3.18.12 Fishing for Information

It wouldn't be right to begin this day's post without a backward glance at last night's green-tinged festivities. Here is my lovely companion and I just after the Minneapolis St. Paddy's Day parade, in a local nightspot to which the various parade marchers had adjourned. We watched the parade curbside, and were surprised when our former nextdoor neighbor came marching along playing a sax. Who knew? We lived next door to him for the past 11 years and in all that time never once heard a single honk from a sax.

We began in the afternoon, walking over to the Northeast side of the river to Keegan's Irish Pub, where we partook of a corned beef sandwich and a couple of Harp Lagers. Later, we walked across the Hennepin Avenue bridge to the downtown side and watched the parade along the the Nicollet Mall. We joined our old neighbor at the Seven restaurant for a couple of beers and the complimentary food available there: hot dogs, beef stew, nacho chips, and bread: an odd assortment, and not particularly Irish, but it was free so who were we to turn up our noses?

We returned home to drop off my jacket, which was highly unnecessary given the crazy warm weather, then hopped a bus (all bus rides were free courtesy of Minneapolis Mass Transit) to Lee's Liquor Lounge to see the band Little Man perform. The downtown area was absolute chaos, streets jamed with revelers and traffic so that it took the bus 20 minutes to travel a single block, but Lee's—a couple blocks west of downtown—was, sadly, quiet and empty. I felt sorry for the bands who found themselves playing to a mere handful of people. But Chris Perricelli of Little Man, whom you may recall as the chap who recently took my record collection off my hands, played a great set and the band which followed was reasonably entertaining as well. That is, they played well enough to allow me to dance my ass off. Since I didn't have the camera handy, this shot of Chris is from a different show, but you get the picture.

Guess where we ended up at 2 AM — that's right, none other than White Castle for a couple orders of murder-burgers, as my friends and I once called them. And, as I also recalled from the past, there's nothing else that quite hits the spot at 2 AM after a night of drinking than those little onion-encrusted dainties.


Which brings me to this morning's stroll around the island, and the one photo I have to share: an older gentleman fishing on the eastern end of the island. I approached him and asked what he might hope to catch. Catfish and small-mouth bass, replied he. After which, we had a pleasant conversation about the island, where it seems that, long ago, he had been a resident. He shared bits of interesting island lore with me that I hadn't known. For instance, that long ago there had been a couple of bars on the island (talk about bad timing!), and a general store. He talked about St. Anthony Main, and a time when the only bar there was Pracna ... which is still there today.



I left this fellow to catch what fish he could, and returned homeward. Near home, I hailed a neighbor who was out tending her yard, and had a nice chat with her as well. Trees were budding, the sun was shining, birds were singing, and I had to pinch myself to make sure that I really was in Minneapolis in the middle of March. This is going to be a great spring, summer and fall!

Life flows on, in and around us—growing inestimably richer when we share it with others.

D.E.S.