Duluth!!! Some more!

Today is Thursday. I'm still a bit bummed about missing book club, but with so many of the others also missing tonight, we might be discussing tonight's book in June as well. I wrote the last entry last night--Wednesday--as an email to myself, and copied it into this blog.

It is 5:30 PM and I'm in the hotel's computer room again. Another journal entry, to warn you. Could be boring!

I straightened our hotel room early, early this morning, including putting all of Bob's change into $1 stacks. I think I fell asleep around 4:30 AM. Bob, naturally, was sleeping like a baby most of the night. OTC sleeping pills really work for him.

I woke after 8:30 and was feeling pretty happy and full of life. Bob was dressed, reading the newspaper. We had breakfast together in the hotel. Pancakes with strawberry syrup, juice, milk, and some processed sausage-like patties. It was like textured Spam with sausage flavoring. Didn't have to chew it much. But it was complimentary, and that was a good savings. Bob tried something that looked like the kind of fried eggs little girls get with their Fisher-Price kitchens. A perfectly round, white disk with a perfectly round smaller yellow disk in the center. Not one of the better choices. He also had a REAL hard boiled egg. The employee taking care of the breakfast area told Bob they would be having scrambled eggs Friday morning, so he is really looking forward to that. He loved the cheese omelettes they served Wednesday morning. Bob is a major breakfast fan. He has always loved breakfast. I, on the other hand, wake slowly and usually have a light breakfast much later. This morning, I had to lie down after breakfast to recover and digest.

So after that, we finally got in the Trailblazer about 10:30. We drove to the Omnitheater down by canal park and were disappointed to find they currently only run the IMAX shows on the weekend. Their "normal" Theater 10, though, was right next door and started their lineup at 1 PM. We decided to take a ride around to check out some of the gorgeous architecture. There are some stunning old buildings. We stopped and took pictures of the old Central High. It is no longer in use, but their bell tower rings every hour on the hour. We were there to listen to it tell the city of Duluth it was 12:00.

We returned to the movie theater and saw The Soloist with Robert Downey Jr and Jamie Foxx. Bob said it was "all right," meaning it didn't really appeal much to him. But I loved it. I told Bob I didn't want to see any movies that might show people having sex. Actually, I said people who weren't married to each other. But then, I'm not aware of any movies that have shown married people having sex. I guess that would be too nice, and kind of boring. Anyway, I'm getting so I can't take watching such; it makes me sad for a number of reasons and somewhat irritated or angry, even. I figured a show listing two male stars wouldn't include filming of any sex acts. And it didn't. It just showed a perfectly stupid shot of 3 men in stalls taken from the ceiling of a public bathroom. The camers settles on Downey's character spilling his urine sample as he tries to answer his cell. He slips on the spilled urine. LOL? Not me. It seems if they don't have a sex scene, they include the obligatory bathroom scene. It must be Hollywood's unwritten law.

Sorry about the complaints. The Soloist was a rather good movie, and it was a true story. Steve Lopez (Downey)writes a column for a LosAngeles newpaper and happens on Nathaniel Ayres(Foxx), a homeless man, in his search for a human interest article. Nathaniel has a violin with only 2 strings, but he is able to play some melodies. He parks his shopping cart in a park that has a statue of Beethoven, his favorite composer. Steve investigates Nathaniel because he can see he is indeed a musician. Nathaniel had a natural gift for music and learned the cello about the age of 11. He wanted to "catch up" with Beethoven's record of composing. He had a great teacher and practiced and practiced and practiced. He got into Julliard, but dropped out his second year because he became schizophrenic. The movie is the story of Steve's friendship with Nathaniel and of Steve's discoveries about himself and life in general. I strongly recommend this movie.

We had buttered popcorn and a soft drink, and Bob loves to get those free refills--bless his heart. He had refilled the popcorn during the show, but our drink cup was empty except for some ice when we left. Bob went up to the group of the employees putting a cardboard display together and sheepishly asked for more pop. And then -- after the smiling young woman manager went behind the previously empty snack counter -- he went on talking about how he supposed it wasn't so nice to fill it as we were leaving, but that we were entitled to one refill. I told her he most often would embarrass me this way lately. We all laughed. Ha,ha.

We were going to go see another movie, but decided to take a drive up the North Shore Road instead. To repeat, both of us enjoy going for a drive. Must have come from when we were little. It was common then for families to take "Sunday drives." Looking back, there wasn't much else to do on Sundays because all the stores were closed and we weren't supposed to play outside on the sabbath. Today we noticed many houses are for sale. It seems a greater proportion of the homes here are on the market than in the Twin Cities. It was sunny and warm. We stopped at a smoked fish shop. Wow, did it smell yummy in there! We bought a couple of postcards and some Minnesota wild rice. A lot of it!!! I'll be looking for lots of rice recipes when we get home.

When we got back to our Hermantown hotel, we drove past it to explore what was on the other side of the hill. We were hoping for a closer SA, but no such luck. We just got lost. Bob was complaining about the lack of road signs and markers and how poorly laid out this place is!!! I scared him when I turned the Trailblazer around on a country road; he thought I would land the tires on his side of the car in a gully. But I was in control. And after figuring out we needed to keep turning right to find our way back, we pulled safely into the hotel parking lot.

It is 7 PM now. I have spent way too much time writing and rewriting this entry!

Bob is most likely sleeping. I don't dare to lie down because if I do fall asleep, I'll be up all night again! After I close this, I'll take great pleasure in shaking him awake. We'll go to Outback for a late dinner. It is right across the parking lot. So convenient. And no danger of us getting lost again.