Weather or not

June 8, 2009


Weather, by nature, changes. It is constantly changing. Even in areas where the weather seems stable and constant, it’s not – it’s simply in a range that is more comfortable, staying clear of the extremes that we can’t help but notice.

Weather, by nature, is also unpredictable – especially in a city like Sioux Falls, where we experience nose-hair freezing lows and egg-boiling highs. It’s not uncommon to see snow in early May, or to be hit with a sudden heat wave in November.

Which brings me to wonder how, after a week of beautiful days, the collective mind of Sioux Falls can explode over the idea of rain.

It’s enough to send Kerrie into a frantic search for earmuffs. She hears it doubly – as the average age of a workplace grows, I suspect the percentage of weather-based conversation grows proportionately.

It works like this. When there’s space to fill, you talk about the weather. And when the weather is anything less than perfect – which is always, despite everyone’s understanding that weather is fluid and constantly changing – you complain about the weather.

Today, even though the rain has gone, people still complain.

From my window, I can tell it’s not a bright sunny day. I know it’s not 80 degrees.

But it’s not raining anymore. It’s actually kind of a nice day.

We don’t live in Siberia, or the deserts of Africa. Hell, we don’t even live in St. Cloud, where winter lasts 8 months. We get the best of both worlds, with the understanding that we also get the worst of both.

So can we stop complaining about the weather?

Please?

Tags: Annoyances, Sioux Falls |

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At 5:30 am

April 24, 2009


At 5:30 in the morning, even the biggest city seems like a ghost town.

It’s dark enough that, through the blurred vision of early morning sleepiness, you could mistake it for evening. Traffic lights blink red and yellow. Buildings continue to sleep, their internal lights barely making enough light to illuminate the offerings inside. Every intersection is a graveyard, your vehicle the only remaining entity left as you patiently look both ways and proceed.

It’s not completely abandoned, though. Other people like me – still half-asleep, trudging into work to make up time or clock in for an early day – slowly cruise the streets, their headlights creeping along the pavement.

They, like me, are experiencing the new day before most others. By the time Kerrie wakes up, today being her day off, the morning will have been touched by thousands, a seemingly fresh awakening already feeling the effect of civilization’s restlessness.

Because last night was warm, I roll down the windows. I turn up my radio. I turn onto Minnesota Avenue and continue on my way, wondering what the day will bring, enjoying a band I had long forgotten, excited to be alive and, for the moment, alone in a ghost town.

Tags: On..., Sioux Falls |

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Peter F’n Frampton

April 2, 2009


[ ROB GORDON walks up to a bar. From the entrance he can hear MARIE DE SALLE singing “Baby I Love Your Way.”]

ROB: [Pauses, incredulously] “Is that Peter fucking Frampton?!”

Far be it from me to comment on boring local news – I’ll leave that to the dude who runs SD Watch – but Kerrie pointed out that the Sioux Empire Fair will be featuring Alice Cooper, Big and Rich and some cowboy rapper. All acts that I’m sure will sell out.

Oh. And Peter Frampton.

Which gives the two of us ample reason to live out one of the best lines in movie history. Or, at least, one of the best lines in High Fidelity.

That’s all. I’ll end the Hornby/Cusack lovefest now.

(P.S. My favorite line of the article: “The fair said it still is negotiating for a hot rock act.”

I can’t wait to see who THAT’S going to be. What, is Hoobastank still around?

Oh, god. They are.)

Tags: Movies, Music, Sioux Falls |

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School spirit

March 23, 2009


I didn’t give a damn about school sports when I was in high school.

There wasn’t much of a reason to in the first place. I went to Lincoln High School here in Sioux Falls. We were a smart kid school. We won debate tournaments, not football championships. We slaughtered in band, not basketball.

In fact, we seemed to only one game per year in football, and aside from a blip in 1995 we were pretty mediocre in basketball.

But now, whether it’s through some force of aging or a reminiscence for easier days or some other rah rah alma mater bullshit, I find myself caring again. I don’t follow the sports - I mean, come on, I have no connection outside of a diploma; it’s not like Sierra’s on the team or anything - but I find myself genuinely excited when the school does well.

Call it a common thread that we all have - all of us that graduated from Lincoln High, whether we were connected at the time or mortal enemies - but it’s as if we feel the same rush of electricity when our high school is mentioned. Not because of anything important, but just because it’s an item of identity. It’s part of who we are, regardless of whether we liked it at the time. It helps define us.

Part of me is there in that school. Even still today.

What I’m trying to say is that, against all odds, with the claws of irony threatening to tear away my genuine joy, I’m proud of Lincoln High School - my high school, my alma mater, my identifiable location for 9-12 grades - for doing something we all thought impossible.

On top of the sports world - not once, but twice. 2008 State 11AA Football Champions. And now, undefeated 2009 State AA Basketball Champions.

Congrats, guys. From all of us who still feel a part of it somehow.

Tags: Basketball, Football, Sioux Falls, Sports, Vilhauer |

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On the market

February 16, 2009


On the market

Today, our house went on the market.

I wish it was that simple, though. Because it’s so much more than that.

This is the vessel that our entire married life has been contained within. The only home Sierra has ever known. The house where our lives changed - where sheer longings turned into surprising realities, where we’ve seen friends come and go and pass away.

Which means, in some confusing and over-dramatized way, we’re selling our life. Or, at least, part of it.

We’ve put our house on the market. In doing so, we’ve put our sense of style on the market. Our security. Our cocoon, our safety zone, our base, free from tag, no touch backs and all of that.

We’ve put our view of the perfect life out for everyone to see, to judge and to offer on. It’s like sending a manuscript to a handful of publishers – we’re opening ourselves up for critique, and the person who wants our home the most will make an offer.

I’m happy that we’re doing it. I’m thrilled, actually. It’s exciting, without a doubt. The chance at altering our surroundings is something I look forward to. I’m thrilled with the idea of the hunt, of discovering the perfect new habitat, where both of our kids will roam free, creating the same kind of memories that I created in the homes I grew up in.

But it’s weird to think that Sierra won’t have many memories of this house. And to Baby Boy, this house will simply be an illusion in his parent’s minds – a home in which he was conceived but never stepped foot. It’s the foundation that we clung to as we created a new life for ourselves, a life that made both Sierra and Baby Boy possible, yet it will be like cell theory to the two of them – impossible to imagine, too minute to understand.

I’ll miss this house. At times, I’ll be filled with nostalgia. I know Kerrie feels the same. But it will be short lived. We will turn wherever we land into our home. Just as we’ve done before at this house; just as the lucky owners that follow us will once we leave.

It’s a chapter in our lives that will have passed by – not with painful remembrance, but with fondness. A chapter we can always look back on, proud of what we accomplished.

A chapter in the past, with many left to discover.

Tags: Friends, Isaac, On..., Sierra, Sioux Falls, Vilhauer |

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Season Ticket Review: Bored

February 9, 2009


Skyforce

Game 16 – Fort Wayne (10-15) at Sioux Falls Skyforce (14-13). February 6, 2009.

I couldn’t tell you the score of Friday’s Skyforce game. In fact, I had to look it up.

Actually, I wouldn’t know if the fourth quarter was as exciting as it seemed to others. I wasn’t there.

I won’t try to convince you that D-League basketball is always great. It’s not, as we saw Friday night. On one hand, we had the Fort Wayne Mad Ants (seriously, it seems like we play them every home game these days) who were running crazy, playing like, you know, the game mattered.

On the other hand, the Skyforce; camouflaged in Military Night uniforms, blending into each other as if drops of mercury rejoining the site of a spilled thermometer. They played sluggish. They didn’t care.

And, for that reason, either did we.

This was our first night seeing last year’s MVP Kasib Powell. I had hoped for a good showing, and he didn’t disappoint, seemingly the only guy who had even bothered to commit to the game. Unfortunately, his play was overshadowed by the rest of the group. A group that was tired. A group that couldn’t be troubled to fight through that tiredness. A group that was as uninterested to be there as we were come halftime.

It was a date night, and we were excited to be there without Sierra. It turns out that the best part of the evening was when we left, went to Culvers, and watched as the guy blending my Concrete Mixer was giving more of an effort than the paid basketball players we had just left.

It was sad. There were a lot of people there to witness a good time. And I know the Skyforce are a better team.

Listen to me. An angry fan, just another railing against the professionals, telling them to know their place, bitching about poor play with a ham-fisted series of lame accusations.

It was probably just an off night. But whether or not it’s because we go to fewer games, or because we were expecting something better – payback for the last two Fort Wayne losses, perhaps – or simply because we’re getting tired of being losers at home, I took the loss personally.

I took their lack of effort personally.

I took the game personally. I just hope they did the same.

Skyforce 89, Fort Wayne 95.

Tags: Basketball, Sioux Falls, Sioux Falls Skyforce, Sports |

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Boom Tho on rivalry

January 28, 2009


Checking Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo! Sports today, I was surprised to see a couple of Sioux Falls Skyforce players rocking the rebound.

Well, duh. I totally forgot that regular blogger Rod Benson plays for the Dakota Wizards, who were in town last Saturday. (We missed it, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they revoked our season tickets for missing a heated rivalry game. Seriously. I feel like a chump for missing the game.)

Anyway, he does a good job of summing up the Dakota Wizards/Sioux Falls Skyforce rivalry without hyperbole, helping lend some credibility to my claim that, yes, D-League Basketball is indeed entertaining, important and high quality.

From the post:

On Saturday we played in Sioux Falls. These guys are our rivals, a rivalry that borders on the Bulls-Pistons level back in the day. I mean, I guess I should say it’s as close to that kind of hard-fought, knockdown, drag-out rivalry as a minor league basketball rivalry can be. The guys on each team are usually some of the best in the D-League. They have been with the same team for years. Of course, the whole “North Dakota vs. South Dakota” thing plays a part. The attendance is the best in the league for these games. There’s just a lot of emotion involved every time we play.

The bad thing is that Dakota won thanks to some stupid heat-of-the-moment technicals and fouls. If it wasn’t for getting into our own heads, the Skyforce would be undefeated.

Regardless, nice to see some semi-national attention for the ‘Force.

Tags: Basketball, Sioux Falls, Sioux Falls Skyforce, Sports |

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