Duluth in Winter on a Fixie
This YouTube video has gotten a decent amount of traffic recently. Check out the icy hills of Duluth from the saddle of a fixed-gear bicycle.
Earth Hour 2010
Designed: Chelsey L
Earth Hour will be coming back to the Duluth area this March! From 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. on March 27 the World Wildlife Fund asks individuals and businesses to turn off their lights for the hour. Nearly one billion people from 87 countries participated in Earth Hour last year! (more…)
Anyone Can Participate
Sarah Heimer wanted me to pass along a reminder that the 4th Diorama-Rama is this Saturday at 7pm. Sacred Heart Music Center. All-ages. Info: caradiabolica [at] hotmail [dot] com.
Shorter Days for All of Us?
Maybe this isn’t really a local enough topic for PDD, but given the earlier post on whether we’re vulnerable here to earthquakes, a Yahoo news story today seems interesting and relevant. The Chile quake apparently may have shifted earth’s axis, and made earth days slightly shorter. And this has happened before with big quakes, too.
Reminds me, too, of a Harper’s article from 2000 about dam building. There’s a quotation in that article that says: 
“The planet accommodates 40,000 large dams–dams more than four stories high–and some 800,000 small ones. They have shifted so much weight that geophysicists believe they have slightly altered the speed of the earth’s rotation, the tilt of its axis, and the shape of its gravitational field. Together they blot out a terrain bigger than California.”
So, any thoughts–think we’re headed towards shorter Perfect Duluth Days due to earthquakes and dam building?
Duluth native Rya Ehle releases first EP – Table No. 9
Duluth native Rya Elhe who now lives in Nashville recently released her first EP titled “Table No. 9”.
Growing up in Duluth, Minnesota, Rya Ehle never got used to the 40-below wind chills that blew in off of Lake Superior each winter. It was there that her 18 years of classical piano training began at the young age of 4. At age 6, her passion for songwriting surfaced in compositions titled “Curious Frogs” and “Death of the Bees.” “I remember wanting to be just like Beethoven,” Rya recalls, “and when I found out he’d started writing at age 4, I remember thinking I’m already 6, I need to catch up!”
Listen here: https://www.myspace.com/ryaehle
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ryaehlemusic
Apologies in Advance for Opening Such a Shit-Storm of Nerdom
Thursday, March 18 · Triple Rock Social Club
Leslie and the LYs with Christopher the Conquered
Cross City Trail: The Proposed Middle Segment
In a Feb. 18 post the maps for the proposed Cross City Trail — which will connect the Munger Trail to the Lakewalk — were laid out. In the comments I included photos of the various route options for the westernmost section.
The middle section of the trail — from Ramsey Street to Clyde Park — has only one option, so there’s not a lot to seek feedback on, but I thought I’d shoot some photos anyway.
This bridge is actually NOT part of the proposed trail; I just like that a tree is growing through it.
And if all of PDD said it, they’d call it a movement … the real cream movement!
I have discovered something wonderful! Cedar Summit Farm cream. It’s the real old fashioned deal from a family run sustainable farm near New Prague, Minnesota. Shake it vigorously and it becomes the most awesome butter. Whip it good and it becomes the best whipped cream I’ve ever tasted.
Problem is, I have to drive to the Whole Foods Co-Op in Grand Marais to stock up. Of course, being available in Grand Marais, the delivery truck drives right through Duluth. Indeed, the Whole Foods Co-Op in Duluth stocks Cedar Summit Farm milk but not the cream.
So, please take my word and join me in emailing, calling or otherwise communicating to the Whole Foods Co-Op in Duluth that they must stock Cedar Summit Farm Cream! Contact info at wholefoods.coop.
And no, I’m not affiliated with Cedar Summit Farm in any way other than being a Cedar Summit Farm cream devotee! For more see cedarsummit.com.
They even have happy cows! Let the movement begin!
Mexico Lindo sign is up at Fitger’s
I noticed last week that the sign is up outside the Fitger’s Brewery Complex for the Mexico Lindo restaurant. Any word on an opening date? Anyone?
In other Mexico Lindo related news, don’t go to the Cloquet location on Friday. I’m predicting the place will be packed like never before. Denfeld plays Hermantown for the Section 5A hockey championship at the Cloquet Area Recreation Center at 7 p.m. I’m sure I’m not the only one planning a pregame meal.
Journalistic Integrety at Stake, part 2
Personally, I didn’t care much about the accuracy of Jeff Tweedy quotes in various media, but I believe I’ve found a media issue of the utmost importance to our society.
In the Duluth News Tribune’s report about Superior High School wrestler Nikola Bogojevic winning the state championship in his weight class, this paragraph jumped out at me:
Moments later he grabbed Superior coach Bill Gedde and put him in an airplane spin — made famous by professional wrestler “Rowdy” Roddy Piper — to celebrate the title.
Since when did Roddy Piper make the airplane spin famous? I remember Mike Rotunda using it as his signature maneuver in the 1980s, but I don’t remember ever seeing Piper do it. I mean, I suppose it happened, but I just don’t associate that move with Piper.
Am I right here?
By the way, congratulations to Bogojevic for his victory, his awesome season, and most of all putting his coach in an airplane spin. That’s epic.
Slow? Who you callin’ slow?
PDD is working normally for me and pretty much everyone else I’ve asked, but at least one person says it’s been enormously slow for a few days now. Is anyone else experiencing this? If you are, it should take two minutes for the page to load allowing you to comment, so thanks for taking the time to let us know.
Right now we’re assuming everything is fine and one person’s computer hates this site for some reason.
What is the risk of earthquakes in Duluth?
Does anyone know about the seismic issues in this area? What kind of risk are we at for an earthquake? If one occurred in Lake Superior, could a tsunami be generated? If so, how big? Any other relevant facts or thoughts related to this?
Major earthquakes and shifts in weather patterns seem to be the norm these days. Does this align with anyone’s scientific knowledge or religious beliefs associated with the “End Times”? And, if you think it is the end times, is Duluth a good place to be? I sure think it is.
St. David’s Day Open Reading 2010
The Spirit Lake Poetry Series presents its 14th annual St. David’s Day Open Reading.
Saturday, Feb. 27, 7:30 p.m., at Somers Lounge, College of St. Scholastica
Anyone is welcome to participate. Readers must limit themselves to three minutes.
Forum: The Copenhagen Debacle and the Fight for Climate Justice
Sunday, February 28, 7 PM, Center for Just Living, College of St. Scholastica Tower Hall
Runaway climate change threatens the entire human species with annihilation. Join a presentation and discussion of why efforts to halt global warming to date have failed and what needs to be done.
Sponsored by Lake Superior Socialist Action, P.O. Box 16853, Duluth, MN 55806. For more information contact (715) 394-6660 or [email protected].
Duluth’s Maria Bamford as Mayor Kadoody on The Sarah Silverman Program
| The Sarah Silverman Program | Thursday, 10:30pm / 9:30c | |||
| Victory Speech | ||||
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USA Men’s Hockey in Gold Medal Game (plus UMD note)
My earlier local Winter Olympics connections post here on PDD didn’t exactly catch fire, what with Wilco coming to town, people waving pitchforks at the DNT, and new doorknobs or cheaper beer or fill-in-the-blank down at Luce. However, I’m gonna take another crack at the local Olympics connection with these two items.
a) The USA Men are in the Medal Game Sunday afternoon vs the Canada/Slovakia winner (that game is tonight). Captain of Team USA is Cloquet Native Jamie Langenbrunner 
b) According to the Wall Street Journal, UMD has produced more Vancouver Olympians than any other college in the World besides the University of Calgary. Full story is here. Naturally, not all of the UMD Olympians are Americans, which is also impressive to me. UMD is a magnet for many of the world’s finest women’s hockey players, including 6 from my ancestral homeland Sweden.
Journalistic Integrity is at Stake Here
So, Chris Riemenschneider, the Strib’s music critic, had an item about Wilco’s Duluth concert in this week’s Vita.MN. In it, he quoted Jeff Tweedy as saying, “This teenager came up to us and said he was mayor. We think it’s legit.”
I couldn’t help but notice this is not quite the same quote that PDDers have repeated. In the post with the picture of our fresh-faced mayor alongsideWilco, for instance, the quote is “‘teenaged boy who claims he’s the mayor.” (And I believe that post was authored by none other than our fresh-faced mayor himself, no?)
That leads me to wonder which it was. The omission of “the” before “mayor” could have been a typo on Riemenschneider’s part, but I wondered about “teenager” v. “teenaged boy,” “said” v. “claims” and past v. present tense.
It’s no biggie, of course. I just remember that after the Sept. 4, 2007 concert, Riemenschneider reproduced Tweedy’s quote about the ore boat/fog/bridge differently than I recalled it myself. Is he just paying too close attention to the music to get quotes verbatim (which is arguably okay for a music critic)? Were the PBRs flowing too freely for anyone to take too close a notice of Tweedy’s comment? Was the concert so good no one really cares about this except me?
Discuss.
10W40 at Pizza Luce
$5 cover, but to put it in perspective … you’ll still spend less at Luce then the Rex when it comes to beer … just saying.
It’s Only Just Begun …
The DNT’s A&E online blog “While You Were In” writes that there seems to be a war starting over Wilco and the recent “teenage boy’s” certificate naming them Duluth’s Honorary Band.
Newspaper Guild Pickets the DNT
(The article below was originally posted to the Northern Worker blog at www.northernworker.wordpress.com)
by Adam Ritscher
On Thursday, February 25 about 80 members and supporters of the Lake Superior Newspaper Guild gathered in front of the Duluth News-Tribune offices for an informational picket. The Newspaper Guild represents the reporters and other workers at the DNT.
Bird or Buoy?
So, we were at Park Point on Sunday. It was pretty far away and after a 45 minute walk on the sand we finally realized what it was. Can you tell?
(picture by Michael Kehn)
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Daily Duluth Photo vs. Duluth Daily Photo
It struck me as a little odd a few days ago when a post on PDD announced the creation of Daily Duluth Photo. “Hasn’t that been around for a while?” I thought to myself.
Now the situation has been cleared up in the comments to that post. The previously existing site I was thinking of is Duluth Daily Photo, not Daily Duluth Photo.
Goodness gracious. I don’t think I can handle two photos a day.