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Are the Hell’s Angels coming to your town?
West Duluth’s Spirit Valley Days events are moved up two weeks to avoid conflict with a scheduled congregation of the Hells Angels. Apparently the police thought that combining street dance patrons and Hell’s Angels was a little too much like red ants/black ants. Related posts: No related posts.
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Iron ore shipments down 60 percent
From Business North: CLEVELAND — With the capacity utilization rate for the nation’s steel industry still hovering around 40 percent, iron ore shipments on the Great Lakes in May totaled only 3 million tons, a decrease of nearly 60 percent compared to a year ago. One dock loaded only one cargo during the month. Another…
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‘Me Talk Pretty One Day’ author appears in Duluth
One of my favorite authors David Sedaris did a reading in Duluth yesterday and I didn’t even know he was going to be in the area. I’m literally reading his last book “When You Are Engulfed in Flames” right now. It’s on the nightstand and everything. D’oh! For perhaps obvious reasons I have great affinity…
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Denial ain’t a river that feeds Lake Superior, or IS it?
Proponents of Duluth’s so-called “Red Plan” are about six months late on calling their school facilities plan a form of “economic stimulus” during the recession. It says something when even pro-stimulus liberals like me find editorials like today’s DNT screed just too Pollyanna-ish to bear. The headline is the first problem: “No denying school plan’s…
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‘Overburden’ wins Northeastern Minnesota Book Award
Tonight I was honored to accept the Northeastern Minnesota Book Award for my book “Overburden: Modern Life on the Iron Range.” I guess they said some nice things in the judges’ comments but I don’t think I comprehended a single word after I heard the syllables “O-VER-BER…” This was my first book and the first…
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Book nerds say what, what
If you’re a reader looking for something to do in northern Minnesota today check out the Northeastern Minnesota Book Awards at the University of Minnesota Duluth. The book fair starts at 12:30, with author readings going on at the Marshal Performing Arts center from 1-3 until the 3:30 p.m. awards ceremony. I’ll be reading from…
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NEMBAs on Sunday
This weekend the “Overburden” road show will be working without a net as the missus and I head south to Duluth for the Northeastern Minnesota Book Awards at UMD. I am one of scads of nominated authors in the creative nonfiction/memoir category (it’s not a juried nomination system; they let anyone in, even me). I…
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‘I’ll stop there and wander around’
Bob Dylan has been granting some fascinating interviews lately. The Duluth native and Iron Range-raised musician is also waxing nostalgic about the place where he’s from. This item ran in Tuesday’s “Eh?” column in the Duluth News Tribune, which contained this excerpt from this month’s Rolling Stone interview of Dylan. In the latest issue of…
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‘All-night rave’ for change
An unusual headline: “Duluth police called to fundraiser for City Council candidate” (Duluth News Tribune). My favorite parts? The fundraiser essentially was an all-night rave held at Thrillz in Canal Park from 10 p.m. Saturday to 6 a.m. Sunday. Shortly after the show started, Nagorski said police were called about 10:45 by the nearby Suites…
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Iron Range development ‘constipated,’ says me
Matt Perrine of the Duluth Budgeteer interviewed me for the “Five Questions” segment this week in advance of my Friday appearance at UW-Superior. The post also appears at the Duluth News Tribune website. Asked to describe Iron Range economic development in one word, I chose “constipated.” How could you not click on that? Related posts:…
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Bob Dylan portable toilet flap leads to desperate plea from Duluth paper
Something is “blowin’ in the wind” at Minnesota native and Hibbing High School alumnus Bob Dylan’s home in Malibu. It appears neighbors are upset about the smell coming from a portable toilet on Dylan’s property. Ha ha! I wonder if anyone else will think to use the term “Blowin’ in the wind” for this story.…
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Classic Iron Range showdown tonight
Tonight the Hibbing/Chisholm Bluejackets battle the Virginia/MIB Blue Devils for the Section 7A boys hockey championship in Duluth. Hibbing vs. Virginia is a classic Range rivalry. The only shame here is that the game isn’t taking place at an Iron Range arena. The winner goes to the state tourney next week. As the Iron Range’s…
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Northland arts mag Oeuvre sets sail amid turbulent times
Sophisticated readers of this blog (all 12 of you) know that Northern Minnesota has a surprisingly deep arts community. From visual artists to photographers to writers and poets, we are much more than beer and hypothermia. Thus, you should know that a new online arts, literature and culture publication called Oeuvre Magazine based in Duluth…
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Ice storm lays an egg
Ice storm? I don’t think so. The temperature never fell below freezing these last couple days in Northern Minnesota, so the vaunted “Ice Storm” instead ended up being a little bit of rain and a lot of high talk. Nevertheless, Duluth schools canceled classes TWO DAYS IN A ROW. That’s not good for our street…
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North vs. South
The Duluth News Tribune has an interesting editorial today decrying the “north-south” rift on the St. Louis County Board — the Iron Rangers being the “north” and the Duluthians the “south.” I wrote about this battle, fought under the guise of a hiring dispute, a couple days ago. The editorial board seemed especially miffed by…