenflo and child craft are recalling more than 2 million cribs after reports of injuries to infants and toddlers. if you d like more information you can go to our website, todayshow.com. the senate is promising swift corn firmation of general david petraeus to take command of the u.s. war effort in afghanistan. on wednesday president obama accepted the resignation of general stanley mcchrystal, who came under fire for insulting remarks about the president and his national security team in a magazine article. petraeus, who was mcchrystal s boss, is credited with turning around the war in iraq. a white house meeting today for president obama and russian president dmitry medvedev. it s expected to focus on international hot spots and trade. on wednesday, medvedev toured a high-tech region of california, where cisco systems announced it would invest $1 billion in russia. the colorado man who went on a private mission to hunt osama bin laden returned home during the night. construction worker gary faulkner was detained in pakistan, where authorities said they found him earlier this month with a pistol and a sword. he was released without charges. australia now has its first female prime minister. former deputy prime minister julia gillard this morning after spearheading an internal revolt in the party against prime minister kevin rudd. his popularity had plunged just months before upcoming national elections. and some fancy footwork wednesday from michelle obama. the first lady jumped rope at a high school event in washington highlighting the president s council on fitness, sports and nutrition. it s now 8:03, back to matt and meredith. matt, i bet you could really jump rope in those shoes. they look very comfortable. i couldn t resist. she did very good, by the way. don t take off the shoes. let s get back to the shoes. have you seen savannah s shoes? take a look at this. oh, come on! it never pays to mess with him. no, it really doesn t. got to buy shoes that fit, savannah. i ve learned my lesson. all right. we ll take it off you and you can check in with mr. roker. hey, al. hey, i like those shoes. and that whole good morning. here we ve got the heat and humidity. it s already building, already now we re in the 80s, and we ve got high humidity in place. it s 83 in washington. it will continue to climb into the mid 90s today with hazy sunshine and clouds. storms 3:00 to 8:00 p.m. there s a risk some isolated storms could produce damaging winds and hail. after that, lower humidity moves in tonight. and it will be here tomorrow, with highs near 90 ands of sun. humid over the weekend. could get storms sunday. and coming up in the next half hour, meredith, we re going to be opening up those penske trucks and revealing our fabulous charity here in memphis. back to you. can t wait for that, al. thank you very much. we re going to head back to wimbledon, because tennis player john isner has arrived at wimbledon. there he is. marathon match for him today. playing his third day of that match. but before he plays any more tennis he s going to sit down and talk with matt and i, right after this. that s why there are 9 delicious kinds of special k® cereal. because every girl could use a little variety. special k®, now in 9 delicious flavors. two times with 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[ male announcer ] now with 0% apr for 60 months. it s a whole new volkswagen. and a whole new game. we re back at 8:10. this was the scene at wimbledon on wednesday. what is now the longest tennis match in history. american john isner, and nicolas mahut of france began their opening round match on tuesday. and after ten hours of action, it is still not over. isner just arrived at the all england club where he will try to wrap things up today. at least he hopes so. john, good morning to you. hey, john. how are you feeling this morning? you know, i m a little little haggard, i d like to say. obviously, you know, i didn t really i think i only slept like six hours last night. the sun came beating in at 4:00 a.m. here. so the body s not feeling great. i have no skin on either one of my pinkie toes. it s been tough out there. but hopefully, you know, i can come out there today and get it done. john, i talked to one of your friends yesterday. he had just left you in the training room after the match. just give me an idea of what exactly you went through in the hour or two after the match to try to, you know, get your energy back and get your body in shape. yeah, first thing i did was drink a recovery shake. i knew i had to get some sort of calories in my body. and then my coach came barreling in the locker room with a plate of pasta, a plate of vegetables, a plate of some sort of meat, and i just had to try to wolf it down. but i wasn t even hungry at that point. i don t know what it was. i really had to wait like 45 minutes to an hour until i could really start, you know, putting the carbs back in my body. yeah, i m wondering by the end of yesterday s play, i mean seven hours of tennis. how much of it at the end was mind over matter at that point? yeah, it all was. you know, i want to say for the last three hours, you know, i was just kind of rolling my serve in and luckily for me, any time the ball got to my forehand i seemed to hit a winner on it. and i was definitely tiring out there. my opponent, believe it or not, didn t seem to be tired at all. he was like spider-man out there jumping around. it was remarkable. remarkable what he was doing. but, to be able to hold on and keep the match even. and obviously, here we are at 59-59. this could go another four hours. it could go ten minutes. so we ll see what happens. we talk physically now. i want to talk emotionally. the stress and the strain of this, because there were several moments where one errant stroke on your part, on nicolas part, would have ended the match. so how did you handle the pressure of it? yeah, i don t really know how i handled it. i mean, i just stayed calm. i went to my towel. you know, when i was in a hole on my serve, i would go to my towel, i d come back, i d hit a serve and unleash a forehand and it kept on going in the court. really the same thing goes for him. any time i had 0-30, i remember one game i had 0-30 and he aced me four times in a row. so it s really nothing i could do. we both seemed to play our best tennis at the crucial moments in the match during our service games. you know, talk about pressure. even andy roddick was tweeting about this. how did you guys go the whole day without using the bathroom? everybody was talking about how are these guys surviving. yeah, i mean, it was it was ridiculous. i mean andy actually, i heard he was tweeting about it. he actually was a good pal, and went out on the town and got me a bunch of food and brought it back to the locker room for me. so he kind of saved the night for me. but, really, you know, we didn t even take a bathroom break up until 58-58 or something like that. i mean eventually i just couldn t hold it in any longer. i had to go to the bathroom. so i really don t know how to explain what went on yesterday. i know you know people say, you know, it was something like that was a dream. i honestly thought i was going to wake up, wake up any moment after the match. well, has the history side of it sunk in with you yet? i mean, forever, no matter what happens today, we ll talk about what could happen today in a second, no matter what happens today, you are in the history books in the world of tennis. what s it mean to you? yeah, it s you know, it s pretty neat. obviously not like to go in the history books for winning, you know, say a grand slam or a huge tournament. but this is pretty special. and i have a feeling i m going to be in the history books for a long time. this will this one is probably going to stand the test of time. yeah, but, of course while it s nice to be involved in the longest tennis match in history, what you really want to be known for is winning the longest tennis match in history. so how worried are you about going out there today and after your body s been beaten to a pulp, getting back to that same high level of play you were at yesterday? yeah, it s going to be tough. obviously i m sore. i m sure he s sore. there s some things tactically that i m going to do different now that i have some time to talk with my coach. and i m also, also like the fact that i m serving first. you know, really puts the pressure on him to, if i can hold that first game for him to hold. if he doesn t, the match is over. so i like the position i m in. and you know, i m confident i can get it done. is there any ritual you go through before a game? yeah, there usually is. but i m throwing all that out the window today. i m actually going to, you know, warm up probably like 30 minutes prior to my match today. whereas i usually warm up two, three hours before. i m going to make sure i go onto the court, you know, in the sweat. i don t want to be cold at all. if i do that, the match could end in five minutes. all right. john, i just want to say, it s really nice of you to talk to us before the match. we kind of expected you d say okay, i ll talk after the match. you ve got a big day ahead of you. you re part of history. do us a favor will you stop by here in new york in the studio when you come into town for the u.s. open? i d love to do that. that s, you know, my favorite event. so i look forward to it. we d love it, too. good luck today, john. yeah, john, good luck. thank you guys. thanks for having me on. nbc sports coverage of wimbledon begins this weekend on both saturday and sunday at noon eastern time right here on nbc. and just ahead, you have your hands full. yeah, chris rock. i do have my hands full. we re going to talk to him right i do have my hands full. we re going to talk to him right after this. no hydrogenated oils so there s no trans fats here whoa. turn the tub around talking about nutrition [ female announcer ] i can t believe it s not butter has 70% less saturated fat than butter and no hydrogenated oils, so there s no trans fat. i can t believe it s not butter, butter taste, better health. a car they can count on. a car that keeps going, when others might quit. a car that stands strong. when you need it most. and expects to handle the unexpected. at chevrolet, we created a team of red x engineers who are obsessed with quality. red x torture tests every car down to the smallest detail. because everyone deserves excellence. 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[ chuckles ] want to replant a forest? maybe you want to rebuild homes for those in need? or, maybe you want to help improve our schools? whatever you want to do, members project from american express can help you take the first step. vote, volunteer or donate for the causes you believe in at membersproject.com. take charge of making a difference. back at 8:19 with four-time emmy winner and three-time grammy winner chris rock. and as we told you on wednesday, he s one of the stars of the new film grown-up about five friends who reunite after 30 years apart. chris plays kurt mckenzie, the stay at home dad of the group. hey, mom. hey. i made pumpkin risotto that we saw on rachael ray seasons of summer. it s awful, mom. do you hear how they talk to me? you hear you ve got to say something. all right, kids, now you know your father worked very hard cleaning and putting three meals on the table for us every day. hello! besides, i brought us a pizza! have the pizza. have your pizza. you broke my heart. you broke my heart! chris rock, good morning to you. i know you get a little embarrassed that happens to me all the time. i cook can you cook at all, be serious. my wife undermines me. oh, i don t make nothing but reservations. i figured. that s me. could you ever be a stay at home dad? you have two daughters in real life. i ve done a lot of work and i m home quite often. i hold it down, meredith. but is it hard? oh. come on. they re my kids. like kids women, especially, totally disrespect you. can i help you with that, like you re an invalid or something. we always think the man can t do it quite as well as the woman. can i help you change the diaper? come on. whatever it is. feed the kids. you offer to help me feed my own children, like i can t feed them. but it s something about you, that you re quite do i look like children die in my presence? do i reek of dead children? no, i hope not. not this morning. i m just saying, i have to tell the audience, in the commercial something that worked with you came up and said a producer of the today show, we were a little worried that you might say something inappropriate. right. should we be? no! no. because because it s part of your act. i m marty the zebra. kids love me. there s that other side of you all over the world kids love marty the zebra. they run up to me. can you do the cracka-lak thing? a little part of you sitting here right now would love to come out with something inappropriate, wouldn t you? oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. yes, if you did search the history of my computer, there might be some porn there. but you know, on the today show it s all about family. it is. and talking about family, this movie is a family movie and it s called grown ups. i m going to ask you at what point did you realize that you are a grown-up, whether you want to be or not? what point in your life you know when you re a grown-up, when you have to you pay for. oh, wow. thank you me. yes, i shouldn t have. that s always that s a grown-up moment. that is a grown-up moment. you ve done that. i don t know that i have done that. you re right, i have done that. boy my daughter has bought me a ferrari. it s amazing. you know, you it s so thoughtful. you know, you go back a long way. he said he met you when you were 18 and he was 17. yeah, yeah, yeah back at the comic strip in about 84, 85, we were both young comedians. it was weird, because he was on stage. he moved past me like really quick. so i had every reason to hate adam sandler. he was a little younger than me. he was getting stage time. he was on the cosby show. he was theo s friend on the cosby show. i m the black guy. i m supposed to be theo s friend. and i still love the guy. what is it that kept this friendship going? and now he s your boss, too, in this movie. i know. but he s a good boss. he s a fine boss. i don t know. we have a lot in common. we both hate the same people. and we hate the same kinds of comedy. and we both are hard workers and we both had crazy dads that smacked us because they loved us. and, yes, you can get smacked and loved, kids. and that s, you know i mean he may be a friend, the other guys in this movie, they re your friends. they were tough on you yesterday. they through you under the bus, said you flubbed the most lines of everyone in the movie. yes. do you want to say anything i m on the set and i m trying to i can just learn the line and just phone it in like the rest of those hacks. but i m trying to you re working much, much harder than they are, obviously. i m doing some other acting thing, okay? me where would that thing be? me and seymour hoffman right there. you know. you know, we go for it. and they re down there. so they re, you know, in the other place, you know. with the kardashians. i think you officially got them back. chris rock, thank you very much for being here. see, no cursing. no cursing. don t start. grown ups opens tomorrow in theaters. what s the matter with you! we almost got away with it. 8:26 is your time now. 85 degrees already. it s very hot and humid out there. tom will have the forecast after the news. good morning, i m eun yang. in the news4 today, two brothers are dead, two other people are hurt, after an accident last night on layhill road near middle veil lane in silver spring. police say the two died in the accident which happened around 10:30. investigators say their car went off the road into a utility pole but they re not sure why. two other passengers are a 17-year-old and 18-year-old girl, both expected to be okay. we ll take a break now. we ll have weather and traffic when we come back. stay with us. hey, volley for serve. friendly competition runs on dunkin with our refreshing coolatta flavors. enjoy an icy boost today. america runs on dunkin . good morning i m tom kiernan. hot and humid today nooshth mid into the mid 90s, an afternoon thunderstorm which could produce winds and hail. lower humidity. humid over the weekend, maybe storms sunday. how s the traffic, jerry? tack a live look at this hour. not too bad along i-27i-270. a couple of sporadic slowdowns. lanes are all open. a quick check, water main break, incident still there. there s a steel plate. water coming out westbound m street at key bridge. news4 midday at 8:30 on a thursday morning. it s the 24th of june. we re a day closer to a great summer concert to take place on the plaza tomorrow morning in the 8:30 half hour. maxwell performing. come on, check that out. they ll put on a great show. we re looking forward to that. meanwhile, outside on the plaza, i m matt lauer, along with meredith vieira, and savannah guthrie, who came up from washington to join us this morning. al, by the way, is down in memphis, tennessee,dy four of lend a hand today. we re going to check in with him. he s going to open that penske truck in just a couple of minutes. i love it when he opens the truck. great stuff always comes out. always. also what you can learn from a man who specializes in helping people transform their brand. he decided to apply his business principles to his own life and lost more than 250 pounds in the process. he s going to share his advice. okay. and there s a surprising surge, it turns out, women in personal security. why more celebrities are opting for females instead of men, not the big burly type. it s about brains. okay. also, jenna bush hager is sheer. she s going to talk to us about an innovative school that has managed a 100% graduation rate in an area where traditionally only 33% of students have graduated. she ll tell us why that s happening. but first let s go down to memphis, tennessee, and al roker. hey, al, good morning, again. good morning, guys. and we only have good morning. the heat is on. we ve got high humidity in place. already hitting the 80s. it s 83 in washington. we ll hit mid 90s by early to midafternoon. storms coming through from west to east ahead of a front that will bring in some comfortable weather for friday, but some of the storms could be severe, with damaging winds and hail, 3:00 to 8:00 p.m. today. lower humidity in place tomorrow. highs upper 80s to near 90 with sunshine and more humidity returning for the weekend. yes, it s magic. unbelievable. you know, any time of the day or night you want your weather or a rain dance go to the weather channel on cable or weather.com online. let s head now to washington, d.c. where it s also toasty with uncle willard scott. hey, willie. how sweet it is. a birthday party in june. you can t beat it. little chocolate cake. triple layer. excellent icing. and take a look at some smucker s label and see whose birthday it is. and it is the very lovely sebastiana serra from boston, massachusetts. 100 years old. she survived a brain aneurysm and lives on her own without any assistance. mae dennis of maine, 102. wrote a cookbook at 90. always loves to play the piano at scottish parties and clubs. and we have ashley boone. oh, ashley take me home. ashley boone, los angeles, california. enjoys traveling and doing all sorts of he loves his rv. just goes everywhere in his rv. belongs to clubs and plays violin for his friends. sweet myrtle mckinnie from murfreesboro, illinois. 104 years old today. honored with an award for her volunteer work, baking all sorts of good things for hospitals. and senior centers. and lenora liette of piqua, ohio, is 100 years old today, plus two. and she makes preserves and loves to do that. christine christopher, isn t that a great name? chevy chase, maryland, is 100 years old. tells the most hilarious stories in the world. everybody laughs and everybody is crazy about here. twila, isn t that a great name? twila salyer of del city, oklahoma. attributes her longevity to never smoking or drinking, a huge oklahoma sports fan. that s it. that s all. we have them all over the country now. a little variety never hurt anybody. now back to new york. all right, willard, thank you very much. when we come back we re going to head back down to mem us for al s lend a back now at 8:38 with day four of lend a hand today. so far al has given away more than $3 million and the giving is not over yet. as you know he s down in memphis, tennessee. al, good morning, again. take it away. hey, good morning. thanks a lot, matt. you know, we re in memphis. it may be known for music and barbecue but there s a heartbreaking fact, one in four kids here live below the poverty line, making it tough to expose children to the arts. well, guess what? today s charity is on a mission. it s the new ballet ensemble and school and they re trying to change all that. whether it s ballet, hip-hop, flamenco or african, the new ballet ensemble and school is teaching kids from various backgrounds how to dance. for every paying student there should be a community student. reporter: new bali founder katie smythe calls the art a necessity for kids. the need might be very different, but there s a need in every child, whether they come from privilege or they come from poverty. or they come from somewhere in between. dancing was the one thing that made sense to me. it was my rock. the only reason i m a professional ballet dancer right now is because katie gave me a scholarship when i was 14. reporter: new ballet reaches into the community, performing in schools and identifying aspiring young dancers. if we find those talented kids who love to dance and who love to move and who are eager to get up there and raise their hands, me, me, i want to do it. reporter: for shamara, it changed his life. if they had never found me i probably would be somewhere in jail. it s a life saver. i feel like the whole new ballet family including miss katie is like a guardian. reporter: and now he s changing lives and mentors inner city kids. it s fun. it s something you can do well. reporter: creating opportunities is what new ballet is known for. charles riley performed on the ellen degeneres show. max reed was a finalist to be a backup dancer for michael jackson s comeback tour. and francesca is headed to nyu on a $50,000 dance scholarship. talent is a wonderful thing and i think a lot of people don t realize how precious it is. this education, it s a directory from school. it s a directory from college because a lot of people might not get accepted at nyu without the dancing. reporter: but above all, new ballet is about bridging gaps and bringing communities together. we re not african dancers and ballet dancers. we re not black and white. we re not latino and chinese. we re dancers. all right, katie smith, are you ready? i am. all right. let s open her up! here we go. capezio giving us $75,000 worth of dance apparel and footwear. ace hardware, $50,000 of hardware supplies. united airlines donating to you $30,000 worth of frequent flyer miles. expo dry erase markers, $20,000 worth of dry erase boards and markers. american harlequin $20,000 worth of dance studio equipment. aspen homes 20 grand worth of furniture. genesis today, 20,000 nutrition drinks. kool-aid is going to give you $20,000 for a mobile dance studio. oh, yeah. 11,000 in sports wear. columbia sports wear has been with us from the beginning. the memphis grizzlies, $10,000 worth of advertising. bridge the gap appliances. hair care, $10,000 worth of hair products. pavilion, $10,000. you re going to get $10,000 worth of insurance thanks to philadelphia insurance. office max has a $10,000 gift card for you. cosmetics, for all your beautiful dancers, $10,000 in makeup. secret will give you $10,000 in deodorant. 10,000 bucks worth of treadmills, leapt cals and exercise equipment. nike, $5,000 worth of yoga and exercise stuff. the family foundation, 25 nights at holiday inn. sara lee, three grand worth of babels. 2500 worth of hair products. glidden paint, $1800 worth of paint. you store it, storage facilities and 200 bucks for movers and truck use. what does this mean for you guys? how would you like to change the life, it s unimaginable. but the power you re giving us means so much to every one of these children we haven t even met yet. does it ripple out into the community? absolutely. ripples through all the communities. children from poverty, coming to the. we can take our projects to schools and provide excellence for those children, and they deserve excellence. flow. it creates flow in the brain, enhances the learning process, possibilities, self-expression, positive feedback. we hope you got positive feedback with all of these. it s our honor to be here. this is the most positive thing that s ever happened. congratulations. thank you. thank you so much. thank you, guys back to you. and a history-breaking moment. we ve got not just one, but two. we ve got donations if from back to you guys. very nice, al. helping a lot 6 folks. still ahead, another innovative idea that s giving kids brighter when it comes to achieving your goals, sometimes change is necessary. peter arnelle knows that all too well. in his new book shift, how to reinvent your business, your career and your personal brand he shares stories of how he not only revives some of the biggest brands in the world, but his own life, as well. pet peter, good to see you, good morning. give me a quick definition of what shifting is. shifting is the opportunity you have to make small changes in your life, continuously, that have very quick impact and can be seen by your family, your friends and yourself, instead of large changes which a lot of times are not attainable. you ve been working with businesses to help them shift for a long, long time. when did you finally realize that this concept also worked in a personal life, as well as a corporate life? just after 9/11, i was thinking a lot i was 407 pounds. which, you almost have to stop again and say that. you were 407 pounds. stand up for one second. you are way thinner than i am right now. you weigh what now? is 45 pounds? 145 pounds. it was just an incredible transformation. and it got you to think about shifting personally? yeah, i realized a lot of things i had done for a lot of companies i could do for myself, including physically and from a health perspective make a lot of impact in my life with my family, my friends. when you talk about transforming. you just said small changes. and yet most people would say going from 406 pounds to 145 pounds is a drastic change. and you don t like drastic changes. no. no. no. but, each pound, and each week and how i did it of course was very, very small. i think it was an evolutionary process and not a revolutionary process. i had no goals. i decided to fix a new diet. get everyone around me, you know, focused up on my diet. so i didn t change my restaurants, i didn t change what i ate. i just got them to make things the way that i needed to eat them. you started to do something, when i read, you started to eat oranges. and when i say you eat oranges. you eat oranges. you d go up to 50 oranges a day. but you really don t want to use that as a statement about a diet. the oranges mean more to you. yeah, they mean more to me. i think everybody should grab a hold of something and own it. so it becomes symbolically a reminder every minute of every moment in your life of, you know, keeping on track, whatever it is that you re shifting or changing in your life. the oranges were basically because they re available all over the world. i travel a lot. they have all the right vitamins and minerals and fiber and so i thought it would be easy to eat an orange. and almost symbolically as you would sit and peel an orange, you saw it almost as peeling away layers of yourself. yeah, exactly. it was it was dramatic. my doctor, my fat doctor, dr. arone said he would be very happy if i got to 250. and as i started sliding down to 200, and 170, et cetera, i think they all got a little nervous about that. but it was to a point it was just a natural evolution to get to my right place. we got some e-mail questions that would pertain to you. and i want to throw one your direction, because i think this is how people can shift and reinvent, and here s the question. i just think i need to make myself stand out more, look better and feel better. my husband just left me a few days before our seventh wedding anniversary and i m turning 40 in august. i feel if i m going to have to get back out there and start all over again, i m going to need some serious help. what would you say to this person, americale, about shifting and reinventing herself? i think the first thing is that she should create a fan club. online, use electronic media, and get a lot of support, learn to listen, a lot to her friends and her family. and build an audience around her new being, her new self. it could be very, very helpful. and people love to help people. people love to support people, toward positive things. they re waiting to be asked to join, you know, and help. so i would just recommend to talk to a lot of people and take all the advice, and you know, get a lot of support, a lot of audience built electronically. the book is called shift. peter, thanks very much. congratulations to you. thank you. we re bang in a moment, this is today on nbc. we are back at 8:52 with the unusual occupation that s seen a surprising surge of women. today national correspondent amy robach is here with details. good morning, meredith. it s the case of brain versus brawn. celebrities from rock stars to royalty use bodyguards. but these days many are turning away from the big, bouncer-type man in favor of a lower profile protection. paparazzi. mobbing fans, angry constituents. it can be a dangerous world if you re in the public eye. it s an unpopular opinion because more and more people feel the need to voice their opposition, you know, in a harsher way. so the dialogue is a little bit different now. so, you could have a different view on, you know, stimulus package or health care, and find yourself in need of personal security. reporter: a strong man guarding a vulnerable celebrity. it s a scene right out of hollywood. but what about this real-life scene? i got the job done. that s great. reporter: after going through intense training over the past year, joanna torrance is now a professional bodyguard. joining a number of other women who have jumped on a growing trend. let s go, girls. no one would see me at 5 3 , you know, a little girl, in their eyes compared to someone you d normally see at 6 5 , big guy. they wouldn t expect me to be that person. reporter: and that s just it. women have the element of surprise. they blend in. they can look like nannies or personal assistants or a publicist. but they re highly trained, and can use deadly force if necessary. female celebrities have female security. look at the madonnas, or the jennifer lopez, or the angelina jolies of the world. they have female security. reporter: lindsay lohan and beyonce, also reportedly travel with female protection. but they re rarely seen or photographed. it s called covert versus overt protection. and it s not just women guarding other women. libyan leader moammar gadhafi travels with female security, and prince william and kate middleton have also been seen with a female bodyguard. anyone who needs a bodyguard could use a woman. just as easily as they could use a man. it s not about muscles. it s not about how well you could shoot most of the time. that s kind of a last resort thing. it s about the brain? it s about the brain, exactly. and we all know women are very intelligent. very mental. after being an a detail recently i realized that having the advance work done is the most important thing you can do. and that s before anything happens. exits, rest rooms or whatever it is you need to know, even for yourself, jiths a life skill you can use outside of the job, as well. reporter: and while there aren t any hard numbers yet, 30 years ago female bodyguards were unheard of. now many security teams say they have at least one female on duty and most notably the demand for women has outpaced the supply. ladies, in this economy, if you re interested there may be work out there by you. look, i m surrounded by my security detail right now. you better watch it. we ll be back after your local news and weather. 8:55 is your time now. 87 degrees out there already. so warm and lum out there. tom will have the forecast after the news. good morning, i m eun yang. five muslim member from the d.c. area arrested in pakistan last december have been convicted on terror charges. a court sentenced each the men to at least ten years in prison. two brothers from silver spring have been killed in a car crash. the car crashed into a utility pole near layhill road and middle veil lane. two passengers were hurt as well but expected to survive. we ll take a break and have weather and tr the gas prices are going down, they go back up again. we know saving money is important. this summer, shop with your giant card and save on shell fuel. earn one point for every dollar you spend. every 100 points earned gets you another 10 cents off per gallon. the more you spend, the more you save. i m saving money at the store, i m saving money at the pump, and that works for me. more savings every time you shop, only with your giant card. good morning. the heat is building. we re already na the 80s. high humidity in place. but relief is on wait tomorrow. between now and then, we ll soar to mid 90s bit midafternoon, and a likelihood of scattered thunderstorms ahead of a cold front moving through. those storms will be generally around the metro area between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m. there s a slight rink an isk an isolated storm could produce hail. tomorrow, sunshine, highs near 90. more humid over the weekend. a small chance of an afternoon storm saturday, a greater chance sunday. how s the traffic? tom, a live look. headed for downtown, all of the southeast corridors loaded up about the problem is an accident on the westbound freeway near 12th street in southwest. a quick check elsewhere, interloop of the beltway crawling. springfield to 66 volume. travel lanes open. come up, the fourth of july is almost here. how to throw a party that will make your neighbors jealous news4 midday at 11:00. back now with more of today on this thursday morning. it is the 24th day of june, 2010. shaping up to be another steamy, sunny, summer day here in the new york area. we ve got a big crowd with us. probably sticking to the by now. i m matt lauer along with msnbc s tamron hall. natalie is on assignment. as we all know, al is down in memphis, tennessee, this morning. day four of this year s lend a hand today tour. and not one city, but two cities benefiting from al s good work today. al? hey, matt. thank you. and you re absolutely correct. we ve got our friends unloading our penske truck. in fact, we got a donation of a mobile studio, dance studio. they re already using it, doing some ballet right now. and as i said, you mentioned we are not only here in memphis, but our friends in nashville, who were hit hard by historic flooding, we ve got a big donation for them, as well. a great charity down there. we ll bring that all to you in just a couple of minutes. matt? all right, mr. roker, thank you so much. great job by you and your team this week coming up from here we re going to take a look at some high school students who seem destined not to have a chance. all of that change when they attended an innovative high school today. special correspondent jenna bush hager who is also a teacher, i should mention, will tell us this inspiring story. also ahead you re never going to get lost in bad style if you take advantage of our fashion road map and our style expert is here this morning and he s got some great tips on what you need to know. you have these style emergencies? today appearently. ann is on vacation this week, savannah guthrie is up from the white house over at the news desk. good morning, matt and tamron. in the news on day 66 of the oil disaster in the gulf, bp says it has overcome the latest setback. a containment cap has been siphoning oil from that blown well, had to be removed for much of wednesday after it was bumped by an underwater robot. bp said the cap was repositioned and working again last night. american gary faulkner is back in the u.s. this morning after returning from pakistan where he wanted to hunt osama bin laden. referring to bin laden, he said, quote, we can t let people like this scare us. after arriving overnight in denver, he said it s good to be back and said he plans to return to pakistan. today, five americans were convicted on terror charges in pakistan, and sentenced to at least ten years in prison. the five, who are from the washington, d.c. area, say they will appeal that conviction. the senate is predicting quick confirmation for general david petraeus. the president s pick as the new top commander in afghanistan. he replaces stanley mcchrystal following mcchrystal s critical remarks about the administration. tragedy in spain, where a train hit a group of young people crossing the tracks to get to a beach party, killing at least 12, and injuring 14 others. about 1,000 evacuated residents of the flagstaff, arizona, area started returning to their homes on wednesday. a 14,000 acre wildfire that started last sunday was still only 20% contained but crews had enough confidence in their fire lines to let the evacuation order be lifted. there was some damage, but no serious injury following a magnitude 5 earthquake wednesday in canada, near ottawa. it was also felt from michigan, and ohio, all the way to vermont. it is now 9:03. back to matt and tamron on the plaza. all right, savannah, thank you very much. let s go back to mr. roker down good morning. the heat wave continues on thursday morning. already, just past 9:00 in the morning, it s 87 at national airport. we re in the mid and upper 80s throughout the region. and it s going to climb another ten degrees for highs today. and then a cool front moving in from the west will trigger some thunderstorms, some of which could produce damaging winds and hail, 3:00 to 8:00 p.m. and there s even a slight risk of isolated tornado during that time. stay tuned to nbc 4. we ll be keeping you informed through any warnings or watches issued. later tonight, lower humidity moves in. all right, that s your latest weather. tamron, you know what, this is today s total more than $810,000 worth of merchandise between memphis, and nashville to lend a hand today. and we re so proud of the efforts of all of our producers in getting these donations for all these worthy charities. congratulations, al. congratulations to the organization and great work for those kids. from the halls of washington s government buildings to local city chambers, there s a lot of debate over education. especially during these tough budget cuts that are happening. but in the nation s capital, there s a shining example of what can be achieved, even with very little. today s contributing correspondent jennifer hager, who teaches herself, is here with this amazing story. good morning, tamron. that s right, there s a lot of criticism of our public education system but we found a surprising innovation. a new public school program that s helping the most at-risk kids have the brightest futures. it s particularly interesting for me, because i teach at the sister program in maryland. all right and set. reporter: there s a moment some thought might never come. thanking god and good fortune for leading their children to this graduation day. but much of the credit goes to an unusual public school in washington, d.c. in the neighborhood where only 33% of students make it through high school, and few go on to college, the seed school achieves a remarkable feat. let every soul reporter: despite the fact that many students read three grades below grade level. how many students are graduating? and how many are going on to college? 100%. reporter: how do they do it? with tough love, hard work and teachers who give more than their job description. seed is a safe haven from the tough, inner city streets. they may be facing, abandonment, living with other family members. maybe living in single-family homes. reporter: with three meals a day, this is a boarding school. for sixth through 12th graders. they live in dormitories monday through friday, with one goal. high achievement. wherever they go. where are you guys going to college. spelman. university of maryland. do you all already know where you re going and you re in sixth and seventh grades? yes. reporter: where they come from, motherhood comes early. and life is hard. and sometimes short. do you ever keep in touch with any of your friends that you from middle school? a few of them have passed and one of them is in jail. reporter: are you ever afraid, like, this could be yeah. reporter: instead, deangelo will be the first in his family to graduate and go on to college. a.c. calculus is your favorite subject? yeah. i never understood how in college there would be one problem on the board and it would take up the whole board. but now i see. his growth has just been through the roof. you know. he s just such well-rounded, you know, so well-rounded. reporter: in addition to rigorous academics, seed teaches social skills and how to navigate in the real world with success. i see her as a woman who i transformed. reporter: tyler went from making fs to making as. did you always know you were going to go to college? i wanted to go to hair school, actually. i didn t want to go to college. reporter: do you think the expectations for her as a student at her old school were as high as here at seed? not at all. not at any level. on a level of one to ten, it s not even a two. reporter: here at seed, it s not just what you learn. it s how you see yourself. so the program focuses on self-esteem, self-respect, and integrity. i ve learned a lot about myself. i learned capabilities that i didn t think i was able to do, ever. reporter: but not everyone is supportive of these, new, personal discoveries. i got a lot of backlash from my family, really. the first thing is, when they hear boarding, they equate that with bad. well what did tyler do to deserve that? reporter: do you think there are pressures from other kids in your neighborhood because they are choosing to go on to college? it is trying to bring them down because they re not, perhaps, in that advantage situation that they want to then bring that child down. and say see, you re just like me. reporter: but that hasn t stopped tyler and deangelo. i realize my strength. once you go to college you can do whatever you want to do. reporter: today they start a new journey, facing a future full of promise. where they say there are no rules. and with graduation behind them, both are heading to college. deangelo is attending miami university in ohio. in the fall. and tyler plans to go to university of maryland eastern shore. both are packing their bags, and ready to take on their futures. my eyes are tearing up from the first hoemt that that piece started. i ve got to ask you about the parents. because that makes a big difference in a child s life. parental involvement. are the kids seeing a lot of that? the parents are incredibly involved. in fact, they are the ones that get them into these programs. and deangelo s mom said there s no option. she didn t graduate from high school and she said, for my son, there is no option. it s a great piece. jenna bush hager, thank you so much. coming up, no need to ask for directions. we ve got a style road map.ing the way for all of your fashion emergencies. next having a blast at your july fourth celebration. entertaining ideas after this fourth celebration. entertaining ideas after this messages. w it all shared it with single and loving it! who made a cup the next morning for ladies man as he was rushing out the back door. he shared it with blondes have more fun and fiery redhead, who, after finding out about each other, shared starbucks via with their new boyfriends, firemen keep it hot and drummers rock, who called his friend know it all, who said he already knew about it. premium starbucks via ready brew. now available wherever you buy groceries. we get double miles with every purchase. so we earned a tropical vacation in half the time. we earn double miles every time we use our card. ( shouts ) double miles add up fast so we can bring the whole gang. ( grunting ) awesome! it s hard to beat double miles. everyone knows two is better than one. introducing the venture card from capital one. with double miles on every purchase every day. go to capitalone.com. ( gasps ) what s in your wallet? wait up! go to capitalone.com. today, we re going to take yummy, creamy danonino and turn it into a frozen treat. first, we poke the danonino with these little spoons. then, we re going to place them in the freezer. luckily, the staff and i have prepared this tray earlier. [cheering] unlike leading kids yogurts, danonino has twice the amount of calcium of milk, ounce per ounce, and it contains vitamin d. bravo! danonino. power packed to helps kids grow. was good for it, too? aveeno introduces nourish + style, the first line of styling products with active naturals wheat to fortify while you style for a healthy hold that lasts more than 12 hours. new aveeno nourish + style. could open a world of wonder ? so sensory so satisfying the discovery never seems to stop it s the magic friskies makes happen every day in so many ways friskies feed the senses all right, this morning on today s home, having your fourth of july festivities go off with a bang. from the kid tables to adult beverages, colin cowie is here to tell us how to do it right. good morning, savannah. i think this is one of those parties, you re able to see something, today we start off with a wooden table i found. and the foundation is this wonderful graphic red and white striped fabric. which i think is festival. and for the chair covers, i love the idea of the flag. this is great. you found it and just tape it on there? tape it on the back. and at each place we use the melamine plates. and you did sneak a little turquoise in the red, white and blue palette. i thought, a couple of sentiments and it calls for a cocktail. sticking with red, white and blue. so wanted to stick with red. blue it doesn t make you want to wash it down. certainly have the recipe here. keep everybody going. you might want to try one of these. tell me, what s in this? how did you get the red color? this is cranberry juice. and strong. exactly. very important, with the citronella, very good for the bugs. and speaking of bugs you and i, we have a special expertise in mosquito bites. if there s a mosquito they will find me from 100 miles away. i think they like me better. if they like you better, i m happy to have you. i like to take the citronella candles and put them under the table. this way when you get up from dinner all of a sudden you don t end up with your legs covered with mosquito bites. be careful with tablecloths. we don t want to have a fire hazard. moving on, we move on to the kids table over here, which is great. with the kids, we start with wonderful candy, which is great. all the food comes self-contained. sandwiches, watermelon. where did you find these little chairs? these come really easy to assemble, and for the kids, basically fireworks in a cup. colin cowie, thanks so much. i think we re good to go for fourth of july. great setup, thank you. coming up, all signs point to great style. we ve got a fashion road map ahead for wardrobe emergencies. and later star, dirks bentley, part of our today lends a hand is going to lend us a song from nashville when we come back. 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(announcer) choosey moms, and dads, choose jif. today, we re going to take yummy, creamy danonino and turn it into a frozen treat. first, we poke the danonino with these little spoons. then, we re going to place them in the freezer. luckily, the staff and i have prepared this tray earlier. [cheering] unlike leading kids yogurts, danonino has twice the amount of calcium of milk, ounce per ounce, and it contains vitamin d. bravo! danonino. power packed to helps kids grow. and olive garden s one of the few places we can take them where everyone s happy. announcer: try our new crespelle dishes italian crepes stuffed with five cheeses, with chicken in garlic cream sauce or with grilled italian sausage, starting at just $10.95, at olive garden. to help your skin get healthy and clear. fast forward a few years. .and now that your problem is wrinkles we still have the solution dermatologists recommend most. neutrogena anti wrinkle moisturizer with pure retinol sa. in just 1 month it s clinically proven to smooth even the deepest wrinkles. so all you neutrogena girls it s time to become neutrogena women. neutrogena recommended most by dermatologists. numbers today, giving away hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of donations on his lend a hand tour. he is in memphis, tennessee, for day four. good morning, al. hey, good morning, guys. katie smythe who is the founder of the new ballet ensemble and school is with us. katie, we re not done yet with the giving. we ve got a little bit more. we ve got not just one, but i think this is the first time we ve done this, we ve got two vehicles for you. first off we ve got from general motors foundation, they re donating a 2010 15-passenger chevrolet explorer. oh, my gosh! yes, yes, katie. look at that bad boy. but that s not all. kool-aid is donating a 2010 silverado pickup truck. kool-aid! hey, kool-aid! kool-aid, come on! they re donating a silverado pickup truck with a trailer to transport your new mobile dance studio. oh, this is unbelievable. katie, what are you guys going to do with the vehicles? we are going to pick up these children at the elementary school and we re going to bring them to our beautiful facility. and we re going to go to dunbar. that 15 passenger chevrolet express van, the silverado pickup. and everybody say it, oh, yeah! gotta love it. what s our total now? $828,000 today alone for memphis and nashville, guys. back to you. all right, al, thanks. coming up, you wrote in and we are solving your style dilemmas with our fashion road map. plus a live performance from nashville, special song from country star dierks bentley. but first your local news and weather. gsd bill? tom? hey! it s an office party! the freedom to name your price. only from progressive. call or click today. have you tried honey bunches of oats with real strawberries? wow. it s seriously strawberry. they re everywhere. it s in the bunches, on the flakes, even real strawberries in the mix. can i have some more? honey bunches of oats with real strawberries. it s delicious. nobody does it quite like us. [ male announcer ] what are you gonna miss when you have an allergy attack? benadryl® is more effective than claritin® at relieving your worst symptoms and works when you need it most. benadryl®. you can t pause life. 9:26 is your time now. 90 degrees in the nation s capital. a hot and steamy day. tom will have the forecast after the news. good morning, i m eun yang. thursday june 24, 2010. in the news4 today, governor e o malley is riding the marc train, days after a train broke down on the tracks in prince george s county. o malley calls the incident absolutely outrageous, and an investigation is under way to figure out what caused the train do break down monday night at height of evening rush. hundreds were stranded in sweltering heat for hours. we ll talk about heat in a minute. weather and traffic up next. stay with us. well, the heat is building quickly wit the strong, june sun climbing quickly high for in the sky. into the mid and upper 80s around the region. it will hit mid 90s or upper 90s in a few locations by midafternoon. a cool front approaching from the west will trigger passing thunderstorms between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m. around the metro area we could get strong storms that could produce damaging winds and hail, then drier tomorrow and cooler. how s the traffic? a live look at this hour, loaded up along interstate 66 for last mile approaching beltway. had an accident, it appears it s out of the roadway. 270 southbound, germantown down, all cleared out. very good news there. thank you. on news4 midday at 11:00, the fourth of july is almost here, how to throw a party that will make your neighbors jealous at news4 midday. got to be starting something one year ago superstar michael jackson was getting ready for a blockbuster comeback tour, then the world was shocked and saddened by his sudden death at the age of 50. tomorrow, on today, we ll be live at his neverland ranch to take a look at how his kids and the rest of the family are doing. and the ongoing legal wranglings over his estate and questions still about how he died. you ll remember michael jackson tomorrow on today. incredible, a year later. i m tamron hall alongside savannah guthrie. natalie is on assignment. and al is in memphis on day four of his record-breaking lend a hand tour. hey, al. you said hey, kool-aid! that s right. awesome. they re having fun behind you. yeah, and i say oh, yeah! we ve got the new ensemble ballet. new ballet ensemble and school. this is a hip-hop group. they do all sorts of dance. it s rea good morning. the temperatures are continuing to climb now. here just past 9:30, well into the 80s around the region, and humidity remains high. but there is relief on the way but it won t be arriving until tonight. between now and then, the temperatures will climb into the mid and upper 90s. and we will have likely scattered storms developing between 3:00 and 8:00 p.m. some of which could produce hail, perhaps damaging wind. and then lower humidity moves in tomorrow, cooler, highs near 90. i know tamron and savannah, this is your kind of dance. i know you guys bust the moves. we are so on our way there to rock it out. you know who else you know who else got this? chuck todd. oh, yeah. he s been i m a little bit jealous, i ll be honest. al, thanks. coming up next, pointing you in the direction of better style with a fashion road map. right after this. ed real people to film themselves taking the activia 14-day challenge. i m mary ellen smith. day one of the activia 14-day challenge. my digestive problems are irregularity. so i m really excited to see if this really works. my husband tried this last night. he loved it. he said it s the best yogurt i ve ever brought home, so.mmm. have just started to notice a slight difference in my digestion. help regulate your digestive system. take the activia challenge. it works or it s free. but look below the surface. your mouth is no different. just brushing leaves germs behind. adding listerine® antiseptic cleans deeper. [ boom! ] to penetrate and kill more germs. [ exhale ] [ male announcer ] listerine®. clean deeper. get healthier™. and olive garden s one of the few places we can take them where everyone s happy. announcer: try our new crespelle dishes italian crepes stuffed with five cheeses, with chicken in garlic cream sauce or with grilled italian sausage, starting at just $10.95, at olive garden. ¿por que no probamos esto? [ male announcer ] old el paso. a special blend of seasoning for especially delicious tacos. feed your fiesta. love to see kids spirits shine. superstar and mom, of seasoning martina mcbride and sunny dacos. sunny taste. sunny spirit. sunny d. brings out the best in kids. sunny d this morning on today s style, we are answering your fashion questions. we asked you to tell us about your wardrobe dilemmas. this morning style expert stephanie greenfield is going to give you some direction using her fashion road map system. good morning, stephanie. good morning. tell us a little bit about how this fashion road map works. the fashion road map is your personal gps to never get lost in style. we ve used fashion road signs to help women with their fashion dilemmas. it s fun, it s kitsch. it s all about solutions. for everybody, here s what people tell us to wear, what not to wear, but nobody helps us with our own personal style dilemmas, and most of us have enough in our wardrobe, with a few tweaks and a few great item investments you can look like a million bucks. let s get to some viewer emmaims. christy marie from orlando, florida, she sent us an e-mail that reads i m a mom of two young kids and i never have time to take care of me. i need an updated style, i want to dress more feminine, and i don t want to spend a lot of money. what should i wear? that is i think so relatable, her issue. there she is with her baby. oh, i love it. i have a 3 1/2-year-old, and the second you have that baby, you want to get back to, you know, your old you. yeah, and a new look. you don t want to wear the mom jeans and the t-shirt uniform. so what s the solution here? well, we have ann curry, our mom coming out. her real name. with her little boy liam. and the road sign is caution children. and we love this, because ann wanted to dress more feminine. feminine doesn t have to mean floral. the investment, every look you re seeing, head to toe is less than $200. here, a simple dress, $148. all the items are available on websites around the country or stores. i love this. this is a neutral print, the strappy sandal. this dress has pockets which is great. this is clean, it s a grab and go style. she looks feminine without looking too girly. and liam approves. that is wonderful. as it gets colder, she lives in new york, layer a cardigan over it. put a long steve t-shirt underneath it. it s worth the investment and it s loose and it clean. it looks like it s wash and wear. because you re carrying the baby around, you re bending up. grab and go, wash and wear. this is worth the investment. the dress, totally. and not too much jewelry because those babies are always grabbing. ann curry and liam, you look adorable. thank you both very much. so our next e-mail is from laurie in berlin, connecticut. she writes i recently lost 50 pounds after my doctor and i after her doctor tested her positive for diabetes. i worked really hard to lose the weight and to get my numbers down. i m really proud of myself but i always tend to wear black on black and i need help. let s take a quick look at lori s photo. there she is as promised in black. and what s the fashion look well that s not black. but i don t think it s what she wants to look like. absolutely. and we all get lost in black. that s why when marcel comes out you re going to be so excited. that s our road map sign? buckle up. because this can take your ordinary silhouette that you had before the weight loss and bring it to extraordinary. let s congratulation marcel. 56 pounds. and marcel, identified with this story because as you mentioned, she lost 56 pounds. looks amazing in this. what s exciting here is with one silhouette, the belt, which everybody has in their wardrobe, here $49.50, this is our investment piece. you can take your silhouette from your pre-weight loss and cinch them up. accent the waist, because now you have one, and bring in color. okay, you ve worked so hard to lose the weight. you were totally attracting, not distracting. pinch your waist. buckle up ladies. and marcel you lost weight working out with our resident nutrition guru joy, so that s fantastic. joy is fantastic. she brought joy to my life and she is an inspiration on how to keep the weight off. joy bringing boy. buckle up. and you re sure to be styling. congratulations. you look gorgeous. congratulations to lori. our last e-mail comes from megan in fredrick, maryland. she says i m an up and coming senior at the university of maryland. i got an internship at the public defender s office for the summer. i m extremely excited for this opportunity but i m also very nervous. i have no real style to my wardrobe, i wear jeans with sweat shirts or t-shirts most of the time. i m worried my wardrobe will hinder my chances of getting respect when it comes to my job. what should i do? you can t wear that to the office. that s not going to work. and she looks cute there, but she could do a little more. the next phase of dressing. okay. what i love about this is i would wear this any point in my life. one item, two ways is our fashion road map sign. isn t this a great one? her item is this pencil skirt. how work appropriate does she look? and she could change her top, put her hair down and she s ready to go to the office. $98. i love that we gave a sleek, simple, like i keep saying clean pencil skirt. this is from ann taylor. clean leg, it s appropriate length to the knee. a strappy scandal. this is sarah. she has been an interhere at the today show. and but she looks adorable. age appropriate. starter with the pencil skirt for her starter job. invest in a key silhouette like a pencil skirt. dress it up if you re going out in the evening after work. dress it down if you re going and you need to be more professional. sarah, congratulations on your summer internship here at the today show. you all look amazing. ann, marcel, great, we appreciate it. thank you. follow those road maps. and for more information on stephanie s fashion road map and the signs that are ahead of us, go to the website todayshow.com. for more information. up next, some finger licking bbq. but first, these messages. ns toe (woman 2) it happens to me when i go for a jog (woman 3) it actually happens to me when i sneeze (woman 4) it happens to me too (woman 5) sometimes it just happens (announcer) 1 in 3 women experience light bladder leakage, or. .lbl poise liners are specifically designed for lbl so they protect better than period only liners learn more at 1in3likeme.com [ female announcer ] these cookies aren t magic, but they make magic happen. that s because glad has partnered with cookies for kids cancer. it s small bake sales like these that help raise big money for pediatric cancer research. together, we can make a difference. one container at a time. because with glad, the care that goes in is the care that comes out. the care that goes in is the care that comes out. we asked real people to film themselves taking the activia 14-day challenge. hi. i m emily ilic. i m going to start the activia 14-day challenge today. problems that i have are, you know, irregularity. i do have some doubts if it works. i think it s really good. um. i like the flavors. i think from being a skeptic in the beginning i do think that activia actually works. help regulate your digestive system. take the activia challenge. it works or it s free. activia we helped keep your skin clear. now we have a solution for wrinkles. neutrogena anti wrinkle with retinol sa smoothes even deep wrinkles. it works.beautifully. neutrogena. it works.beautifully. [music, talking, laughing] what makes hershey s s mores special? hershey s chocolate goodness that brings people together. pure hershey s. it makes my skin really silky and velvety. this is my body wash. what do you mean? this is it? why?! oh, don t do that to me! dove creamoil body wash. now with nutrium moisture. nutrium moisture. i m a believer. the nourishment in dove creamoil goes somehow deeper. i m happy about the change. change is good. dove creamoil body wash. i m happy about the change. change is good. have you tried honey bunches of oats with real strawberries? wow. it s seriously strawberry. they re everywhere. it s in the bunches, on the flakes, even real strawberries in the mix. can i have some more? honey bunches of oats with real strawberries. it s delicious. nobody does it quite like us. and this morning in today s kitchen, world famous memphis barbecue. hot chef mike mills is the only three-time grand world champion at memphis in may. a barbecue showdown known as the super bowl. the 17th street bar and grill. mike, good to see you. good to see up. all right you ve got the rubber gloves. i have gloves on here. we re talking ribs. this is what you re famous for. this is what i m famous for. they re like baby back. they re not as meaty. you should say you get a slab of 2 1/2 pounds. i m going just the opposite of that. i prefer the baby backs. you like the baby backs. a little higher on the hog, the meat is not quite as juicy. doesn t have as much fat in it. how do you prep this? first of all you ve got to start out with a good product. this rib right here is what we normally serve. mm-hmm. you take the membrane off the back. it s already been removed off of here but i recommend that whether you re using fingerless libs or the loin back style, baby back. you ve got to put a rub on it? a dry rub. we call this our magic dust. i sprinkle a coat on. nice and even. it will make the new membrane on the back very edible. i don t pack it and rub it and do all of that. what i try to do, i do the same thing on the front side of it. what s the biggest mistake people do with ribs? too high of heat. they rush them. i m going to come back and put a couple other layers on there during the cooking process. right here, i would take this right now, put it over on the pit. that man in the pit there? oh, that s like a bank vault right there. that s a bank vault of meat. right there. that holds 150 racks of ribs. and it comes out like this? they ll come out looking like this. and you don t have to have a knife. oh. tell me about this bad boy. this bad boy right here. this is a fill shoulder. this is what they cook in memphis in may. you can always tell when it s ready. oh, look at that. pull these bones out of here. oh. hmm. just pull the fat skin back right here. oh, man. get rid of that. wow, people all across the country are having a heart attack. just pull that out. that looks good. and you ve got some deviled eggs here. your secret, barbecue beans? these are five kinds of beans in here. there s a pinto beans, pork and beans, large red kidney beans, jelly beans and i always say a mystery bean. whatever you want to add to it. put it in there. it will be in the book and on your website. of course, the punch tressed by our producer sarah, and it s true. mike, thank you so much. and coming up, we ve got a special lend a hand concert from dierks bentley in nashville. but first, this is today on nbc. boss:hey, glad i caught you. i was on my way to present ideas about all the discounts we re offering. i ve got some catchphrases that ll make these savings even more memorable. gecko: all right. gecko: good driver discounts. now that s the stuff.? boss: how bout this? gecko: .they re the bee s knees? boss: or this? gecko: sir, how bout just fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. boss: ha, yeah, good luck with that catching on! anncr: geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. all right we want to check in with al again before he heads off to another city. al, great job today. thank you so much, guys. you know, here in memphis, we raised $828,000 for both the new ballet school, and hands on nashville. and we also would like to remind folks, you can logon to our website, todayshow.com to donate united airlines frequent flyer miles to any of the lend a hand charities this week. we re going to be off to our next location, which happens to be in beautiful new hampshire, but we ve got a real special treat to sing us off. dierks bentley is going to be singing love goes wild. and dierks, three years ago you were with us in nashville when we did lend a hand. you were terrific then. we thank you for helping us today. yeah, it s great to be back here doing this, as well. a lot of volunteers here in nashville today. doing to do some great work and help people get back in their homes. me and jason and john get a chance to sing together. thanks so ñimuch. as dierks performs love goes wild we want to show you our donors who provided commercial consideration. dierks, thanks a lot. there s a place where love goes wild the heart is just like a child like they don t need a lot no matter what i used to be hard to care but you ain t nowhere once i threw love away but that fool was yesterday now my heart is holding steady wild things grow i know it will be you and me right down in the middle where love grows wild 9:56 is your time now on this thursday, june 24, 2010. good morning, everyone, i m eun yang. in the news4 today, five muslim men from the d.c. area, who were arrested in pakistan last december, have been convicted on terror charges. a court sentenced each of the men to at least ten years in prison. two brother from silver spring have been killed into a car crash. the car crashed in silver spring last night. two passengers in the backseat were hurt but are expected to survive. the forecast now, tom kiernan joins us. the it s 90 already? heating up quickly it s the end of it, at least, for a couple of days. we ll get a break, but not until tomorrow. today, one more day with excessive heat and humidity, into the mid and upper 90s. strong storms developing from mid to late afternoon, 3:00 to 8:00 p.m., the chance for any storms to get going here, there is a risk that isolated storms could produce damaging winds and hail. but that to be followed by thankfully cooler, drier weather with lower humidity. jerry jerry, how s the traffic. delays on the interloop of the beltway. sluggish towards i-66. outer loop is fine. american legion bridge, sluggish outer loop. looking good inner loop. lanes open both ways. news4 midday at 11:00, the fourth of july is almost here. how to throw a party that will make your neighbors jealous, coming up on news4 from nbc news, this is today. with kathie lee gifford and hoda kotb. live from studio 1a in rockefeller plaza. hey, everybody, we re so glad you re with us today. it s thursday, june 24th. how we do. how we roll. it was a good, good day for the usa today. yes, it was. i know a lot of people were probably sitting in bars in front of television sets. you heard the cheer go up, didn t you? when the u.s. played algeria, check out the goal one more time. first attempt and pop. yeah. frankie and johnny s waiting for you. i know. where were you? i was en route to you. and i started getting text messages. so anyway, landon donovan was the one who scored the winning goal, and it was mayhem. now the u.s. gets to go to the round of 16. which we ve never made it that far before. we re playing ghana. so get ready. for the first time since 1930. yeah, a long time. the year frank was born. 1930? mm-hmm. he was? so that was 80 years ago, hoda woman. you re not supposed to say that anymore. he could still play, though, how s that? that is how great the man looks. so we play ghana. what do you think s going to happen? i think we re going to win. i think we re on a winning streak. i think ghana s road kill. we ve got ghana. what about the other game that was going on, the one that was never-ending that was unbelievable. this is one of those tennis matches that you say you can t believe it s actually happening. from day one, a player from the united states and a french player, john isner is the player from the u.s. he is adorable. hello. hello. so these guys played for the very first day. the sun set and the game was not over. it was still tied in the fifth set. so they played the following day. that day all day long they played, still in the fifth set, no one was winning. it was called because of darkness. 59-59? they re going to play again. it s unbelievable. and one of the questions people had and matt got to ask the guy from the u.s. today was when on earth do you go to the restroom? no one saw them go to the bathroom. except maybe they were my theory well, we ll show what he said. let s listen to what he had to say. you know, we didn t even take a bathroom break up until 58-58 or something like that. i couldn t hold it in any longer. i had to go to the bathroom. i really don t know how to explain what went on yesterday. i know, you know, people say, you know, it was something like a dream. i honestly thought i was going to wake up any moment after the match. he s adorable. he s so gracious. he was humble. he s adorable. he s ranked 23rd. the other guy is ranked 148th. and yet during the interview with matt he kept saying you didn t seem to be tiring out. he was like spider-man. he kept going. i like that he kept giving it to the other player. very much a sportsman. after something like this, you hate to see because it could end in five minutes. it could be over just like that. i know. so what do you think s going to happen? i isner s going to win, usa and isner. all right. do you know that botox can paralyze your emotions? that s right. that s right, hoda woman. researchers at barnard college say botox may affect not only your facial expressions right. but your emotions as well. and i say to that, who cares? they say because you cannot show happiness or show sadness. your brain isn t registering that you re happy or sad? is that the theory? that seems not very i don t know. it just doesn t seem what do you keep putting it on me for? stop it, anthony. take camera one. anthony, you re making me fuzzy. what botox? what do you mean? that is fuzzy. all righty. i don t know if i believe that one. we can t stop looking at jennifer aniston on the cover of ok! absolutely gorgeous. but apparently, yes, i am having a baby, she says. i wonder if that s true. makes me want to read it. we could get to where we are. okay or not okay? to root for another country during the world cup. yes. what do you say? hoda said of course it s okay. it is the world cup, after all. just root for the underdog. i think you can because the u.s. doesn t play every single match. you say it s one thing to root for another country, but another thing to be willing to die for it. check your surroundings and limit your alcohol. these things can get ugly. what are we talking about? well, if you re sitting in the stands, say you re at one of these games, and you re, like, the only one rooting for ghana around or all the u.s., and you re the only one, because that happened at a football game. right. it can get ugly. yeah. so be careful. just check your surroundings. okay. here s another. is it okay or not okay? kind of. so there is a school, a private school in new york city, that is mainly to help children who have learning disabilities. and they have chosen to perform, and school s asked them to perform, and these are for young children. and the parents aren t thrilled. if you guys know the story, there are boys who dress up like girls. and there s kissing among the same sex. and cross-dressing and that sort of thing. what do you all think about it? even the spokeswoman for g.l.a.d. agreed that 10-year-old boys are too young to be doing that. what about annie ? it s a perfectly lovely show. under the bridge, my eternally favorite music. there s two little kids and a dog. do that. for free. if they do under the bridge, free scripts. mcdonald s has been given a warning basically. by a pretty serious organization. you know how it is. mcdonald s has toys with happy meals. the kids go, i want the happy meal but they really want the toy. they want it all. so the center for science in the public interest. interest science in the public served mcdonald s notice to sue. what do you think about the idea? i understand what they re doing. i think you re contributing to childhood obesity which is such a huge problem. i think what they should do, i think they should give incentive to eat the healthier things. you know. make the happy meal available because this is america, after all. try to cut down on that transfat stuff like they re doing. but at the same time, make the toy come with the salad. right. make the toy come with the fresh juice or the yogurt. yeah. okay. everybody loves to win. everybody gets to win. unless it s the mother and the father who buy the healthy thing and then give the kid the toy because he gets the happy meal. they just work the system. that is going to happen. i don t want to legislate life so much that we can t live it anymore, though. i think we ve got to be a little bit careful about that. i do agree with that, but i do think when you see all these kids who are so overweight, you feel like someone should help some way and do something. i mean, we ve done so many stories about how these kids, that s what they eat 24/7. so let s reward them for eating healthily. hello, miss sara. we re happy you re home although we did like having adam here. i do know you like having boys here. my gift to you. thank you very much. well, we re talking about the sports yesterday. marty wrote in usa s win in oncht o.t. brought me to tears then the tennis match. carrie wrote, it was the feel-good story of the day. america was the comeback kid. we saw a lot of sportsmanship. we hear so much about athletes behaving badly. this was, you know, you re seeing tremendously gifted athletes behaving like gentlemen. i loved yesterday. it would make frankie proud. coming up next my mother was born that year, too. that did not help. actress maria bello is making people laugh. actress maria bello is making her comedy debut in the new adam sandler film opening friday called grown-ups. the story s about five best friends who return to their hometown with their families 30 years later. and maria bello s character, sal sally, is married to one of those guys. that s kevin james s character, right? good to see you, maria. describe your family, you and kevin and the child. kevin and i always said we were like the homecoming king and queen who never left town. and our family is the most important thing to us. and we have a beautiful relationship, you know? we re still very much in love. and you read all the ok! magazines. she s obsessed with her character. they re obsessed with what s going on with everyone. there s something weird about your character. she s a little off. she loves her son. a lot. he s 4 years old and she is still breast-feeding him. which that s in some cultures, i guess it s perfectly perfectly permissible. but i love what kevin says when she asks how old she is, 48 months. he can t even say 4 years old. after he nurses his mommy, there s salma hayek sitting there, he goes, can i have some of her milk, mommy? it s very funny. got milk? you re funny in this, but comedy is not your genre. it s not. no. it s funny. i think adam only hired me for my boob side. i m the only one in hollywood with double ds. maria! i ve known him for years. he always said we wanted to do something together. he called me. are you serious? i don t know if i m funny. you re funny. you can do this. we ended up having this great time. family experience. he building like a camp all summer. for kids he built a basketball court, a swimming pool, a playground. your son must have had a ball. he had a ball. how old is he? he s 9. so he s hanging out. not just the stars kids but the groups, lighting guys, all the technical guys. and he beat them all at basketball at 9 years old. there was this clip on extra that has run all over the place. oh, my gosh. and it s a clip there was a snake. it came into the interview. look at this. salma hayek, you. look at you. everyone s cursing. look at you. it s not going to come up here. this is true, right? this is not acting, ladies and gentlemen. wow. we wanted you to feel at home, maria, too. yeah. you know we have a little pet segment. are you really afraid of snakes? no. oh, you re not? i mean, they re okay. from a distance. from a distance is good. wow, albino, huh? yeah. that s pretty. a little freaky. it s just precious. i literally like salma had a snake phobia when i was a kid. but before i went to africa some years ago, i did snake phobia therapy. i did. i was terrified. so i had to carry around a rubber snake. i would go to the trip to zoos and look at snakes and touch snakes. and it worked? and it worked. and i feel fine about snakes now. but it literally surprised us. it was right there. and it got up like this and it came towards us. no. it ran over my shoe. so you see i m barefoot. i was, like, ooh! we should talk about your beautiful necklace. you have a strong connection to. it says don t forget. that s right. judith leeburg designed this for the women of haiti. i ve been working in haiti for a years with a group of 300 amazing strong women, politicians, businesswomen, artisans who are really changing the face of haiti. they are bringing life and value and beauty back into this country. so you can go to judith leeburg to get these. and 100% of the money goes to them. awesome. she s a lovely lady. you spent a month in haiti, and then you go to paris tomorrow. is that for the premiere of grown ups ? vacation. vacation, finally. thank god. there you go. it s time for me to drink some wine. eat one for me, would you? you look great. we love having you. thank you. again, the movie opens in a theater near you tomorrow. up next, the page-turners you won t be able to put down this summer. and later, cupcakes and couture. oh, she s here, karen, we love her. look at the combo, right after this. reading reading such a wonderful thing time for today s hot summer reads and the books to pack, we ve got three authors standing by to help make wrur book shopping easier. we begin with paula froelich, columnist and author of the new york times best-seller mercury in retrograde. hello, miss best-selling author. it s on paperback. i ve seen it floating around. chick. i like that. you re picky about what you like to read. you like the chicklet books. let s start with an oldie but goody, the original sex and the city. she writes the way she talks. she started a whole movement. frankly, a lot of the people she writes about are still prototyping around today. if you see the movies, will you still enjoy this book? it s different. the thing is that the movies were written by someone else. this is the original. it s smart, it s fun, it s sassy and very pro-lady. i like it. what s your next one? spellmans strike again from lisa lutz. it s the wackiest, craziest family. it s like the nicer version of running with scissors. jennifer wiener, fly away home. i love her books. she writes beautifully. not only that, but every single character is you. and it s also really topical because it s about a couple that basically, you know, they kind of have a big break-up in public. and what happens and blah, blah, blah. blah, blah, blah. very important. then the rehearsal by eleanor catton. this is a debut novel, and it s really, really good. it s a coming-of-age story. it s in drama class, which i love. you? and then i m going to end with the ultimate that still gives me a giggle because let s be honest, bridget jones s diary. that s the one? please. good look with your paperback recessionproof version of your book. let s go upstairs. time for the literary genre. i m here with justin cronin, author of the passage. good to see you. what have you brought for us? in no particular order, they re all terrific. the first book is allen first s spies of the balkans. he is my favorite living spy writer, i think probably our best. ra el? what i say about his books is they re so rich in period atmospheres, you can smell it coming off the pages. where are his books? all are set in europe in the second world war. wow. okay. strangers of the feast. she s one of the underrated fans and i think she s going to win many new fans with this book. i think this is the first great novel of the financial crisis. it s the story of a family trying to get together on thanksgiving, and they re actually on a collision course with two young men whom they have inadvertently wronged. is sounds like a serious book, it is, but it s also very funny. timely. if you do not see yourself someone on these pages, you have never been to thanksgiving dinner. larry mcmurtry. they re coming out with a 25th anniversary edition of lonesome dove. has it been that long? yes. he handed it to me when i was on a trip to italy many years ago. i spent the first three days lying in my hotel room in rome reading that book while the glories of rome went on outside. we re out of time but just mention the other two. angelology, three little words, angels gone bad, earth abides, one of the great post-apocalyptic novels of all time. whoa! thank you, justin. now for good crime novel, go back to hoda. if you d like a good thriller, lisa, author of look again. lisa, a terrific author. how are you? great. tell me your top five here. i love books where things happen that s dramatic. first pick, jodi picoult, a kid with asberger s syndrome accused of murder. dave baldacci, love him. no one does it better. deeply researched and a wonderful villain. nelson demille. the lion game. if you want to understand how terrorists think, read it. it s also some humor. do you have to read the earlier one to get this one? no, you don t have to. i like to throw in up-and-coming people. her characterization of this detective, she s a woman. she s just like us. and her brother s a real pain in the neck. it s a great book. all right. finally, lisa gardner, also someone who deserves a greater following. it s harrowing. a woman who has some issues, another detective is going to solve the murder of an entire family and also kind of herself. when is your next book coming out? october for fun. oh, good. and for thrills in the summer. we look forward to it. lisa, thanks so much. thanks to all of our authors. coming up, we re going to show you amazing things you can do with cupcakes. you re going to love this segment. our heat wave continues. coming up news4 midday, tom has the latest on higher humidity today, along with a possibility of dangerous storms. he also has good news about the end of the week. good morning, i m barbara harrison. coming up at 11:00, party tips for the fourth of july. we ll show you how to turn we re back on this first day with more on today. cupcakes like you ve never seen them before. bobbie teamed up with the author of what s new, cupcake? to cook up some new designs. you put your heads together. she blinged karen. we met here in the studio and it was love at first sight. i just squealed over her creations. and i asked her if she would do a fashion. it was so much fun because she would send us images and we just allen and i just played with the candies and cookies, just coming up with more and more ideas. our favorite there are so many good ones the shoes are going to blow you away. wait for the shoes. here s the genius. you don t know where the real thing ends and the cupcake begins. they re so easy. they re so easy. you ve got your ring pops. you know the candy with the big gem on top. we took that off, took a mini cupcake on the bottom. that s the candy. and then that way you can put a little white chocolate, let it glue on there and then decorate the top. these are gum balls on top. cute party favors. so much fun. i had to break out my jewelry chest. talk about how we presented it. so from the rings we went on to bracelets and earrings. we have to point out, these are cupcakes. these are the real things. these are the cupcakes. real things, cupcakes. unbelievable. finding small candies that you can just that are sunshiny and fun like these sixlets that you can have. this is beauty. we wanted to get into beauty. and she made everyone our personalized perfume bottles. with sponge cake. sponge cake. slice that and dip it in the canned vanilla frosting. that s a rolo. that s a chocolate wafer. how did you make this mascara wand? that s just a wheat stick dipped in chocolate and one of these chocolate wafers and sprinkled jimmys. sprinkled jimmys. how did you make those? a wafer cookery. and that s just a piece of gum or you could use a chew. with the spills. this is taffy that she rolled out and this is a marshmallow. to make the nail polish. whatever color frosting you want. again, you re using canned frosting. look at the cotton balls and q-tips-oh, my gosh! i love that. cotton balls are unbelievable. you dip the sticks. you could use pretzel sticks and breadsticks. we had a blast. we were going back and forth with e-mails. at one point i sent her a model filled with cupcakes. this is so far i think our favorite, the shoe department. this is actually allen s creation. the first version of the shoe was like a boat. we said let s do it this way. it s a single cupcake. reynold s makes all these fun liners. i copied the decoration from the liner paper. these are just these oreo sticks that we used as the stiletto heel. they started with the picture of the ruthie davis shoes which are my favorite. i said they have to be platform because i m short. of course. what s this part? i see the cupcake and i see the stiletto. what do you use for this portion? this is a graham cracker we coated with white chocolate. otherwise they get kind of soggy and your stiletto would go i was so excited about these. unbelievable. look. all different colors. who can have heels without handbags? we have, of course, the real handbags. this is the judith lieber famous cupcake that katy perry held. so those are double cupcakes. yes. double cupcakes. we put two cupcakes, kind of. a little tootsie roll. unbelievable. and we took two cupcakes, put one on top of the other, froze them and then, again, tinteding your vanilla frosting any color you want, dip it after you melt the frosting and you can decorate it with all the bling. this i see as a twizzler. what is that? that s melted chocolate on some waxed paper. that would take me three days. this stuff, although it looks really tough and i know you ve shown us how to do some of the things, it s not completely impossible for us to do. so is this your next book? i think it s fun. by the way, you should know karen s book will not get off the best-seller list. what s new, cupcake? is everywhere. that s your second one. it s one of the most inventive, creative and most beautiful. you happen to be one of the nicest people. that, too. the best part, karen and allen were just so amazing. so sweet inside as much as they re sweet outside. all this sugar is making us sick. this is my dream come true. are you kidding me? shoes and sweets. so much fun. we ll see you tomorrow, bobbie. yes, we will. i wish karen could stay. up next, things that go bump in the night, not just hoda but other things as well. what? animals time now for today s call of the wild. and the great american backyard campout. every summer countless people turn off the tv, silence their phones and head outside. i wish more people would, right? so what can you find creeping and crawling around? david from the national wildlife federation is here to tell you what you might find in your own backyard. really good to see you. this must depend on where you live, though. we ll get to that. but you re just back from louisiana, right? yeah, i was down there for a week just going down and assessing what s going on with the wildlife and the bp oil spill. it s pretty horrific. worse than you even imagined? so much bigger than i even imagined. the gulf is such a huge area. these are pictures we took of the pelicans being washed. you know, it s heartbreaking to see these animals not only covered in oil, but they don t know we re trying to help them. the cleanup process is just so traumatic for them. you know, fortunately some of these birds have a future and they ll be released. but the long-term be released where? you have to take them someplace else. florida. now they re moving them to texas. unless we get serious about getting clean energy and restoring the whole gulf ecosystem, this is going to keep happening and these wildlife and the people which are also part of this horrible situation are just not going to have a future. we re going to get to our animals. there s one that we smell. we thought it was david at first. but apparently it s this. this is one of my favorite animals. oh, please! oh, my gosh! no kidding. we re not exactly you should have had masks. i m just saying. he s cute, but putrid. if you were only porcupine, that smell is important to let you know that other porcupines are in the area. they mate smelling like that? this is a male. he wants to mate with a female, guess how he gets her attention? with that? he pees on her. you are an animal that s completely covered in quills, you have to be careful about getting your mate s attention. that s just what the species does. if you re out and about camping in a wooded area in some of the western areas, this is an animal that you might experience. you know, now that you know that experiencing wildlife isn t always about what you see, it s about what you smell, too. we ll good with that one. we re going to let him munch away. let s bring on this little cutie. why is he staying? we ve had some stinky guests. so this is a gray fox. now, another animal isn t he sweet? another animal you might experience when you re doing the great american backyard is he dangerous? which by the way is this saturday, june 26th. folks around the country will be camping out. can we gently pet him? yeah, you can pet her. hi, sweetheart. might smell bambino. she s the only wild dog species that can actually climb a tree. if you re out and about in the woods or in your neighborhood, these guys can live fairly close to people. look up in the trees and you might spot one. this is a baby. this is just a baby. look at her tail. see how it has a black tip? yes. these and red foxes are common over much of the country. the difference is that a red fox has a white-tipped tail and the gray fox has a black-tipped tail. very cute. salad bar. we ve got another critter that i m sure you guys are going to have a lot to stay about. stinky s staying for lunch. he is not happy to be next to stinky either. nobody is. this is an alligator snapping turtle. you re killing me. don t put your finger too close. hoda. trust me, i won t. check out the little tongue. see how it s pink? ew. these guys sit in the bottom of ponds and rivers. and they flip that little bit of their tongue out. it looks like a worm. and when a fish swims, they don t see the rest of the turtle. it s camouflaged. that is rude. if you re out camping this weekend and you re out on the rivers of the mississippi and down in the deep south, you might see one of these guys. and you know what? they look really fearsome, but under water they don t bite. their reaction is to swim away. they re not stopping turtles. why wouldn t they bite? if they re out of land and out of their element, that s when they re prone to biting. the females soon will be coming out of the water to lay their eggs. stinky. that s when you want to be careful. you don t want to get too close. by the way, this is a baby. this animal can get twice as big as that porcupine. it s the largest freshwater turtle in the u.s. and this last animal is that it? one more. one more. i m just going to bring this container up here. oh, we saw this earlier. this guy right here. this is an important animal to talk about when you re camping out because a lot of people are really afraid of snakes. although maria was not that afraid. she seemed okay. that was a little anticlimactic. that really didn t work. this is a bull snake. and this is a native north american species like all of these animals that i have here today. has he been defanged or he s not dangerous? he still has his fangs and he can bite. what happens if he bites you? nothing. and that s the point i wanted to make. when you see a snake, almost all snakes in north america are nonvenomous and completely harmless to people. except for rattlers. yeah, rattlesnakes and copperheads. your chances of encountering them are slim. when you do, nine times out of ten he ll hide or slither away. my message is don t go out. these guys are important to the ecosystem. appreciate them for what they are and enjoy your campout. david thank you. thank you so much. and thank you, stinky. coming up next, hot pepper clams and drinks that will go with them that will come in handy just about right now. yes. we re going to toast to that right after this. stinky, you want a drink? today s be well, be healthy is brought to you by cheerios, 100% whole grain oats and one gram of sugar per serving can help you. time for our special series be well, be healthy. summer clams you re going to love. oh, i love clams. famed chef susan is here to teach us a thing or two about sauteing clams. yes, but before please. we have to have a cocktail. great summer cocktail. fresh lemons. you didn t want to bother modeling, you could take fresh lemons. beat the crud out of them. a little bit in there. you muddle your lemon. then, of course, we ve got vodka. we just put lots of ginger, let it sit for a week, you get ginger vodka. that sounds good. syrup. this is healthy vodka. ginger is great for you. eat well, be healthy. cheers. this is a gin engineger syru. i m going to add just a little bit of triple sec, a little bit of the ginger vodka. not much. a little bit of the hennessey in there. you know what? it doesn t taste heavy at all. no, it doesn t. it s got a couple of shots. it tastes like it doesn t have any alcohol at all. you need a little more in there? i m just saying it s deceiving. i only made a half a drink for myself. i m just going to add a little sparkling water. because that s healthy, too. this is a great summer cocktail. that s delicious. so here s what we re doing. we re making black pepper clams. when i entertain, i want it to be really easy. so you cook a lot for guests as well even though you have the two restaurants. i do. as a matter of fact, i have four restaurants. where are the other two? one at vegas in mandalay bay and one in los angeles. you re a busy girl. yes, you are. okay. this is garlic. we re going to throw our clams in there, right? now, you have to wash them, right? you ve got to get all the sand and stuff off of them. you wash and rinse them. these are cockles. take a little bit of stock. this is a dish i did on top chef masters and won with. just so you know. stop it. swear. how long because they re not covered. there s not enough to cover. they re going to pop. we re going to steam them literally two, three minutes just till they open up. see like we have there? you should never force a shellfish open, should you? exactly. if they don t open throw it away. is that all the ingredients? so that was the garlic and the stock. that was it. now we re going to add a little bit of soy sauce. mm-hmm. a little bit of soy. put some lemon in for you? a little fresh lime juice. lime? the whole thing? yeah. okay. a little bit of oyster sauce. you can throw it in there. oyster sauce. you re sure you re not ruining my clams. you sure? we re going to add yeah, let s put that in there. butter. butter in, too, yep. you aren t going to believe how good this is. really? it better be. i sure love clams. is it hard to mix all knees ingredients up in there? no, this is great. also, just to finish it, cracked black pepper and a little bit of palm sugar. more than that. more than that. what kind of sugar? palm sugar. or you can use brown sugar. there you go. okay. stir that baby around. stir it around and we re going to finish it with a bunch of fresh herbs. so this is totally this was the winner dish. wow! see all that juice? no, i got it. you sure? i got it. like that. okay. you can take this back here because i want to show you quickly how we finish this. all we re going to do, then, is just add in fresh right there. we add in fresh thai basil cilantro and mint. and we ve got this little rye bread and chunks of sourdough. you dip it in. it s wonderful. is this it? this is it here. that s something else. what is that? this is the asian salad that you serve with that. i can have the bread. quite yummy. i love to serve an asian pear salad with it and a big pitcher of a gin engineger cocktail. susan, so good. thank you very much. right back with if you re into that marathon wimbledon match, tied 61-61 going into day three. unbelievable. my gosh. go, usa! tomorrow, the hottest polo player in the world is going to be here. we are going to play a little polo. also, we re going to do our ambush makeovers and how to redig rate for free. sorry, but we re all out of clams. thank you so, so much for being with us. thank you very much. delicious. thanks, bye-bye.