saintpaulitan
by nick and patty

Some photos from up north. That’s all I got…

Way back in May, at the Living Green Expo, Patty and I ran across a map of all the geodesic dome houses in Minnesota, and we noticed that one of them appeared to be in our own neighborhood, just a few blocks from our apartment. We literally spent two months looking for it — on walks, on bike rides, in our cars and on Google Maps. What started as a passing curiosity quickly became a kind of ludicrous obsession, as we simply could not find the thing.

Finally, via the “Neighborhoods” application available on Facebook, Patty was able to find somebody who knew where it was. Much to our chagrin, it was even closer than we had thought. It’s wedged into a corner at a six-way intersection, which is apparently what had made it so difficult to find.

Tonight, while out on a walk, we finally decided to see it up close and in person. The place is tiny. The owner happened to be out in his (equally tiny) yard doing some gardening, and since he noticed us gawking rather bizarrely at his place of residence we decided we might as well introduce ourselves. I forgot to ask his name, unfortunately, but he was a nice guy. He said he’s been living in the house since 2000; prior to his moving in, the house had been built on what was apparently an old parking lot. He said his lawn and his gardens literally sit on dirt planted over asphalt. His bedroom sits in the top part of the dome, apparently, in a loft.

Well, there you have it. Mystery solved.

When I stopped by the local MGM Liquor Warehouse to buy some beer on Saturday, I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted. I love all kinds of beer, and generally tend to switch back and forth between cheap generics (PBR, Premium, Budweiser) and spendier craft brews (Surly, Fat Tire, Rush River). As I wandered the aisle trying to decide which of those two routes to go, I stumbled across this little doozy of a marketing experiment.

I found this 12-pack of Lakemaid Beer sitting on top of a display outside the coolers. I don’t remember for certain, but I may have actually laughed out loud when I saw it. I immediately decided that anyone trying this hard to get me to buy their beer probably deserved my patronage. I didn’t have high hopes for the beer itself, figuring it for a bland, watery clone of Hamm’s or Natural Ice; however, when I saw it was produced by Schell’s Brewery (makers of one of my all-time local favorites, FireBrick), I reckoned it might actually be worth a try.

At home, I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the beer, which I’d rate as a slightly above-average lager. It’s got a nice light color and texture to it, and just about the right amount of hops (for a lager, that is; I like my ales super-hoppy). I don’t quite recall the price, but I don’t believe it was any more or less than Schell’s other craft beers.

I was also pleased to discover that the kitschy packaging didn’t just apply to the outside of the box; in fact, each bottle has one of the 12 species of lakemaids printed on the label, and the package comes with a “Spotter’s Handbook” that contains “The Lore of the Lakemaids” and helpful instructions such as how to do the lakemaid call. All of this is really dumb, of course, but I found it to be dumb in that enjoyable, Adam Sandler-movie kind of way.

On balance, I’d say Lakemaid is a good enough beer that the over-the-top packaging is basically unnecessary; on the other hand, it did get me to buy the beer.

This morning, Patty and I got up early and walked down the road to watch the controlled demolition of the smokestack at Xcel’s High Bridge Plant. Thousands of people turned out to watch, either because they wanted to witness a little piece of St. Paul history in the making or because they just wanted to see something blow up. For the record, I came for both.

There’s been some interesting discussion in the local blogosphere (much of it here and here) over the last few days about whether the smokestack should be preserved as a kind of historical landmark, and also whether it adds some aesthetic charm to the St. Paul skyline. As someone who drives past the power plant at least twice a day, I can honestly see both sides of the argument — which, I realize, is now moot since they already blew it up anyway. But my hunch is that now that it’s gone, people really will miss it less than they think.

First of all, Xcel plans to tear down the rest of the facility and basically turn the whole area into a grass field. If it looks anything like the artist’s rendition, I think it will actually be quite pretty, and it will also give people traveling across the bridge the ability to enjoy the city’s southern and western skyline. Secondly, although the smokestack itself was interesting to look at, the rest of the facility is frankly a blight on the landscape. (Just take a look for yourself now that the smokestack is gone.)

Moreover — and I’m not trying to generate controversy here — but let’s not forget what that smokestack was there for. I’m pretty sure people had a less nostalgic view of that tower back when it was spewing several thousand tons of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, lead, mercury and all kinds of other toxic crap for St. Paul kids to suck into their lungs every year (not to mention several million tons of annual carbon emissions). As a resident of the West Side, I’m pretty happy that I don’t have that stuff wafting into my windows every day. So, there.

But anyway, enough preaching. As to the demolition itself, I’ve also got a longer version of the video (below), and a few Flickr photos, here. Mine aren’t as good as Tony Webster’s or the ones on MPR’s News Cut blog though.

Here’s the longer version:

Iggy has the right idea.

Sorry, folks, no commentary here. I’m tired and I just got back from a vacation. You can sort this all out for yourselves.

The amount of cool places that I continually discover within just a few miles my house never ceases to amaze me. Tonight Patty and I took a walk through some trails at the Dodge Nature Center in West St. Paul. It’s an environmental education center for school-aged children, but it also offers free hiking trails for the general public. Apparently, it’s a bit under-used; as with most places we go to in St. Paul, Patty and I were literally the only people there tonight.

I didn’t really know what the place was before we went (I’d never even heard of it before), and I was pretty amazed to walk up to the map board, look to my left and see a hawk, an owl and a Bald Eagle sitting in a series of raptor mews. (Man, that eagle! I’d never actually seen one up close before. They are beautiful — and huge.) Apparently, the birds are all injured or imprinted. We also ran across a functioning apiary (bee colonies), animal barns, ponds and a variety of wildlife. We only walked through about a fourth of the trails there; we’ll have to come back for the rest.

Any place you can walk around and run into a Bald Eagle is pretty cool, so you outdoor enthusiasts out there should check it out for yourselves. One word of caution: I did pick up a wood tick. MPR says there is an abundance of them this year because of the cool, wet weather. Yay for Minnesota.

More pictures here.