• twin_cities: ISO grassy metro parks for a guinea pig festival! “The grass has to be chemical free as dozens of hungry guinea pigs will be snacking on and simultaneously fertilizing it.” OMG SO KYOOT!
• MPR: College of St. Catherine to become a university. “The new name hasn’t been determined, but will include ‘St. Catherine’s’ and ‘university.’”
• Minneapolis Issues Forum: Do Idaho’s bike safety statutes make more sense?
• MinnPost: How we’re doing so far. Joel Kramer reports in on the first six months of MinnPost. “MinnPost.com has more than 100,000 absolute monthly unique visitors, as measured by Google Analytics. This makes us the most-visited local-news website in Minnesota that is not driving traffic to itself from a legacy medium, like TV, radio or print.”
• Minnesota Monitor: Congress studies wrong city for RNC disaster preparedness. “The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee found that Minneapolis’ Hennepin County Medical Center did not have sufficient capacity to handle a terrorist attack. The committee completely overlooked St. Paul’s Regions Hospital, which would be the first responder in the unlikely event of a terrorist attack on the RNC.”
• Southwest Journal: Neighborhood organizations are adjusting their fundraising strategies in preparation for the loss of NRP funding. They mention Bryn Mawr Neighborhood Association; Elliot Park Neighborhood, Inc.; and East Harriet Farmstead Neighborhood Association.
• City of Minneapolis: Sustainability Initiatives
• City of St Paul: Sustainable Saint Paul
• The Deets: Ed looks at recent reports on the link between local food environments (i.e., stores/restaurants in your neighborhood) and obesity and diabetes. Ed’s theory: “The distance you drive to buy groceries effects how you shop.”

When we moved into the new casa last fall we realized there’d be things that needed fixing right away. For example; all of the kitchen appliances were circa 1980 and either didn’t work or only half worked.

In comes our favorite appliance store ApplianceSmart.
In the past we had used ApplicanceSmart a few times and been pleased with the quality and price.

Well, this time things started out badly and as is often the case when things start out poorly they only became worse. 

 The sales associate was hounding, which I can understand to a point since they are paid from commission, but he was new and not very knowledgeable on the products.

 Thent he lost our order, then he placed the wrong order, and finally he “upgraded” our fridge to a more expensive model for free.

Sounds good right? If only.

(more…)

It’s gardening time in the land of Minneapolis Metbloggers so let’s take some poetic license and spread the seeds of information.

I spent my early afternoon shopping for garden supplies. I needed to buy a few trees, replacements for those destroyed in last fall’s big wind storm, and to browse for some new gardening ideas. 

I found an interesting annual called the daisy vine that grows 5-8′ and flowers all summer and I bought a few whitespire birch trees. Bachmans is having a tree sale that includes 15% off and free delivery for all trees, except pines.

Any other gardening deals happening we should all know about? Anyone else getting worked up to garden?