#northeast minneapolis

[chaddavisphotography]

An Oromo protest in Northeast Minneapolis over the unrest in Ethiopia.

[doublescribble]

Darius Garland and Rudy Gobert 2022-23 NBA Regular Season

[roebeanstalk]

took myself out on a movie date tonight

saw the little mermaid and hung out by the river for a bit and got pizza after :)

[cardofrage]

Gorkha Palace in Northeast Minneapolis

[mayakern]

upcoming store stuff & why we're doing a super sale

omg hiiii it's devin again, and this time i'm bringing store news

the short version: we're moving ourselves back to minnesota, and we're moving order fulfillment to a fulfillment center

wow, that's big news! maya and i are so so so excited to be closer to our minnesota friends (and also my family lol). i'm hoping to be back in northeast minneapolis, but let's be real we're probably gonna get priced out and into the suburbs

in addition to that, due to a variety of reasons i'll explain in more detail below, we're transitioning from in-house fulfillment to working with a fulfillment center (or 3pl, short for third-party logistics). we're at an awkward size that makes staffing difficult and have had issues with extended processing time. the 3pl should be set up by september, and we're working on the back end to have fulfillment centers in australia, canada, the UK, and eventually the EU. if tax authorities work with us we should have all that ready by december 2024!

to prepare for that we're doing a super sale. ash told me not to call it liquidation but she said that like 30 seconds after i hit send on the marketing email, sorry about that. items that we don't want to pay to move to the 3pl are discounted by 25-70%, with some of them priced at cost. under no circumstances will anything ever be 70% off again

if you're nosy you can read the q&a i made up in my head while eating pigs in a blanket:

how are the labor protections at the 3pl?

pretty good! we were shocked to find anything even halfway decent in the US; we went looking for a fulfillment center in the EU to handle all international fulfillment, and the one we found just so happened to have bought a US location two years ago.

they're located in ohio, pay $19/hr, and provide health insurance and 401k matching. that seemed too good to be true so we dug through employee reviews on places like glassdoor, and while there were some bad reviews those were all dated prior to when the facility was purchased by this new company. they also have a very low turnover rate which is a HUGE green flag

why are you transferring to a 3pl?

the serious

sometimes we have a high volume of sales, and it makes sense to have two full-time employees plus a part timer! but usually we have a low-to-medium volume of sales. we can float by on that, but it gets risky, and the economy is in a bad enough state that we're concerned about the longevity

related, the 2023 holiday sale showed us some major flaws in our fulfillment process. if the same issues were to happen this year the business probably wouldn't survive

we're moving cross-country in early 2025 and would've had to close this location anyway

the dumb:

i'm sick of dealing with commercial landlords and if i have one more wall leak i'm going to throw it into the river brick by brick

what about your staff?

unfortunately we will have to say goodbye to our office staff. they have been given 3.5 months notice and no-questions-asked PTO for interviews with a small severance

why are you moving back to minnesota?

troy was always meant to be a temporary move. initially the plan was to move to vermont or massachusetts, but after being out here for 7 years we just kinda want to go home. the weather in troy is perfect for us, we love the mountains, and we have some great friends here, but for some goddamn reason we want our eyelashes to freeze together.

will you be returning to midwest cons?

if we return to cons at all it will be with ariel and/or ash running the booth, maya will not be involved. this would likely be in california and/or in the northeast US.

my friends are begging me to go to CONvergence as an attendee so ig you might see me there? maya has pledged death before crowded venues tho

will you do any local events in minnesota?

we might do sample sales. honestly idk what we're gonna do with the samples we have in troy, most of them are terrible. do you want samples of the strangest low rise bell bottom pants ever created? please take them from me. my bush hangs out

also my kid brother has gotten really into library events and if he asks nice enough we might do some of those

is there anything else?

i mean probably, but i started this last week and i haven't had any other ideas on what to include

[stuffaboutminneapolis]

Northeast Park Softball, Minneapolis (1970) via Minnesota Digital Library

[sisyphusshrugged]

so where should i live next? i've been thinking Minneapolis lately. though i've still never been to the PNW and that's top of my To Visit list. but this last trip has put Utah/Colorado/the southwest more on my radar. then there's just somewhere else in the south. idk about that, i'd wanna be on the coast or in the mountains if so. and there's always back northeast but i want to try new places so that's unlikely anytime soon.

[ateriblewriter]

Don’t Take the Girl {1} (m.b)

a/n: I’m really sorry. Please don’t hate me. Also remember you guys wanted more Matt Boldy.

warnings: accidents

Enjoy! 

Part 2 

You never pictured your life turning out the way it had. You never thought you would eventually follow your then hockey player boyfriend cross country to a frozen wasteland. But you did and you wouldn’t change anything. Especially when Matt proposed and you found out you were pregnant not long after. The two of you were young yes but the two of you knew it was meant to be when you first met each other.

That brings you to today. Your 22nd birthday. You were two weeks overdue with a stubborn little baby boy and miserable. You wanted this child out of your body, he has overstayed his welcome. This child definitely got his stubbornness from you because Matt was cool as a cucumber. You shouldn’t have to wait for much longer to greet your child as you started feeling twinges late during the third period.

The contractions were far apart and nothing to worry about yet. So you didn’t inform anyone of your current situation. It’s not like you were going to give birth at the X. Nope. Matt was going to finish up with interviews and such in the locker room, you guys would head home for a little bit until things were a little further along. Eventually you would make your way to the hospital and bam you would have a baby. Or at least that would be the plan if only your lover boy would hurry up.

“You doing okay Y/N?” Calen, one of Matt’s teammates, asked you, bringing you out of your current train of thought. He found pacing back and forth, the way you do when you get nervous sometimes. “Do you need Bolds?”

“Yeah. I might need him soon.” You rubbed your enlarged belly. You hoped the man would take the hint as to what was going on. You stopped pacing momentarily as another contraction hit you. This one was a bit stronger than the last.

“Oh well, he should be finishing up soon. I can go and snag him for you if you’d like.” The man offered to help retrieve the person you needed.

“That would be great Calen.” You paused walking back and forth as another contraction rolled through. This one a little bit stronger than the others. “Please tell him if he wants to meet his son he should really consider getting out here.”

You don’t know what the Wild defenseman said when he went back into the locker room but you could hear some whoops and hollers. Hearing the outburst of excitement of what was to come made your heart smile. You really did love being in Minnesota. You loved how everyone was so nice and supportive. They really did care about each other.

“Hey.” Matt walked over to the pillar you had been leaning against. Since he was a bit taller than you he had to lean over to give you a kiss.

“Hey yourself.” You kissed him back.

“I heard someone is ready to grace us with his presence tonight.” The two of you started walking over to the car hand in hand. Halfway to the car you need to stop again for a contraction. You really squeezed your hockey player’s hand as this one had been the strongest yet.

“You good babe?” He never once let go of your hand. It was reassuring to know he had your back when it came to this thing. “You want to go straight to the hospital or?”

“No no, I think we still have a little bit of time left. I think we can make it home.” Matt opened the car door for you and helped you in. He even went as far as buckling you in. He wanted to make sure his family was as safe as could be. “Plus I may have forgotten that stupid bag. And I want my fuzzy slippers.”

“Oh you want the fuzzy slippers? That’s more important right now?” A laugh erupted from his lips as he started the vehicle.

“Yes you goof. The slippers are very important.” You shook your head, thinking about the most comfortable footwear you own.

The normal 20 minute drive back home to northeast Minneapolis seemed like it was taking forever. It could have been the nerves you were feeling about giving birth. But it was most likely the thin sheet of frozen water that covered the roads.

“Matt, slow down. You don’t need to be going so fast.” You reached up to tightly grip the handle above the door. You hated the icy roads, never feeling completely safe on them.

“It’s not me, it's the shitty -” Matt started but never finished. It all happened so fast. You saw the bright light to the right of you before feeling the crunching metal around you. It was over in a minute. The darkness surrounding you as your fiancé yelled your name.

Again I apologize for this. 

Please let me know what y’all think. I’d love to hear your thoughts, comments, and complaints!

A part 2 coming sometime?

[richincolor]

New Releases

A fun fantasy, a swoony romance, and a touching contemporary headline this week's new releases. 

Click below to read about this week's releases.

Of Jade and Dragons (Fall of the Dragon #1) by Amber Chen Viking Books for Young Readers

Eighteen-year-old Aihui Ying dreams of becoming a brilliant engineer just like her beloved father – but her life is torn apart when she arrives a moment too late to stop his murder, and worse, lets the killer slip out of reach. Left with only a journal containing his greatest engineering secrets and a jade pendant snatched from the assassin, Ying vows to take revenge into her own hands.

Disguised as her brother, Ying heads to the capital city, and discovers that the answer to finding who killed her father lies behind the walls of the prestigious Engineers Guild – the home of a past her father never wanted to talk about. With the help of an unlikely ally – Aogiya Ye-yang, a taciturn (but very handsome) young prince – Ying must navigate a world fraught with rules, challenges and politics she can barely grasp, let alone understand.

But to survive, she must fight to stay one step ahead of everyone. And when faced with the choice between doing what’s right and what’s necessary, Ying will have to decide if her revenge is truly worthwhile, if it means going against everything her father stood for . . .

With Love, Miss Americanah by Jane Igharo Feiwel & Friends

17-year-old Enore Adesuwa doesn’t dive into things, she wades in very carefully. So when she and her mother and sister move from Nigeria to America shortly after her father’s death, she wants to be as prepared as possible for attending an American high school. Her cousin, Adrian, doesn’t have time to explain the ins and outs to her but, luckily, he recommends the perfect research teen movies.

Still dealing with grief but armed with a list of rules of survival (including no drawing attention to herself) gathered from these beloved movies, Enore is ready as she’ll ever be for senior year. But when she meets Davi Santiago, it may be much harder than she thought to keep to her rules. Because not only is he super thoughtful (and okay, very good looking), he encourages Enore to share her incredible singing voice. She prefers the background but it just might be time for her to take center stage, even in spite of her mother’s own strict rules and desires for her.

With help from Davi, some new friends who don’t quite fit the roles she expects them to play, and her younger sister, can Enore get through senior year with a new passion, new boldness, and new love?

Where Wolves Don’t Die by Anton Treuer Arthur A. Levine

Ezra Cloud hates living in Northeast Minneapolis. His father is a professor of their language, Ojibwe, at a local college, so they have to be there. But Ezra hates the dirty, polluted snow around them. He hates being away from the rez at Nigigoonsiminikaaning First Nation. And he hates the local bully in his neighborhood, Matt Schroeder, who terrorizes Ezra and his friend Nora George.

Ezra gets into a terrible fight with Matt at school defending Nora, and that same night, Matt’s house burns down. Instantly, Ezra becomes a prime suspect. Knowing he won’t get a fair deal, and knowing his innocence, Ezra’s family sends him away to run traplines with his grandfather in a remote part of Canada, while the investigation is ongoing. But the Schroeders are looking for him. . .

From acclaimed author Anton Treuer comes a novel that’s both taut thriller and a raw, tender coming-of-age story, about one Ojibwe boy learning to love himself through the love of his family around him.

[chaddavisphotography]

The Pillsbury A-Mill is a former flour mill located on the east bank of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It held the distinction of being the world's largest flour mill for 40 years. Completed in 1881, it was owned by the Pillsbury Company and operated two of the most powerful direct-drive waterwheels ever built, each capable of generating 1,200 horsepower (895 kW). The mill was named a National Historic Landmark in 1966 and has since been converted into resident artist lofts. Source: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillsbury_A-Mill" rel="noreferrer nofollow">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillsbury_A-Mill</a> A-Mil Flour "Flour Mill" "General Mills" "Historical Building" LensTagger Mill Milling Minneapolis Minnesota "Minolta 135mm" "Neon Sign" "Northeast Minneapolis" "PIllsbury A Mill" Redevelopment "Rooftop Sign" Sign Tower "Water Tower" "National Historic Register

[trivialbob]

Last night the four of us went out to play pickleball. The Lucky Shots club in Northeast Minneapolis is pretty cool. It's in an old, brick warehouse that's been repurposed with pickleball courts. Whenever I'm in old buildings like this I think of the people who built them. They are all gone but their work is still standing more than 100 years later.

Sheila plays pickleball often because she teaches lessons. Matt and I have played a few times. Michelle had never tried it. We had a nice time.

Would we have to rent or borrow paddles, I wondered. Then Sheila opened her bag. It was a clown car of pickleball paddles as she kept handing them out. I think she gave some away to the people in the next court before she realized she could stop. She gets some for free or heavily discounted from a store that also gives her plenty of business cards to hand out. She lets her students try different ones. But still, she had a lot of paddles.

Then I noticed her footwear. Oh, those are some nice, new court shoes. Look how bright they are! When we started playing she was wearing different shoes. So apparently there are special shoes just to wear to the pickleball courts, then you change over to (what I assume are very expensive) actual court shoes. Who knew!?

Today we're celebrating Christmas at our house. Over the years, with several in the family who have been in law enforcement and EMS, we often celebrate on a different day, when most of the people can make it. Making lemonade out of lemons, I see it as I get to open presents more than a week early.

Jack and Ali will be here with their dogs. My dad is coming too. Sheila's making a Thanksgiving style dinner. She and Michelle are baking cookies right now. (We strictly enforce gender roles here.) I can't wait to eat. Excuse me now, I need to go move some clothes from the washer to the dryer.

[hclib]

Fire Department Homemade Sprinkler

Firefighters at Station 11 in Northeast Minneapolis built this soaking sprinkler to help neighborhood kids beat the heat in the summer of 1935. The sprinkler was attached to a fire hydrant near 3rd Ave. and 6th St. SE and turned on by firefighters (William Fust is pictured here) on hot days. On August 10, 1935, when these photos were taken, the mercury made it up to 89 degrees Fahrenheit.

[dandp]

Phil confidently both saying Minneapolis instead of Indianapolis and scrolling to the northeast to find it ohhhh Phil

[transit-fag]

The upper midwest could easily become as interconnected as the Northeast, Lets explore what steps are needed to do that.

I am defining the upper midwest as Northern Illinois and Indiana, alongside Wisconsin and Minnesota. So the Major cities we are looking at are Minneapolis, Madison, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Duluth, and Chicago

[186-3]

how would you rate Minnesota as a state?

ah, minnesota. the land of 10,000 lakes. a state mostly known for... uh... tim walz? what do most people know minnesota for? i don't actually know

(SORRY FOR THIS BEING SO LATE I HAVE SO MUCH TO WRITE YOUR STATE IS SO COOL)

but that's not gonna stop me from rating it! once again, we have five categories: political, culture, nature, urban, and transit:

political rating: 7/10. minnesota hasn't voted for a republican at a statewide level since tim pawlenty was reelected as governor in 2006 (i actually had to look that up!), but it very, very nearly elected a republican to the senate in 2008: al franken won in 2008 by a mere 300 votes. in fact that election was so hotly contested that franken was not certified as having won the election until nearly july 2009.

but that's history. nowadays, minnesota only has one thing that makes it politically interesting nowadays, and that is its upper and lower chambers, which are both much swingier than the state is at every level. but because the governorship is unlikely to swing red anytime soon, that hopefully won't result in republicans being able to pass a serious conservative agenda.

which is great! when democrats took the minnesota senate in 2022, they passed an enormous amount of really cool laws, including trans rights protections and a free school lunch program.

fortunately, or unfortunately from the perspective of this rating, it also means the state can be kinda boring from a political standpoint. every since tim walz and rick nolan left the house, and ever since colin peterson got his butt kicked, minnesota hasn't had a competitive federal race. so, minnesota has great policies, but otherwise, it isn't very politically interesting.

culture rating: 9/10 i think most people who know minnesota would say that you can pretty easily divide minnesota into two places: the twin cities area, and the rest of the state. but i think that's an oversimiplification. to me, we can actually divide minnesota cleanly into 3 sections.

we can start by looking at rural southern and western minnesota. these are more traditionally midwestern farming communities, which i assume come with all of the charms of traditional midwestern culture. while i'm sure they have their own minnesota-specific traditions... so does the rest of the midwest. this isn't a dig at rural minnesota - far from it, i'm sure it's great! i just don't know much about it aside from "midwestern"

then there's northeastern minnesota, which is vastly different from what you might expect of the rest of the midwest. it's the home of the iron range - a massive swath of land primarily used for mining metals.

it also contains duluth, one of the world's furthest inland port cities, which is insane, because it's kinda located smack in the middle of the continent. but it serves as the end of the saint lawrence seaway, which means a lot of the surrounding area - including the iron range mines - use it for shipping.

and best of all? the area is heavily unionized! most of those port workers and miners in northeastern minnesota are part of collective bargain units! isn't that awesome? 10/10 culture for northeast minnesota.

and last but not least is the twin cities of minneapolis and saint paul - the state's largest city and capital, respectively. despite minnesota having a reputation of being white and midwestern, the twin cities area is very diverse. it has the largest hmong community in the entire united states. it's also home to one of the largest somali communities in the US, and is represented in congress by a somali american, ilhan omar. all this diversity adds a humongous amount to the culture of the area.

so yeah. minnesota culture is awesome.

nature rating: 4/10 okay this one might sound kinda controversial, and maybe it's just because i've never been to minnesota before, but from what i can gather, minnesota's nature primarily consists of lakes, rivers, and more lakes. and there's nothing wrong with that - they have really cool ecosystems. plus, the mississippi river starts in minnesota, as does the saint lawrence seaway.

but... what else does minnesota have? yes, the lakes and rivers and stuff are cool. the source of the mississippi is neat, as is voyageurs national park and the entire grand portage. but... it doesn't strike me as anything amazing. there isn't very much nature in minnesota that you can't find elsewhere in the country.

and this feels wrong, because minnesota, from what i can tell, is known as a very outdoorsy, natural state. but i think that more speaks to the success of their urban areas, which i will get to now:

urban rating: 8/10 minneapolis is hands down one of the best cities in the united states from a zoning and layout perspective. it has a lot of nature integrated into it, with lots of bike paths encouraging people to exercise and take non-invasive forms of transit, and lots of parks around the city - which i imagine is why people perceive of minnesota as a very nature-y, outdoorsy state.

it also has perhaps the best zoning laws in the country. it was the first city in the country to abolist single family housing, which has lead to it being one of the only growing cities in which rents fell, due to the influx of housing. minneapolis is awesome.

but. minneapolis is not the entire state.

i don't know much about duluth, but it doesn't seem to be as good as minneapolis. it has a massive freeway separating nearly the entire city from its lakeshore, with the notable exception of park point - a 7-mile-long beach-lined peninsula jutting out of the city into the lake, ending with an old growth forest. aside from that, though, duluth doesn't seem to be particularly interesting from an urban perspective.

i know literally nothing about rochester. lemme check maps.

back. it seems pretty cool - no downtown highways and lots of parks. gonna assume it's pretty good.

anyway, these two cities bump up minnesota's urban score to be quite high. duluth is meh so it's not perfect.

i will ignore saint paul. for all intents and purposes, it's just minneapolis. sorry, saint paul.

transit score: 3/10. minnesota is quite possibly the king of what is referred to as BRT creep - bus lines that do not qualify as bus rapid transit claiming to be bus rapid transit. look, i'm sure they're more frequent than regular bus lines (15 minute headways???? that's good but philly and new york have bus lines that are more frequent than that and don't claim to be "BRT"), but if you can't even have bus lanes, you're not a high-quality bus line.

oh yeah, and then there's the northstar commuter rail line. it runs 4 TIMES A DAY IN EITHER DIRECTION. that's HALF the frequency of VRE, and VRE isn't very good either. plus, northstar is one line, and VRE is 2

it's not all bad. minneapolis has two decent light rail lines, and they're building more. the bus system, despite not having anything resembling real BRT (aside from sheltered stations, which is fine, but also the bare minimum), is not altogether bad.

minnesota's amtrak service also used to be terrible, but it just got a whole lot better with the introduction of the borealis train, making one daily round trip between saint paul and chicago. there's also plans to make another daily amtrak line between minneapolis and duluth, which would be super cool.

plus, the bike lines around the city are quite good, and that's got to count for something.

unfortunately, minneapolis and saint paul are not the only cites in the state. duluth and rochester have no passenger train service whatsoever, which is a huge point against the state. sorry, minnesota.

overall rating: 6.2/10 this state has bizarre contradictions. it's got fantastic urbanism, and fairly bad transit (they're working on it!) it's fairly outdoorsy, and yet it lacks significantly distinctive natural features. it has a very fun political history, and some of the best laws in the country, but it's also not a very interesting state to watch on election day.

i'm gonna be honest, i expected this rating to be a lot more positive when i went in, given the wealth of culture this state has that many states lack. maybe that should count for more, idk. but 6.2/10 isn't that bad, either.

what do you guys think? did i disparage a wonderful state?