The Astral Log

7 October 2015

Reason Fest Day 2: O Canada, Where Art Thou?

Filed under: Artifacts & Holdovers, Canada, River City Reason Fest, US-North Dakota — Andrew T. @ 23:27

Morning broke in Fargo, North Dakota. Leaving the city was slow going, though. First, I was enticed by the smell of Perkins...even though they weren't running their all-you-can-eat pancake special and I got food poisoning the last time I went to one of their restaurants. Then, I was enticed by the distraction of another nearby construct: The West Acres Mall. I stepped inside and promptly discovered two epic surprises: A operational, coin-filled fountain original to the mall's 1972 construction, and a roman-lettered Sears sign that was miraculously still intact.

I came dangerously close to buying a tank top at 50% off (forgetting that I'd almost never have a reason to wear one) until I discovered that it had screen printing inside the front of the garment. Somehow, that was enough to wake me from my shopping stupor...and I made tracks north on U.S. 81.

Most of North Dakota was very sparsely populated...and it felt very peaceful. Almost discordantly peaceful, given some of the sinister shit that goes on within the state's bounds.

One of the few incorporated places I encountered was Hillsboro, home of the forlorn Traill Theatre and county courthouse.

The moderately larger abode of Grand Forks (third largest city in the state) offered some roadside artifacts of its own, including a Phillips 66 gullwing canopy and a rare Matawan-style Texaco building. Both had been shorn of their pumps decades ago and turned into adaptive reuse.

U.S. 81 had dumped me quite a few kilometres west of the main highway. When I slowly wheeled the car to the border crossing at Gretna, the customs official seemed suspicious. "Why are you going this way? Were you rejected at the other crossing?" I had nothing to incriminate myself, however, and was traveling lightly. The official collected my passport, followed up with questions about my trip details, employer, starting point, and other expected minutia, asked to look in the back of the car, jostled my suitcase momentarily...and left me to go on my way. I was mildly annoyed that I had to open my car (a far cry from the 1990s era when you could cross the border with a driver's license and no searching at all)...but compared to the experience I'd have four days later, it was quick, upfront, and painless.

I was thrilled and psyched to be in Canada at last. Which way to Winnipeg, though? I didn't have a good map, and I was well off the beaten path...I even ended up on dirt without trying. Everything in the prairies is laid out on a grid, though, and I successfully worked my way to the main road that I should have taken in the first place.

50 kilometres later, I was there. The day wasn't done, though: I stopped at Tim's for dinner, where I mustered up some energy and had the added bonus of receiving an American nickel in my change. I then drove around for over an hour both to gain a crash course on Winnipeg's street grid layout and to find my conspicuous, yet strangely hard-to-find hotel. I wound up arriving in the city the same day as an AC/DC concert, so traffic was tied up to oblivion in some corridors.

Winnipeg had the aura of a decidedly multicultural city, and I often heard languages other than English being spoken. It was also a vast place where seemingly anything and everything could be. I had been in Manitoba's capital for less than a day, but I liked it already.

I'd get to explore the city on my own in another day's time...but for now, it was time to relax.

6 October 2015

Reason Fest Day 1: Journey through the Land O' Lakes

Filed under: Artifacts & Holdovers, River City Reason Fest, US-Minnesota — Andrew T. @ 23:32

When I launched the Astral Log earlier this year, all I knew was that it had the potential to develop in any direction. I didn't expect to use it primarily as a vehicle for travelogues. But I can never stay put in one place for long...so it was probably inevitable. The latest raison d'être? My first international conference in 30 years.

I left home around 9 a.m., pointed the car northwest, and drove like hell until I reached the Minnesota border. Well, almost the Minnesota border: I wound up getting sidetracked in La Crosse long enough to visit the Valley View Mall, which features a JCPenney store with the (bricked-over remains of) auto service bays along one side. This wound up being a recurring theme on the trip.

Minutes later, I had crossed the Mississippi and was safely in Minnesota. Yes, Minnesota...the wonderful land of milk and honey I came within a hair's split of moving to in 2012; the state that legislated marriage equality while my back-stabbing neighbors were legislating Wisconsin Synod Sharia Law.

I was somewhat stingy with pictures on this portion of the trip. During my journey to Arkansas a couple months earlier, I ran out of room on my memory card and I was fearful that the same thing would happen again. Still, there were a number of scenes of artifacts and coincidences that captured my attention...and my photo frames. How often do you see one Geo Prizm hatchback on the road...let alone two in the same color? Both of these are probably '89s, since they have pillar-mounted seatbelts.

A former Ben Franklin variety store in Lake City, with a rather creative reuse of the original sign.

After creeping through Winona, Wabasha, Lake City, Red Wing, and Hastings, I reached the Twin Cities area...the cultural and economic epicenter of the upper midwest. Sadly this wasn't the day to stay there for long...and since my view of it was miles upon miles of a gray, gridlocked concrete jungle under the dim glow of a cloudy day, I didn't get to see Saint Paul or Minneapolis at their most congenial or inviting, either.

Soon it became apparent that there were two Minnesotas. There was the Twin Cities area, which was cosmopolitan, reasonably secular, and free of the worst kinds of economic disparities that affect many other cities in the USA. And there was the interior of the state, which basically consisted of farmland and wilderness peppered with anti-abortion billboards. By the time I was halfway to Fergus Falls, my arm was so tired flipping the forced-birthers off that I wanted to take a rest break then and there. But there were no facilities to be found...so I drove on until night fell and I was able to cross one more state off my list.

The street grid of Fargo, North Dakota is divided into numbered streets and numbered avenues, each with directional splits. An incomplete address like "210 7th" is therefore useless unless you trek over all four corners of the city trying to find it. Some streets are disconnected, further complicating matters. After doubling back on myself and wasting time driving in Fargo for nearly an hour, I checked into a Motel 6 room with an air conditioner that leaked on the floor and plotted out the plans for the next exciting day.

Compared to the last motel I stayed at, it was bliss.

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