Let's Go Lynx!

 Minneapolis, MN

Mary Tyler Moore!  We're going to make it after all!

$1 WNBA Minnesota Lynx Tickets

Today we continued unpacking and then walked over to Target Center to use our $1 Minnesota Lynx tickets Donna found for us by subscribing to the local newspaper.  Right after we subscribed we were offered $1 tickets as a thank you.  

The walk to Target Center as well as Target Field is about a mile.  It was a little rainy but we were not deterred.  We arrived and were surprised to be able to enter the arena without showing our tickets.  The ticket check started inside.  I guess that makes sense when you could maybe freeze to death while waiting to get in during a winter storm.  

We always just follow the crowd that looks like they are going where we are going.  It works pretty well.

This Prince mural caught my eye as we got close to the arena.

The Target Center hosts concerts too.  Minneapolis is a really big music city.

Security was fast.  Also we didn't really have anything other than what was in our pockets.  We know better.

They scanned our E-Tickets and then handed us printed tickets.

It isn't open but if it was should we count it?

The fine beers on offer.  I was snacky and thirsty so I decided to spend a little money on food and drink seeing as how the tickets were only a dollar each and we didn't have to pay for parking because we walked.

They did card me so I guess I look to be 30 years of age or younger.  I will take it as a compliment.

My food choice was a Walking Taco.  Walking Taco, Chili Boat, and Frito Pie are all similar fast food concoctions.  The internet tells me that The Walking Taco is always made in the chip bag but the Frito Pie AKA Chili Boat can be made outside the Frito bag as well as inside.

The finest ingredients go right in the bag!

I'm counting my calories these days (and approaching my goal weight), so I checked the bag which I thought would be in vain, but it's packed to be a walking taco!

I tried to showcase the fine ingredients.

It was as good as you would expect.  I figure it's worth the price because I would never make it at home.

The game was super fun and exciting.  The arena staff really kept the crowd energy up with all sorts of things.  One of the pauses in play featured a slam dunk contest for 3 very shy 4ish year old girls.  It was fun to watch the handlers try to get them to dunk on a basket made just for them.  It looked like they all just wanted to hang on to the basketball so no one would take it away from them.

I was disappointed when I saw the camera guy wearing Timberwolves branded work attire.

I then noticed that The Lynx have their own floor at the arena.

Dessa, a local rap artist headlined the halftime show.

The Lynx won the game.  They have a strong team.

All of the players did a dance to celebrate the win and the arena staff danced along in the aisles as we left.

We went out the wrong door so I was able to get a better view of the Prince mural.

That's it for today.  If you missed, A Quick Pinball Tournament at Broken Clock, check it out.  We played pinball all day.

A Quick Pinball Tournament at Broken Clock

 Minneapolis, MN

Playing pinball at Broken Clock Brewing Cooperative

Another Pinball Tournament

Today I wanted to go to Broken Clock Brewing Cooperative for a 3 strikes tournament.  The format is if you don't come in first or 2nd in your round of 4 players, you get a strike.  Three Strikes and you are out!  This was a new tournament for me so I didn't know how long it would go.  Donna decided she would come along and hang out but she was worried about how long it might go so she figured she would just play in the tournament to kill time.  It's basically free if you plan on buying a beer.  The tournament entry is $5 and you get a ticket for a beer with entry.  Most beers are more than $5 so you can't afford not to play in it.  Since it was going to be her first ever tournament, she thought she would play three rounds while drinking her beer, get 3 strikes and be done and then wait for me to finish.  That isn't exactly how it all went down.

We arrived and we got Donna all registered and then we got her set up with her Matchplay account.  Matchplay is software used to run the tournament.  It's just easier to have it all set up on your phone so you know who you are playing and what machine you are on and what order to play in.

The tournament started with the director telling everyone the rules and then we were off.  My first round was on Eight Ball Deluxe.  I played my game and between balls I looked over and it looked like Donna was having fun.  I ended up placing 2nd in the first round so I didn't take any strikes.  I checked in with Donna and she said, "Yea, I had a fluke good game and I didn't get a strike."  Cool!  We both made it through round 1 without a strike. 

On my 2nd round I was on High Speed, which isn't a machine I know that well yet.  I ended up taking 4th place and got a strike.  When I checked in on Donna after the round she had received a strike as well.  

On my 3rd round I played Swords of Fury and won the round.  I checked in with Donna and there was another fluke where she didn't take a strike.  :)  This is great!  We were both sitting on 1 strike going into round 4.  Round 3 is when people start getting 3 strikes so neither of us was going to finish in last place.

On my 4th round I played Spin Out, which is an older machine.  It is one player only so we all had to play one at a time.  I ended up coming in 2nd so I made it through another round without another strike.  After checking in with Donna there was yet another fluke and she ended the round with still only 1 strike.  We were both tied with 1 strike after round 4!  This was great!

Donna caught me doing the tango with Spin Out right next to a pull tab vending machine.

My meh score on Spin Out that somehow got me 2nd place.

A screenshot of Matchplay showing us both at 1 strike after 4 rounds!

On round 5 I was on the new John Wick game and I had a terrible game.  I came in 4th and got another strike.  Now I was at 2 strikes.  One more loss and I would be done.  After checking in with Donna what do you think happened?  If you guessed another fluke you are right!  She was still at 1 strike after round 5!  At this point 20 out of the 40 players had been eliminated.

The field thins

Yes, a lot of words so here is photo of a beer to keep you going!

For round 6 I would be playing Halloween.  I would have to win to keep playing;  I played a pretty solid game but by ball 3 I was behind player 1.  Player 3, who was the only other player, still had her 3rd ball.  She hadn't had a good start so I had a chance to advance without a strike.  I ran to the bathroom while she played and when I got back, she was entering her initials into the game so it turns out she had a great ball 3 which meant I was out.  I checked in with Donna to see how she was doing and she was having a rough game.  As I waited for her to finish I looked at Matchplay and our scores hadn't been entered so I walked up to the 3rd player and she said if you are entering scores you beat me.  It was player 1, then you (meaning me), and then me (meaning her).  I said something like, "I thought I was you entering your initials?" and she said, "no, that was player 1's initials I was entering".  I came in 2nd!  I was still in!  I still only have 2 strikes!  Sadly Donna got her 2nd strike and we were both at 2 strikes going into round 7.

For round 7 we both ended up on Austin Powers together.  This meant that if we both didn't finish 1 and 2, one or both of us would be out!  

We both played well but only one of us advanced.  Sadly, Donna got her 3rd strike and was out.  I ended up in 2nd place and advanced to round 8.

For round 8 I ended up on Jaws with 2 sharks (not including the Jaws shark).  This was going to be a 3 player game so I needed to come in 1st or 2nd to advance.  My first two balls were terrible so I wasn't feeling great about advancing.  My 3rd ball was pretty good and I ended up with almost 100m.  I was well behind player 1 but player 2 was a bit behind me with 1 ball to go.  I sat back down next to Donna and watched player 3 from across the room.  After a bit of playing I saw him act like his game was over and he wasn't happy.  I went over and checked and I had come in 2nd!  I was advancing to round 9!  

Round 9 featured the remaining 8 players playing in two groups of four.  All 8 of us had 2 strikes so 4 of us were going home.  I ended up on Foo Fighters and had a horrible game.  I ended up in 4th place and tied for 5th with 3 other players.  This was a fantastic result for me and it was so much fun playing with Donna.  

What we thought was going to be a quick tournament ended up going for a bit over 5 hours.  We both had a great time and got to talk to some really great people.  I even shared the blog with a couple of them so maybe they are reading this.

Here are my scores and results for the tournament.  I ended up setting personal best scores on Eight Ball Deluxe and Spin Out (I didn't have a previous score).

That's it for today.  If you missed, Getting Settled in Minneapolis, check it out.  It features fewer words and more photos.

Getting Settled in Minneapolis

 Minneapolis, MN

I like big trucks and I might be lying.

Getting Our Stuff

Last month we pulled the trigger on having our POD moved from western Washington to just outside of Minneapolis at a warehouse they own.  We could have then had the pod delivered to our house if we had one but our apartment building doesn't have a place for a POD to be dropped off so we had to get a rental truck, drive to the warehouse, and unload it ourselves.  I only found out we could do this while trying to figure out how we would move into the apartment.  It's a pretty good option if you can't have a POD delivered to your doorstep.

When we got to the PODs storage facility, Donna ran in and let them know we were here.

They pointed to a POD unit behind the warehouse that was set out especially for us.  You set up your move day online and if you miss it, they charge you.

Moving ourselves may have been an optimistic choice due to our 50+ year old backs.  It did save us some money, which is good.

Soon we started moving our stuff from the POD to our truck.

Another action shot!

While we moved stuff I walked around to take a photo of the impressive warehouse with tons (literally) of people's stuff in it.

This is an after shot of the POD

This is Donna feeling triumphant after we moved all of our stuff into the van and it fit!

There was a nice loading bay for our van while we unloaded it.  We also noticed our van was customized by a local artist.

Our stuff is now happily in our 9th floor apartment.  It only took about 6 hours for the whole moving process, but wait there's more to the moving story!

When we parked the van in the loading bay, I set the parking brake and it went to the floor.  I was a little worried when this happened but forgot about it while we moved.

The pedal would lift if I pulled it up with my hand and while I pulled the brake release.

It turns out the brake broke so I had to call UHaul roadside assistance.

They told me not to drive it and sent a technician out.  He arrived exactly at the 1.5 hour estimate and looked at the situation.  He told me the sensor was broken and that the brake wasn't engaged.  This meant, to him that it was drivable, which was all I needed to hear.  I wanted this move done!  We chose to avoid highways just incase the parking brake locked up while we were driving.  I drove with my left foot holding up the parking brake pedal so it wouldn't beep beep beep at us the whole way.  This made the drive slightly less stressful.  We both flinched every time the "Towing Brake" engaged when I took my foot off the gas thinking the parking brake was engaging.  We made it back to UHaul before they closed and told them exactly what the technician told us to tell them, "The technician told us to let you know that you have a faulty parking brake sensor."  The dude said okay and then moved the truck into its parking spot and came back in to get us checked out.  He said he heard the sensor beep beep beeping as he moved the truck.  Once we had our final receipt we ran out of there.  On the way out I pointed to a cable that was loose under our former UHaul.  It had been dragged on the road the whole way from the apartment building.  I told Donna that I bet that's the broken parking brake cable and she agreed.  NOT OUR PROBLEM ANYMORE!

We are so happy to be in our apartment with all of our stuff.  We are highly incentivized to get rid of stuff so that we have less stuff to move next time, maybe even next year.  

We Are Very Happy With Our Apartment

This is our apartment building on one of our dog walks.  There are plenty of places for us to take Francis for walks during this warm weather.

Our apartment is a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom 1286 sq. ft. apartment on the 9th floor of a 35 floor building.  There is a door person here 24/7 and they are incredibly helpful. There is free coffee and doughnuts weekdays if you get up early enough.  The big complaint is that retired people get the doughnuts before the younger crowd gets there and we can confirm that I almost got the last of the doughnuts the other day :).  Our apartment comes with heated indoor parking and we pay a little extra for a reserved spot. We learned during our month stay in Kansas City that a reserved spot is worth a small fee.  Our apartment also has an indoor pool, gym, a gender-neutral sauna, a sauna in the women's changing room, an indoor dog relief area, rooftop tennis and basketball during the summer, and it comes with free basic cable, internet, heating, and water.  The only thing we pay for utility wise is electricity. 

Retired people grabbing up all of the free doughnuts!

 There is still a lot to do but we are starting to feel more settled.  As I type this, Donna is reading the newspaper and getting us free tickets to the Lynx, a professional women's basketball game on Monday.  Newspaper subscription has it's privileges!

That's it for today.  If you missed, "We Have Landed in Minneapolis", check it out.

We Have Landed in Minneapolis!

 Minneapolis, MN

Minnesota don't you know.

Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey

On Saturday we left Bismarck, ND, passed through Fargo, ND, and entered Minnesota for the first time this year.  Our "final" destination is Minneapolis!  We arrived at our new apartment in Minneapolis at around 1:15pm, got our keys, and began unloading our camping gear.  We have a giant list of things to do but most of this will have to wait until Monday, when we get internet (hopefully) and final instructions on how to actually move our stuff in.  Our POD storage unit is waiting just outside the city for us.  We have a rental truck reserved for Tuesday and our POD will be accessible to us at the PODs storage facility for the day.  The plan is to empty the POD, move the stuff into our apartment, and return the truck on Tuesday.  It will be fun seeing our stuff again after 2 years and wondering why we kept so much of it.  Hopefully we can lighten our load a bit for the next move whenever that is (probably next year).

Francis found the sunny spot right away.

Exploring the Area and Our Building

After getting settled a bit, we headed out to a brand new brewery that just opened just steps away from our apartment.  BruHaven Craft House opened last week and it's going to be nice having a dog friendly, solid brewery so close to us.  There are even 2 pinball machines!

It's a large space and there was even live music going on.

We tried 3 of their beers and they were all very good.

We have even had good Mexican food here already.

The Roxy is right around the corner and they have free Movie Nights on Sunday nights.  We will probably take advantage soon.

Our building has its summer holiday tree up already.  We are ready for The 4th of July!

There is an indoor heated pool that we used yesterday.  It's going to be great!

There is also a Sauna, because this is the Scandinavia of the US.

We also went to the roof of our 35 floor building to see the sights. Our apartment is on the 9th floor so the views aren't quite as good but the rent is cheaper.

There is also an indoor dog area that Francis currently HATES!

We have had 1 and a half days of living in a large apartment with just our camping gear.  It's working out pretty well.  We are looking forward to getting our stuff though.  

Camping chairs work great indoors too!

"Table" for two!

We even splurged on an electric kettle.  It's one of the things we figured out we like while on the road.

That's it for today.  Hopefully things going smoothly and we will be settled in a few days.  If you missed, Mermaids in Montana, check it out.