Category Archives: Minnesota

The week Chase let go

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(Flickr, Michael Levine-Clark)

May, here in the Upper Midwest, is when spring finally starts. The trees are budding out all over Median Lake, crocuses are poking up from flowerbeds, and that pile of snow in the parking lot behind City Hall is melted down to its stubborn, pyramidal core of gravel and ice. Gardeners have been putting in all the tomatoes they started on their kitchen windowsills back in April — Mother’s Day weekend, that’s the date to get them in the ground, and spend the next two months dreaming of big, juicy slices of heirloom beefsteaks for caprese and BLTs, brilliant red Romas to can for sauce.

It’s also time for Median Lake Pride, second to last weekend of May. Yes, Pride is traditionally in June. But when you’re planning Pride in a town midway between Des Moines and Minneapolis, and within road-trip distance of Milwaukee and Chicago, you have to make some accommodation. We know better than to try to compete with the big cities, even if we do know how to put on a show in Median Lake.

And, honey, it has not been a quiet Pride Week in Median Lake.

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Oh, hon, let me tell you. It has not been a quiet week in Median Lake

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(jby)

Median Lake got another foot of snow this week. The sun came out and warmed us up above freezing for maybe an hour, at high noon on Tuesday. That mostly served to re-establish the glaze of ice on the sidewalks — best we can do in February, on the prairie.

In weather like this, I expect you think we spend all our time huddled indoors. And you’d be right! But diners are indoors. Church fellowship halls are indoors. Coffee shops are indoors. The Rainbow Garland Tavern, the only gay bar between Des Moines and the Twin Cities, just a block off of Main Street on Third Avenue, by the Larsson Brothers Hardware? That’s as indoors as you get. And whatever else you might say about folks getting together in diners and fellowship halls and coffee shops and bars, it usually doesn’t make for a quiet week.

Steven Kramer, who tends bar at the Garland most nights? Well, he’s more or less the only person in town you might call an events promoter, and he’s been running ragged.

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My review of Lab Girl for the LA Review of Books

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How should I illustrate a review of Lab Girl? Let's go with a cool plant. This is bunchberry, Cornus canadensis (Flickr: jbyoder)

How should I illustrate a review of Lab Girl? Let’s go with a cool plant. This is bunchberry, Cornus canadensis. (Flickr: jbyoder)

You have surely, by now, heard all about Hope Jahren’s terrific scientific memoir Lab Girl, including as one of my “bookshelf” recommendations for Chronicle Vitae. My full-length review of Lab Girl is now online at the LA Review of Books, and it is, as you might expect, very positive — Jahren writes beautifully about the process of scientific discovery and the daily miracles of the natural world. As a postdoc still scrabbling for purchase on the lower rungs of the tenure track, though, Lab Girl managed to simultaneously tweak my anxieties and give me hope:

The world is heating up, and it often seems that the intellectual luxuries afforded to scientists of the past — Darwin’s leisurely publication schedule, Haldane’s dalliances with radical politics — are gone. Lab Girl’s rendition of the daily institutional frustrations of research marks it as a different kind of scientific memoir — but also as a product of twenty-first century science. If you navigate among scientists’ blogs or scroll through their Twitter feeds, you’ll quickly find the same fears and vexations and injustices Jahren describes, intertwined with accounts of the work that excites scientists’ passions. … Jahren does not makes science look like an easy career choice, but it isn’t her job to do so — and if Lab Girl chronicles the real and substantial barriers to becoming a successful scientist, it also makes that life compelling: she shows the fruit that can still grow from the rocky soil of a research career.

I do hope you’ll read the whole review, and pick up a copy of Lab Girl if you somehow haven’t already.

Minnesota winter as a series of cinematic genres

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Image via.

(Update: Cross-posted.)

First snowfall: Romantic comedy. You meet cute when you feel the first flakes against your cheek. The fresh snow cover makes everything look new and crisp and innocent. You take a long evening walk through the park, watching the falling snow dance in the light of the street lamps. You stop to make snow angels. There is a snowball fight, but afterwards everyone is still friendly. Towards the end, adorable children come out to play.

The cold snap: Heist. Going outdoors requires careful planning, and if you don’t have the right equipment, things could go pear-shaped in an instant. You have many of your most important conversations over the phone—or via Skype, if you want to look particularly tech-savvy. If you’re going to take I-94, you’ll need a really good driver.

White Christmas: Disney animated musical. Fresh snow arrives just in time to accessorize the family photo on the front porch. Everything is covered in tinsel and blinking lights. Your trip to the drugstore to buy cough syrup has a twinkly soundtrack. People you meet on the street are jolly, but there is a sneaking sense that they’re just trying to fulfill expectations.

The blizzard: Mumblecore independent drama. The cold has numbed even your memories of summer. Everyone wears layers of flannel and threadbare sweaters, and many of your friends have taken up knitting just to make more insulation. You drink flat, tasteless Grain Belt because you can’t bear the thought of shoveling off the car again to go get something better. You have long, elliptical, monotone conversations with the houseguests who are trapped in your apartment after the sun goes down at 4:30.

The thaw: Film noir. Everything seems to change when a high-pressure system from the south waltzes in and asks if you know when it’ll be the right time to plant tomatoes. You prowl the slushy back alleys of the Warehouse District, searching for a glimpse of dry pavement. Two-story-tall piles of accumulated snow peppered with gravel and cigarette butts loom over empty, ice-covered parking lots. You think you see a crocus poking up through the snow—but forget it, Jake, it’s still only March.

The April snow storm: Adam Sandler farce. Ten inches of wet, heavy snow fall overnight with an almost audible thump. It looks shiny and new, but rapidly develops the familiar gray shading of slush. People get splashed in embarrassing ways. There is laughter, but it has a desperate, mean-spirited edge. It lasts about fifty percent longer than anyone really wants it to.◼

2013 Twin Cities Marathon, in photos

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2013.10.06 - Balloon Arch Photo by jby.

So, that marathon I ran this morning? Went pretty damn well. My official time is 3 hours 19 minutes 55 seconds, which is a personal record marathon time—by about ten minutes! I attribute this to (1) spectacular autumnal weather—clear, cool, and perfect for running; (2) some half-arsed attempts at speed training I did over the winter; and (3) actually paying attention to my pacing, instead of my usual marathon strategy of just running as fast as I can until I end up barely able to walk the last mile.

I didn’t do much tweeting from the course, but I did take a bunch of photos—the camera on my new iPhone is a lot better than my old one. So here they are, with a reconstructed transcript of my internal dialogue:

“The best thing about a marathon in my hometown is, I can walk to the starting line. It was near the Metrodome. And the weather’s nice and clear! But, eek, I only have about 25 minutes to stand in the porta-potty line …”

2013.10.06 - Metrodome Photo by jby.

“Whew. All set. Time to head to the start line.”

2013.10.06 - Headed to the starting line Photo by jby.

“And we’re off! Next stop, Saint Paul.”

2013.10.06 - And we're off! Photo by jby.

“Yay, marathons! Here’s Hennepin Avenue. I’m going to see Wicked in a couple weeks!”

2013.10.06 - South on Hennepin Photo by jby.

“And here’s the Basilica.”

2013.10.06 - Basilica I Photo by jby.

“I’m a sucker for Baroque architecture.”

2013.10.06 - Basilica II Photo by jby.

“Ooh, the Walker Art Museum.”

2013.10.06 - Walker Art Museum Photo by jby.

“And now we’re at the lakes! This is just like my usual Sunday runs.”

2013.10.06 - Lakeside I Photo by jby.

“There’s the skyline across Lake Calhoun.”

2013.10.06 - Lake Calhoun Photo by jby.

“And now the trails around Lake Harriet.”

2013.10.06 - Lake Harriet Photo by jby.

“Is this Minnehaha Parkway? I’ve never run here before.”

2013.10.06 - Parkway Photo by jby.

“Balloon arch!”

2013.10.06 - Balloon Arch Photo by jby.

“Almost to the halfway mark. Whew.”

2013.10.06 - Almost halfway! Photo by jby.

“Oof. Sixteen miles in two hours. I’m right on pace.”

2013.10.06 - Mile 16 Photo by jby.

“Crossing the Franklin Avenue Bridge. I’ve done this hundreds of times before … but it hurts a lot more this time.”

2013.10.06 - Franklin Avenue Bridge Photo by jby.

“Gee, thanks for the reminder, sponsor I’ve never heard of. Six miles to go, mostly uphill.”

2013.10.06 - Gee, thanks. Photo by jby.

[Five and a half miles of incoherence and pain. Otherwise known as Summit Avenue.]

“Finally, the cathedral. All downhill from here. Ow.”

2013.10.06 - Cathedral Photo by jby.

“I can see the State Capitol!”

2013.10.06 - Final stretch Photo by jby.

“Getting closer …”

2013.10.06 - Finish line in sight Photo by jby.

“The finish line! Does that clock really say 3:20?”

2013.10.06 - Crossing the finish Photo by jby.

“Ow. Owowowowow. Now where’s the chicken broth table?”

2013.10.06 - State Capitol Photo by jby.

“Of course they make me climb a staircase to get to the bus back to Minneapolis. Ow.”

2013.10.06 - Finish line festival I Photo by jby.

And that’s the lot. Next year, I’m going to have to do a marathon out of state for a change. Maybe Chicago?◼

Marathoning, yet again

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Tomorrow morning I’m running the Twin Cities Marathon—a mere two and a half years, and three other marathons, after I moved to the Twin Cities. What can I say? Scheduling is tricky.

I’ll be bringing my phone, so there may be live-tweeted photos if I’m feeling comfortable enough for that. Certainly the forecast—cool and cloudy but not actually raining—is perfect weather for both a very long run and for nice photos of the prettiest parts [PDF] of Minneapolis and Saint Paul. But I’m really hoping to crack my current time record of about 3 hours 30 minutes, so the only mid-race updates may be the ones available via the marathon website.

In the meantime, I have one last very short run to go do, to keep the ol’ joints loose.◼