State Fair postraveganza...on a stick

It's time for the state fair! Everyone who lives in Minnesota inevitably returns there every year (not unlike spawning salmon) to see the sights, ride the rides, and FEAST. I didn't want to bring my camera there in the first place since neither my camera warranty nor my health insurance covers grease burns, but fortunately @julielyda convinced me.



These people wanted to charge me 3 AMERICAN DOLLARS for a one way ticket on what is, in essence, a colorful ski lift.



This is somewhere in the international bazaar, which is significant to me because it is adjacent to the Summit beer garden.



It's the Brass Kings! I automatically approve of any band that consists solely of a washboard, washtub bass, and guitar.



There are also apparently rides at the fair, which I cannot attest to, since I have never ridden them. If it costs money in the fair and I can't devour it, I am NOT INTERESTED.



PERT' NEAR SANDSTONE was also there! EVERYONE should go and see them once in their life. Banjo? Check. Mandolin? Check. Clog Dancer? CHECK. They'll be at the Cabooze in a few short weeks, and it will be delightful. ATTENDANCE IS MANDATORY FOR ALL CITIZENS.

Grain Belt

Here's a picture from the Grain Belt brewery, where apparently the date 1891 hold some sort of significance. Maybe that's when they built it, but I'm clearly too busy to google something like that. The brewery is cool because it was built in a time where the people building it didn't say "let's build a functional building, one that brews beer and doesn't care if it's an eyesore." No, these men and women (Men.) were just drunk enough to think "Let's build not just a brewery, but a magnificent monument to beer and those who drink it." As the descendant of those beer-swilling builders, I'm glad they made the choice they did.

Skyline from Broadway

HDR is a fascinating thing. I only discovered it about 6 months ago, and I enjoyed it so much that it can largely be credited with fueling the "Twincy Renaissance," as it is known in the fanciest-pantsiest of fine art circles. It's definately a valuable tool to have hanging off the ol' toolbelt, and can be used to create some stunningly beautiful photographs. Unfortunately, it can also be used to create horrific eye-abortions the likes of which the Good Lord himself could not forgive (comedy sidebar: it's watermarked!)

I was a tad bit apprehensive taking this shot out on Broadway, since I was informed that the area was kind of shady by @julielyda. She was quick to clarify "Like mugging-shady, not murder-shady" That put my mind at ease.

Signs in Northeast

Taken while walking around town just across the street from Surdyks, whose fine liquors fuel this very blog. Delicious beers, fine wines and cigars, all a short distance from my home. Although in the interest of full disclosure, I've never bought beer that cost more than 8 dollars for a six-er, nor wine that costs more than 10 dollars a box. Classy? You know it.

Necklaces

You may have noticed by now that I'm not what you would call a "person who comes up with halfway decent titles for uninteresting blog posts" Much like when I was a child, I look at something, blurt out the first word to dance across my synapses, and mash the keyboard until the words that I see match the picture in front of my face. We could just fool ourselves and call it some sort of artistically minimalist statement about the photos, but then I'm no better than that jerkoff trout fisherman on NPR the other day talking about how making squiggly lines for titles was sticking it to the scientific binomial nomenclature.

Frankly, I'm not clever enough to pull anything like that off. These are necklaces, and that's what I called them.

Butterfly Milkweed/Duluth, Two for One

One of my prairie favorites, the Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa interior if you're so inclined) grows all over the midwest. It has a tight cluster of orange flowers that seem to make them irresistible to insects and prairie-philes.



Here's one of the piers in Duluth. I typically don't have much faith in my ability to make black and white photos (meaning that when I hit the "convert" button in Photoshop, they don't tend to look too great) but I like the way this one came out.

Northeast Church

After a bit of a hiatus, we're back! Had a very successful trip to the BWCA, but sadly only took a few pictures, opting to spend most of my stay in that most epic of battles: Man vs. Fish. The historians shall mark it as a triumph for man, as I managed to eat fish without being eaten in turn. After cementing myself atop the food chain, I can return to my regular blogging duties. This is a church, in case you just thought it was a photo of a man carrying a giant letter "T", perhaps typesetting for a race of giants. It was taken as I was riding my bike along the Grand Rounds