Times in the hood

Grand Old Day- Grand Ave St. Paul Minnesota. A state fair teaser, but since it's Grand Old DAY (singular) you have with comfort of knowing you're not getting food fried in week old grease. Fresh-grease fried mini donuts.

Since I live a block away from Grand I decided to go for it and do everything, starting with the 5K. I discovered running with a big group of people is fun, and cheering spectators are a helpful feature that should be installed along all the cities' running paths. Also helpful when running races: training. I left that part out... but, whatever. Formal registration ensured I was up and going at the unthinkable weekend hour of 8AM.

The other wonderful part about Grand Old Day is the collection of music tents that allows you to stage-hop down the street and check out tons of bands. Outdoor music is great because it's always super fun, regardless of quality.

One band was some kind of rap group that tried to establish gansta' street cred by taking the stage and immediately shouting, 'We're from mother f---in St. Paul!' This attempt failed because they pointed out they were from St. Paul. They probably rode their bikes to the concert venue, stopping for lunch at the local food co-op. Another band, 'Iron City', was better despite a tendency to convert 5 minute songs into 15 minute self-indulgent ballads. Rain, unfortunately, put an end to their iPod shuffle playlist of Prince, Bob Marley and Johnny Cash, so we had to buy some cheese curds and make a quick exit.

This type of thing always makes me excited for the State Fair. Last year, probably due to misguided ideas about wise usage of time and money, I didn't go. This year, I've recovered and will go twice.

Because no one wants to be TOO nice...

Sometimes I worry my level of snarkiness is getting out of control. Fortunately whenever this happens something always reassures me I'm just a novice in abrasive sarcasm. In this instance it's an e-card site full of delightfully caustic messages forwarded to me by Sal, fellow web-browsing-while-at-worker.

Site: someecards.com

Some favorites:

Stuff I like Part 2

I'm still pretty into all the stuff mentioned in Part 1 (which you'll have to view at www.myspace/iowafarmgirl.com) but during the past year I've discovered some new stuff.

One: Cathedral Hill St. Paul, MN.

The address is quite self-descriptive and for the past year I've been lucky enough to live in this historical neighborhood. Selby Avenue has the vintage, hand-painted-wallpaper-glamour of my favorite restaurant, W.A. Frost, situated within old brownstone apartments. A block over is Summit Avenue, where I live, a street lined with old houses that all have ballrooms and secret passageways. These are not (*eye roll*) mcmansions but unique, fantastic examples of great architecture.

Two: Beethoven. In high school I learned part of Piano Sonata No. 8 in C minor, recently I decided to learn the entire piece. At first I thought I could do it in a year, then I listed to a recording of the work and realized I'm way out of my league. It's totally fine for you stop reading, listen to a sound clip of the Rondo, Allegro and laugh hysterically at the futility of my endeavor. The one year time table has been multiplied by about 40. This will be just in time for serious nursing home stardom.

Four: I've fallen back in love with the public library. I still believe in building a personal library, but bad memories from a recent move leave me reluctant to buy more heavy objects.

Plus the library is f-r-e-e and when I'm looking at all the available books, CDs and movies I get the same feeling I have when I'm about to spend too much money on shoes. I regularly scour the music section for recordings of upcoming MN Opera productions and can now say a couple things in Russian thanks to some language CDs.

Ahem: Trashy food! I love beef jerky and corn nuts. You wish I was kidding. Fortunately for bystanders, I also enjoy mints and gum.

Punctuality. On average each person spends 42 days of their life waiting for someone else. Yes, I just made that up but any amount time is too much. People making other people wait around is rude and being late is stressful. So we should not do those things.

Six: The Minnesota Opera has a young professionals club called Tempo and last year I joined the board. This is completely fun. We plan all kinds of great stuff, like Opera Taste- a mix of opera and wine tasting (get ready to put it on your calendar!!), and get to hang out at after-parties with singers and artists. With my characteristic flair for moderation I'm now on every possible committee.

An ode to the house party

I'm in a bit of an anti-restaurant/going out phase. It will probably end soon. But remember a long time ago when people had dinner parties and dances? Instead of complicated evenings spent gallivanting about town, people opened their homes to friends for evenings of socializing, sharing of musical gifts and buffalo wings. According to the following case studies we should do more of this.

Recently I attended a Mexican food night. Our lovely hostess provided delicious strawberry margaritas, several people participated in themed apparel - complete with mustaches, and I was a key player in a game of domino setting up and knocking over. I also learned how to play 3 chords on the guitar.

This other time, not too long ago, I was at this apartment. APARTMENT. Here's a picture.

Stealthy eavesdropping reveals a couple bachelor lawyers gutted about 1/4 of an apartment building (floors 1-3) and created the coolest, retro tacky fabulous place in existence. They have a bandstand- with overlooking balconies, a water fall and a bridge.

At this one Oscar party I went to the hostess provided so much wonderful food I felt a little guilty. Plan to reciprocate. Yay! Another party! And not only did I win the Oscar pool, I didn't need to eat the next day.

As you can see, hanging out at someone's house is fun! And more relaxed. No restaurant stress with reservations, space, lingering too long, grumpy waiters, timing of the bill. Yeesh. Who does that? Hosting can be very low maintenance. Consider the following invitation:

Friend: Hey do you guys wanna come over.
Group of friends: Sure.

This is pretty conclusive evidence. So until I feel like going 'out' again, please invite me to your place. And of course I'll host something too.

Words of Wisdom

Recuerda que a veces, no conseguir lo que quieres es un maravilloso golpe de suerte.

foto

Fashion photography!

This ad for Akris is super sharp.

News bulletin

Thursday marked the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. In celebration of the anniversary Iran is enriching some uranium! But just to 20% purity (90% is the benchmark for nuclear weapons) for use in a medical-research reactor- so it maybe doesn't really count. Mr. Ahmadinejad wants recognition of Iran's contributions to the medical field. He has stated 'my favorite TV show is CSI. Seriously. I just really care about science'.