Sunday, May 31, 2009

Event #1 - Minneapolis, MN

Event #1 - Minneapolis, MN
Memorial Day weekend, 5/22 - 5/25, Twins vs. Brewers series.


And so the journey begins. The sole goal - to generate interest in the Pal ermos pizza company, one town at a time. The Yukon Denali is not meant to tow our pizza trailer. That's pretty clear. 7 miles per gallon. Yes please. We stopped at a gas station outside of Baraboo around 7pm. On a diaper changing station in a scary, dimly-lit mens bathroom read "Cleveland Police Chief Mike McGrath slobs the big knob". You taught him, law-abiding citizen! We've been on the road for 3 hours, and we aren't even to the Dells yet. Traffic is terrible due to it being Memorial Day weekend.


9:00pm - to Eau Claire. Lots of miles to go, but we're not stopping. Dinner can wait. In other news - Head East's "Never Been any Reason" just came on the radio. Kev says they're from WI. I don't believe him. We shall see upon further research. (Further research - they're from Champaign, Illinois. HA!) In other news, we are killing this poor Yukon's engine. The oil pressure gauge is buried PAST the maximum point notch. We discuss how 'incognito' is a great word. What's the word origin? May I have it in a sentence please?


We arrived at our Holiday Inn Express at 10:00pm. Immediately headed over to Ray J's, an American Pub/Grill that served actual chicken wings. AND they had Fat Tire on tap. WTF? I asked the barkeep how long they've had it. 2.5 years. Apparently the twin cities was the testing point for New Belgium Brewing to see if it would be worth distributing to the midwest. So, thanks MN for being awesome at drinking beer, thus allowing WI to carry it.
A round of disc golf was in order early Saturday morning. After circling Cottage Grove (Minnesota, not Wisconsin...) for 20 minutes, we finally found it. Course was good, but quite dirty. Garbage, litter, and BROKEN GLASS everywhere. Oakwood park disc golfers / hippies - clean your shit up. Seriously. Get your acts together, or you'll get the axe.


Our Saturday pre-game event was successful. A little fuss was had about the fact we were using a generator for electricity. But no matter - as a band drowned the noise out considerably. I can't remember the name of the band, but they seemed to enjoy the free pizza I gave them during their set. 108 total pizzas were made, rounding out to 864 slices given away. I'm guessing that's a lot of satisfaction. The best part came after we packed up, as the Minneapolis Town Hall Brewery was a few blocks east. Sat out on the patio and enjoyed the food and beverages. God I love that place.
Sunday morning started off nicely with a round of disc golf at Acorn Park in Rosedale, MN. 2 of the holes actually had swampy wetlands, somewhat difficult to navigate. San Jovi, a dear old Madison friend of mine joined us on the excursion as well. Witnessed a dude hit an impossible, blind, uphill shot through a 5 ft window between 2 trees. It was absolutely incredible. Hope his girlfriend, whom he was shooting with, was also impressed. I hope he got laid because of it. I hope their children are future disc golf professionals. Onward...
Sundays event was also smooth sailing. MN people are nice. This wasn't surprising to me, but welcomed. Yelling "free pizza!" got old, but at least they formed their own line. Way to go, Twins kids! After a short clean-up process, we got our free tickets to the game. So we stayed for a few innings of shitty Brewer interleague play. Did get to see the Mike Cameron jack, followed by an even more impressive Joe Crede bomb. Equal amounts of fans from both squads were in attendance. Even though it was on ESPN Sunday night baseball, it was lame. The Metrodome sucks. Still. I imagine even the Twins fans hate it there. How much would it suck to be a season ticket holder? No thanks. Shitrodome. Abortodome. Whatever. I felt like a plastic toy prize smashed in the bottom of a crack jack box. People jammed so close together that strangers leg hairs get braided with yours by the end of the game. They even have a large counter that read '56' - as in 56 more home games in this shithole before they get their new stadium. If you can't guess by now - we didn't stay long. But, uh, thanks for the tickets!


We hooked up the trailer at some point around the 5th inning, and drove it back to the hotel. A quick shower was had, as we were going to go out in St. Paul to 2 bars that I had read about. First stop - The Muddy Pig. Shout out to bartender/manager Thea - you were awesome. Food was awesome as well, but not as awesome as the tap list. Good god. Drank a Southern Tier Iniquity (Beeroseur rating: 9.0) Also tried a Wikap Pater Dubbel (8.1). Your typical beer flags/signs/tins adorned the establishment, along with a ton of ceramic/plastic/plush pigs. Awkward name for a bar, but it was the shit. (If you ever are in St. Paul, go to this place). 2 blocks away was The Happy Gnome, the second bar on the list. In between though, were newly layed sidewalk squares/cobblestones that Kev was furious at, for some reason. It was hilarious, guess you had to be there. Also had a large tap list, but wasn't as inviting as the Muddy Pig. Service was kinda terrible as well. And I know a little bit about customer service. Sunday funday (fun-night?) in St. Paul also showed us a magnificent view of the lighted capital building. Whilst at the Gnome I had Surly Brewing Bender, a local brewery's version of a coffee porter (8.6) Also tested Surly Furious - a ridiculous hop inflused brew. Also bought a few taster glasses from there.

So the above is what I had written down in the car from the adventure. Hopefully something more exciting will happen next week while I'm in Omaha. I'm planning on getting a mullet, more disc golf, and new bars. Stay tuned.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

What a fun job! :-) You have to let me know when this pizza gig brings you to Madison!

Scott said...

I saw that same bathroom graffiti in November 2007 and was mystified. Glad to see that it still exists.