So I realized I haven’t put anything on the website since our trip to the Smoky Mountains. Looking back on my previous posts I think there is a clear trend: we hibernate in the winter so the likelihood of taking outdoor photographs plummets precipitously. Makes sense; the cold air in Minnesota often times hurts my face so why go outside?
Winter is awful in Minnesota. It boggles my mind people live in this climate voluntarily and even immigrate to and stay in twin cities regions from extremely warm regions like Eastern Africa, South East Asia, Latin America, and the Indian Sub-continent.
Weather aside, somehow an interesting culture was built in the Twin Cities / Minnesota which fosters the development of businesses and happy people. Minnesota punches well above its weight in the number of Fortune 500 businesses, intellectual property development, cost of living adjusted wages, and general welfare / health. There is a pragmatic approach to just about everything here and so long as people can cut thru the Minnesota Nice and tolerate the weather it can end up being a pretty neat place to live.
Maybe there’s something to staying indoors for five-ish months a year that makes people industrious and makes people thankful for the small things, like vitamin D.
I have had a couple reprieves from the cold this winter. There were two visits to Chicago, which feels like a tropical paradise compared to Minnesota, and a visit to Denver for the holidays.
It was neat to be back in Chicago for a bit and see familiar sights and smell familiar smells. I don’t particularly miss Chicago but there is an energy to Chicago not found in the twin cities. One evening was even nice enough to make the seven mile walk on the Lake Front Trail from McCormick Place near the South Side to my hotel in the Gold Coast neighborhood. I was the only one who walked from the group and managed to beat my coworkers who were stuck in traffic. I’ve always enjoyed the walk so it was wonderful to have the opportunity to walk along Lake Michigan and weave my way thru downtown to my hotel and skipping the traffic was just the cherry on top.
Of course the visit to Denver was awesome. Denver is a fabulous place and it’s great to see family. The weather was great and I even ended up with a slight sunburn.
Probably the last thing to note about Minnesota is a conundrum I’ve found: I lived in this state for a bit over 10 years without traffic violations or vehicle accidents. In the last four months I’ve had two people hit my car while driving around with my wife with the most recent occurring yesterday. What makes this especially weird is that I drive very little since my work is a bit over a mile from where we live and I don’t drive around very often with my wife. I’m not sure what clicked between departure and return to Minnesota but it’d make me happy if this trend discontinued.
Enjoy the photos 🙂
Chris W.
