Those Twins Are Hot

Despite the very poor start of the baseball season, my favorite baseball team the Minnesota Twins have gotten back into the swing of playing ball and are on a roll. Yet so are the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago White Sox. Being 11 games out of first, it's tough to get excited to watch them, but they have just had an outstanding month of June, yet so have the Tigers and White Sox. This photo is from the Seattle game played earlier in June or the very last week of May. The Twins are on the field and Johan Santana is the pitcher on the mound.

Ready, Set, Go

Looking down into the Lego building area from above on the third floor landing at the Mall Of America. The kids are building cars and racing them down the ramp. They have legos set up in this area for all age of children. My two kids could spend hours here building cars and racing them. It's quite an art to get the weight, length, strength to win these fun races. I taught them well.

The Yellow Bullet

I've only rode on the light rail one time so far since it has been in operation. It was quite smooth, but it was before a Minnesota Vikings game and the car was completely packed with people. The light rail runs from the Mall Of America into downtown Minneapolis with many stops in between. The crazy thing is it's all done via the honor system.

Two On The Runaway Train

When the traffic is bad on 494 crossing the Mississippi River, I take an alternate route. Sometimes this works against me if there is a crossing train. When I snapped this shot, I saw the lights flashing red and the engine approaching and I had to stop and wait for the train to pass. As I was waiting, I saw something that looked like people sitting on the train. Sure enough it was two guys sitting up front on the slowly moving train. Lucky for me the train was only pulling two cars that day. The great news was I had my camera with me for this shot. Was shooting into the sun and wasn't sure how good the photo would turn out as I had to adjust the settings as quick as possible. I took the photo and waved as they passed.

Just Throw On Some New Paint

Was surprised to see this run down apartment building looking rather good. Amazing what a coat of paint will do to a building that looked like it had been in a previous war zone. It has a new historic plaque that says the building was built in 1883. It doesn't look too bad these days from what I can remember it looking like. It's on the corner of Ohio Street and George Street in St Paul.

Through The Nose

These clever bird houses were for sale at a really unique store in the Mall Of America in Bloomington. Didn't catch the name of the store, but they had a TV running a video of the bird houses in action. The birds would enter their nest via the nose of the bird house. It was quite comical and certain an excellent attention getter. Every one of the faces on the bird houses were differnt from each other as they were all hand carved.

Forbidden Caramel

They were making these caramel apples at a shop in the Mall Of America and they had the look of; take a photo of us. So I had to snap a shot of these. Many of these treats will be doctored up with candy sprinkles and various nuts before they are the finished product. I'm not sure why I didn't purchase one....

Quite An Overhaul

I was trying to find a photo of this intersection from 10-15 years ago, but I'm not finding anything on the interwebs that is pre-yellow paint. This used to be Concord and State intersection, not sure when that changed. Just south of downtown St Paul, this area on the West Side is quite unique. Lots of Mexican themed stores and the community in this area are well supportive of the heritage.

This entire area has been so improved, this one photo doesn't do it justice. It was quite run down when from when I can first recall living in this area. It is a very beautiful neighborhood now. For restaurants in the area, Boca Chica is highly recommended. The El Burrito Mercado grocery store in this photo has been here for quite a while. It looks like they have expanded from what I remember plus Cherokee Bank is now in the building. I certainly will have to revisit this area when I get the time for more photos.

Shiny Happy Buildings

I'm headed north into downtown Minneapolis on Interstate 35W at this point. The sun is an hour or so from setting giving the buildings reflection a tad different look.

Zig Zag Chris Cross

The view from inside cover of the metrodome in downtown Minneapolis. The view the cameras rarely show, unless they are heading out to a commercial break. It will be sad to see the Twins move to a new outdoor stadium. Wait, reverse that, my error, I can't wait for them to leave the indoors and move to the outdoor stadium. I wasn't a big fan of using tax payers dollars to fund the new place, yet I wasn't a fan of the dome either.