Juneteenth Ride 2025

I had Juneteenth off and I have for quite a few years.  I have some opinions about who I work for, so that's not surprising.  I took a ride in the afternoon up into Minneapolis and back, just over 42 miles. Not a very fast 42 miles given downtown it was a bit stop and go, lots of turns, and I was parking myself here and there to enjoy the day.

On the way "up" I pedaled past the Juneteenth celebration near Lake and the burned out third precinct they're turning into a voting and community action center.  That's a good use for it.  It wasn't very hopping, but I was there in the first five minutes of the celebration, so not surprising.  When I came back four hours later it was packed with people and I sat at Arbeiter for a while having a beer and enjoying the crowds of people all dressed up for Juneteenth.  Most of the photos below are from my way up, although I managed to capture a photo of the communal mural going both ways.

Downtown I was going to go to Modist [https://racketmn.com/bri-smith-modist-first-black-woman-head-brewer], but realized when I got there it was around 2 p.m. and a Thursday, so Modist wasn't opening for another two hours.  Fortunately, right across the street is Bricksworth although I could have saved myself 32  miles and just pedaled to the one over in Burnsville.  I refueled and turned back toward Lake Street, although I got lost on the way and ended up at the field entrance to Target Field.  Just as I was turning around to avoid the No Trespassing sign onto the field a guy came out of the Target office.  He must have been vaguely important because he had a corporate SUV and looked like an ex ballplayer.  He saw my RAGBRAI jersey and was super excited.  He went on it for the first time last year and is going this year again.  He mentioned that this year it's sneaking up into Minnesota on one of the days.  That's a smart trick on their part to make it feel less like an Iowa ride and more like a midwest ride.  Iowa irritates me ... lately [a long lately, my "all lives matter" experience with them was a long time ago now] ... and that's kept me riding in Minnesota instead of spending my money there even if the Register tends to be more liberal than Iowa on average.

I didn't realize downtown was making their LEDs pride flags for the month.  That's a nice look.

Juneteenth Soul sign with Arbeiter Brewing and Moon Palace books in the background.  A smarter person would have picked up the book waiting for him at Moon Palace but I didn't put it on a list, so I was distracted by all the other things going on.  Maybe I'll have time to pick it up tomorrow.

Drums and dancing.

Community mural in the morning.

Community mural later in the afternoon.

Million Artist quilts.  The burned out precinct is right behind me here.

Bonus bit...after I sat at Arbeiter people watching, I headed for home.  I was only half a dozen blocks south of Arbeiter or so when a car tried to left turn into me on a green light while I was in the bike lane.  I couldn't tell for sure, but she seemed to look up from her phone, and then jittered a bit and went past me to continue her turn which would have almost put her on the sidewalk.  She accelerated hard....right into the side of another SUV with five people in it.  Green light, she was turning.  The SUV on the receiving end was totaled.  Both wheels were crooked and a big pinch in the side.  Big.  I went back to make sure people were ok and three other cyclists, two pedestrians, and a few cars stopped to ask everyone if they were ok.  The woman taking the left hand turn?  Came out of her car furiously tapping on her phone and asking loudly, "You're an Uber aren't you? You're an Uber driver?"  I don't know if that was some attempt to go on the attack, but she's going to have a hell of a time explaining that one to insurance.  Everyone was ok, surprisingly. Cars are fixable.  People generally not as much.

However, that wasn't my only brush with death yesterday.  I also took a tumble at the of the hill/trail going from Minnehaha Falls/Park to Fort Snelling.  Entirely my fault.  I lazily commute most of the time, so I know the rule about not pedaling into a turn, but I forgot.  So I cam down the hill and turned right and started to pedal to take advantage of momentum for the hill.

I heard a "snick".  And I thought, ut oh, pedal, down.

I heard the start of a "screeeeek" and there seemed to be a lot of time to literally say, out loud, "Oh."  Followed by the full on scrape.  Followed by me saying, "S^%t."  At which point the whole bike stopped on a dime and popped almost straight up 4 plus feet in the air, arresting all forward momentum.  I did not lose my momentum.  I flew forward landing head first, skidding along the pavement on the back of my head/helmet for what I think was about six feet on my helmet before finally bouncing a bit.  I'm glad I have a helmet.  I think this one would have killed me or been close.

Here's a nice photo [immediately above] of my bike actually bouncing around.  Not me - I was separated from the bike at this point without the digital odometer on me sort of skidding uphill. 

And here's me being really wobbly and having a hard time pedaling a straight line to get moving up the hill after the crash.  A nice guy who was coming down the hill stopped to talk to me for a while, which was really helpful to get a read on whether I had an obvious concussion.  I had my family watch for an unobvious concussion later.  I didn't actually do too bad finishing out the 7 miles home, but when I got to where I could check myself out, I had relatively minor scrapes.  But....a big bruise on my left ankle and a lot of ache in my right which seemed to be more related to the pedals stopping suddenly and throwing me than to any visible wounds.

I slept fine later, only waking up now and then when I rolled an ankle.  And today I feel pretty good.  Little bit of a neck ache, and I took a thirty minute walk on the ankles, although I'm being super careful on stairs because balancing on the left is tricky.

I seem to get in one round of ouch each year, so hopefully this is the end of it and it's not like Final Destination where the deity of cycling injuries will be hunting me down the rest of the summer/fall.

Come and See

Sunday afternoon, Kyle, Lisa, Pooteewheet, and I went to the Trylon to see the movie Come and See.  It's a pleasant romp through the Belarus countryside in 1943 by a playful tween boy, Florian.  At least until the stacks of dead bodies.  And burning people alive.  And gang rape.  And...and...and....holy ^^^^ did that ever live up to the Bleak Week: Series of Despair category.  Anti-war, anti-German...it didn't pull any punches.  2.5 hours that flew by as it threw atrocity after atrocity at you.  By the time you get to the end, there's a German who knows he's going to die, maybe burnt alive, still saying, "Some nations just shouldn't exist."  At which point the ending is German war footage and footage of Hitler rolling in reverse, almost Wizards-esque, until we get to Hitler as a child, highlighting both the allegation by that same German that "it starts with the children" [he told the adults they could leave the building before they burned it with them in it if they left the children behind] and that some nations shouldn't exist.  

I like the part on Wikipedia that says, "Roger Ebert posted a review of Come and See as part of his "Great Movies" series, describing it as "one of the most devastating films ever about anything, and in it, the survivors must envy the dead."  That's damn accurate.

Pooteewheet didn't get to see it because her ulcers kicked in so she went home in case they got worse, but came back to pick me up later at Arbeiter Brewing.  I took an hour to slough off the despair by picking up my four pack on my Arbeiter beer sub and a buy one get one free Stonewall beer. [wheat, fruited]. A very good beer.  They're having their release party for it tomorrow.    I gave away 3/4 of my four pack to my brother, who showed up because he was just down the street at Venn, my neighbor, and the host of the yard parties we go to, and it was still a really good subscription deal just for me.  I recommend Arbeiter highly.

Here's a nice phot of a bird that seemed to want my beer, or something I had, and a cyclist to wash away the despair.  If you ever get a chance to see Come and See, maybe don't.  Or do like we did and watch it with a large group so you have some ambient social support.

Krampus at Arbeiter Brewing

Wow....I have a lot of things to blog over the last two months that I really didn't get around to....the sheer number of photos that I scraped off my phone is daunting.  I'm going to backtrack so I have some of it here on the blog.  Expect things as far back as Christmas, and maybe a bit before.  I've had a BUSY two months, not even including my wife's double knee replacement [not nearly as sexy as it sounds].

This is one of my favorite recent photos.  From Arbeiter Brewing.  I'm often there, but I went up there specifically to get my photo take with Krampus  That's Kevin the bartender under that mask.  I was amused at how many parents showed up with their 3-4 year old kids for a photo.  That dog in the background...I'm pretty sure that's the same Ikea dog Aeryn bought as their first stuffed animal purchase when they had their own money.  So it's a nice photo in that Krampus appears to be threatening me with intimate knowledge of my kid.

Books, Bicycling, and Beers 2023: Arbeiter Brewing

 Ah, Arbeiter Brewing.  5/1/2023. Per the original rules, the exception when it comes to number of times I can visit.  I took a detour on the way there, so it was 29.08 miles and 892' of climb.  If I went house to brewery and back....more like 26 miles.

This is a Nitro Into the Sea.  A very clean beer.  Good choice.  And that book by Tamsyn Muir, also a good choice.  Hilarious.

The beer board.  Maybe some people are allergic to nitrogen?

One of my favorite new addendums is the artwork related to what to do about the burnt out third precinct building.  I was talking to my mother about it and the insanity it would take to reopen the original building?  Not "it would save money".  It's a black fucking hole in a vibrant neighborhood and a reminder of times that were so absolutely shitty that it took a murder to boil them over.  It needs to go.

Another poster.  Makes you wonder how the hood has survived without a precinct building for so long.  Place sure does seem more settled in some ways without it.  I'm not saying there doesn't need to be a way to deal with crime. But I'm pretty sure that old way is bullshit.

Busy Weekend

Wow...very busy weekend.  

On Friday, I got a hankering for a banana split.  I could have gone to the DQ, but a DQ banana split is the very bottom of my banana split ranking.  I'd rather try something I know nothing about and take the chance I'm not getting ice milk with oversugared toppings.  So we [Poot and I] went to Dar's Double Scoop in St. Paul.  Very enjoyable and delicious...under that mess of toppings is coconut and two kinds of chocolate ice cream.  It's smaller than some banana splits I've had, but let's be honest, it's incredibly reasonable and the price was really good and I don't need a banana split twice that size.  It's always too much anyway.

I liked their sculpture.  Here's Poot posing.  No need to do a mask version outside.

I did think this in the back where the BBQ joint [smelled SO good] and bathrooms were was pretty funny.  They didn't label the actual exit nearly as well.

 

On Saturday, we went to Aguirre the Wrath of God with K and L at the Trylon.  We hit Merlin's Rest for dill pickle soup, drinks, and fish and chips, and pasties first. I tried to convince my niece she should drive over to join us as she has a brand new license.

Aguirre was wonderful.  The scenes where he tromps around the boat dealing with monkeys and proclaims he will have a new kingdom and his rebellion against Spain to found said kingdom while everyone dies on the journey was surreal.  I'm looking forward to some of the other movies in the Warner Herzog series at the Trylon.

And last night, Poot and I went up to the Hook and Ladder to see Jill Sobule.  We stopped at Arbeiter Brewing first.  This photo isn't from last night, but it's from not so long ago when we went up specifically to catch the opening of the collaboration with Venn Brewing, Collider.  At 9.3% that stuff is heavy.  I'm headed up to find some in a growler tomorrow for my neighbor, as well as pick up a book at Moon Palace.

The Hook and Ladder was excellent for covid protection.  Masks and proof of vaccination. Not to mention the space isn't so huge you're swamped in people

The opening act was the Jorgensen Duo. Poot liked them enough to go chat and pick up an album.

Jill Sobule was hilarious.  Lot of hard core fans in the audience.  She started off with a fuck Aaron Rodgers and then told stories about songs she'd played while she was in the middle of brain surgery [including I kissed a girl].  Poot and I helped crowdfund her brain surgery, so those were cool stories.

She's brilliant on her instrument.  I liked the part where she launched into a little Jimi Hendrik riff in the middle of a not so hard core song.