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September 13, 2009
My Two-Week Summer - Part 3: On the Go
In the six days that I was theoretically at home in Cumberland, I was somewhat surprised when I realized that I was only home for two meals (not counting breakfast). Yep, that's right, just two. And one of them was when Alex & I arrived on Tuesday the 18th for dinner. So where was I?
On Wednesday the 19th I had lunch with my younger brother Jake in Rice Lake, between my visits to the DMV to transfer the title on the Taurus to my name. Yeah, I had to make two trips because I didn't realize the first time that the DMV didn't accept credit cards. Argh. And then that evening I went to Bible study at Word of Life Church in Taylors Falls, Minnesota, with my parents.
There was a little excitement that afternoon too, in the form of multiple tornado warnings for Barron County. There were also confirmed touchdowns in downtown Minneapolis and in northeastern St Croix County in west-central Wisconsin. It was rather strange and unexpected that there were tornadoes at all that day, because it was cool and cloudy all day long. The TV meteorologists were all saying that they'd never seen tornadoes form from such a weather setup before. Interestingly, the Minneapolis tornado struck the Convention Center, where the ELCA denomination was meeting to debate whether practicing homosexuals could be installed as pastors. Was the tornado a coincidence? Maybe, maybe not, but John Piper, a preacher from Minneapolis who I respect a lot, made an argument for why he thinks it wasn't a coincidence.
On Thursday the 20th I drove over to Paynesville, Minnesota, to visit my sister-in-law Eve, my niece Gabriella and my nephew Mathias. I met them out there right after lunch because they were spending a few days at a lake cabin that belonged to Eve's grandpa. Her sister Kate and Kate's kids were there too. I got to play a little bit of a card game called tens with Gabriella & Mathias, and then Eve & Kate taught me how to play Sequence. I was only able to be out there for about 3-4 hours, but it was really good to spend some time with them again, if only for an afternoon.
That evening I drove back to White Bear Lake, Minnesota, to have dinner with my friends Scott & Katie. Mmmm, never-ending pasta bowl at Olive Garden with a good bottle of wine... It was cool to catch up with them, and to hang out with Scott the rest of the evening, hearing about his recent travels to China and everything, over some more beer and wine. I spent the night there, wisely. :-)
I got back to Cumberland after lunch on Friday the 21st, because I did some shopping while I was in the Twin Cities, including getting a tape adapter and car charger for my iPod, so that I could listen to music on the long drive back to PA (the Taurus doesn't have a CD player). Also, while I was at the JC Penney at Rosedale, a whole rack of Brett Favre purple Vikings jerseys arrived -- "Favre jerseys, coming through!" was the announcement from the clerk wheeling the rack into the sports apparel section, with a couple customers in tow. You can bet I took a cell phone picture of the purple Favre jerseys and sent it to my friend Mike in Green Bay. ;-) To be honest though, it's still so weird (and a bit wrong) to see Favre in the purple horned helmet and jersey, after he spent so many years as a Packer.
I actually had supper at home on Friday night -- my second and final meal at home -- before going over to my brother Nathan & Laura's place in Rice Lake to play some Settlers of Catan: Cities and Knights. I didn't fare well at all, but it was still fun to play and to see them again. I always make sure to reserve at least one night to play games with Nathan & Laura when I'm home for a visit. :-)
On Saturday the 22nd I rode with my parents up to the North Shore (the Minnesota shoreline along Lake Superior). It was an absolutely spectacular day up there, not a cloud in the sky, just a light breeze and temps in the low 60s. They mainly took me up there to look at a few properties they've been checking out up around Lutsen. They have a dream of someday moving up to the North Shore, having a house on Lake Superior. There were some nice properties up there too, but it's hard not to be taken with pretty much anywhere along the North Shore:
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We decided to spend the night at a place called Thomsonite Beach, about 5 miles south of Grand Marais. We met up with my uncle Gary from Grand Marais too (my aunt Kathy had to work), got some beer and a couple of pizzas from Sven & Ole's Pizza in Grand Marais (we got an "Uffda Za" [supreme] and a "Shicken and Vild Rice Za" [with plenty of other veggie toppings too] -- both were delicious!), and brought them back to Thomsonite Beach for a nice picnic out on the cliffs above Lake Superior. It was a bit cool but an absolutely gorgeous evening. As night fell we built a fire out there too, and just had a great time. And I have to say, I don't think I've ever seen Jupiter reflect so brightly or so beautifully in a lake before, shimmering all the way to the horizon. I also got to see the aurora borealis for about five minutes too!! It was a patch of pale white shimmering light, and quickly dove below the tree line (it was also about 40 degrees away from a brilliant Milky Way -- hooray for no light pollution!). While it was far from spectacular and very brief, it was still really cool to see the northern lights. It was an enjoyable evening.
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We lingered up on the North Shore for awhile on the morning of Sunday the 23rd, and it was another beautiful day up there. It was quite enjoyable to spend so much time by Lake Superior, it was a great way to spend a weekend. :-)
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After grabbing lunch at Culver's in Superior (always try to get to a Culver's at least once when I'm back in Wisconsin!), my parents dropped me off at the movie theater in Rice Lake just as the movie "District Nine" was starting, which I watched with my brothers Nathan & Jake (also went out to dinner with them after the movie). I was pretty impressed with the quality of "District Nine." It's not a movie for kids or a movie to watch if you're a bit squeamish, but it was a quality film. Given the movie's themes of racism, I also thought the setting for the movie was perfect too, in Johannesburg. I also liked that Peter Jackson continued his pattern of casting previously-unknown (or little-known) actors in leading roles, so that you're not thinking of previous roles that actor did. The acting in the movie was also very good all-around. I give it two thumbs up.
Monday the 24th was my last day in Cumberland, but it was only a partial day. I drove up to Spooner to have lunch with my friend Brooke from high school. It'd been two and a half years since I'd seen her last (at her wedding, in fact), so it was good to catch up. Then I packed up my stuff and drove down to the Twin Cities to go to a Twins-Orioles game with Alex. Alex's younger half-brother and some of Alex's cousins came along to the game too. It was the only home game the Twins had while I was home, so I really wanted to go because it was the last time I'd be able to see a Twins game in the Metrodome. It'll be really strange in future years not to see the Twins play in the Metrodome, but I can't say that I'm sad to see them leave it for an open-air stadium. Baseball is meant to be played outdoors, and it'll be wonderful not to have a teflon roof overhead on a fine summer evening. I try to make it to a Twins game at least once a year, and I really hope I can get to a game next year at Target Field. I might have to wait a year or two though, depending on the demand for tickets. While last year was the first year in quite some time that I didn't make it to a Twins game, this was the first Twins game that Alex went to in more than a decade. At least it was a fun last game in the Metrodome for us, and we were able to see a 2-1 Twins victory. After the game Alex & I stayed up really late, playing a dozen or so games of Sequence, haha. Good times, good times. It was fun to spend time doing nothing but relaxing before starting the drive back to PA.
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For whatever reason(s) though, I didn't actually get any sleep. I hate it when insomnia strikes. Especially the night before a 6-hour drive. I did seriously consider not striking out for Chicago, but in the end I decided to go for it, because I thought it was a good thing to make it back to Penn State for my second day of class. A couple hours after I left Alex's place I seriously started to reconsider the wisdom of my decision. In hindsight I should've either stayed at Alex's another day, or driven up to Cumberland for another day, to get some sleep before doing a long drive. As it was, I made a few extra stops along the way, including at a rest stop north of Madison to doze for about half an hour, but eventually I did make it to my friends Ryan & Sarah's place in suburban Chicago safely. 
Good thing too, because otherwise I wouldn't have been able to be their first guest since they moved there, or have some fantastic Chicago-style pizza (complete with a wheel of sausage and cheese right above the deep-dish crust, and the tomato sauce on top), or play a competitive game of Catan: Cities and Knights (which Sarah won). I got a great night's sleep though, so while I was of course tired on my 11-hour drive back to State College, at least I wasn't as dead-tired as my drive from the Twin Cities to Chicago...
And that's basically my vacation in an anti-nutshell. If only I had known ahead of time that the second day of NWP class would consist entirely of stuff I've done many times before (download, compile and run a test case for WRF), I definitely would've stayed home an extra couple days, so that my break wouldn't have been so rushed. And then maybe I would've been able to go to the Minnesota State Fair for a day and eat a bunch of deep-fried _____ on a stick. Oh well. It was still a good break and a good summer, even if it was very, very short. Next year I had better have longer than a two-week summer!
Posted by Jared at September 13, 2009 03:57 PM
Comments
Peter Jackson didn't direct the movie, he produced it. The director, Neil Blomkamp, put an old high school friend as the lead of the film, someone with no acting experience. In fact the movie is an expansion of a short film that Neil Blomkamp did called "Alive in Joburg". The reason he set the film in South Africa is because Mr. Blomkamp is from South Africa. Most people the places he filmed didn't need be to changed... they actually were slums. In fact many of the 'local' people being used for sound clips about how they hated the aliens were real people talking not about Space Aliens, but about the influx of people from Zimbobwe. Much of the film is based around recent events in South Africa and the treatment of their own illegal aliens from Zimbobwe.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNReejO7Zu8
Posted by: Joshua Zimmerman at September 14, 2009 07:58 PM