doodledee

This week is spring break and the neighborhood seems to have migrated en masse to distant sunny places like Fort Myers or Jacksonville or Mexico where they'll wear shorts and crane their sunscreen-slathered necks and try to catch a glimpse of summer. They'll drink ice-cold beer outside with a bare hand and sit on a bench in a teebox and wait for their turn to slice another $4 ball deep into the thick stuff. Or maybe just read by the pool. Either way, they're getting away.

We stayed home. With our feet on the ground and our necks uncraned. Transitioning. Begging for robins and rebirth. Because this winter won't end. The kids ask why it's light out so late into the evening and we try to teach them how the days get longer in the spring and they say "what's spring?" and we confess we're not sure anymore ourselves. And we mope. And sit. And try to come to terms. And we have another fire in the fireplace and read another section of the paper and stare longingly at the porch we've taken to calling a "1 season".

But then on Sunday the clouds opened and the sun shone down and the grass seemed to green-up overnight. And we poked our heads out and looked for our shadows, afraid that it was yet another false start. But it wasn't. It was spring incarnate. And we took long walks and broke the winter seal on the shed and got out the gardening tools and lined them up and talked about all the things that we'd soon be doing with them. And we pulled out the scooter and it started with no trouble at all - almost suspiciously so, bordering on impatient even, as if it knew it was 50-degrees out and the puddles were dry and the parkways were begging for the attention that only a friendly powder-blue scooter can provide. Meep. Meep.

And now it comes crashing back down in a heavy white rage. The type of snow they advise you to warm-up before shoveling because if you're not careful it can kill you. And that's not a joke. It can. If not your very being, for sure your spirit. And you put on your coat. And you pick up your shovel. And you prepare to come to terms. Again.

But this time it's different. It's a last hurrah. A celebration. Of the transition. And we all know it. And we smile as we trudge thru the sloppy streets, taking cellphone pictures to send to our friends on their teeboxes. And the kids rush to play. And it stays light so late these days. And the wind isn't that cold. You can stay outside forever. And the snowmance is back. If only for a day. It better be a day. I'm supposed to be gardening next week. Seriously.

I hit this beauty late the other night and it almost blew-up the suspension on the jeep. The jeep! I know! Kaboom! WTF!

I went back the next day to take a picture and discovered it wasn't technically a pothole, it's just one of those rectangles they cut out of the street to fix a plumbing problem. Like when someone's mainline crumbles or whatever. It happened to my neighbor once. Like $1500. Ouch. Anyway, because it was [probably] winter when it happened, the repair crew fills the hole with gravel instead of actually patching it. Because they can't actually patch it? Because it's winter? Who knows. Either way, it's spring now and the gravel is gone, leaving only a huge alignment-jarring hole. Sunuva!

So yeah, maybe it's not a real pothole, but it's still a force to be reckoned with. So watch out. And next week I'll try and have a legit one. Or maybe this idea dies after one week? We'll see.

One day you're decorating your bikes so you can have a parade and celebrate the sun, and the next you're digging them out of a snowdrift.

Seatbelts!

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Hell yes that's Hollywood golden boy Rob Perez sitting in a Linden Hills clothing boutique having a beer and breaking down his long journey from assistant yogurt fetcher to Hollywood golden boy. At least I think he's a Hollywood golden boy. He rolls with Josh Hartnett and RT Rybak, right? He wrote that "40 Days 40 Nights" movie, right? Is that maybe only a silver boy? No disrespect. I don't make the rules. Seems like it should be golden boy. Let's go with golden. I'll deal with the heat if I'm wrong.

He was there to give a talk to the local neighborhood "let's get published" club. It's a neat vibe. Lots of appetizers and wine and amazing hair and teeth and Volvos and yoga and so on and so forth. Some dudes were even wearing blazers. Basically what you'd expect. [FD: I was rocking flannel lined pants (dirty), a long sleeve tshirt (clean) and a stocking cap with ear flaps (awesome).]

Night started with mingling. I cornered neighborhood Strib columnist Kim Ode for like a 15-minuteu chat-up. That was fun. Seriously. Later I went to check on my nemesis Phil (dave+1) and he's talking with these two cool looking guys so I wander over and start going off about how cool everyone looks and how fast I can run and how I got new running shoes and at one point I think I challenged the taller dude to a footrace or something. That's when the shorter dude introduces himself as [that] Rob and it turns out the taller dude is some Rob.producer.buddy or something. And here's me, thinking they were just neighborhood guys I'd never met before. I knew they looked too cool for Morningside. (No offense Morningside! None taken!)

Perez sat and talked for like an hour. He winged it. It went well. Lots of interactive Q&A and stuff. A little derailed at times, but whatever, that kept it amusing. The best parts were the part where he tiptoed into his philosophy of what it means to be a 'writer' and the part where he said that 95% of people have nothing to say. He didn't add "that's why they post pictures of their cats on their blogs". I think maybe he wanted to? Either way, he had me 95%. I would have hugged him, but I was too busy downing another brownie.

Turns out he lives here now. He's making what I think is a coming-of-age film. Set here. That'll be fun. It's 'independent'. I raised my hand and asked what that meant to him. I expected an answer like "you know, polo shirts and Velvet Underground on the soundtrack", but he said it was about total creative control. That was a neat answer, but I'm thinking most of the film-going public just sees it as a genre now (c) 'alternative' music. I wonder if that's maybe hard for independent filmakers to come to terms with? Should we apologize or anything?

I also asked if it was worth it to struggle as a production assistant in Hollywood when you can just make a REAL movie RIGHT NOW and post it on youtube and get noticed that way instead. His answer again was great. It included something like "we're just going to end up with 10 million mediocre movies on the internet". Seriously, can somebody put this guy in a bottle?! Loving it!

The evening wrapped with more mingling. And me eating like 19 shamrock cookies. I had no pitch. No treatment. I shopped nothing. I felt like I should have been more prepared. Like with a business card or something. I'm not exactly sure why, though. It wasn't my intention. Like who needs to get published? And hang out with golden boy screenwriters? Who should totally call me to funny-up their next screenplay? Pass the chicken skewers? Yes please.

Fun times.

How great is maple syrup season? Supergreat. Especially when you get to help tap a tree and hang the buckets before you wander over and watch them boil the sap down in a kickass huge cauldron.

And after that you go inside and taste some syrup and have some maple candy and maybe make a necklace out of a slice of maple branch and whatever color yarn you want. I chose green.

And then you get to hang-out in the reading corner and stare out the window for a while and play with a rainstick.

Sure it's all obvious. Obviously supergreat. Duh!

It's been a late spring - not sure if you've noticed - so the sap season is running a week or two behind. This week looks cold, too. I'd imagine that'll push it back even more. That means you've got plenty of time. The trees won't wait, though. So plan accordingly.

FWIW, we hit up the 'festival' at Elm Creek Park but there are other opportunities all over town. The DNR has a listing of maple syrup events at state parks. Maybe check that out. I hear Fort Snelling is nice.

Friday night I made a last minute decision to hit the Cedar for the Vic Chesnutt / Jonathan Richman "double-bill of the month, if not the season". I was mostly in it for Vic. He's moody in all the right places, soft in all the others. At least to me. Your miles probably vary.

Last time I saw him was back when I was using javascript to pop to larger images. That was the tour he was doing to support 'Silver Lake'. Which was a great album, btw. Especially 'Zippy Morocco'. Which is still great on a lot of levels. Though the novelty is obviously gone. But whatever, still great.

On Friday the Cedar was set-up in the always unusual 'open floor with chairs on the wings' formation. Open floor meaning "open for dancing". Which would normally be fun, except nobody dances to Vic. Because he's profoundly undanceable. So here's Vic, up on stage, staring down at what was literally an open floor. And here's us, sitting off to the side in chairs, sipping our decaf and eating our cookies. Not dancing. It was a really weird vibe. Eventually some late arrivers went and sat on the floor. That helped I think. Ok, no it didn't really, but it was still better than the superweird empty floor situation. So thanks to them for trying.

Nutshell review: very nice. Better than I expected. Jaded as ever. Always with same 'tired of everything' vibe. Even a bit of in-your-face freakfolk politics to kick off the weekend. Zero regrets. Wish it would have been 7 songs longer.

After the break the floor filled up with Richman fansters who wanted to stand up front and get their guitar spinning Lesibian Bar game on. So they did. And I stood in the back on the soundboard riser. And ate my cookie and sipped my decaf. (Again.) And it was alright I guess, but yeah, I was there for Vic, and this dude wasn't exactly dialing me in. Too playful? Or was it just too silly? Hard to say. And don't get me wrong, it was fun enough. So I'm not sayin' just sayin'.

Vic Chesnutt [vicchesnutt]
Vic Chesnutt - Cleveland, Ohio - 3/10/2008 - similar setlist [bt.etree.org]
Jonathan Richman [vaporrecords]

A buddy from Texas sent me this pic over the weekend. He MMS'd it to me. My phone is from the 80's so I had to log into some website to see what it was. Turns out it's from the 'grand opening' of some Dunkin' franchise in Dallas. That's his idea of a joke. Frickin' Dallas.

Then I went to the DD website. They're opening outlets in China now. Frickin China! So China and Texas get Dunkin before we do? Whaaa?

I'm so confused. Hold me.

Perhaps the last weekend of winter brought an end to seasonal hockey.

First it brought an end to 13 consecutive weeks of neighborhood dads pick-up hockey. That's right, thirteen weeks. Unreal. And they were all great. Right up until the end. Even though the city stopped icing the rinks on the 1st. And then it snowed. And ordinary citizens had to take up the cause. And blow the rinks. And bring our own nets. And it was patchy in spots. But we played. And when a group of 5 old dudes pulled up and kind of gimped over to the rink and asked if they could join us, of course we said yes. And when they took the ice and owned us all with their insane stick handling and genius positional play it was all so predictably great you knew you couldn't have scripted the final week any better.

Then it brought an end to the State High School Hockey tournament. The answer to the question is: not this year it didn't. Because that was the game. Especially with Roseau in the wings. Until they lost. But at least JoePa and I got to demolish a Sheiks Dinner for 2 from Holyland while we watched the Pioneers steamroll the Hornets. Also this: when I picked-up dinner there was some crazy Mexican pop group at the Midtown Global Market. It's not on their calendar, so I don't know who it was, but it was quite a sensation. I got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time and was basically stampeded by cellphone picture taking Latinos. Um, what a rush? A bit, yes.

I've put my skates away.

My neighbor Alan left these on our front porch the other day.

He's done it before.

I'm sure he'll do it again.

Just because he's cool like that.

I thought they were pretty great.

Last Friday I met the family and some neighborhood friends over at Saint Albert's for their famous annual Lenten Fish Fry-o-rama. I've read about it a few times but I wasn't really sure what to expect. Fried fish? Sure. Cole slaw? Sure. Tartar sauce? For damn sure. Folding chairs? Probably. Little old ladies keeping it real? Hopefully. The list goes on. It's a long list. It did not include $10 hand-painted medium-sized garden gnomes. In retrospect, it probably should have.

So I get there and find a place to park and wander around outside for a while until the rest my posse shows up. You can smell the fish all over the neighborhood. Literally. Everyone arriving also points this out. Literally. They pull up, get out of their cars, and yell "OH MAN I can smell the fish already!!" It was a riot. The wait flew by for this reason alone.

Onward. You go in this weird little side door. There might be another entrance on the west side of the building, but all I found was a door on the south side. It feels like it's gonna be small potatoes. Couple of people waiting by the door for their ride. They're done eating. It's like 5:20. Down a narrow flight of stairs to the basement and HOLY MOSES the place is packed! Church tables everywhere. Folding chairs. Little old ladies. Kids. Fish. Tartar. I was BUSTING. Like some crazy parallel universe. I mean there were obviously cars on the street outside, but it felt like a thousand people where down there. Total festival atmosphere. Like some sort of crazy Catholic speakeasy. Jackpot.

Get our tickets. $10 for adults, kids under-5 eat free. (Suckers!) Look around and notice there is no seating for out group of 8. Even 4 together would have been difficult. So I ask and OF COURSE they're willing to help us find a spot. Next thing I know I've got 3 people clearing places and putting down 'reserved' table tents. High chairs? "Yeah, we need two" I say, "and two boosters if you have them... we've been busy." One of the ladies yells "good Catholics!!" and turns to run to the high chair corner. Uhhhhh.

To the food. Multiple buffet lines working. Mashed or hashbrown potatoes, fried or baked fish, [meatless] spaghetti, and cole slaw were the basics of the mainline. After that you had your lemonade/milk table and after that you had the Little Ol Lady Keepin' It Real™ dessert table. All handmade. All so great. Seriously. They'd say stuff like "Would you like a brownie, deary?" I could have cried. If I wasn't so busy shoveling desserts onto my tray.

The line moves fast and we're all sitting and eating before I know it. Then I'm up/down/up/down. Taking pics. Eating fish. Breaking down the hand-painted gnomes with the Activities Director lady. Loving it. Taking kids to the play area in the corner. Shaking hands. More fish? Yes please. Did I say lovin' it? Meanwhile the microphone is blasting raffle info like every 5 minutes. I held off. I have 14 afghans already. Hardest raffle I've stayed out of? Some say yes.

Time to go. So soon? Uh huh. One last look at the gnomes. Goodbye gnomes.

Now let me be clear. None of the food was outrageous. It was all very What You'd Expect for this type of thing. So if you go don't be all "I've had better fish". Of course you have. We all have. But if what you're looking for is a church basement fish fry that would make Garrison's head explode, then by all means, check out the fine work of the team over at Saint Alberts.

Lent on.

Saint Albert the Great [saintalbertthegreat]