– The (New York) Daily News stole the Empire State Building recently for an in-depth article about the growing problem of mortgage fraud. In mortgage fraud, scammers generally forge paperwork with local governments to transfer property to their aliases; they then use the property to apply for mortgages. They then take the money and split. In most cases, the genuine property owner has no idea the scam has even happened until a foreclosure crew shows up to seize property due to the unpaid, illicit mortgage. In the Daily News’ case, the newspaper’s forged documents contained several “tells” that should have tipped off the people in the NYC deeds office: star of the original King Kong film Fay Ray was listed as a witness, bank robber Willie Sutton was listed as notary, and the company purchasing the iconic New York building was “Nelots Properties LLC” (stolen spelled backwards). You should check out the article; it’s a good read!
– Watch out: Microsoft is planning to make their own version of WordPress.
– Shopping at a Circuit City liquidation sale? Be careful! The closing Circuit City stores are no longer owned by the company but by a liquidator who apparently has no qualms about doubling the MSRP on electronics and taking a discount off that absurdly high price. For example, one woman stopped by a closing Circuit City in Parker, Colorado looking for a deal on a Sony BDP-S350 Blu-Ray DVD player. She’d seen the player at Best Buy for $299 and Amazon for $249, and figured Circuit City’s “50% Off” offer might save her a few ducats. However, the liquidator’s “saleperson” assured the shopper that their price of $309 was a huge 50% discount over their “list price” of $618!
– Good karma and “get well” wishes to Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson, who is now on the heart transplant waiting list. I’m not a fan of your team sir, but you are, by all accounts, a good man and a swell NFL owner. Get well soon, and God Bless!
– With his win against the Ratbirds yesterday, Ben Roethlisberger became the first quarterback in NFL history to win 50 games in his first 5 seasons. Congrats, Ben! It’s been a hell of a ride so far!
– Epic Carnival – a website that’s half pictures of hot celebrity chicks and half snarky NFL news, a mash-up of The Superficial and a slightly more serious Kissing Suzy Kolber, if you will – has become one of my favorite new sites. Check out this list of Top 10 amazing but true NFL facts. Some excerpts: “There is, in fact, no NFL law on the books that prevents the Cardinals from hosting a playoff game”… “Minnesota actually trailed for most of its game against Detroit, and became the first professional football team ever to be concerned when Gus Frerotte got hurt”… and “Despite the fact that he’s been on the losing end of a great deal of football games, Terrell Owens still screams and cries like a little girl when it happens again.”