February 2019 Posts

Tried Skating to Wisconsin

Made it to 35th before impassable stacks of plate ice.

Tim Kaiser – “Organelle”

Tim Kaiser appears to be reorganizing his recordings on SoundCloud, and so this gem appears on my feed.

1970s Duluth Radio

I believe WEBC had a slogan and I had won a T-shirt of this:

“WEBC blew the WAKX outta my ears”

I cannot seem to find any archives of this.

Any thoughts?

Lake Superior Aquaman Patrolling the Big Lake on Skates

The BBC Interviews Duluth Cyclist Leah Gruhn

Photo by Jeremy Kershaw

Leah Gruhn, geologist at Barr Engineering and avid Duluth cyclist, was the first woman to complete Northern Minnesota’s Arrowhead 135 mile race in record-breaking low temps on Tuesday, Jan. 29.

The BBC asked her how she did it.

How to Change a Flat Tire

I think it’s been something like 10 years since I’ve blown a tire while driving and had to replace it with a spare on the side of the road. What’s weird about that is I remember having to change flat tires fairly often in previous years — like once every 20 months or something.

The most I have ever paid for a motor vehicle is $4,000. My current car cost $3,500. The seven others I’ve gone through over the years each cost about $1,500 or less. Every one of them was a bargain, but involved a bit more maintenance than newer cars. The well-worn tires on some of those clunkers used to give me my share of roadside adventures. I’m not sure why that has stopped in the past decade, but I’m certainly not complaining.

About 15 years ago, as a public service and also as a reminder to my future self, I compiled a list of advice about changing flat tires. I’m assuming all of it still applies to today’s vehicles and might be useful to the general public at some point in the future or me tomorrow. It’s not really technical advice, it’s more for emotional preparation.

Glamourous Duluth

Duluth’s Ashley Sullivan, sporting a Duluth Cider hat, is part of a feature in the online women’s magazine Glamour titled “Insanely cold polar vortex temperatures are literally freezing people’s eyelashes.” The article refers to a social media trend of people “posting commentary and photos of themselves turning into Elsa from Frozen simply by going about their lives in a polar vortex.”

“Depending on how cold it is, you can feel them freeze right away,” Sullivan told Glamour reporter Abby Gardner. “It doesn’t hurt and doesn’t affect your eyesight, but by the end of a hike, you get the pretty frost. The aftermath isn’t so pretty as the ice melts and mascara runs down your face. But it’s like Mother Nature’s art on while you’re outside, if you think about it. It’s like you’re your own snowflake with the frost vibrating to your own energy.”

Entangled lives: Poles and Jews; Europe and Africa

University lectures showed me quite a bit about the entangled lives of the past that shape our present. Last Thursday, Dr. Deborah Petersen-Perlman gave a historical tour of Poland. She opened with a video that shows the borders of European nations, beginning hundreds of years before the invention, even, of the nation-state.

Selective Focus: Yarrow Mead

Yarrow Mead is a metal smith who works with Northern Minnesota “gems” including local stones, agates and seaglass. The pieces she creates proudly show tool marks and uneven, organic shapes that reflect the North Shore.

YM:
I am a silver and gold smith working with primarily local stones, beach glass, and American sourced metal. I was trained in jewelry by Stephen Hoglund, who is a very talented smith out of Grand Marais, as well as through my time working as a Props Master at the Hamline University Theater Department, under Theater Director Bill Wallace. My personal style has been influenced by both of these men, as well as my childhood on the North Shore of Minnesota. I am greatly inspired by the shapes and textures along the shores of Lake Superior, as well as my personal Nordic heritage.

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