Talking 'Bout The Twins (No, Not Those Twins)

It's pretty exciting that the Minnesota Twins have a really nice outdoor ballpark and a pretty decent team this season, but the big news is that the Target Dog went to the game yesterday!

Are you guys excited about the Twins? Are you going to see them play this summer? And what's up with Joe Mauer's sideburns?

Who Lived Here?

Here is a photo tour of some of the most memorable domiciles ever inhabited. Can you guess who lived in these fine homes? They appear in chronological order for your memory jump start.

 

  

Some have continued their fabulous deterioration that had begun twenty years ago. Others have improved. Good old Hashinger Hall is now a day spa. 311 E11 appears to have become a monoplex. Where is our front door? Neal dubbed it just as crappy as all the other ones in that particular neighborhood. I suppose, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Kitschy Kansas Tour 2010

March winds blow and Spring Breakers will follow. When looking for adventure on vacation in Kansas you can only go West with that wind. The intrepid Woodbut's (and Gappi) blew westward on Wednesday. 

The day started as we tumbled like tumbleweeds into Abilene, Kansas. This fine cow town was the home of Ike (recent reports indicate he no longer resides here) and more famously Wild Bill Hickock (see photo in jail). We were tickled to find that he still spends his winters at his former home and jail. The cot was a bit leaf filled, but he is a bachelor so we will excuse his domestic failings.

 

North and west of Abilene was Rock City. You may react to this with an "I'm not getting out of this car." or a "This is just a bunch of stupid rocks and I can't believe you are making me look at them." as others have, but once you are dragged out of the car and told to enjoy it, you will. Folks have been carving their names on these weird rocks since 1903 and crawling through Donut Hole Rock for just as long.  Put a smile on your face and know that if you show up before April, it is off season and you won't have to pay to see this attraction.

 

Next on the tour was little known and or visited, Minneapolis Kansas. We just had to go and pick up some acorns here (not much else to be had for souvenirs). Once in Minneapolis you may feel like Coraline, this parallel universe will trap you and keep you within its city limits with its impenetrable force field and bad signage standards. Only by stopping to ask the way to Delphos, will the locals turn the field off and release you with this magic phrase.

Though asking the way to Delphos gains one freedom, we should have refrained from driving here as it extended our trip causing us to almost miss the next attraction on our itinerary, Cawker City.

Some may believe that the largest ball of twine is in Darwin, Minnesota. They are wrong. It is clearly in Cawker City, Kansas. These people mean business. The ball is kept fresh looking with new twine by two really nice gals from Cawker City. They drive by daily to check on it and stop when they see visitors have arrived. These two ladies offered us a twine and pvc pipe device allowing all of us to make the ball EVEN BIGGER! It was really exciting to be part of the action. I was all tingly inside as we drove away, knowing what we had contributed.

Last stop Lucas. Inna Gatta Da Vida baby. Lucas is much further than Cawker City than you might think. There was a lot of time for deep reflecting and reading and as it happens, crossing your legs.  Once in Lucas, there is only one destination, The Garden of Eden. Created between 1909 and 1932ish by SP Dinsmoor this concrete miracle has amazed new and repeat visitors over and over again. Dinsmoor was a populist, which may mean he was crazy or just a little different. He built his house and his garden to be a tourist attraction in little Lucas and just kept adding more sculptures to get more folks to come. He even trapped live wild animals and kept them in concrete cages on the property to entertain his own and other children. Eagles, bobcats, badgers, all very entertaining animals. 

Dinsmoor dug up his first wife out of the cemetery and built a mausoleum for her. He joined her when he died and left a glass window on the top of his casket. Yes, we have all seen a dead guy. We saw him on Wednesday. He had a beard and a suit that still looked like they were in working condition. Neal got to see him twice, because he said please when he asked the lady!

Kansas, the land of Ahs, very kitchy, very big, not too many dead people,  and lots of string. 

Twin Cities "True" "Facts": What's Up With That Giant Spoon?

Recently, I was invited to be a contributor to this fine blog (a Scuttlebutter?), but there's one problem... I don't live anywhere near these Woodbut people. As a result, my entries will have to fit somewhere between reality and St. Paul.

Everyone knows the famous sculpture of the Spoonbridge and Cherry at the Walker in Minneapolis, but did you know that this piece of art has never been seen as the artists intended?

Citing a combination of budget constraints and health code violations, the Walker Art Center had to cancel the final stage of the installation: 50,000 gallons of vanilla ice cream scooped onto the lawn of the sculpture garden. Experts believe that this Build Your Own Sundae Bar would have been the largest in North America, but alas, it was not meant to be.

Interestingly, the artists did build a prototype in their studio, prior to the project's cancellation (as seen in the photo below.) They now weigh 1,200 pounds each.