Driver2165

The Star Tribune is clueless yet again

So it looks like Borders is planning on closing shop in their Block E location. The company line on the closing is slow sales due to poor foot traffic. The Star Tribune's brilliant idea? A white guy got shot down the street last year and everybody's afraid to go there. They must have forgotten that nobody went to Block E before last year, either. There's a small sentence acknowledging the Barnes & Noble 300 feet down Eighth Street, but according to the Tribune, that couldn't possibly have anything to do with it. And Block E being the ugliest building in town, built below the lowest common denominator (Borders was how they 'niced it up' a bit) couldn't possibly have an effect, right? Because people just love spending time in places where they don't enjoy being? While every globalized chain store continues to move out of that eyesore [wasn't there a Snyder's for about three days?], how long is the Star Tribune going to blame the teenagers that spend their time there because they're the exact demographic the entire building was built for?

When is Minneapolis going to learn?

Borders prepares to leave Block E [Star Tribune]

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Another first for the kid

Eliot learned a new way to deal with something she doesn't like: revenge. She's been sick since Sunday, hitting the one-year-old trifecta with a cold, an ear infection, and popping a new tooth (number eight, if anybody's keeping track). We also found out she takes after me with a cat allergy. Because of this, her nose has been running uncontrollably, so we've been swiping her upper lip with Puffs. She hates it. After five days of fighting it, pushing us away, today she suddenly got a determined look on her face, grabbed my nose with one hand, and wiped my face as hard as her little arms could.

We've also found that she's rather listen to real music than children's music. She couldn't care less when we put on a Wiggles or They Might Be Giants CD, but when Deerhoof or Why? or the Advantage is on, she gets down, and when Joanna Newsom or Julie Doiron or Blonde Redhead is playing, she starts singing along (she makes up her own lyrics: "Yah yah yah yah"). She already has far better taste than the average listener of the Current [pdf].

Really, though, it's been a week and I couldn't think of anything worth talking about other than my sick kid. Also, I like pointing out how horrid the Current is.

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Cars can bite me

I'm always complaining about the way people drive in general, and specifically in Minnesota. I was telling somebody who has lived in Los Angeles for the last sixty years that it's gotten awful around here, and when she started to give me the yeah-well-in-California, I mentioned that specifically, a new habit I've seen beginning this summer was that when people stop at a red light, they'll run right through it if there's nobody coming as if it's a stop sign [As of today, I've counted nine in my last five workdays]. She quickly changed her look to one of disbelief. A few months ago I complained about a guy trying to run me down on Lyndale while I was crossing with the kid in a stroller. On tuesday, I was crossing First Street at First Avenue to go to Origami, and some guy in a Buick decided it would be much funnier to run right through the stop sign and cut me off by a matter of inches than to stop and wait five seconds.

Finally, today at about 12:30, while riding my bike to work, I was hit by a car. I was stopped at a light at Franklin in the turn lane on Nicollet, ready to turn left. The light was about to change, so I looked left first to make sure no cars were coming. I looked right, and there was a retired squad car, a '97 Crown Victoria turning right into me. I had enough time to jump up off my bike, she rammed my bike into my left shin, I landed on her hood, and my bike ended up under her bumper. Five hours in the ER later and it turns out I have a fracture in my leg and a bunch of bruises. Yikes. Won't be cycling for a while. Or driving for that matter. The bike didn't fare so well either. I just bought brand new wheels about three weeks ago and new handlebars last weekend. So that's where we stand. I'm still a little foggy, so I'm going to bed.

Suddenly beer gives me serious heartburn. Anybody know what's going on there?

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List Week: Best Local Albums of 2006

We're going to start off List Week with something of a teaser. I can't say that I've heard a definitive amount of local albums [Side note: for the unaware, we're talking Minneapolis, St. Paul, and sometimes Duluth, but the Hold Steady are disqualified for one, not being Lifter Puller, and two, not actually being located here. Does this album make Sufjan Stevens an Illinois native?] but I've heard enough to make a short list of recommendations. Let's say, well, we'll do six, for the route I drive most frequently.

1. Seawhores - Forest
2. A Whisper In the Noise - As The Bluebird Sings
3. STNNNG - Fake Fake
4. The Plastic Constellations - Crusades
5. Zebulon Pike - Zebulon Pike II: The Deafening Twilight
6. Haley Bonar - Lure The Fox

As always, dissenting comments are cherished here.

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So, the Mayor read a book on urban planning

Honestly, the paper makes it sound like a complete reform. Really, however, it's not. Sure, let's make downtown streets two-way. It will slow down traffic, as they wish. Interestingly, the reason they (I keep saying 'they': it's obviously not Rybak's plan, but he's taking credit for some consultant's plan) want to limit the streets that buses are on is because, they say, buses slow down traffic. But what doesn't the plan do?

Well, it doesn't take buses off Nicollet Mall, like it should, like it pretends to. The main reason in the plan for limiting Mall buses is because the people that eat on the sidewalks don't like the exhaust from bumper to bumper buses in rush hour. We're changing the entire traffic plan of downtown Minneapolis because of people who eat out at 5 pm during the six warm months. They're still going to keep local bus service on the mall with this plan, which is the bulk of Mall transit traffic. That includes two buses that run every 10 minutes and one that comes every 15, and a couple other less frequent lines. Add each direction and you've got a bus coming from one direction every 90 seconds on average. That's during the time that people actually do eat out (6:30 to 9:30 pm).

The other thing is doesn't do is take buses off Hennepin, so the sky is not falling (I'm looking at you, Star Tribune). It also doesn't really change the routing. If they're going to make all the streets two-way, it stands to reason that they'll make the routes operate on the same street both ways.

It's really just a lot of excuses to change the traffic flow back to two-way traffic. The best part is that in the official language of the plan, they're patting themselves on the back for having "small walkable blocks" in Minneapolis [Giggle].

Maybe next they can focus on the four lane freeways that speed through the Wedge neighborhood called Hennepin and Lyndale. Yesterday, I was crossing Lyndale at 27th with the kid in a stroller, and a car saw us and sped up, then gestured and honked when we didn't run. It's not a goddamn highway, it's an inner city street, albeit with crosswalks every quarter mile (not an exaggeration). At 27th, there's no crosswalk. It's a major intersection with bike shop, an apartment building, three restaurants, two art galleries, a boutique toy store that specializes in japanese dolls, an award-winning tattoo shop, a hair salon, and a coffee shop. It sounds like a pretty nice corner when you list it off like that, but there's no way to cross the ridiculous 45 mph four-lane "interstate".

For the uninitiated, Lyndale is one of the two or three main retail corridors in the city, where you're most likely to find the cafes and restaurants, the boutique stores, and, theoretically, a lot of yuppies walking around. But this city is a strip mall with an out of touch mayor and city council.

Maps:
Downtown Transit Alternative: Hybrid Buses - Draft (PDF)
Downtown Transit Alternative: Local Buses on Marquette - Draft (PDF)
Downtown Transit Alternative: Shuttle Buses - Draft (PDF)
Existing Downtown Transit Service (PDF)

The Plan [Mpls official site]

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Playoff fever, baby

We stopped at Napa Jack's, a new liquor store near Lake & France, on a recommendation from one of my passengers ("Man, they don't have any malt liquor or nothin' smaller than a fifth. You can't even leave that place without spending ten dollars.") I've never seen a store like this. The owner was very friendly, and he didn't even laugh when I asked him for a wine under $15 that would go well with both a quiche lorraine and a peppercorn steak. The prices are very good, and there's a giant walk-in beer cooler. He recommended a grenache/shiraz that Good Food also recommended this week. (In a wierd sort of 2006 style deja vu, later in the day I mentioned another podcast to the owner of Sunrise Cyclery when he mentioned that he was going to Vegas next week and I knew he wasn't talking about gambling.

We heard a rumor that Whole Foods has started to stock our beloved gDiapers, making it the second store to do so locally, but the first to price them anywhere near the price from the gDiapers online store. And with the availability of Whole Foods coupons being somewhat better than actual gdiapers manufacturer's coupons, I feel like we just struck gold.

It's true, iTunes 7 did cripple my computer. It's the reason we haven't had a new photo of the kid for awhile. It should be fixed soon and we've got a backlog just waiting to go up.

Morneau should be the MVP.

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The fair smells like poo

The kid has been teething for about a month. She's being a good sport about the whole thing; she's only really getting overly cranky at night when she's very tired or whenever we're at the Church of Extremely High Temperatures. Otherwise, she's just been crawling around chomping like the Lemony Snicket kid on anything she can find and fit in her mouth [like my big toe when i turned my head for a second]. This morning she finally popped two little white buds. It's getting to be pretty good times making food for her. We gave her her first red meat tonight, the Creekstone beef from the Wedge. I cooked it last night in a Bolognese sauce with these cute little letter-shaped pastas. It's more fun now that we're beyond mashing up various fruits and vegetables, and she can eat more complex meals.

We took Eliot to the state fair yesterday. We went in to the Miracle of Birth barn where she loved the baby ducks and piglets and was unmoved by the calves and baby small horse pony things. She also went into the building with the fish, which are an animal that continue to amaze her. If we had a few bucks to rub together we'd consider getting her a fishtank. Bethany spent most of her time trying to win an iPod and taking candid photos of extremely fat people eating [deep fried Hot Pockets on a stick?]. That's not to say we didn't eat ridiculous food. We had a terrible bratwurst [bratworst, more like], mediocre french fries, really great locally-grown kabobs, and some decent fried vegetables from across the street. Bethany is still bitter that we didn't get a pickle. There were buffalo balls in the disappointing Eco building that were delicious. The fair pretty much blows. This is the part of the year where it's hard to convince me that Minneapolis is a cold Kansas City with a baseball team. Come to think of it, I'm trying to think of a part of the year where that's not the case.

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Pssh, Moby.

So what's with brightly dyed hair coming back? It's starting to look like 1995 in a big way.

The idiots with the walkie-talkie toy phones are starting to drive me nuts. Every trip has got some clown who thinks she's got an inalienable right have one of these things blasting away at full volume. Another thing that's getting to me: Nicollet Mall. I'm looking forward two weeks when I'll only have one day on the mall instead of five. Plus, it's Saturday, when hardly anybody is there, because after all, Nicollet Mall is a complete failure as both a transit mall and a pedestrian mall [nobody bothered to tell them you can't make it both] and the only reason they haven't moved buses off permanently is because nobody would be there if it wasn't for thousands of commuters and teenagers waiting for their bus -- my proposal: put the buses and taxis back on Marquette and make it truly pedestrian-only. ]. During the week people are in such a rush. It's not a New York or Chicago style rush where people are focused. The Minneapolis rush seems to be based on a fear that there's going to be a sudden blizzard at any time and people don't want to be stuck downtown so they careen about while their mind wanders. The other day a hippopotamus-shaped woman walked right in front of me while I was driving down the mall [she didn't look, oblivious to the fact that there are actually large vehicles on the mall during rush hour -- blame the 10 mph speed limit. 15 mph would actually be safer for this reason], giving me about four feet which i used all of to slam on the brakes and honk. If i steered away, I'd hit an oncoming bus. She couldn't get through, so she yelled at me. "I hope this gives you a reason to get up." Yeah, exactly -- narrowly not killing people just brightens my day. She was forced to use a crosswalk, and walked into the Walgreen's across the street where she presumably bought a box of Hot Pockets and two liter bottle of Diet Coke. Later, somebody said I looked like Moby.

I'm enclosing a picture of Minneapolis transit circa 1950. Have a look at how many of the streetcars used Nicollet Mall.

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There are so many things wrong with this headline

Recently I complained about the Media's eagerness to talk around soccer rather than about soccer. KCRW's Design and Architecture had a fascinating interview about this year's football design, and how it's affecting gameplay. That's exactly the sort of discussion that I had been craving. I was looking in all the wrong places for it (the Conservative News Network, for example) and just needed the southern California public radio take.

Today's Planetizen was hilariously pointed. Nothing very new, just jabbing at suburban planning in the face of peak oil, but there was some good pwnage to be had.

I had an otherwise quiet day. I guess it was Skateboard Day or something, and there were about 75 skaters that skated past me down Nicollet Mall today. Also, the transit cops are riding segways now. Why are the bicycle cops on heavy mountain bikes anyway? I'm still waiting for one of them to get smart and bring a fixie to work.

Is Kirby Pucket Overrated? I'm arguing yes. Nobody else is, apparantly.

One last note: I apologize if anybody's comments didn't go through. I turned off the comment moderating system, so it should go through now if you put the 'D' in there.

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I'd have to say that the nectarine is my favorite all time fruit.

That rain the other night was awesome. Did anybody else see the manhole covers flying off? I have no idea what caused all the pressure, but water was shooting out of the manholes downtown. One was five stories high. Another tore the siding off a skyway. We got an all-call on the radio to pull over. Five years of driving and I've never heard that. The rain was so intense that one of the stoplights in Northeast decided to flash red and display solid green at the same time.

I saw a Smart car downtown. I'd been getting a bit grumpy at the weatherman for predicting rain for two days before it actually did start raining. I was really itching to ride my bike this week, but it's not quite weatherproofed yet. Plus [as I realized midway through my shift on Tuesday, when I did bike to work], I didn't put any reflectors on it, much less buy a light yet.

On friday, my wife worked one of her three-hour shifts, and we had a showing, so I dropped her off in Edina, and ran some errands. This is what angers me most about Minneapolis. I went to the co-op, the liquor store, and the bookstore for a magazine, and there is not a single area of Minneapolis where one has those options within walking distance. And even if I was willing to take the four buses and two hours it would require if I was to go downtown for one of the big boxes, and then down Lyndale, [my beer selection would be severely limited (Hum's blows)] it's not even a real possibility for me to bring Eliot, with Metro's anti-customer stroller policy that is the complete opposite of safety (fold up the stroller, leave your bags on the sidewalk, hold your baby in one arm, your diaperbag with your other arm, and your stroller with your leg, and watch your shopping bags roll up and down the aisle) [please complain here].

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There are way too many ridiculously obese people in Minneapolis

Talk about great news, this is the best news I've heard since they said beer makes you smarter.

Rough day today. I got yelled at for not stopping in not-a-bus-stop, I got yelled at for running late ["yes, sir, I arrived late on purpose just so you would miss your transfer"], and America's Worst Drivers were turning in front of me like gas was going to go up a penny and it would cost an extra forty bucks to fill their damn SUVs.

On the bright side, a guy started complaining about all the detours due to the Minnesota summer road construction season and told me "There are two seasons in Minnesota: Winter and Lose." [To be fair, he rode my 11 line for twenty minutes before he realized it wasn't a 10 line on a ferocious detour.]

I didn't ride my bike today because I haven't quite finished the weather-proofing, and it was supposed to rain. There were about three clouds today. I've got it in a semi-finished state, though, and I rode it to work on Saturday. It was great, but I'm embarrassingly out of biking shape [in spite of six months of regular exercise at the YW]. It's a singlespeed right now, but I'd like to get a new wheel at some point to make it fixed. I should take an awesome picture of it.

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Dumb bus vingettes

On tuesday I saw newly-engaged Kassie and CJ at a stoplight as I whipped around a corner. Kassie's one of the few people I ever picked up with any regularity, I saw her a lot on the train and when I drove the 2. I also remembered that I picked up Michelle a few times when I didn't really know her too well.

Yesterday, driving down France, I saw a woman in her 40's (and I wish I hadn't) who was riding a recumbant bicycle, wearing a flowing dress, and struggling to keep modest without crashing.

I was driving the 6 last night. I stopped at 24th St. and the young lady at the corner asked "Is this the bus six route?" I made her repeat it just to make sure. She was on the wrong side of the street, trying to go downtown. She knew she was going downtown. You can see the skyline from 24th. Later, a similarly chubby white teenager boarded downtown and complained to me that somebody asked her for money. She said that doesn't happen in Richfield. She said "I bet you have black people begging for free rides all day long." I was driving a 300-series bus, one of the oldest in the fleet, and the sun shade fell on me. Made me jump etc.

I doubt this will make a difference, but a bus stop is the sign and the shelter, not the bench. The benches are placed randomly by an advertising company. They have nothing to do with transit. This is an issue at 16th and southbound Hennepin. If that's your hood, though, we're going to be expanding the Downtown Zone 50¢ fare to Oak Grove on Hennepin and 16th on Nicollet, albeit during non-peak hours only. That's great news if you live in Loring Park or Lowry Hill. It's a test, so make sure you call or email the company if you want them to keep it up. While you're at it, complain about the ridiculous anti-passenger (not to mention unsafe) stroller policy.

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New Ballpark

I love the new ballpark plan. Not only is it great from a baseball point of view, it's great from an urban planning perspective. Take out everything about baseball, millionaires, public subsidy, referendums, and what you've got is somebody finally realizing that they nearly ruined the Warehouse District with their Interstate building and surfact parking lots. I view it as not only an apology, but also as a sign they're going to put us right again.

Now to the baseball. I'm hoping those mockups are true to the real deal. TC logos instead of those ugly M's is just the tip of the iceberg. Anybody else notice the complete lack of foul territory? And that looks like a short fence down the left field line. Looks to me like somebody's planning of keeping their left-handed power pitchers for awhile and giving their boys a shot at 30 homeruns for the first time in twenty years. I love the asymmetrical outfield fence. That's some character. It'll be a nice centerfield to watch Torii Hunter make his highlight reel catches seven games per year in his Red Sox jersey. I'll also like being able to watch the game while in line for hotdogs and beer. I'm excited. The best part is there's no retractible roof. When I come to Minneapolis to visit familiy and friends in 2010 from my new home in Seattle, Chicago, San Francisco, or Portland, we'll definately go to a game.

[Via Twins Official Site (complete with new pics)]

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C'mon, three dollars!

We took the kid in for her four-month checkup. Her 10% head has grown in and now stands at 50%. The rest of her kept growing, though, so her weight and length are both 90%. She's enormous. 26 inches and 16.5 lbs. Last time, she didn't mind the shots so much. Yesterday, she hated them. Such is life. She's been so much more verbal lately, like the other day, she rolled over for the first time, and would not shut up about it. She was so stoked and proud of her self, she was almost hyperventilating. Adorable. Also big new, I'm headed to the Wedge to get her some baby cereal. That's right, solid food. Time passes quickly.

Last night a guy put a five dollar bill in to pay for his buck-fifty fare. I told him I could give him a few passes for the next few days, but he just rolled his eyes at me and asked for a transfer. I thought it was interesting that low-grade gas was listed at $2.95 at the beginning of my shift at all three Hennepin stations at the start of my work at about 3. At about 6:30, the price was $2.85, and on my way back at 7:30, it was back to $2.95. It pisses me off when talking heads start talking about how that's still cheap for Europeans, because they get taxes out of the deal instead fat old men lighting cigars with our commutes, and their goverments don't limit the number of small cars to the extent that ours does. It's no wonder Americans have so sense of geography or world context.

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Fallback mode!

Our buses are in fallback mode all weekend. I kept waiting for something to happen that would make me laugh, but it never did. That was the best thing about the light rail. People saying things like "I averted my eyes at the key moment" when reporting drunks urinating on Franklin station on the airwaves is always great. My farebox kept breaking and then fixing it self thirty minutes later tonight. I've never understood it when you tell somebody the ride is free because the machine's broken, and they say "well, can I have a transfer?" "If the machine could give out transfers, you'd be getting charged, son."

There's a building on the northeast corner of 33rd & Nicollet that I've never really noticed much. It's just a two-story, single-lot building with a painted vinyl siding that is so common in Minneapolis. Last week, on my way to work, I noticed some workers tearing off the siding, and it turns out there's beautiful red brick underneath it. I cheered; it looked phenomenal. Today I drove by, and they're putting new siding up.

Today's Planetizen was stupid. The last four were all interesting, though. That's not a bad ratio for a podcast. Also, I added Norwegianity to my blogroll.

If anybody knows how I could get solid, lightweight, 22" men's and 19" women's frames/bikes for less than $100, email me.

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I <3 rain

Last night was vaguely more interesting than the night before. Sure, a cantaloup surprised me by rolling down the aisle at 37th and Bryant, but that was just about all the excitement the evening could muster.

I've noticed this before but never remembered long enough to make it home, but the new neighborhood signs for East Harriet Farmstead are badass. Like most things in the city, they look even better in the rain. I love the rain. Especially when I'm working. I've never understood umbrella people. I have enough to carry, and it's not like an umbrella will keep you more than a little bit dry. I guess I'm a baseball cap person. The only bad part about the rain is that I was going to take my dad golfing for his birthday. There's always next weekend. Now, this is the kind of post that usually induces yawning than attracts awards [I can't get enough of that -- I haven't been written about in an arts weekly since the pulse made fun on the (essentially adult contemporary) band I was in when I was 19].

What's up with those crazy super aggressive drivers with Kerry or Visualize World Peace stickers? It pisses me off as much as the Bushies, but aggressive driving at least fits with the "me first and the gimme gimmes" ideology of the neo-cons. But the dems that drive that that just look stupid.

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Earth day or something

We got a new tree as a gift from the city on Saturday. We even got a tree-loving DVD on how to care for it. As much as I think that anybody who has ever carried any power at all in Minneapolis in the last fifty years wouldn't know what to do with a city even if it was written in an easy to read book and read to them, I have to admit that the city of Minneapolis does trees better than anywhere.

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Cool, new readership

I hope this means I get a little sticker I can put on my windshield (great idea, Sheraton). Welcome, new readers. I must apologize upfront for the website, which can be extremely slow at times.

So since my readership has shot up this week from the four or five people that it used to be, I suppose I should roll out some basics. Your Friend, Kid Tiger is a pseudonym I used for my music. I haven't made any new music in about a year. I plan to make more at some point. MTC has been renamed Metro Transit for something like twelve years. [Has anybody seen the new SW Metro buses? They look like what people in the 1960s thought buses would look like in 2006!] I've been driving bus since I gradated from Edina in 2000, and you can find me on the 6 line from three to midnight, monday through thursday, and on 4 line fridays. Something funny happened recently, but I forgot to write it down. Somebody who forgets to write stuff down far less frequently than I do is another dude who drives, Transit Librarian. And now that I read his site, the BMW and secret restroom things makes since, because those stories are from his blog. So I guess me and Ceej are really sharing the sticker [when you check out his blog, make sure you ask him for RSS]. We're a team! He's the funny one, I'm the angry one with the kid [cutest kid ever, by the way]. Right now, by the way, she's staring at three wooden bears and cracking up.

Does anybody have any tips or good resources on refurbishing an old bicycle frame and converting a ten speed into a single speed? I need a new bike. The one I've got is a mountain bike I've had since middle school that must be made out of solid lead.

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Mpls takes over

Anybody else notice that two of Pitchfork's six headlines right now feature Minneapolis-based buzz bands? Sure I don't care for either of them, but honestly, we could be doing a lot worse. There's even a third local Buzz Band [A Whisper in the Noise, you know, the band I don't mind out there attaching the good name of my city to their fortunes] that hasn't been featured on PFM in about a week. Still, If I was Andrea, I'd move to Chicago.

In a perfect world, Bands du Jour from Minneapolis would be Fog, Cepia, and Seawhores.

[UPDATE] Tiny Mix Tapes [best music site EVA!] ran the headline Tapes 'n Tapes to Tour, Get Hyped 'n Hyped I like the band just fine, but the hype is ridiculous.

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Everything's comin' up Milhouse

It's been a great weekend. I had friday off work, which turned out to be a great day to take off. I would have been driving the 4 on Lyndale and through downtown on Hennepin, and, from what I saw when we went down to the Wedge to get Eliot some wipes while we wait for our ridiculously large order from Amazon to arrive, traffic on both streets was atrocious. I'm not talking Seattle traffic, no, Minneapolis beats that on a sunday morning. I'm not even talking 20 minutes for 4 blocks typical of every morning rush hour on Lyndale. It was nuts. And I'm glad I wasn't working. I don't understand everybody's mindset during the first week of nice weather in the spring. Lake Calhoun looked like the State Fair on a Tuesday. And by early May, just about everybody's tired of going outside.

Anyway, last night, the wife and I got her sister to babysit the kid and we went down to the Rock Rock Rock to see Dosh, Fog, and Subtle. I was a little disappointed with Dosh. His newer stuff is good, but it's not quite as interesting as I thought his earlier solo stuff was. Not that's it's just a rehash, either -- it's not. It's just more "Moby" than I would like. Jel wasn't very good. Fog's bassist made hilarious joke about a Dosh and Jel collaboration that could be called Del… the Funky Homo… Dosh.

Fog came out as a three-piece guitar/bass/drums combo. They rocked and it was incredible. They played some new tunes from their new ep, Loss Leader -- which, by the way has 10th Ave. Freakout featuring Markus Acher of Notwist on Vocals, and two brand new songs that will rock your socks off -- and had some reworked-for-rock-band 10th Avenue Freakout songs, and one from Hummer if I remember correctly. It made me wonder at exactly what point I stop filing Broder's genius under 'hip hop' -- I also wondered the same thing where Why? is taking us. I mean, I know all about the whole thing about not fitting bands into neat genre-sized packages, but the thing is, iTunes still wants to know what genre it is, and I try to keep it general, but there's a line in my library between rock and hip hop. In any case, the Fog set was amazing.

Then the Subtle bomb dropped. Life and the universe, not to mention everything, were absolutely pwned. I've never seen anything so divisive. Half of the crowd in the front left during the first 5 minutes. Suddenly everybody had to get up early. Unfortunately I, too, had to leave after four songs, on account of our babysitter expecting us home by one [Eliot's a party baby - she normally stays up until midnight or one since I get off work at midnight]. Adam Drucker aka Dose One has a phenomenal stage presence, but what really impressed me about him was how great he sounded. I had always assumed he had some computer help on the records to help him with that rapid/nasal/chopped up sound, but that's the way he does it. I wish I could have stayed for the whole thing.

This morning we had a showing on our house, so the kid and I rolled down to Anodyne [OMG I just looked at that website for the first time IT'S BEAUTIFUL. Great job @ Furnace on the design] and -- I realize this post is starting to sound like hyperbole, trust me, it's not -- I ate the greatest breakfast burrito complemented perfectly by the Twin Cities Blend Peace Coffee [Peace Coffee absolutely murders Stumptown, while I'm at it. Other recent coffee deaths inflicted by Peace coffee include Intellegentsia of Chicago, and everything I had in Seattle.] But hear me out, I'm a huge fan of eggs+beans+salsa wrapped up in various combinations. Earwax (Chicago) previously held the title for Greatest Breakfast Burrito, and the Uptown Diner held the local version, but Anodyne has taken over. Insane.

But wait, there's more! The Twins are on a roll. Remember five days ago when people were freaking out about the Twins' 1-5 start? A slow start to a season on the road has never been reason for worry. We just swept the A's. Our supposedly terrible offense wiped oakland pitching all over the FieldTurf. Scott Baker put the supposedly incredible [offensively] Yankees in his back pocket and sat on a very… hard… something. Now we're suddenly one game behind the two hottest offenses in the American League, and tied with the defending World Series champs [soon to be once-World Series champs]. I'll admit I don't like the additions. But they'll help more than it looks like they will. Castillo batting second is better than whoever the heck we had there last year. Batista makes the seventh spot in the order upgrade from a hack to 25 homer potential. And at some point Gardy's going to realize that Morneau should be batting fourth or fifth and Rondell should be putting up his 25 homers in the six hole. Morneau is going to be sweet this year. It would be nice if he would have somebody on base when he's up. Liriano is smoking jerks. Baker's pitching like Greg Maddux. Lohse is in the way.

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Photo cop hits red light

Photo cop hits red light: It's really too bad. I thought it was a great baby step to get people to stop driving like complete idiots. I had noticed a large change. At 11th and Hennepin, instead of seeing vehicles accelerating to 50 mph and running a red by two seconds every time I made the bus stop there, everybody would actually slow down and stop when it went yellow. That is a practice commonly known as "safe, responsible driving," I know, I know, it's a totally foreign concept to people who drive in Minneapolis, but as a matter of fact, "safe, responsible driving" is something that actually occurs all the time in cities that don't start with 'M' and end with 'inneapolis'.

(Via Star Tribune.)

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Last saturday for a while

Today a guy on my bus yelled "Hey bus driver! She's got some booty, eh? F'shizzle!"

I like driving the 6 line. I don't mind working nights, i don't mind working weekends, i just don't like working weekend nights ['course on the other hand, i refuse to wake up before 10 on weekends, so mornings are out too.] The main problem are the idiot 952's that hang out downtown and jaywalk en masse all night long. I mean, I don't drive the bus on the friggin sidewalk, do I? I guess if you really boil it down, the problem is that a long ass time ago some idiotic city planner thought it would be great if we had blocks that are 3 miles long, and was followed by 150 years of local goverments that have never heard of crosswalks. Anyway, it sometimes makes for some interesting trips.

Tonight, I stopped at 8th and Hennepin and picked up a bachelorette party of about 30 women somewhere betwen the ages of 25 and 35. One of them put $3 in the bill slot and said "This is for me and my bitch." The woman standing next to her leaned in and said "I'm her bitch." They spent most of their trip to Uptown Station singing songs about how the bride-to-be "likes it better from the back." An elderly woman boarded at 10th, paid her fare. She took one look at the party, and looked at me and said "Maybe I'll just wait for the 4," and alighted.

One of the ladies in the party topped all, however. She showed me $3 and asked me "What do I do with this?" I patted the bill slot and told her to "just slide it on in there." In no kind of indoor voice, "Like a penis?" and held up a penis figurine.

Seawhores is the Minneapolis band that actually deserves the hype they get. Also, that new hotel on 9th & Hennepin is looking very cool. The new condos are a nice touch for the city; I do, however, think we need more row houses.

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The solution

I've been under a ton of stress lately. There are multiple reasons -- there's the general urban disaster that they call Minneapolis, I haven't had a full night's sleep in a month and a half, and my employer is "forgetting" to pay me in full in two cases so far [that's in addition to the far more sinister way they're found to screw with me that I'd rather not get into at this point in time] -- and it's been really taking a toll on my psyche. Today I found the solution. After weeks of non-stop sunshine, we had a few hours of an overcast sky before the sun went down. That is apparently all I needed. I need to skip town.

I added a links section for podcasts that I listen to. 75 Minutes is the only music one. Left, Right and Center is an interesting one that even my conservative friends may enjoy.

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Out to eat in Edina

We met my mother and sisters for dinner at Big Bowl at the Galleria in Edina. My pad thai tasted like pepperoni pizza.

The good news is there's a clean changing table in the men's room. Also, the Galleria itself has private "family rooms," each with a changing table, a rocking chair, and a sink.

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Totally lame

It looks like we accepted the second contract offer with 67% in favor. I voted no. The only change I saw from the previous contract offer, which was terrible in my opinion [and was voted down] was that they added a $400 "signing bonus" [which will end up being about $250 after taxes, or did everybody forget the $1100 bribe to end the strike ended up being about $600?] and to make up for it turned the 30¢ raise into a 20¢ one. So what's different about it? We get $250 up front instead of slowly over the next 6 months. I don't know what we're so afraid of.

The bit I find personally insulting is that they could have given us a two-year offer instead of the three-year offer we got, which would have cost the state the massive sum of zero dollars. Instead, the next administration will be have an anti-transit policy towards the state's transit employees for the first half of the next term, whether they want it or not.

In better transit news, Peter McLaughlin's wife took the train downtown when she went into labor the other day. I like Rybak enough, but this is part of why I voted for McLaughlin. Sidenote: Whenever I hear Minneapolis heralded for electing a liberal mayor I always wonder if anybody remembers that he was the most conservative of the three main candidates.

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Mi & L'au, but no Josephine

Oh wow, this looks cool. Mi & L'au are playing St Paul (Turf Club) and Minneapolis (Rock Rock Rock) on two consecutive nights. I can't think of the last time a semi-obscure (by which I mean unfairly overshadowed by Young God labelmates Devendra and Akron/Family in the indie rock press) pulled that off. My first thought was that it's too bad I can't go (I'm not taking a 3 week old baby to the smoky Turf or the very loud Rock Rock Rock), but maybe my wife and I can alternate nights? It's a thought. Who wants to take us out?

The bad news is Josephine Foster and Born Heller (is Foster doing solo and band sets? Hot.) won't be joining them until two days after the Minneapolis Show.

I haven't had much of a chance to listen to much music lately, but the TToTM mix should be on time, as it was 90% finished in the first 10 days of January.

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Quick late night post-beer music complaining.

So apparently because I mentioned local band Tapes 'n Tapes a few weeks ago and Google picked it up, some of their fans have been wading through eight pages of Google results to find out who's mentioning the band. I'm getting several of these hits every day, which is sort of ridiculous. Some of these Tapes 'n Tapes apologists have even been declaring the band the greatest thing ever and mocked me for even thinking negative thoughts about them. That's some straight up Death Cab sty fanboyism. I feel sorry for the band though; they seem like the light-hearted sort that start bands just to have fun. And sure, looking back, I guess I do sound like I'm some sort of anti-tapesntapes zealot, but that's not even close to what's going on. I don't hate em, they're just not that great. They're not Cowboy Curtis bad. They're not Matt Marka bad. They're not at all Fiery Furnaces bad. They're just a slightly better-than-your-average-bear stroll down PFM lane. There's much worse things a band could do. Especially if they don't even take themselves seriously.

So here's some albums I've heard recently that I care to mention. I haven't heard anything too new in a few weeks. Dinosaur In Trouble turned me on to Thee More Shallows, which I've been listening to a ton and for which I'm very grateful, but I'm gonna have to say it's a 2004 album. It is the closest an album I hadn't yet heard has come to breaking up my list.

Some band called Metal Hearts has an album coming out on Suicide Squeeze that's a little bit bedroom pop and a little lo-fi dance, but completely lacks both the standout songwriting and the gravitational character of The Robot Ate Me or Thee More Shallows. It is, however, solid [3.4/5]. I finally got around to hearing A Day in Black & White's My Heroes Have Always Killed Cowboys (2004) and I was amazed. It's solid from start to finish and the post-hardcore Converge influence fits very nicely with the GY!BE style Post Rock they use for structure and melody. Very, very nice. Also kudos for making a short 30 minute album instead of boring us with your bad songs from 4 years ago just to hit the 45 minute mark. Way to find the lost art of making the EP [4.9/5]. I was also blown away by the brilliant Conference of the Birds by the Dave Holland Quartet (1972). It's some quality yet still quite accessible free jazz. I'd never heard of him before today, but I was reading about Albert Ayler on AMG and his name popped up a few times, then my RYM page happened to recommend him and voila, it's brilliant [4.8/5]. AIDS Wolf comes in a long line of good musicians (Yoni Wolf, Wolf Eyes, Howlin' Wolf, Wolf Parade) and a bad one (Patrick Wolf) to use Wolf (what did you think I was gonna say?) in their name. They're just left out of the first group. What we've got here is some interesting noise punk, but what they're got in interesting music they seem to lack in heart. It's not bad, but it'll probably soon be forgotten. The Lovvers LP [3.6/5] Junius has an EP called Blood is Bright that is not a bad Chamber style Post Rock record with singing [3.8/5]. By the way, Cloud Cult's singer sings the way Pat Robertson talks. Arcade Fire's Win Butler has the same problem. I know some people love it, but it drives me batty. I'm perfectly aware it's supposed to sound like they have as much invested in contemplating the lyrics as they have in the emotion they're trying to convey, but they sound constipated. That's not to say it's bad music. Cloud Cult has good melodies. They still need to work on lyrics (gravely). The production fits. On the other hand, Arcade Fire is just lame. That band is the reason I stopped listening to the Current.

Oh yeah, and the new B. Flieschmann, The Humbucking Coil, is dope dope dope.

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Pedro the Lion broke up (and stuff about books)

Sort of. TW Walsh quit (which means nothing to me) and Bazan is dropping the Pedro moniker for a while. He'll be doing stuff under his birth name for awhile. So nothing's really chaning except the letter of the bin you'll be looking in. He's got a demo of his new song The Devil Is Beating His Wife, which is really making me look forward to some new music. He's obviously still learning about the craft of songwriting.

Also Library Thing looks cool. Add your books and add me. I'm theblvd. Send me a message or a comment if you join.

On the subject of books, why are there zero non-topical new bookstores in Minneapolis? It's totally lame. I have to go to the unionized Borders in Calhoun Square just to appease my conscience. It's not that I don't do most of my book shopping at used shops (I adore Magers, Booksmart, and HBP), but you just need to buy new sometimes.

If you don't live in Minneapolis, you can search BookSense for what your local indie stores stock.

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Buses are free New Years Eve

I just wanted to mention, because people need to know these things. 12am Saturday to 3am Sunday.

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A new level in music geekery

So making the local year-end list sort of depressed me a little bit. There were only two good albums released locally in my opinion, and one of them is a band from Duluth. I was thinking about the not-too-distant past when we had classic albums by Lifter Puller, A Whisper in the Noise, 12Rods, Tiki Obmar, Mr Projectile, Kid Dakota, and The Plastic Constellations, just to name a few. Sure some of those have broken up or moved to another city, but the magic isn't gone, it just didn't happen as much this year. Brother Ali has an album in the works. Next year's TPC pwns for the most part. Cepia still hasn't made an full-length. Ryan Olcott has a something going on; I've heard him play a couple tracks and it's ridiculously good. So in spite of the dubious honor of being the home of Fitzgerald and Har Mar, it's still not a bad town for music, even if Tapes n Tapes and Heiruspecs are supposed to be the hot acts (that's just a little embarassing).

On to the geekery! I have made a very scientific list of what the best areas for music for 2005, based on my top 80. I have the areas split in to arbitrary political borders. My formula is basically population per album, weighted for how good the albums are, and set to a curve with the top location getting a score of 1. I limited the list to locations with more than one album on the list. Sorry, Boston! So it turns out Minnesota's not that bad when you factor in population.

Countries

1. Iceland (1.00)
2. Sweden (20.54)
3. United States (37.80)
4. Denmark (40.28)
5. Canada (58.23)
6. France (109.02)
7. United Kingdom (140.04)
8. Germany (146.45)

US States

1. Washington (1.00)
2. Oregon (1.06)
3. New York (1.95)
4. Illinois (2.60)
5. Minnesota (3.00)
6. California (3.79)
7. Ohio (6.92)
8. Texas (13.33)

US Cities

1. Seattle, WA (1.00)
2. Portland, OR (1.02)
3. SF/Berkeley/Oakland, CA (1.62)
4. Austin, TX (2.63)
5. Chicago (3.80)
6. San Diego, CA (4.62)
7. New York (7.80)
8. Los Angeles, CA (9.95)

Countries on the list with one album: New Zealand, Norway, Finland, Australia, Spain, Germany

Previously: Local Top 10, Top 65 Albums of 2005

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Another day, another list

I because curious of what good music came out this year from Minnesota, so I went through what I heard. It wasn't a good year for Minnesota. It's telling that only two of this list made my Top 65 List, compared with four just in the top 21 from Washington (California and Illinois also had good showings). But here are 10 Minnesota albums that don't suck (New York albums with a part time Minnesotan drummer count):

1. Fog - 10th Avenue Freakout
2. Low - The Great Destroyer
3. Dosh - Powder Horn
4. Chariots - Congratulations
5. Dwindle - History Is Easy
6. Halloween, Alaska - Too Tall To Hide
7. The Bad Plus - Suspicious Activity?
8. Dallas Orbiter - Magnesium Fireflies
9. Robert Skoro - That These Things Could Be Ours
10. Happy Apple - The Peace Between Our Companies

Previously: Top 65 Records of 2005

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New Buses?

Well, it looks like we're going to see some new buses rolling around the Twin Cities soon. According to the article, Metro has an order with New Flyer of Winnipeg (with two of the company's three plants in Minnesota) for 51 buses. 15 of them are high floor articulated buses (just like the double/accordian ones we've already got) and the other 36 are low floor forty-foot, which are not the high-floor forty-foot buses made by Gillig that we've been using for the last twenty years. It's not a completely new bus - we've got something like ten of this style that are the big blue hybrid buses (7100 series), and ten more that they tested in 1994 (I haven't seen one of these in a few years - they were cool but sloooooooooow) but we've never ordered anything like 36 of a tester bus. Maybe we're going a similar direction with agencies in Seattle and Portland, who seem to have low-floor on most of their new buses.. The benefit of low vs high floor (we've had twenty years of Gillig high-floor) is that low floor makes travel faster and is more accessible to the elderly and disabled. The tradeoff is that there are less seats, so on busy routes (which we have here like nothing in Seattle or Portland) more people have to stand. That's not a bad thing in my book, though. Could this be the end of Gillig in Minneapolis? I hope so.

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As a far-left progressive liberal, bite me, ACLU

ACLU: You're way off on your siding with people who operate motor vehicles recklessly. Sorry, but the right to walk across a street in a marked crosswalk with a green light more than trumps any supposed right people have to drive their automobiles through a crowd of people because they're running late for a soccer practice.

Way to kill civil liberties while siding with the upper class. Sounds awful right-wing to me.

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Remind me to complain about this on my blog, pt. 3

Minneapolis is the single worst-run city I've ever been in. There are seriously no city services. And for once I'm not talking about how the city council spends two-thirds of its time telling developers that they can't build a four-story building on an empty lot because it's "too high". What got me going this time was the traffic signal on Hennepin and Lagoon. For those not in the know, it's a very busy intersection. It's also very important because it needs to work in step with Lake and Hennepin, just half a block away, to keep traffic moving, as it's part of the same one-way street system. Anyway, on Saturday, the traffic light at Lagoon was flashing red. The city said they can't fix it until Monday morning. That's fine, whatever, maybe they don't have anybody working weekends. Minneapolis isn't a 24-hour city, it's not a seven day per week city, and I don't expect it to act like one. It's a small little city with a 2:1 residents:cops ratio with an out of control violent crime problem. That's what's bothering me. With that 2:1 ratio (that's an exaggeration by the way, there aren't really 185,000 cops in Minneapolis, it just feels like it) you'd think they might be able to do something about something. On Sunday, there were four Minneapolice at 50th and James directing traffic for a church service, mainly for the pedestrians. I know the church probably payed the city for the service, but here's my point. When a traffic signal is causing traffic backups for eight blocks in four directions, why can't a city with too many cops send maybe just one of them out to direct traffic? Especially at a traffic signal that controls one of the four intersections in Minneapolis that actually has pedestrians (Q. What's Minneapolitan for pedestrian? A. Somebody who's car broke down). Maybe the answer lies in getting the Minneapolice to be useful. That is, stop harassing brown people and write a few traffic tickets. Of course if they did that, there'd be a huge backlash with groups accusing them of racially profiling because they'd end up with a majority of people stopped over North being brown people. You seriously can't win. Can some other city please hire me?

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52 Minnesotans can't be wrong

Hey, thanks City Pages Blotter for the Minnesota Blog of the Day mention there. Since I'm hosting this site on my own, I hope nobody had any problems loading anything. If you're new here, welcome. I'm really not as crabby as I pretend to be online. Although I have to admit, if i had known before my food post that there would be new people here numbering in the double digits, I might have complained about lots more stuff. Like the people who run in front of 40 mph traffic without looking, just to get on a bus that comes by every five minutes. Or something. Anyway it's my day off, so I don't have anything work-related to say. Other than the elderly white lady on Sunday who got on the bus, and when she noticed that there was nobody else on there she said "Good! Now I won't have to listen to some drunk cracker!"

By the way, CP had it backwards, I drive at night, and blog the next morning. Transit Librarian tells even better stories, but he'll not be driving the bus for a few months. So stay tuned over there for some new driver training stories! He also doesn't have RSS. Overtime tomorrow night, 146 and 115. I love the 115.

On the subject of people showing up to this site out of the blue, here's some of the better Google searches that resulted in people finding my blog lately:

• awesome new brewers uniforms
• hahahaha
• someones death in harvard, il
• mature nudists couples (wha? stupid comment spam)
• bus driver bathroom breaks (heh good luck with that one, you might as well search for pictures of unicorns)

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Here's a great idea

TC Sidewalks had a great idea involving taking the 18 layover north of the new library and turning it into a park, thus expanding Gateway Park from First St. to Fourth St. along Nicollet Mall. I think it would be perfect, providing the block directly east of the library is developed into something involving retail. It's right on the border of the North Loop and Downtown. With a large apartment building (albeit with a horrible setback and ugly street-level parking lot) and a brand new condo project directly west of the new library, a Whole Foods with residences and retail northwest, and the Mall to the east, that lot would serve as an ideal place for a park, making a true gateway. Who knows, maybe with that many people around, the Mall might actually be able to attract an actual retail magnet!

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"I'm holding up a 10"

I stopped on the mall today and Transit Librarian was in the bus going the other way. He was waiting for his time at 8th. After I leaned out and said hey, he told me to apologize to the 10 bus behind him for making him wait (unlike on an actual transit mall, we're not allowed to pass on our mall). This is just my way of letting him know that I happened to stop by the 10 bus's window and I did apologize for him. The driver just shrugged and said "what are ya gonna do?"

I'm trying something I picked up from the drivers in Portland. It's really helping my mood, the mood of my passengers, and it makes the day go much more quickly. When I call out a street, I've been calling out points of interest. This has actually made me like Minneapolis a bit more. There's actually something worth calling at almost every stoplight. I'm not calling out chainstores, because they don't need any help. 28th street seems to be a wasteland though. I can't think of anything for Nicollet or Lyndale on 28th. (Help would be appreciated. The best part of doing this: "Nicollet and Lake! Big K in the Way!" The best routes for interesting points of interest, in order: 2 (all those co-ops and it never leaves the city), the 6 (yeah no kidding), the 4 (lyndale, obviously, but johnson is turning very cool), the 18 (Nicollet is the new uptown) When there's a transfer point, I'll call out the route number and the current time. I think it's been helpful, although in the last two days, three people have asked me "what time itizzz" within 3 seconds of me saying it. Oh well.

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How do these people get these jobs?

Old headline: "Study cuts downtown Minneapolis down to size"
New headline: "Minneapolis looks more like Detroit than success, researcher says" (lol burn!)

Vaguely interesting article, that lady almost knows what she's talking about. Until she starts to ignore statistics. Oh yeah and is amazed that Minneapolis has a Field's downtown.

"Minneapolis is really unusual in having as much downtown retail as it has," she said. "How many downtowns still have department stores? Zero! And what's really amazing that you also have the Mall of America!"

Well, lets see, starting with the cities I've been too... all of them. I think Portland was the only downtown with just one.

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Fourteen weeks at a time

I could have gotten Sunday, Monday, and Christmas off like the Ceejster, but I decided I should stick with the straight runs instead of those short splits I would have had to take, to spend more time at home. So I picked nine hour work and took Tuesday and Wednesday off. The good part of this is I'm 14th in line for overtime on Wednesdays, and I'm about 100th in line on Saturdays.

So I'll be spending fourteen weeks on the 6 and the 46, which isn't bad at all. Half the time I'll be driving around yuppies and college kids, and during the other half I won't be driving anybody around (heh heh I kid - the 46 can take it).

Sat: 2:45p to 11:24p on the 6
Sun: 10:16a to 6:54p on the 46
Mon: 3:12p to 11:59p on the 6
Tue: off
Wed: off
Thu: Short day 3:41p to 6:11p on the 156
Fri: 12:06p to 8:56p on the 46

That Friday run should be nice, instead of going to work I'll just have to walk 3 blocks and pick up by bus en route. Unless our house sells and we move to uptown or Loring Park or something. Then my 6 line will be nicer.

On Christmas and New Years I'll be working the 4 bus from 6p to 2a. That's gonna be a long day.

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The Bad Waitress

We ate breakfast at the newly opened Bad Waitress on 26th and Nicollet today. We really liked it. The food was just fine, even though they don't have my Tabasco. We liked the atmosphere as well. It doesn't look like a brand new building on the inside (unless you look at the ceiling). I didn't have a chance to look through the jukebox, but hey, cool there's a jukebox. The atmosphere points out something about Minneapolis, or at least southside (I can't speak for the NE hipsters, but their culture seems more like the common sort you'll find anywhere), and that is that Minneapolis hipster culture -- much like Minneapolis urban planning and yuppie culture -- feels like it sprang up separate from the typical national culture. That is, there's no woodland deer hunting feel, the music you hear at the cooler places is rarely Pitchfork's Best New Music or the ironic music style du jour (is it still New Wave? WTF?) , and nobody ever says anything like "Pabst is so Minneapolis."

So, yeah, we'll go back. I wonder if they have drink specials.

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I drive bus

Eugene, OR drivers complaining about lack of bathroom breaks. Good luck with that, the company will always say they don't pressure you to run on time, even when they'll suddenly write you up for running late.

Philadelphia transit workers are back to work after a week, but...

Pittsburgh could strike within two weeks. Go Pennsylvania!

By the way, you can look at aerial pictures of houses in Hennepin County now.

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Remind me to complain about this on my blog, pt. 2

We went out with a bunch of people for Chinese food at Village Wok in University Village. I ate there once about six years ago, and I was less than impressed with my visit. It had to do with a long wait to get in, only to be served below average food. Tonight I ordered fried rice with chicken. After a forty minute wait, it finally arrived. I took a bite -- YUK. It tasted like charcoal. I got the order replaced with sweet and sour chicken. Guess what? It smelled like a barbeque pit in the park. Disgusting. The bathrooms are gross too.

I wanna go to Little T's next time.

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Election Tuesday!

I have to say, it took me a while to figure out the difference between Rybak and McLaughlin, but in the end, McLaughlin is gonna get my vote. He's much better on worker's rights, knows a new baseball stadium will generate new revenue, and most importantly, thinks the city zoning code needs a major overhaul (as opposed to Rybak, who wants to keep all new buildings under 2 stories and focus on developing downtown).

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There goes the neighborhood.

A naked dead man was found three blocks from where I live in some random guys front yard.

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Day six

Today we woke up and went over to the Pearl District and had lunch at the Byways Cafe, a nice little diner type place with cheap breakfast. It kinda remined me of my grandmother's house. We spent the next five or six hours just basically meandering around the neighborhood. They've done a great job building it up. There are a lot of old buildings, but there are also a lot of new condos, most of which appeared to be less than 7 or 8 years old. Seriously, Minneapolis gets four new condo projects and all the sudden everybody starts complaining about "too many condos" and "the city is too vertical". To those people I say grow up. There was a real cool little home store called Relish that drove me crazy. It had all the things I've been drooling about online actually in the store! I saw Amenity sheets and Lotta Jansdotter designs in the flesh! We got sandwiches from the Whole Foods and ate them in a little park nearby. The streetcar was kinda cool. It's a Czech tram, I forgot who built it.

We went back to the hotel for a little for our little midday "pregnant lady needs to lie down for a bit while her husband frantically makes notes of addresses of stores and restaurants and bus lines" rest. We decided on more downtown stuff. We still haven't really gotten out into the neighborhoods yet but there's still time. There's more to do near downtown Portland than Minneapolis, Seattle, Chicago, and San Francisco combined. We made a quick detour by the world's smallest park, which was a severe dissappointment. The bush and the sign was gone and it was just a pile of dirt with half a dead cactus sitting in it. Imagine a sad face on Ryan. We weren't quite hungry yet so we went over to this place called Ground Kontrol. It's a 25¢ video arcade almost completely filled with pre-1988 video consoles. And they have a bar. And it's 21+. We really suck at video games so we went though four bucks pretty quickly, but still. We'll probably go back and waste more money there. Basically every single person I can think of would go apeshit in there. And it wasn't all lonely wierd dudes, there were lonely wierd ladies there too. After that we walked a few blocks down to Old Town Pizza. We sat in a little sofa in a little nook and had what is billed as Portland's best pizza. It was super cool looking in there, with couches, tables, little nooks all over the place, brick walls. After scoffing at "only 30 toppings" we got a pretty damn good Artichoke and Olive (big surprise there) pizza. We were walking down Burnside to the Bus Mall to try to find a late night coffeeshop to kill time in when somebody pointed at us and yelled "Hey I know you" which scared the shit out of me because I don't know anybody from anywhere near Portland. It was the front desk lady from the hotel. We talked for a little and told her we were looking for a late night cafe and she said her and her friend were going to a bar right next to one. We followed her down there and it was open, but it was small and had some synth emo band with indie girls bouncing all over the place. We decided to skip it and go down to this place called Tiny's on Hawthorne. The hotel lady told us there's a newer Tiny's on MLK Blvd. (which would make it much easier to get back to the hotel on the bus) so we went up to that one even though I didn't know the cross street. We finally found it, and it closed at 9. I asked some people in Seattle and Portland if there are any late night coffeshops. 10pm is the latest we've seen. In Minneapolis 10pm is the time the old lady coffeeshops like Anodyne close. I thought the pacific northwest was all up in that coffee shit, but I guess it's nothing like Minneapolis. We named 10 places in Mpls that are open past midnight. We really take that for granted. Add that to the list of reasons Mpls is actually pretty cool (next to the smallest city with 5 minute bus service, better artichoke dip, more tall bikes, and more pizza toppings than countries in Europe.

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Feeling left out

I was wondering yesterday while I was driving if any other cities named a street after Minneapolis. After all, we have streets named for Chicago, Portland, Oakland, Ontario, Columbus (possibly not related to Ohio, but it's next to two other city-named streets, and Minneapolis usually has a theme to the street names in an area)

The best I could find was a Minneapolis Ave. in Amery, WI.

(Hey, we made out better than St. Paul. They had to name one after themselves.)

UPDATE: Kassie notes that we did have to name one after ourselves. When we're looking for a new pad I'm definately hoping my address will be 2121 Minneapolis, Minneapolis, Minnesota

This 6 route I had yesterday and today is super sweet. I felt like I worked for 3 hours. It's 12:52p to about 8p. And the schedule is possible. I actually had to wait a few times for my time.

On friday I drove the 17. Northbound, there are two 17s. The 17 Downtown and the 17W Washington. Going through downtown it's very common for somebody to ask if the bus goes to Washington, even when you're a 17 Downtown. The W bus goes down the Washington that is over northeast. There is also a Washington near the north end of downtown. Anyway after answering so many questions that have the same answer ("No, I just end downtown") I just sorta answer and sorta not answer. I mean people should be able to tell the difference between 17 and 17W, most of them are the same people multiple times. I usually just say "I only go downtown" and leave it at that. Well after four and a half years with the company somebody finally wanted to go to Washington downtown. Breaking news.

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Car slams into the Heywood building

Wow, a car slammed into Heywood this morning.

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They'll even have beer!

The Bad Waitress sounds real cool. Same owner as Spyhouse, except with more food. Good stuff.

Today I was driving the 2 line. It's probably the line I have the second hardest time keeping on time, behind the 17. I've gotten as high as 18 minutes late just with normal operating a few times this week, I've had maybe 3 out of the 44 trips I've done end up on time (two of which were during that huge rainstorm on Wednesday). The driver who picked it has been off work for a while now, so a different extra board driver has had the work for the week for the last couple months. I had it this week. Today a supervisor called me on the radio and asked me if it's my regular run. He was trying to figure out why he gets so many complaints about how late it is. I told him I just had it this week and it's been a different person each week. Hopefully something gets fixed, because as bad as it is for the drivers, it's ten times worse for the passengers. Anyway, at one point today I was 4 minutes late driving west on Franklin when I stopped at Tenth Ave. Amazingly, nobody wanted off and nobody was waiting at any stop until First Ave. That's nine blocks, just over half a mile. Even more shocking: I hit every green light on the way. I was driving a hair over the speed limit without having to slow down once. At First Avenue, I was still four minutes late. If the only way to keep on time is to not pickup passengers or stop at stoplights, there's definitely a problem.

We're putting our house on the market soon. Our next door neighbors have moved out. They were a bunch of deaf old guys, who we though might possibly have been selling pot on the side (hand-made small crafts was my other theory). We used to complain about how they used to wake us up at night raiding the neighborhood's recycling bins for soda cans that they would fill with rocks and then hammer so they could get more cash for the weight. One time they had a visitor who kept us up all night because she was running around in the street screaming at the top of her lungs. Zakcq and Jessica probably remember that night. We now have new neighbors. They've been accused of dealing drugs and also of prostitution. A car parked behind the apartment building exploded a few weeks ago. Arson is suspected. There are fist fights in their yard in the daytime. I've heard gunshots. They're up screaming at each other in the alley almost every night.

I miss our old drug-dealer neighbors.

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Huh?

Today at the top of the offramp from 35W to Diamond Lake Rd there was a middle-aged man standing on the corner with a homeless sign like you see so much on Minneapolis’s on and offramps. What made this one interesting is that the sign the fella was holding wasn’t a scrap of cardboard—it was an 15” Apple G4 Powerbook with a screensaver that displayed his veteran status, his desire for a job, and a phone number at which he could be reached.

As i write this, it’s nearly 5pm on December 30 in Minneapolis, where it’s now 48° F and raining. To think exactly one week ago it was -15° F.

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