Circle this: It's Ellen's night at Target Field

Ellen DeGeneres is due to receive the "Circle Me Bert" treatment at tonight's Twins game.

The talk show host, who may possibly be with her terrific actor of a wife Portia DeRossi, is coming to town mainly to promote her replacement of "Oprah," as if anybody could, at 4 p.m. weekdays on WCCO-TV.

To Whom It May Concern in Hollywood: "Circle Me Bert" is the plaintive plea of Twins fans who want announcer Bert Blyleven, retired Twins pitcher and now Hall of Famer, to acknowledge their presence in the crowd by drawing a circle around them on his telestrator.

Twins exec director of public affairs Kevin Smith said that DeGeneres' people will be allowed to use the video anyway they like.

"We're all for it. Love to get Target Field on Ellen's show," said Smith. "They want to do a 'Circle Me Bert' thing with FSN [FOX Sports North] and us. We'll pre-tape the 'Circle Me Bert' thing in the third inning. Then we'll run it on our big screen later. She's going to do a fifth-inning live interview on the FSN broadcast, not in a booth but up on one of our decks. She is going to do the in-ballpark Delta player tribute segment on the big boards."

DeGeneres is not expect to stay for the whole game. Shemight want to see if there are any Lynx around, since the WNBA team is having a much better season than the Twins.

DeGeneres is scheduled to drop by the offices of WCCO-TV on Tuesday.

If this happens, major kudos go to WCCO-TV's GM Brien Kennedy for pulling this off, I'm told.

DeGeneres is allegedly a reluctant traveler (probably, especially for something in flyover country), I hear. And her people and handlers are very Hollywood, in the worse sense of the name.

If I run across DeGeneres, I'll ask her if she's buying into this hype that she's a good dancer. Having rhythm, which she does, and being a good dancer are two different things. I also wonder why an area on her website isn't devoted to disclosing the makers of the many interesting shoes she wears. Actually, I would make the shoe request before asking that dance question, which she probably won't appreciate. Yeah, that's right, I don't think her dance moves should be seen in public.

C.J. is at 612.332.TIPS or cj@startribune.com. E-mailers, please state a subject - "Hello" doesn't count. Attachments are not opened, so don't even try. More of her attitude can be seen on Fox 9 Thursday mornings.