I Scream From Saint Paul
Greetings, dear friends. It seems that I missed the Minneapolis rollout, what with my whirlwind trip to see my cousin married off in Colorado. Things are off to a roaring start, aren’t they?
It is customary that I tell you I live not in Minneapolis, but in Saint Paul. Somehow they let me in here. Before you call the local Department of Homeland Security office, let me defind myself: I work in Uptown. And my romantic interest lives right off the Hiawatha Corridor. And she’s a vegetarian. Which pretty much makes me live right off the Hiawatha Corridor.
Truth is, if I practiced real hard, I could spit on the suburbs from the roof of my apartment building. Lots of people are tempted to spit on the suburbs. I live on the East Side, right off I94, and sure, there’s a Krispy Kreme a few blocks from here, but I assure you, it’s still St. Paul proper.
I have lived in more romantic sections of this wonderful city. When I moved here from South Dakota, precisely five years ago, I lived on Grand Avenue, a block from the Grand Olde Creamery (the finest ice cream available, yes?). This is a fantastic neighborhood to live in, as long as you can tolerate or otherwise learn to revel in Grand Old Day, the first weekend of every June. I’ll always remember one year, my band [we have another musician here] played a private party in a wildlife conservancy up north. I awoke and stepped outside to hear absolutely nothing but a distant woodpecker. Nary a man-made sound. After breakfast I made the drive back to the city, and when I got home there were 55,000 people on my front lawn, and a reggae band was playing in the parking lot across the street. The guy in the apartment down the hall had a keg in his living room, and it seemed he had invited anyone who could still walk up the steps to come in and shout. The space between my building and the next had become an impromtu lavatory.
Then I lived on Cathedral Hill. After that it was the Merriam Park neighborhood, on Marshall, a block from Izzy’s Ice Cream (the second finest ice cream available). Ice cream is everywhere. Except for nine months, in which I had to settle for the Dale St. Mississippi Market’s supply of Cedar Summit Farms’ Ice Cream (again, a block away), I’ve always been close to a top-notch ice cream manufacturer. I swear to you, this is purely by coincidence.
So now it’s Culvers’ frozen custard–wait for it–a block away. Admittedly, not as unique or boutique, and the chain is from Wisconsin-of-all-places, but it is just as fattening.
Related posts:
Hail, Saint Paulite! I lived in Lowertown for two years, myself. (in the Cosmo apts on Mears Park)
I moved back to Minneapolis this summer, off the Hiawatha Corridor. I am not, however, a vegetarian.
Hi, I just moved to Dale/Selby…
I end up at Mississippi Market all the time.
What did you think of the Cedar Summit Farms products? Are they ‘grassy’?
I’ve tried their milk and ice cream…
it seems hmmm… unusual.
:)
s-
I will absolutly hold it against you that you live in St. Paul!!! Why on Earth would you live in the inferior city?!?!?
Just kidding. You really couldn’t have a Minneapolis without a St. Paul. We Are called the Twin Cities for a reason…
Re: Nate
Right. I was sorta wonderin’ why the blog is called Minneapolis, and not Minneapolis/St. Paul. Without St. Paul, and–alas–the sprawl, Minneapolis wouldn’t be THAT big of a city, really.
I thought about recommending that it be called twincities.metroblogs.com, but as we hadn’t even started yet, I didn’t want to be presumptuous.
As a St. Paulitianite for the past five years, I must concur that it would be much more inclusive to have been “Metroblogging Twin Cities.”
Let me explain something here just so people don’t jump to conclusions. We (metblogs) don’t decide on a city then find people to stick there, we wait and hear from people who are interested. Some people from Minneapolis got in touch and said “hey, we should have a Minneapolis bog” and we said “OK, find people to write for it” so we added Minneapolis to the list of cities that people could apply for and people startes signing up. No one ever got in touch and said “Hey! Their should be a St. Paul blog” or “There should be a Twin Cities blog” even if they lived in St. Paul. That’s different than Hawaii for example where all the people said “hey, it would be much better to have a Hawaii blog than a Honolulu blog” so we went with that. We leave a lot of control in the hands of the people who run each city for that very reason. It’s also important to note that Metblogs is an international project, so someone reading the Istanbul blog would be very confused trying to look up “twin cities” on a map to see where this site is based. Perhaps people from St. Paul should apply and if we get enough then we’ll set up a site just for that.
You be famous now!