This week, Metroblogging sites around the globe are unveiling seven gifts their cities can share with the world. Browse the numerous Metblogs, or check here to see what other cities are giving.

Let us know if you totally agree or totally disagree with the gifts we’ve chosen. When we say “Minneapolis” sometimes we mean “St. Paul” or “Minnesota.” Our 7th gift is The Great Gatsby.

The Great Gatsby is widely considered to be a classic piece of American Literature. It was published in 1925 by St. Paul native F. Scott Fitzgerald.

There are four film adaptations and one opera. The spectacular new Guthrie Theater opened in July this year in Minneapolis with the first authorized stage adaptation of The Great Gatsby since the novel was first written.

Originally uploaded by swirlspice.

Gatz, a stage adaptation unrecognized by the Fitzgerald estate, features a collection of office workers reading the story aloud. Gatz had its U.S. premier at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center (located right next to what used to be the old Guthrie Theater) in September of this year, shortly after the closing of The Great Gatsby at the new Guthrie.

F. Scott Fitzgerald attended the prestigious St. Paul Academy and returned home to St. Paul after college to finish his first novel. His parents once lived at 599 Summit Ave, on the longest remaining stretch of residential Victorian architecture in the United States. Various descriptions of Fitzgerald’s days in St. Paul [skip to pg. 38 (pdf)] detail the numerous places Fitzgerald used to hang out in, many of which one can still find today.

Tags: Metblogs7Gifts 7Gifts Metroblogging7Gifts

On my way home today, I got stuck behind a Honda Insight sporting two bumper stickers cut up and rearranged to read “Meat Baby is Murder On Board” waiting to turn into The Wedge.

The undead in Minneapolis just can’t catch a break

If you don’t recall the original story, basically some folks were dressed up for a Zombie Dance Party and were arrested by police for “simulating weapons of mass destruction.”

Well, the zombies are pissed, and have filed a lawsuit. And nothing’s more scary than a pissed off zombie.

According to today’s AP article, police thought “…wires protruding from the zombie’s backpacks could have been bombs or were meant to imitate bombs. It was later learned the wires were actually radios.”

The lawsuit claims the zombie event was intended to “satirize contemporary commercial culture,” and the arrests violated the partygoers rights to free speech.

I say go for it, zombies. Just as we’re finally getting some distance from the Murderapolis image, here come those pesky zombies earning national and international media attention for our city’s idiot police force.

If Roswell can be known for their aliens, why shouldn’t Minneapolis be known for its zombies?

This Friday, December 1st is World AIDS Day. The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is responsible for one of the deadliest epidemics in human history. Minnesota has lost approximately 2,772 people to the disease, in the United States an estimated 529,113 have died, and worldwide about 25 million people have lost their lives to HIV, a staggering number on par with the black plague of medieval Europe.

Minnesota has faired better than most states in preventing the epidemic and caring for those affected. Despite the large urban area of the Twin Cities, Minnesota is known as a low incidence state. We are 38th of 50 states based on infections per 100,000 population. Approximately 5,233 people in Minnesota are currently living with an HIV positive diagnosis, and around 300 people are newly diagnosed each year. Estimates predict that about a fourth as many people do not know they are infected, or about 75 people per year in Minnesota.

Minnesota is also home to the international epidemic. The United States has strict laws about immigration for people who are HIV positive, but Minneapolis is one of only 6 cities nationwide that is allowed by the Federal government to resettle HIV positive refugees and asylum seekers, mainly because of a strong nonprofit community dedicated to immigrants and refugees, along side a strong research and nonprofit sector for care and support for people living with HIV. Minnesota is among the best positioned to take in those who suffer persecution in their home countries because of their HIV status.

The Minnesota Department of Health has an extensive list of World AIDS Day events in Minnesota from Minneapolis to Rochester to Alexandria to Duluth. As we think of others during the holiday season, please consider contributing to one of the charities hosting a World AIDS Day event, and make the fight to stop AIDS a priority in Minnesota by contacting your legislators.

It took me a while to decide if I was appalled or amused.

Aesthetic Apparatus has for sale a print of the Foshay Tower. Which is unremarkable in and of itself. Except that this print includes a tiny cartoon soul jumping off the top of it.
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I was off work and at home today, so I headed over to the Science Museum to see the Body Worlds exhibit. It runs through Sunday (Dec 3), so take time this week if you haven’t squeezed it in yet. It’s open until 11pm every night this week, and it’s open round-the-clock from 8am Friday to the final closing at 11pm Sunday night. I don’t know if the Science Museum has ever done that before, but I guarantee the demand is there. Also, if you go on Thursday, you get BOGO entrees at The Liffey.

(Going in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday meant the Museum was full of senior citizens and high school kids. I swear, I wasn’t like that when I was a teenager. Complete disregard for the presence of anyone else in the entire place. I’m looking at you, Eden Prairie High School.)

The exhibit itself was… striking. Definitely not for the squeamish. The human body is extraordinary and extraordinarily complex. It’s a lot to absorb.
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Originally uploaded by v.buzzkill.

From the Twin Cities Flickr Pool. Frolicking in Mac-Groveland park. I’m so impressed. The leaping and the timing and whatnot. This picture just says “fun” to me. Giddyup!

• King’s Highway history lesson
• CNN douchebag asks Keith Ellison a ridiculous question
• Anoka County says no to a new Vikings Stadium
• 30,000 gallons of ethanol spilled in train derailment in Blue Earth County

Originally uploaded by Gabriel M.A..

From the Twin Cities Flickr Pool. From the November flickr photowalk, which I believe was in St. Paul, so this might be… Rice Park? is Mears Park.

Two things are exciting about the prospect of a lesbian bar opening in the Seward Neighborhood.

First, south Minneapolis has a LOT of gay and lesbian folks, yet no watering hole closeby. Very gay Uptown has a slew of gay friendly bars, but hasn’t ever had a truly gay place to go. The Herkimer is practically a gay bar, but isn’t. I have yet to go there and not run into folks I’ve seen at the Saloon or 19 Bar, but straight folk still outnumber queer folk by at least 10 to 1. Cafe Barbette is lesbian owned but barely qualifies as a bar, and has the typical mixed Uptown crowd.

Second, a bar in the Twin Cities that explicitly caters to queer women is something that has been needed since Club Metro closed in 2002. A bar in Minneapolis that caters to lesbians is practically unheard of, as the lesbian/gay dividing line has always seemed to exist somewhere around Prospect Park. Gays stay in Minneapolis, lesbians stay in St. Paul.

Rumor has it, the new bar will be open by the beginning of 2007, and will be called Pi. The location will be around 25th and 26th. That will make for a great bar crawl on Wednesdays with trivia at Tracy’s Saloon (very lesbian friendly), then dancing at Transmission at the Hexagon (lot’s of gays there), then finish the night at Pi, all within walking distance.