Considering I’m a couple blocks in either direction from the Minneapolis city boundaries, I’m amused to see this ‘Coming Soon’ network in my available network listing - while sitting on my sofa.

I’m guessing this means the Phase 5 Build out is on schedule for Feb 2008 completion.

Some highlights:

• Having my immediate family all in the same room at the same time on Christmas day. This in itself made the day. To my mom, dad, sister, and Bob: Thank you for making the drive, for spending the time, for being together on Christmas. Let’s not wait 15 years to do it again.
• Teknikal Diffikulties Advent Calendar Day 22: Happy Solstice[mp3]. While each piece of Cayenne’s Advent Calendar is enjoyable, this installment felt so perfect and comforting I stopped shoveling to appreciate the significance of the shortest day of the year.
• Taking a day-long break from 5 months of heavy programming (in addition to podcasts, email, and the internet as a whole).
• Jeremy’s fantastic home-made butternut squash ravioli on Christmas Eve dinner
• Cooper making a bee line for the simple wooden train under the tree on Christmas Day.
• Assembling Cooper’s new trike.
• Cracking open a Wake-n-Bake Coffee Oatmeal Imperial Stout from Athens, GA’s Terrapin Beer Co. last night after the day was done. A tasty, frothy brew, paired well with 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream. Thanks Pat.
• Only a single holiday-related dramatic incident that sorted itself out quite neatly once the moment passed.
• As I write this, Cooper is sitting in the tallest snow bank in the yard. Content as can be.
• The entryway shelf overflowing with holiday greetings, cards, photos, and letters.
• Me: “Cooper, What does Christmas mean?”
  C: “Um…People come over.”

1 Comments

• At 26 December 2007, Connie Bensen wrote:

  Thank you for sharing your Christmas Garrick. Isn't Minnesota a wonderful place to live? All four seasons are amazing, but the snow has it's own unique wonder.

  It's been great sharing tweets.

“Come on, Jackie. You called me about this on Thursday afternoon. We discussed the story, I pointed you to sources where you could find more info, including the email of one of the sources you quote. You told me you’d mention The Deets in the article.”- Ed Kohler

BTW - Ed’s story hit my radar first.

ELSEWHERE:
The Wege hauls everyone back to their own corner:

“Just to be clear, the Strib clearly screwed over Ed Kohler at The Deets, and he has every right to complain. My issue is with the piling on. Bloggers steal. Period. I try to attribute but I also have a two and out rule: anytime I give credit to a blog twice in one day, I’m entitled to steal any other links I like from them without giving credit. Others have different rules, but hardly anyone gives credit for EVERY link every day. If nothing else you don’t plug Atrios because you chose to read his take on today’s Krugman before going to the NYTimes and reading it for yourself.” - The Wege

“Grounds for worry: Trouble’s brewing in the economy, if the news from the nation’s biggest coffee chains is any indication.

No. 2 player Caribou Coffee Co. Inc., based in Brooklyn Center, announced the unexpected departure of CEO Michael Coles, who spent the past two years overseeing an aggressive expansion that has yet to show results on the bottom line. Caribou is expected to see red ink of $1.01 per share this year and lose 63 cents per share next year.

More worrying, market leader Starbucks disclosed negative same-store traffic later in the week and took down its projections for ‘08.

People don’t give up their high-end java for Maxwell House unless they’re feeling light in the wallet.”

That’s right, it’s the last sentence. Aside from free advertising for Kraft Foods there’s no reason to include it. It’s off-topic, uncredited, and simply continues to fan the ‘hell-in-a-handbasket’ attitude.

In addition, if these 5 sentences were actually news reporting, we’d see that Starbucks’ issues have little to do with people buying less coffee and more to do with the over-saturation.

“The concern is that the company has been adding locations so quickly that the new stores are cannibalizing the old ones…” - Janet Adamy, Wall Street Journal

Lastly, even if the dip in bottom-line growth in the Starbucks and Caribou wasn’t due to build-out, “Trading Up” could just as easily explain fewer sales as reaching for the lower quality coffee. Personally, I don’t remember the last time I stepped into a Starbucks, because I’ve found far-tastier and higher-priced coffee at Kopplin’s.

Thank goodness Black Monday is coming, the additional ad flyers should distract me from the paper itself.

I’m not confident in getting the whole story from a single source, so who else needs to be on the list?

Add links in the comments and I’ll put together an aggregation.

Thanks.

“We met at Starbucks. Not at the same Starbucks but we saw each other at different Starbucks across the street from each other.” - Meg Swan, Best in Show

Meeting for coffee at a Dunn Bros. on University this afternoon and just got the call that there’s more than one. We each chose a different one.

Not the first time this has happened this summer (there are also 2 on Washington). They should start putting store numbers on the doors or we should meet at more unique locations - like; Kopplin’s, J & S Bean Factory, 1-on-1, CRC.

Let’s both remember next time. Thanks.

2 Comments

• At 23 September 2007, Louis F. Springer wrote:

  I think that places should have quirky, memorable uniqueness that doesn't affect the consistent product quality we are looking for. Different numbers merely amplifies our ubiquitous depersonalization of things in pursuit of efficient perfection. I don't need to be reminded of this. This is probably one reason I prefer interesting server names to structured names by convention, even if the names are aliases.

• At 28 September 2007, Phil Crissman wrote:

  The ones on Washington are complicated by the fact that they are both on 3rd ave. I looked for a Real Estate agent there for almost a half hour one time until I realized he was at *N* 3rd.

My favorites are the Spinach Pie and the Savory Pie. Both are so much tastier than Davanni’s par-bake or the nastiness that is Papa Murphy’s.

Jen just called, reporting a citing of a bus ad for HomeMade, and their site confirms locations opening soon at Hwy 7 & Hopins Crossroad in Minnetonka and 830 East Lake in Wayzata.

Sure, it’s not in walking distance from my house (or I would’ve known sooner), but it’s here and will make the occassional trips to those neighborhoods so much better.

1 Comments

• At 8 August 2007, Eric Fosse wrote:

  Garrick,

  We appreciate the props! we also will be opening in St. Paul and Apple Valley, in addition to others this year. I hope we see you there. Thanks!

- thanks to smithers for the photo

The stretch of Highway 35W bridge I - and many other of my Twin Citizens - take to get around Minneapolis collapsed earlier this evening.

Gone.

Into the river taking 50+ cars, trucks, and a school bus with it.

If you need an idea of where:
Imagine this picture without the big bridge.

I’m pretty torqed @ the mobile phone networks right now. This is when they’re needed the most. And they’re failing.

UPDATE 3 AUG 2007:
With the 35W South onramp @ Stinson/New Brighton Blvd closed and now 280 closed @ Broadway, I went from living in a place with easy access to all major Twin Cities freeways, to being completely isolated. It’ll probably be like this for a couple years. Farg.

I’m anxious to see how NE Mpls culture will change between now and when 35W re-opens. Will the disconnect with downtown make it more NE-y, more suburban, or more North-y?

2 Comments

• At 1 August 2007, kris wrote:

  good to hear you are you weren't on the road.

• At 1 August 2007, Smithers wrote:

  It's amazing how many people I know from outside that have phoned to make sure that we are ok.

“I’m really missing my laptop - taken from our office while two of us sat on the other side of a half wall. We heard a small click and that was all.” - Joanne Henry

Joanne, I’m sorry for your loss. I hope it comes to a sastisfactory conclusion.

“Several law enforcement officials said, however, there have been no direct threat[s] to the airport and that the suspects had yet to obtain financing or explosives.”

That quote* - buried on A18 of today’s Sunday Strib - proves the story doesn’t belong on the front page. Especially since - also on A18 - a much shorter story (”A Snag in the Plot…”) confirms:

“…the level of catastrophe that may be created is much more limited that most people would expect..” -

Why?

“…jet fuel doesn’t easily explode.”

At startribune.com, the JFK movie-plot threat is the second headline (and falling) in the second section a couple screenviews down. In terms of priority, importance, and relevance, this is where the story belongs.

The asymmetry between the placement as lead story in the print edition and insignificance placement online betrays the actual news-worthiness of the story (none) and the differences between fishwrap news editors and online news editors (apparently, the easily frightened buy fishwrap while the more thoughtful read online).

Lastly, this is the second time in as many days and with as many newspapers where I’ve struggled to find a print-edition story in on a newspaper’s website. Just as I expect retail stores to have symmetrical catalogs between their online and offline offerings, I expect the same from publishers.

*Oddly, I couldn’t find this quote in the online version.