My priority today – which also happens to be Memorial Day – was to find another cozy coffee shop, in which I could continue my daily ruminations of life in Minnesota. I ventured westward, down 5th Street. The first and only other coffee shop I stumbled across was the Loto Cafe, at the base of the humorously proclaimed ‘skyscrapers’, the Galtier Towers.
As I slowed my pace upon approaching the Towers, I saw a cigarette-smoking man perched on what I knew to be the steps leading into the cafe. I steadily strode past him, so as to not appear new to the place. The large windows quickly gave me an idea of the internal atmosphere – upscale and uncomfortable. I made another loop down to Robert Avenue, in hopes of spotting the cafes that Google Maps had so thoughtfully pointed out to me. No such luck. Now, it was back down 5th, in the opposite direction.
In what turned out to be an unfruitful search, I settled back down at the Black Dog (and so did another woman, who was walking parallel to me from Robert and 5th). It was here, where I ran into Magnus, my future coworker at Cannon. What a coincidence! We exchanged a few words, I disclosed the costs of my apartment, and we made plans to have dinner in SP with a visiting manager from the UK office. Phew! Now the tone was set for us two living in the same neighborhood!
Yesterday, I thought that the Farmer’s Market area was in the lowest part of Lowertown, but it seems like Lowertown isn’t at all that big. Its website, http://www.lowertown.org/ , does not delineate Lowertown’s borders, but it does attest to how well-planned-out it is. Maybe the Black Dog Cafe is the only cafe of its kind in the area. That is why Magnus, who lives in the Mear’s Park jurisdiction, and the woman who walked all the way from Robert and 5th were both there at the precise time that I decided to show. Now, I guess the only bar to go to will be Kelly’s pub, on Wacouta. That is fine with me, since it makes life very simple – perhaps that was the vision of the Lowertown development group – to make creating community simple.
One thing Lowertown does not have a is a supermarket. I resorted to eating the first Hostess cupcakes I have ever had in the past 6 years. This is definitely a step backwards for me, and I should be careful not to make this a pattern!
I transferred most of my files yesterday from my Toshiba hardrive to my Mac, finally. I used the red crossover cable, which I was supposed to give back to Vision before I left, and created a home network. However, I forgot to transfer my coursework over. It would have been nice to have that. Now, I am sitting at the Black Dog Cafe, with a coffee and every intention of starting this essay I was supposed to have started on Monday, but all I can think about now is transferring my coursework over. Do I really need it all? I would say no, but I know that just as soon as I leave and go back to my apartment, I will hook up the 2-computer network and transfer the rest of my “My Documents” folder. OK, I have to start this essay.