2003-06-22 - 9:22 p.m. MN recap I spent the better part of my week in Minneapolis, MN. To be more precise, I spent nearly a day getting there and back, then a day and a half of awake time there. Alas, I saw almost none of the sites there were to see. Not even the Walker Art Center. Instead, I spent my time in the new Le Meridien Minneapolis hotel. Apparently, it�s attached to some huge shopping mall and a Hard Rock Caf� in the midst of downtown, bordering on the warehouse district. Unfortunately for me (especially now that I�ve learned they don�t have sales tax on clothing there), I was firmly parked inside the hotel other than for a few short drinking and eating excursions in the neighborhood. For whatever reasons, I was distracted when I got to the airport, and thus forgot to take off my shoes, and set off the security alarm. I�d also forgotten to take my laptop out of my carry on laptop bag (they didn�t have a sign up, and didn�t ask me to take it out, so it didn�t occur to me), so that became an issue as well. Once all my possessions were run through a few times, with me standing in the glass enclosure watching, a woman with dark wavy hair almost as long as mine came over to give me the once over with the wand. She also did a more thorough than I would think was necessary examination of my underwire bra. My flight was running late, and was overbooked. I forgot I was eligible to pre-board, which resulted in my luggage being taken away from me and checked. Unlike every other airline I�ve flown on though, the gentleman who took it away informed me I�d have to go to the baggage carousel to retrieve it. Grrrr. Thanks to the half hour flight delay, followed by the 25 minute wait for luggage and the 20-something minute cab ride to the hotel, I completely missed the client dinner. I knew they�d set a place for me, but I didn�t want to be the jerk who showed up late and drug dinner out for an extra hour, thus I resolved to check in to the hotel then arrange to meet up with the group for the inevitable post-dinner carousing. On the drive to my hotel, I saw all sorts of decaying or abandoned buildings I wanted to take photos of, but thanks to my lateness, I couldn�t double back after checking in. Instead, I ordered some room service, logged in to the high speed Internet connection, then made arrangements to meet up w/my group at the hotel bar after dinner. The hotel was swanky and minimalist and full of attentive staff, which is good since it was a labrinthe to navigate and had almost no signage. I deemed it a Midwestern hotel trying to be New York; one of my coworkers quipped that it was trying to be New York two years ago. Ouch. It was nice though. Much better than that horrible chain business hotel in Cleveland with the damn air conditioners that wouldn�t shut off� Unfortunately, thanks to our party girl meeting planner, one round of drinks at the hotel became a bar crawl, heading from one cheesy bar to another. Somehow, in the rush to get ready, I left my ID in my carry on bag (it was stowed where it was easy to get at in the airport without digging through my handbag.) Normally, that�s no big deal. I am way past the legal drinking age. But, apparently, the MN folks thought I looked like the vice squad or something, and carded me everywhere we went outside of the hotel. Seriously. In 2 days, we went to 4 or 5 bars and I was carded every time! Crazy. Along the way, I learned that Minneapolis� citizens were really nice, friendly people. As a long-time city dweller, I do tend to forget that people in smaller cities tend to be a hell of a lot nicer to each other. Oddly enough, I ended up running into more Minnesotans, from Minneapolis no less, at my farmers� market on Saturday. I kindly advised them to buy as much June Taylor jam as they could carry, and steered them towards her Santa Rosa plum conserve. I further assisted tourists at the Healdsburg Bakery booth, advising them to try the doughnut muffins, and validating their other decisions. It was nice to let down the indifferent City fa�ade and get to be a nice, helpful, convivial person again, if only for a few hours� NOTE: I added a "swap list" link to these pages to provide easy-access to my swappingtons list. Please trade with me! Thanks. any comments? (0 so far) previous - next recently on almostgoldsf... in defense of an email box I came to do battle with SPAM - 2008-05-17 hello 2006 - 2005-12-31 Happy Thanksgiving - 2005-11-14 bon voyage - 2005-11-05 October already? - 2005-10-09