Feeling Minnesota

"Feeling Minnesota" was a lump-of-a-movie back in '96, but it's a great way to describe this place to people if you've never been here before (and I hadn't prior to the GOP convention).

• It's a great place -- flat as all get-out -- and the people are among the friendliest anywhere. Period.

• Talk about clean! (You see people picking up scraps of litter on the streets as they happen across the trash -- and it doesn't even belong to them!) There's greenery everywhere and, heck, a river (or two) runs right through the Twin Cities.

A river runs through it: The Mighty Mississippi runs right
through St. Paul (across the street from the Xcel Center).

• When people greet you and say, "How are you doing?" They mean it. They really want to know.

• Minnesotans use the word "super" a lot. A lot.

• The Mall of America is simultaneously a monstrosity and a glorious tribute to free market capitalism. The place even has a theme park in the middle of it with roller coasters! The only thing it's missing inside is an airport, a volcano and a mall-within-a-mall.

The maul of America?: The Mall of America is so huge
that it even has its own theme park smack dab in the middle.
The park includes roller coasters, a Ferris wheel and a host
of Nickelodeon TV network-related attractions.

• The state is sports crazy. Hockey rules, but baseball, football and every outdoor sports activity you can think of ain't far behind.

Wild about hockey: The local NHL franchise, the Minnesota
Wild. (As you can see, this year's line-up looks tough.)

• Minnesotans are very politically aware and they see themselves as a very cultured people (galleries, theaters, stunning architecture, public art and such abound).

Extra: The various contingents from throughout the state making up the police presence at the convention have been top-notch in the way they've dealt with the various tasks they've been handed this week. I'll bet that when the Twin Cities folks signed up for this big event, they had no idea that they'd have to lockdown parts of St. Paul and call in police from across Minnesota.