I love this neighborhood

It was one of those unexpectedly nearly perfect days in October (OTUNPDIO???).  After lunch, and after a chat with the African Prairie Princess, I took a walk around the neighborhood to take in the sights, the fresh air, and the view of newly fallen leaves. There are lots of quite interesting happenings and Halloween decorations in the blocks around my house. One of the Halloween decorations had a skeleton and a bunch of faux graves - all in a row with familiar names on the stones. I should have taken a photo.  One was Frank N. Stein - a usual and expected casualty of Halloween, but the stone at the far right read "Cookie Monster." That seems to be a bit out of line for even Halloween.  It's too soon to be putting the Cookie Monster in that position.  I think I protest.

The most interesting thing on today's walk was the seemingly sudden emergence of these little free libraries. It's a small box with books than can be borrowed at any time for free.  I encountered three of them in my neighborhood and it seems to be the fruit of some kind of movement to fight illiteracy. It's an international movement, I hear, and there are over 3,000 of them in the USA. There is also a web site.

I walked a bit further and came across some folk art in the process of being born.  Some people have a sense of humor, even when decorating their garage door. I love this neighborhood.

I tried to do some translating on the telephone with PP this afternoon, because her internet ran out of minutes and she couldn't figure out how to get more. She called from her research station in Amani Nature Reserve in Tanzania. Her access to the internet was denied. The instructions on how to order more internet minutes came to her in a text message from the phone company - Vodacom - in Swahili. "Google translate" seemed like a good option, and my computer was available. She read the words to me. She struggled with reading the text because her phone has a failing display which is blurring some of the words. Finally after some frustration and failures we got to this in what we thought was Swahili:

"salio lako lai toshi kuti surushi kufurushi"

I keyed it into Google translate. It was translated to:

"Your balance lai enough packaged coconut leaf surushi"

Which absolutely released a torrent of laughter from us both. (And don't call me "surushi!").

Here's a photo from about 1987-8 of the principals in the struggle with a foreign language and a foreign culture.  And a balky foreign phone company.

It was a tennis-less Tuesday, but I needed a day off to recover and to contemplate the new decade, perhaps to arrive at some sort of plan of action to deal with it.

The Minnesota State Fair's third day

After a morning of not very inspiring tennis, I went with the Prairie Princess to the Minnesota State Fair where she was to work in the booth dedicated to her candidate for governor, Ken Pentel. We got there early enough to get a photo of PP with the two candidates of the Ecology Democracy Party, Ken Pentel, and his running mate Erin Wallace. They were spending most of the day in the booth and PP has a four hour shift this evening.

After meeting the candidate we explored the fairgrounds. I'm not much of a big crowd guy, but I was there and there are a few things that are fun to take in. We saw another of the candidates for guv, Tom Horner the Independence Party candidate, talking to some fair goers. He's another guy that doesn't seem very likely to get elected. He's likely to finish third in November and Ken will be probably scratch out a fourth place finish.

Speaking of crowds, check out the population of one of the walking streets in the popular part of the fair, the part where it is easy to buy some of the popular food "on a stick" and the high calorie deep fat fried cheese curds. The fair set attendance records the first two days - each in the area of 110,000 attendees - and today looks like another record. That's a lot of cheese curds.

We visited the DNR building and the Minnesota Conservation Corps (MCC) booth where PP is also known. We talked for a while to her former boss at MCC, and he had good things to say about her and her work.

PP and I visited the Fine Arts building where the folk art of Minnesota is displayed each year. The Strib reviewer in today's paper seemed to dislike most of this year's efforts, but there were some noteworthy works there ... and a crush of people checking out the paintings, photos, sculptures and drawings.

We also ran into some familiar faces at the fair - something that seems likely with that many folks in one place. Near the Horticulture Building we ran into Andy and Tula. They were wandering about carrying their favorite beverages when we ran into them on our way to the International Bazaar to get some food. I didn't get a photo, but they have appeared on this blog (and Santini's) several times in the last year.

Prairie Princess endorses Ken Pentel

Flowers are in their prime this time of year - even with the current heat wave they seem to stand out and do their best to attract the buzzing bees.

I played some tennis with the geezers. It was a two bottles of Powerade day - one per set. It always seems like on hot box days I have long, close sets. Again today, I had two close sets and finished playing until almost six o'clock. 7-6, 5-7. The temperature was still 88 on my car thermometer on the way home.

Big news from PP's political party. Apparently she decided to endorse a candidate, Ken Pentel. Here's a photo of Ken Pentel, the Ecology Democracy Party (EDP) candidate for Minnesota's governor.



Ken Pentel is a 49 year-old Minnesota native and former Green Party gubernatorial candidate with 11 years of work experience with Greenpeace and 12 years of work experience developing the Minnesota Green Party. Ken is the founding director of the Ecology Democracy Network.

He is also a hardcore bicycle rider having ridden 6000 miles in two years in campaigning around the state. He has a Wikipedia article here. Here is another shot of him on his bike (photo by Kelsey) as he campaigned earlier this year in Minneapolis.

Minnesota politics are great.

Simulated Avalanche

We are in the middle of a snow event. We have had snow continuously for 24 hours and are expecting, according to the weather experts, the snow to continue until noon tomorrow. I've been out for two rounds of snow removal with my trusty snow shovel and the two snow throwers that live here. There is a certain cold beauty that a good snowstorm brings to the land.

Before I began the first round I took a photo out the back door. The snow was still and white and waiting expectantly to be moved. And so I did.



The first round was aided by the efforts of the Prairie Princess. We were done with the job and rested on our shovels in front of the house. So I captured her image.

News item: "A skier was buried beneath an avalanche for 17 hours in the Swiss Alps before being pulled from the snow with only minor hypothermia. The 21 year-old man appeared to have survived because he was trapped next to a pocket of air." - Today's Strib



After the first round I roamed around the neighborhood a while, admiring the way the snow engulfed the landscape. And I mailed a letter at the mailbox on Oxford. The streets looked pretty much like the photo below. I stopped in the middle of Fairmount to snap the picture, knowing that the traffic today was light and moving slow. St Paul is expected to declare a snow emergency sometime in the next 24 hours, but so far not so much. I suspect that plowing will not improve the street surface much at all. Minneapolis is plowing tonight.



Most of the rest of the day was eating and planning what to eat. When Unky Herb came home tonight we shoveled round two. The main course for dinner was Santini's "squash in the oven." That and mac and cheese with eggs ala moohoo - spiced with the correct amount of dill. And bean salad. And herring. After a day of shoveling there is no need for gourmet cooking. Yum.

That cooking blog is coming in handy.



Tennis for tomorrow has been canceled due to injury to one of the anticipated participants. A second consecutive day of rest.

"So much of life is disappointment. That's why we have art." -Joyce Carol Oates

Cookout

The Prairie Princess planned a cookout for her MCC compatriots and she planned it for November 9, today. As luck would have it, the weather turned decidedly glorious. Who'd a thunk it? Sixty degrees on November 9, weather warm enough for bare feet. I hung around for a photo or two and also to sample the food. PP made bison burgers and wild rice with mushrooms and onions. We had three bean salad and the MCC guys and gals brought additional vittles. Here's PP hanging out by the grill in bare feet. It was a nice feast, and I got to partake.



I also managed to get the group to pose for a picture. They are funny people and the joking and laughing was out of control, but you can see by the photo that they were enjoying themselves. Then I went off to Hidden Falls for a walk in the wilds while the young'uns socialized. They're an entertaining bunch.



Funny story. My patio furniture rotted away a couple of years ago and I haven't replaced the table. PP and I thought we should have a table for the cookout, so we went to Menard's yesterday to buy some patio furniture. The signs indicated "Patio Furniture" above the department where they used to have patio furniture. They apparently moved that all to storage a couple of months ago and filled the space with Christmas decorations. There was not a single patio table to be had. We improvised for the cookout and it worked okay. I had an old card table and we used upside town waste baskets for coffee tables. I'm getting a new table next spring while there is a selection.

Other points of interest. Yesterday was Sunday and the weather was even better than today. So the GTA geezers played two sets of tennis outside, in the wind. Outdoors tennis on November 8. And we're scheduled to do it again tomorrow. We're starting later, about three pm and, given the shortness of the days lately, we'll be lucky to get in one set before the sun deserts us. But it will be outdoors tennis in November in Minnesota.

The order of months has apparently changed this year. Now it's August, September. October, and September again. I am not against it.

Double Doors

With a theme day titled "doors," you might expect at least a few photos of Jim Morrison, at least from bloggers of a certain age. I passed up the obvious and am posting the doors to The Fred Wells Tennis Center. It's a place that I use twice a week and so I pass through these doors at least four times a week. Today was no exception. We played at 2:30 and that meant missing most of the first half of the highly hyped football game of the local pro gridders flailing away at the Packers in Green Bay. The local boys managed to beat the cheesehead favorites and everyone in Minnesota seemed happier for at least a little while. Today's tennis sets at Fred Wells went well, too. The doors appear to be propped open by a pumpkin, perhaps a nod to the recently completed candy wolfing holiday.



PP went to a Halloween party last night and I'm including a photo of her costume. She went as a pirate, complete with a parrot and a sword. [Not a real sword or even a real parrot.] She managed to survive the party and is safe again from the demons of Halloween. I guess she learned a little about her coworkers and the evil firewater.


November is here. And immediately it warmed into the fifties. I feel somewhat encouraged.

Venus in Eclipse

I admit it. I went to the Fair, not once, but twice. It's an experience that I won't repeat this year, but it was, as the old Norwegians are wont to say, different. PP was working at the MCC booth by the DNR area, so I stopped and picked her up as her shift ended and we took this photo of her pretending to be an MCC employee in the photo cutout. She actually is an MCC employee and has, on several occasions, wielded a chain saw. So, other than the wooden-like stance, it could be a photo of her at work.

Then we toured around the fairgrounds. We ate some of the on-a-stick gastronomic delights(?), like the alligator and a pronto pup, visited the International Bazaar, and generally checked out the Minnesota people out in public and on display. I had a tour of the Poultry Barn while PP was working, and only later thought that I could have encountered the bird flu in that venue. But I wasn't alone. Apparently Garrison Keillor spent some time there this week, too. I was struck by the variety of chickens that people raise, some of which are quite attractive birds, yet when one buys chicken meat in stores there is no mention of the variety that one is buying. Apparently they are all the same, at least taste-wise.



The other must-go exhibit for me is the fine arts display. The range of art work is wide, but there are a lot of very talented artists in Minnesota that enter their work for ribbons and a chance to be displayed. I personally like the sculpture and the oil paintings.

I found the car parks in the Como area pretty interesting, as did Mr Moohoo on his blog. My next photo is of some one's second income source. The $15 rate for parking seems pretty excessive, but they are filling their yards and collecting their fees. It was and is possible to park free at Highway 94 and Snelling and catch the bus to the Fair, also for free. It's hard to knock the free enterprise system though.



Venus lost her match this afternoon to the resurgent Kim Clijsters at the US Open, 6-0, 0-6, 6-4. It was a very weird match with the two offsetting bagel sets, before a hard fought third set. Clijsters is returning to the game after having a baby girl. The only mother, that I can remember to ever win a grand slam event was the athletic Evonne Goolagong. Clijsters has a few obstacles to winning this one, including Serena, but she's in the quarter finals. It's all a pretty good show.

Dragon Boat Races

Unky Herb was part of the dragon boat races at Lake Phalen today and so PP and I went over to see how he would do. It was part of Asian American Day celebration and festival. He was part of a 20 person team (the Flying Dragons) that paddled and otherwise inspired paddling in a contest that included about 20 teams from various organizations and companies in the Twin Cities. UH has practiced some over the last few weeks and today was the test. The first shot is the finish of their second heat of the day. UH is in the green boat in the foreground, paddling as fast and powerfully as he can. They were touched out by about a second in the race. But the day was pretty successful. They finished fourth and received a trophy and medals went to all the members. Plus they had a bunch of good Asian eats all day from the Flying Dragons support team.



This is UH's team, or at least the male members of the squad. The women were in a later photo which I missed out on. But these guys were an important part of the race engine and appear to be having a good time. And they were. PP and I were there for moral support, but also were able to track down some Mung egg rolls, Nepalese momo, Thai veggie pad thai and California roll sushi. Good eats all around.



After the races, PP wanted to go to Norway Day at Minnehaha Park to see if they had any rummagrot (or however you spell that rich Norski pudding). They were out of it. But the falls are there and I thought to have a look. The creek was basically dry, and no water was falling over the edge. It's a rare day when the creek is dry, but part of the low water effect is deliberate. They are still working on shoring up the creek bed to lessen the chance of wall collapse.


The Norway Day crowd was sparser and more subdued than the Dragon Boats, but they are more familiar ethnically and there was music and art displays from Nordic organizations in the area.