This is the greeting at the gas pump at Mike’s Downtown on the corner of Robert and 11th in St. Paul. The $50 I spent at the pump and the below zero wind chill I endured while completing this transaction are testimony to the contrary. But thanks anyway. Perhaps they should follow that up with “…SOMEWHERE ELSE.”

And yeah, I know, that’s a lot of money for gas! That’s a big car! I’m terrible for the environment! Oh, boo hoo.

Burning things., originally uploaded by smooth_d.

Jeremy’s party was fun. He has better (more pervier) commentary and additional photos. Delicious food, delicious beer, fire and almost a beard off. Fantastic.

And congratulations to the DeRusha family on their newest addition and newest Minnesotan. Going into labor in the presence of a Senator was way cooler than going into labor in the presence of all of us. It would have been awesome, though. Welcome to the world, Sam.

Googly Eyes!, originally uploaded by smooth_d.

Isn’t it cute?

This is what I found on the side of the dumpster behind my building this morning. Isn’t that sweet?

This morning, I did a little spring cleaning in my apartment, and got rid of many things I no longer need. Some of it went into the dumpster out back, and some of it went into the storage unit to eventually give to someone else.

When I returned home from the trip to PublicStorage, there was a lady crossing my street with a giant green parrot on her shoulder. It’s cool, it’s not like I’ve never seen someone walking around downtown Minneapolis with a big bird perched on them before. Oh no, it happens all of the time.

Ten minutes later, I’m upstairs and starting to tidy up my apartment and clean out my fridge. There were a few items that needed to be run down to the dumpster. As I approached the corner, I noticed a few things sitting on top of the dumpster lid. Apparently, someone had gone through the trash and pulled out a few key items of interest. Of course, they must not have been too interesting, because they were left behind. Among them, a box of old glittery drawing pens that I used to own, but they never did work very well, and a box of all of my old computer’s drivers and manuals. There were a couple of pens missing, so I guess they wanted some of them, but not the whole box. I’d like to meet the kind of person that will go dumpster diving, and walk away with some pink glittery drawing pens.

After that, I came upstairs to check my email, as I noticed I had several Overheards waiting for me. One of the kind people of Minnesota sent me a naked picture of a middle aged, extremely hairy yet bald dude sprawled out with his junk to the wind on the edge of a couch, asking me if I thought the guy in the picture was Paul Koering. Look, I don’t know if this fellow with poor judgement is a Senator (though it probably is), and I really just don’t care. I’m a little surprised that someone thought I would be interested in this. However, I do appreciate the pixelation on the guy’s family jewels, that was polite. It’s just too bad the rest of it didn’t get the same treatment. For you, I shall make it MUCH smaller and crop it! Yes! I sort of feel like burning my eyes out with some candle wax.

Even though Aaron did an interview on a live taping of Drinking With Ian, I didn’t get any pictures of the actual interview. I did soooort of attempt to get on there myself, but I was little shy. Their awesome bartender Ollie told me he was booked until October, so if I wanted to be a guest, I’d have to wait for a while. Wow, that’s really awesome, that they have that much lined up!

Overall, besides the weird bands, and the one guy that jumped up on stage to “take over” the mic, and attemped a death metal scream and was quickly escorted elsewhere, the Luce Block Party was fun. There were a few OIM fans out there that I got to meet, as well as the Totally Scrabble Tuesday guy and his foxy girlfriend, and the beer was flowing nicely.

Two things happened that saddened me. 1. Somehow, I ended up short two tickets. Either they only gave me 18 for the 20 I purchased, or I managed to give away 2 extras when I purchased my Summits. I have no idea. Either way, 4 bucks down the tube. Cry. 2. The music was too loud to overhear anything awesome. Aaron and I heard, “I thought he was cute until…” from two hot chicks, but didn’t get the rest of it. Whatever it was, it was probably awesome. Damn you, loud music!

Man, I should have had some pizza.

Clearly, I didn’t have as much fun as this guy: