Flour Power

On Thursday night this week my friend, client, and former colleague - Heather - arrived in the Twin Cities (Minnesota) on her quest to see all 50 US States. So this Friday through Monday the two of us are touring Minnesota and North Dakota so she can reduce her list down to only 5 more states to visit.

We spent the entire day on Friday touring the Twin Cities including visits to the following venues:

• American Swedish Institute - http://www.americanswedishinst.org/, based in Minneapolis which is housed in the former mansion of a newspaper publisher. My favorite feature of the institute is the stained glass window which depicts a Danish king receiving tribute from conquered Swedes to prevent him from burning their village -- a sad story but a very beautiful window.
• Mill City Museum - http://www.millcitymuseum.org/, located in downtown Minneapolis on the Mississippi River at St. Anthony Falls. I love touring this museum especially via the tower elevator which utilizes the voices of former workers at the flour mill to tell its history.
• PUSH Institute, Inc. - Heather and I met with the founder/president - Cecily - of this think tank which hosts the annual PUSH the Future conference in Minneapolis, http://www.pushthefuture.org to discuss plans and opportunities for the June 2006 conference. If you want to "push the boundaries of your thinking" this is an ideal conference for you to attend.
• Shop Girl - after meeting with Cecily, Heather and I, drove to the Uptown area of Minneapolis to see the new film, Shop Girl, based on Steve Martin's novella by the same name. I read the book about 10 years ago so really enjoyed seeing it reproduced as a film. Heather enjoyed the film but thought Steve Martin's character and Mirabelle's colleague's character at Saks 5th Avenue were not developed enough. We both agreed that the character -- Jeremy -- was the most interesting in terms of the maturation process he experienced. Mirabelle is the star who sells evening gloves at Saks 5th Avenue and is Martin's love interest. I am happy to recommend this film to others.
• Campiello -- Heather and I had dinner at this Italian restaurant, http://www.damico.com, which is a short walk from the Uptown Theatre. We both agreed this was a very good restaurant especially my sorbet dessert of grapefruit and raspberry!! Overall rating is a "3.5" since they violated a pet peeve of mine by reciting descriptions of how specials were prepared -- not only boring but I could not remember what the hell the waiter said so why not just type everything for me to review myself? Please restauranteurs do NOT have wait staff memorize these things.

Explore your neighborhood,

Todd