Dawn Xiana Moon: Melodic folk pop infused with passion and honesty. From Chicago.

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Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Why did we decide to tour the upper Midwest in December?

I'm sitting in a local coffeeshop across from an old roommate who's now a grad student in political science, listening to Keane as it plays over the cafe's speakers and typing on (gasp!) a Mac. I have to say, as much as I love PCs, I've already discovered a couple of very cool things about this computer, mostly notably the visual interface. Though not being able to right click and use all my keyboard shortcuts is rather irritating (not everything works even if you replace CTRL with the APPLE key).

Nerdiness aside, the best thing about Minneapolis has been spending time with two sets of old friends from--you guessed it--my days at the University of Michigan. It's funny how you can find us everywhere. Jayson thinks it's strange that almost everyone he met in Chicago and many people we've met in Minneapolis have been from Michigan. Emily--old roommate #2--and Dave (now a grad student at the other U-M) have been hosting us, and it's been wonderful spending time with them. Not to mention that they've been hooking us up with food. Jayson says that on his last tour, they ate ramen noodles for a month. On this tour, between Emily, Dave, and I cooking, we've had steak and twice-baked potatoes, more chocolate cookies than you could possibly want, and fettucine tossed with fresh basil, garlic, and tomatoes.

I've learned that Minnesotans have found ingenius ways of hiding from the cold--the university has vast underground tunnels so that in the right part of campus you don't actually have to step outside, and you can navigate the entirety of downtown via the Skyway. The end result of this is that downtown Minneapolis, like Singapore, feels a bit like a giant mall. There isn't much happening outside on street level, but some of the indoors is structured to ressemble city streets lined with trees and street cafes. And I'm convinced that every building has a Caribou Coffee, and perhaps a Starbucks too.

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