Dave Arnold knew things were getting strange when he found himself talking on the telephone with Matt Lauer. It wasn?t just that he had the anchor of NBC?s ?Today? show on the line. While Arnold was talking to Lauer, he had Barbara Walters of ABC on hold. At the same time, he was fielding an email from Wolf Blitzer of CNN.
?It was a little surreal,? Arnold said last week. It was happening in the spring, when Arnold, 26, a Rice Lake native, UW-Madison journalism graduate and former Wisconsin State Journal intern, found himself at the center of a true media maelstrom.