It's cold out today. Cold, but beautiful. Currently the temperature is 18 degrees and it's partly sunny with a bright blue sky. I love Minneapolis.

Last weekend the annual City of Lakes Loppet was in town. Due to the unseasonably warm weather we had throughout January, they had to switch up the route a bit. The finish line was moved from Hennepin Ave to The Mall which happens to be outside my window. I love being in the center of the local hubbub. Unfortunately, this also meant that they blocked of the entire mall area from parking and driving. They also closed off my street and a few others to thru traffic. It's a small price to pay for living in an action packed neighborhood. Watching the large trucks haul in piles and piles of snow that they smoothed out to make a cross-country ski course was very cool. I left my car parked all weekend and walked/cabbed everywhere with DC instead. Nothing like a brisk 20 minute walk to get to the Bulldog on a Friday afternoon to jumpstart your weekend!

Friday was an unusually busy night for DC and I. First we met up with friends at the Bulldog for a drink. Then we had dinner reservations with KM, LN, CL, and PS at Figlio. I've been trying desperately to do a silent boycott of Figlio. Once again it didn't work. It's not that it's a bad restaurant, per se. It's just never *good*. I like the atmosphere and it's an easy place to decide on when you're with a group of people because EVERYONE loves it. This time instead of ordering a bland same-old pasta dish entre, I attempted to just eat appetizers. Well, DC and I accidentally ate some big pretzels at the Bulldog less than an hour before so we opted to share a meal. Once again I ate the ziti and once again I wasn't impressed. Don't get me wrong, it doesn't taste bad. It just always tastes the same. Noodles, meat, tomato sauce. The bruschetta was pretty good though. Except they make you assemble it yourself. I'm sorry, but if I'm going to pay over $10 for bread, tomatoes and balsamic, then please have it ready to eat when it comes to me. The presentation was very pretty - 5 slices of crostini toasted, arranged like flower petals. A pile of tomatoes in the middle of the plate with a single sprig of basil. A single ball of mozzeralla in between each piece of bread and a single drizzle of balsamic in a circle around the plate, creating one stripe of brown across each piece of bread. I wanted to scream when I saw it. It tasted good, but it's the principle of it all. Which is why I probably won't order it again. What can you do?

Then we headed downtown for a birthday party at O'Donovan's. Now, I normally dislike O'Donovan's. I blame the usual state of mind I'm in when I end up there - drunk, exhausted, and overheated with my homemade outfit falling apart. Not to mention the 200+ people that are also in the same frazzled condition. (Please see Running of the Bullshitters for more information. God, I love Minneapolis!) My point is, this time it was kind of nice. I got to spend some much needed quality time with CL and I had a much needed Strongbo cider which they serve there fresh from the tap. Dee-lish!

DC and I caught the tail end of a high school leg of the Loppet on Saturday afternoon. I snapped a pretty awesome picture on my cell phone of a skier racing by:



We didn't stay long though, because it was quite cold out and we were on a mission to eat at Davanni's and then catch "Match Point" at the Lagoon Theatre. A lovely Saturday night in uptown.

Sunday we caught the first quarter of the superbowl at Williams while enjoying $1 burgers (and 50 cent fries) and not so much enjoying their terrible bloody marys. Our first choice was the Uptown Bar, I mean, why wouldn't we go there when you get to keep the glass! For some reason it was closed. Sad. So we choked down mini-marys at Williams and left.

Apparently the Walker Library across the street is moving again. Or changing anyway. I've only been inside once. I turned around pretty quick when I realized the books I'd be checking out weren't shiny and new like the ones you see in stores. Reading a dirty book that who knows how many people have touched just isn't appealing to me. Wait... 'dirty' as in 'filthy', not an adult themed book. Ew. I'll still be sad if they tear it down, though. It's kind of a neat place. It's almost completely underground.