The Rake Magazine

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  • The Opposite of Beige

    Warning: In this post, you’ll have to wade through some sap
    before arriving at the payoff. This weekend I met my new mentee via the U of M’s
    school of journalism mentoring program. (I’m also on the school’s alumni board;
    do the warm-fuzzies never end?) Here’s what I love about mentoring: You give and
    you give, and then you get back more than you ever imagined. Already, my mentee
    has proven her self a person of impeccable tastes. She is a former Japanese
    language and literature major, so she happens to know oodles about Japanese
    culture. She told me about this cool, origami-inspired method of Japanese
    gift-wrapping     (which I intend to try this holiday season) and even referred me
    to this aptly named Japanese fashion magazine, FRUiTS. On a beige Minneapolis morning such
    as this, these pics of colorfully clad Tokyoites (see the gallery within) really
    hit the spot.

  • Politics in Minnesota: MnDOT Suffering Under Strib Attack

    Whoa. Sarah Janecek’s Politics in Minnesota newsletter sure lobbed one into the Strib newsroom late Friday. In a Weekly Report item entitled “MnDOT Under Seige: The Star Tribune’s Agenda,” Janecek writes that MnDOT personnel are getting pretty fed up with certain pushy, expletive-spewing Strib reporters.

    According to an email sent by a MnDOT mucky-muck to an unnamed GOP legislator and passed along to Janecek, agency employees “have been subjected to professional and unnecessarily harsh name-calling, hostile phone conversations and phone and email harassment. MnDOT employees have come to me with reports of enduring profanity in phone conversationsand having their professional and personal integrity questioned.” Among other charges leveled: When MnDOT employees did grant interviews and provide information, “they feel their work has been mischaracterized in print and facts have been disregarded in lieu of predetermined story lines.”

    In particular, according to Janecek, employees singled out Strib investigative team members Tony Kennedy and Paul McEnroe as particularly egregious offenders in the offensive language category, uttering phrases like “bullshit,” “you’re lying” and “you’re stonewalling.”

    MnDOT has been under investigation on so many occasions by the Star Tribune that I wonder why its employees aren’t more desensitized by now to the journalistic speculum. However, another part of me sympathizes with MnDOT worker bees.

    Kennedy and McEnroe are not the warm and fuzzy feature writers the paper uses to staff the booth at the State Fair or provide whimsical insight into the paper at Rotary Club luncheons. No, Kennedy and McEnroe are the baying hounds from Hell that are released from their heavy chain link kennels by leather-gloved handlers when the prisoners escape.

    Thinking of them working a story brings to mind the description given Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator: “It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever.”

    That’s McEnroe and Kennedy. Especially McEnroe. This is the man the paper has sent to cover two wars—and not as an “embedded” correspondent. When rookie Minnesota Viking Dimitrius Underwood went AWOL to Philadelphia in 1999, McEnroe was dispatched with a pocketful of cash and orders to find him in that city, with no other information. He did. McEnroe is relentless. So is Kennedy—ask Northwest Airlines, which he covered like a blanket when assigned to that beat.

    That’s good news for Strib management, which has been reaping the benefits of their exhaustive, scoop-filled bridge collapse reporting and is gearing up to nominate the pair in all sorts of Pulitzer categories, according to staffers. The bad news is, when you unleash the dogs, sometimes people get bitten.

    In this case, according to Janecek’s report, the victims are MnDOT employees who are either potty-mouth adverse or just plain tired of being—pardon the pun—hounded by the pair. Is that a crime? Should the Stribsters be sent to journalistic charm school for a refresher course? It’s doubtful the paper will pay much attention to the PIM report, other than to write it off as political polemic.

    Neither McEnroe nor Kennedy responded Friday afternoon to an email containing the PIM story. Kennedy, reached at home Sunday night, seemed more poodle than pit bull. He said he hadn’t received the email, wasn’t aware of the PIM report and didn’t want to hear about it. "I work hard during the week; I don’t want to deal with anything on the weekends," said the reporter, who is well known for making calls at any time, day or night (or weekend), when he’s working on a story. "I’ll deal with it Monday, if I have to deal with it at all.

    Of course, I was tempted to yell at him, “Stop stonewalling me with that bullshit!” but I guess he wouldn’t have gotten the joke.

    However, the part of Janecek’s story that did gave me pause involved claims that story coordination at the Strib seems so poor that everybody and their mother at the paper appears to be asking for the same documents, which is making for costly extra work at MnDOT, an agency funded by tax dollars.

    That may be the point where this story rises above the partisan pool.

  • The Only Thing You Owe the Public Is a Good Performance

    MUSIC
    Ben Lee

    At the very green age of 14, Australian singer-songwriter Ben Lee emerged on the music scene with his then-band, Noise Addict, and caused a minor stir, garnering the attention of members of both Sonic Youth and the Beastie Boys. Fifteen years later, with albums, movies, and experience under his belt, Lee is in town tonight promoting his sixth and most recent album, Ripe,
    which came out a couple of months ago. I just hope all those love songs are no longer about Claire Danes. Opening for Lee this evening are the Cary Brothers and The Kahn Brothers. What’s with the whole brotherly theme, eh?

    5 p.m., Varsity Theater, 1308 4th St. S.E., Minneapolis; 612-604-0222; $15/$17.

    Ryan Montbleau Band

    While their website claims they’ve averaged over 200 gigs per year for the past few years, this is no doubt the Ryan Montbleau Band’s largest tour, as they promote Patience on Friday, released last month. "Patience is simply something you have to learn," says the band’s frontman, "and Fridays are the days you go balls out." If you’re a Ben Harper fan with a special place in your heart for Stevie Wonder, this is definitely a show for you to check out.

    8 p.m., 7th St. Entry, First Avenue, 701 First Ave. N., Minneapolis; 612-332-1775; $8.

     

    FILM
    The Quintessential Film Noir

    No actress has commanded the screen as well as Lauren Bacall. No on-screen chemistry has impressed and charmed us as well as that between Bogie and Bacall. And the quintessence of that chemistry, of the duo, of an age, of a genre, of film noir… is without a doubt The Big Sleep. (Granted, I’d choose To Have or Have Not any day. Have you ever stepped on a dead bee?) The film is a gold mine in every sense possible — the best of the best at every stage: a Raymond Chandler novel adapted into a screenplay by William Faulkner, directed by Howard Hawks, and acted by Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and John Ridgley. This is Philip Marlowe at his finest: "I don’t mind if you don’t like my manners, I don’t like them myself.
    They are pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings."

    8 p.m., Parkway Theater, 4814 Chicago Ave., Minneapolis; 612-822-3030; $6.

    Forever

    Surely you’ve seen this image before. Pere Lachaise cemetery. Jim Morrison’s grave. Some of us may have actually been there ourselves, paying respect to the Doors frontman and everything he has come to stand for (what exactly is that anyhow, desert peyote trips? jeans without underwear?); regardless, we’ve at least seen it on film. You know the story: the die-hard fan travels across the globe to visit the resting place of a beloved artist — Morrison, Chopin, Proust, Maria Callas, Oscar Wilde, Yves Montand — all in a quest for solace or inspiration, answers to an all-evasive question. It’s no fiction. Every year, some of our favored, long-gone celebs receive millions of visits from people of all ages and corners of the world. Who are these people? Why are they there? What do they hope to get from the experience? Director Heddy Honigmann gives us a glimpse into their worlds in Forever. Watch the trailor.

    7:15 & 9 p.m., Oak Street Cinema, 309 Oak St. S.E., Minneapolis; $8.

     

  • The Forever Marriage

    We meet weekly for wine. At Alma, Erté, Heartland Wine Bar, Zander, jP American Bistro, and Barbette. Lesser known places, too. Once, when everything else was packed, we went to the Herkimer (this was a mistake) and once we drove an hour and a half for flights of Amarone at a rural wine bar called Fermentations, then spent another hour drinking coffee so we could drive back.

    It was nine years ago that we stood in a parking lot talking after wine and suddenly she blurted out, "I got married on a whim. I’ve never loved my husband. I can’t live with him any longer. I don’t know what to do."

    We both had families and houses and part-time jobs; each of us had a child with special needs. We were similar in age, education, and income. The difference was, I intended to stay married. She did not. It was her plan, she explained that night, to ask her husband for a divorce. Once their daughter was settled in an appropriate program, once they’d caught up on their bills, once she’d figured out what to say.

    I moved out of state the following year, but we spoke several times a month. In fall, she called one evening to tell me her husband had been diagnosed with a particularly virulent cancer. He was rushed into surgery where tumors like sausages were cut out of his head. When he got out of the hospital, he’d need rehab, chemo, and round-the-clock care. "I can never leave him now," she said.

    I, on the other hand, with my forever marriage? I was divorced within 18 months. I bounced around the country for a while, then came back to Minnesota. Our wine meetings resumed. Her husband went into an experimental drug program that sapped his energy and made him skeletal. He walked around their house in a tattered, knit hat. Their relationship grew more distant but whether this was due to her loss of feeling or his loss of spirit, it was impossible to tell.

    The years went on. Both of our oldest children graduated from high school. Each of us changed jobs — several times. I remarried. And she kept on, through every subsequent surgery, staying with this man who had become increasingly forgetful and frail. Taking him to Mayo, sitting with him through doctor visits, mourning with him at his father’s funeral then visiting his elderly widowed mom. She’s cleaned his surgical wounds and monitored his medications and raised their children essentially on her own. Lately, since her own 90-year-old mother began to fail, my friend who has wanted nothing more for a decade than to be free — to go back to school or meet someone she might truly love — has been shuttling back and forth between the hospital, the nursing home, and parent-teacher conferences at school.

    And me? I buy the wine. I’ve offered more: to sit with her during surgeries or visit her mother or at least pick up her daughter after work. But she tells me over and over that the best way to help is to listen, to be the one person who knows who she is and understands choices she’s made.

    Few of us will ever face this sort of dilemma. It’s a pet subject of literature, however: Mr. Rochester, the dour hero of Jane Eyre, locked his crazy wife in the attic and beseeched Jane to understand that he’d never loved his island bride, even before she went insane. In The Dive From Clausen’s Pier, the 2002 novel by Ann Packer, a young woman decides to break up with her fiancé just moments before he hits the bottom of a lake with his head and is paralyzed from the waist down. In both cases, the disaffected parties do indeed abandon their unloved spouses: Rochester by sequestering her with a nurse; Clausen’s Pier’s Carrie Bell by fleeing to New York. Even in books, it is apparently too much to ask that someone forfeit his or her own happiness to stand by a commitment gone sour.

    That someone I know has done so in real life literally fills me with awe.

    At this point, my friend’s husband is small and terrified, reduced by years of radiation and toxic IV drips and stealthy, fast-growing cancer cells. He can no longer work, drive to the grocery store, or choose an entrée at the restaurant he’s been visiting for 15 years. His wife has become his nurse and keeper. What’s worse for her, however, is the dearth of understanding for exactly what she’s given up.

    I alone knew that she was planning to leave this man. And for nearly a decade, I’ve said nothing. She has confided her moments of wicked ambivalence only in me. Friends and family members offer sympathy of the sort they would if she were a woman losing her lifelong lover and friend. Her responses, she tells me, are hollow. It’s likely they all assume she is stricken with grief. Instead, it’s the emptiness of knowing that while she doesn’t want this man to die, this is the only way she’ll ever escape. Twenty-three years of marriage to someone who has slept in a bedroom across the hall since year twelve.

    We meet at The Peacock Lounge, the bar adjoining Erté. This is a perfect place for a quiet talk or an assignation. Double-high tin ceilings, marble fixtures, a long polished bar, and Van Morrison songs playing back to back.

    "You’re hitting a wall," I tell her sternly. "You need help. Friends who understand what’s going on, hospice, estate counseling. It’s time."

    "You’re right," she says. But all she wants, really, is quiet conversation and Spanish wine. We drink the Arbanta Rioja, a smooth, robust, slightly spicy Tempranillo that costs just six dollars a glass.

    "Why don’t you ever write about this, about me?" she asks after her second.

    "Because it’s not my story to tell," I answer in a righteous voice.

    But of course, this is bullshit. We writers are like vampires, sucking the marrow out of others’ most personal and desperate tales. I’d take her story in a second, if I didn’t think it would do her damage. Or expose her husband to something he should never, ever know.

    "He can’t read any more," she assures me. "Even if he could, he wouldn’t understand." She wants me to write about her life, she says, because it would help her make sense of the last lost decade. She needs to know — to see — that what she has done matters.

    "It does," I insist. But here’s what I do not say, because I’m freakishly inarticulate in person for someone who’s fairly fluid on the page: It matters to ME. Not only is this woman one of my closest friends, she’s also proof of something I very much want to believe. That people in untenable situations routinely do extraordinary things.

    There’s a Martin Luther King, Jr., quote that I pull out often and wave in front of my children. The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. It is, I’ll admit, a cheap, motherly trick. But untested as I am in most ways — living a life that is 90 percent comfort and convenience — I like to think that at least I understand.

    There is objective value in personal sacrifice, not just for one man but for all of us. A k
    nitting together of society that occurs in the small moments and generic-seeming households and never-recognized acts. For the small bit of solace it offers, to help sustain the measure of this woman, it’s my privilege to buy the wine.

     

  • Better Eating Through Chemistry: Foie Gras Pop Rocks

    The New York Times had a fascinating story last week, Food
    2.0: Chefs as Chemists    . Cutting edge chefs like Wylie Dufresne of WD-50 in
    Manhattan, and Grant Achatz of Alinea in Chicago are experimenting with
    ingredients like hydrocolloid gums to create combinations of flavor and texture
    not found in nature, like a fried mayonnaise, or Mexican mole sauce turned into
    little lentil-shaped pellets.

    I haven’t seen a lot of that kind of experimentation going
    on locally, maybe because it runs counter to the whole
    natural-sustainable-local-organic ethos that has been embraced by most of the
    top local chefs in town, from Lucia Watson of Lucia’s Restaurant, J.D. Fratzke
    of Muffuletta (soon departing for the Strip Club), Scott Pampuch of Corner
    Table, Brenda Langton of Café Brenda and Spoonriver, Lenny Russo of Heartland,
    etc.

    But the one local chef I’ve found who seems to enjoy
    tinkering with molecular gastronomy is Ryan Aberle, executive chef at North
    Coast     in Wayzata. His most original concoction is foie gras poprocks. The
    recipe is simple: he starts with unflavored pop rocks, available from
    www.chefrubber.com, and rolls them in a mixture of liquefied foie gras and
    tapioca maltodextrin. (Kids, don’t try this at home.) And in another recent
    experiment, Aberle created a 21st century version of the bacon-wrapped pork
    tenderloin – after rolling slices of pancetta through a pasta sheeter, he brushed
    them with transglutaminase, an enzyme that chemically bonds proteins together –
    and then wrapped the pancetta tightly around the tenderloin. Instead of the
    bacon cooking more quickly than the tenderloin, it becomes the outer edge of a
    single cut.

  • The Three Pointer: Ingraining Bad Habits

    Road Game # 2: Minnesota 93, LA Lakers 107

    Road Game # 3: Minnesota 93, Sacramento 100

     

    1. Half Empty

    The die-hards among us who pledged to ride with the Minnesota Timberwolves throughout the 2007-08 season know that higher levels of tolerance and different parameters of success will be required. Put bluntly, wins and losses take a backseat to player development and team synergy. For those who merely peruse the stats or want to view things in isolation, there were some promising things to take away from this weekend’s losses to the Lakers and the Kings. Those who saw the games, however, might be finding their patience tested by this seemingly willfully callow crew.

    In Los Angeles, the Wolves jumped out to a big first quarter lead–albeit only 8 points, the first time in their first four games it wasn’t double digits–and was still within 7 points with 4:15 left to play. In addition, Sebastian Telfair has his best offensive outing, posting 15 points (6-12 FG), to go with 17 from Ryan Gomes and yet another double-double for Al Jefferson, who scored 24 to go with his 15 rebounds, seven on the offensive glass. In all, the Wolves racked up 42 points in the paint.

    Sacramento’s statistical high points were even better: A whopping 52-34 advantage on points in the paint, a career-high 15 points from Corey Brewer to go with 16 from Rashad McCants and another team high 17 from Jefferson. Oh, and six blocks by Theo Ratliff.

    Yet even by the new and downgraded 2007-08 standards, it was a discouraging couple of games.

    The Timberwolves rarely put together extended stretches of solid team play in either contest. One would think the offensive gameplan would always be to establish Al Jefferson in the low block, compel the double and even triple-coverage that might ensue (as happened in Sacramento), and then utilize ball movement to create open shots and/or open seams for penetration.

    Nope. Far more often, the Wolves’ perimeter players saw fit to take the game into their own hands, with by far the biggest offender being McCants. Out with a sprained ankle versus the Lakers, Shaddy was inserted into the Kings game late in the first quarter, and wound up playing a little more than 26 minutes, enough time to jack up 14 shots and do a credible imitation of someone fantasizing about being Michael Jordan while working on moves alone at the playground. The most memorable stretch occurred when McCants replaced Gomes with 5:53 to play in the third period and ran amuck until he sat with 20 seconds left in the quarter. During those five and half minutes, he performed some beautiful things, including a trey caught and shot in rhythm right off the bench, and a couple of strong, literally beautiful moves through traffic to get to the rim. But the predominant vibe was palpable, purposeful narcissism–McCants uber alles. Along with five shots in 5:32, he also turned the ball over four times and committed three personal fouls, heedless of anything resembling a practical, incremental action. And despite his seven points, the Wolves were a net minus-1 during his stint. For the game, McCants was minus-9, the second worst total on the team.

    The worst total, minus-13, belonged to Brewer in his "breakout" game. Announcers Tom Hanneman and Jim Petersen helpfully pointed out that Brewer is more prolific offensively when "he doesn’t have to think," and it’s true: Those one-on-five drives that McCants utilized and Brewer dutifully copied also got Brewer some fabulous buckets in traffic, as well as notching him 7 free throws, all of which he sank. But do you think there was a reason the normally mild-mannered Al Jefferson started screaming at his teammates to get him the fuckin’ ball about midway through the fourth quarter? Was there a reason the Wolves made two, count ’em, two, field goals in 21 attempts in the 4th quarter? And do you think one of the reasons McCants and Brewer had some success drawing fouls on dribble penetration had to do with the fact that the Kings were minus Ron Artest and were playing their beefiest front line–Brad Miller and Kenny Thomas–to deter Jefferson, who would have enabled Shaddy and the rook even more had they dumped it to Jeff enough to further take Miller and Thomas out of the picture and open up seams.

    Meanwhile, the guys McCants and Brewer were supposedly guarding, Kevin Martin and the unheralded John Salmons, went off for 29 points (25 in the second half!) and 19 points. And Spurs (and Wolves) castoff Benno Udrih had a profitable plus +5 running the point in the second half, after the Kings started out-of-position Francisco Garcia at the point due to the absence of Mike Bibby. Such was the juggernaut that handed Minnesota its fifth straight loss.

    2. Painted Ugly

    Ah, but what about those combined 94 points in the paint this weekend? Yup, that’s a legitimate glass-half-full stat to hang on to. Jefferson is a bona fide bulldog, and both Craig Smith and Theo Ratliff had their moments.

    Here’s the rebuttal: The Lakers game on Friday night turned on the fact that Bynum and Odom simply overwhelmed Jefferson and Smith on the occasions when they were the frontcourt matchups. Bynum was simply too big for Jefferson to handle–it is becoming increasing obvious that "Big Al" is big as a power forward but not capable of negating classic NBA centers–and Odom was waaay too quick for Smith. (For that matter, Odom was too big for Gomes, and a matchup nightmare all game, which is why he scored 18 points on only ten shots (7-10 FG), registered 10 boards, didn’t turn the ball over once and finished with a game-high plus +22.) Yes, the Wolves got 42 points in the paint. The Lakers, alas, got 56.

    Against the Kings, the problem was more situational–like crunchtime. With 2:42 to play and the Wolves down by just a single point, the Kings grabbed six offensive rebounds on a single possession before Ratliff finally fouled Martin at 2:03. And with the Wolves down three with 10 seconds to go, Brad Miller had a tip-in to ice the game.

    On paper, a front court of Ratliff, Jefferson and Gomes would seem to be rock-solid defensively. But the problem is positioning. Theo’s thirst for blocks is a high risk strategy that frequently leaves his team vulnerable to put-backs on the offensive glass. Here’s an amazing stat to chew on: In 123 minutes of play thus far this season, Ratliff has more blocked shots (14) than defensive rebounds (13).

    Back to the basic parameters by which fans should judge this team. Looking over the roster, it makes sense that the Wolves should be tenth worst in the NBA in points per game (94.6), because they are minus point guard Randy Foye and, with the likes of Greg Buckner and Marko Jaric in the backcourt supplmenting a front line of Ratliff-Jefferson-Gomes, have the makings of being a pretty good defensive oriented team who needs to depress the score in order to triumph. Consequently, the Wolves’ rank as 9th worst defensive team in points per game allowed (102.8) is the bigger disappointment of the season thus far, especially when you consider that the aforementioned five players rank in the team’s top 6 in minutes played (Telfair, second on the team with 155 minutes, is the other).

    One significant problem, for whatever reason, is that the Wolves have had trouble defending the pick and roll. It fosters the surfeit of fouls the team commits, or otherwise yields situations where open midrange jumpers and interior passes for layups become the norm. Perhaps, as against the Lakers, it is a matter of matchups and having to worry about Kobe so much that a talented ‘tweener like Odom can burn you and a big burgeoning galoot like Bynum can make hay cleaning up. But one could hardly accuse the Kings of being stocked with talent, yet they were still able to post a triple-digit score. The Kings, as with every other Wolves opponent, lived on the free throw line, shooting 40 times, including a whopping 30 attempts in the second half. And while it is true tha
    t the refs have been stingy and biased about giving Minnesota the calls on offense, most of the whistles against them on D are legitimate. Put simply, this team isn’t moving its feet diligently enough and isn’t building that flowing trust relationship on rotations and other pick-and-roll decisions that create a defensive identity and place a body in front of a defender at the moment a shot is inevitable. Instead, we see the reach-in, the desperate lunge, or the "whistle is better than an  automatic bucket" mentality. Blame for that lack of precision and cohesion (which isn’t getting better) starts with the coaching staff and goes right through the team, including Jefferson, who for all his blue-collar effort this season has been lackluster defending the paint.

    3. Quick Observations

    Sebastian Telfair sure seems like fool’s gold at the moment, if that isn’t overestimating somebody with such a shaky rep. The past two games he’s come off the bench for Jaric and played the entire 4th quarter. Against the Lakers the Wolves were down 14 entering that final period and in that nothing-to-lose circumstance Telfair shot 4-7 FG, including a pair of treys for 10 overall points, and chipped in a pair of assists and two rebounds. Versus the Kings, it was tied with a quarter to play and he missed all four of his shots (1-8 FG for the game) and had one rebound and zero dimes. If he missed ’em all equally in both games we could chalk it up to a lack of skill. But this discrepancy seems psychological–not good for a wannabe NBA point guard.

    Gerald Green finally saw some action in that same 4th quarter of the Lakers tilt and immediately showed that he too does not play well with others. Yeah, he nailed a couple of nice jumpers in his 9-plus minutes of action, but also got tunnel-visioned about winning the game himself, resulting in a pair of forced misses and a pair of turnovers. I know he’s scored 33 points before in an NBA game, but without looking, it wouldn’t surprise me if his team lost that night. Here is yet another example of a player who would have greatly benefited from being bossed around–schooled–by an autocrat like Roy Williams, John Thompson or Billy Donovan, rather than grabbing that NBA teenager dough. Among Green, McCants and Brewer, it sure was a sour weekend for smart, disciplined play at the swingman slot.

    The exception, of course, is the vet Buckner, who continues to do most of the little things (that I expected and saw out of Gomes until his steps back on the West Coast): Play generous, rotational defense to help his teammates; enhance ball movement; and know how to draw and avoid fouls. Yes, Buck too occasionally gets the shooter’s itch at inopportune moments, no doubt from his exasperation at the prevailing low basketball IQ happening all around on the court, but compared to the gloryhounds with whom he shares the backcourt, he is a paragon of discretion.

    Craig Smith was felled by a sprained ankle late in the Kings game, which contributed to the loss, given that Ratliff fouled out and Coach Wittman was forced to use the rook Richard, who promptly ceded Miller’s tip in in the final seconds. Up to then it had been a good game for Smitty, who ranks with Jaric and Gomes thus far this season as inexplicable performers, capable of shining one stint and stinking it up the next. It is too early to know if it is matchups or that he plays better with some teammates than with others, although as On the Ball commenter Andy B noted–and Jim Pete reiterated during the Lakers game–Smitty was better suited to Kevin Garnett’s game than Al Jefferson’s. Nevertheless, what this squad will get out of Smith or Jaric is up to your ouija board. At least Gomes’s doldrums can be attributed at least in part to him missing wide open jumpers and not being able to handle larger players like Odom. The former, at least, will be rectified often before game 82.

  • Worship Brett Favre for the Price of a Brewski

    Update: An earlier version of this post said that the Suburban World Theater would be serving brunch today (Sunday, November 11). That’s what I was told when I stopped in yesterday, but there was an unannounced change of plans: brunch service is tentatively scheduled to start next weekend, with a limited a la carte menu, plus kiddie cartoons, followed by a live broadcast of the Green Bay Packers game on the big screen. Check the theater website for details, or call 612-822-9000.

  • Buster's

    What would happen if somebody smart decided to reinvent the
    neighborhood tavern? If they were really smart, they might come up with
    something like Buster’s on 28th Ave, at 4204 28th Ave.
    S., in south Minneapolis. Outside of northeast Minneapolis and Saint Paul’s
    West Side, the old neighborhood bars have largely disappeared, replaced by
    coffee houses and wine bars. And those few that remain tend to look like the
    forlorn relics of a bygone era, serving up frozen pizza and watery beer to a
    clientele that has, like the taverns themselves, seen happier days.

    What’s so smart about Buster’s is that it remains true to tavern tradition– it still looks and feels like a tavern, complete with multiple tv sets and $3 pints of Miller Lite on tap, Budweiser and Michelob on tap. You can get a basic half-pound burger or a pulled pork sandwich for $8, including a generous side of fries, or a walleye sandwich for a buck more. All the breads come from A Baker’s Wife, right around the corner on 42nd
    Street. But the menu, and the beer list both offer a lot more, without getting fussy or yuppified. Okay, maybe a little yuppified, but not too bad: a bison burger ($11), a roasted garlic and pear pizza ($8), shrimp fettucine Alfredo ($11).

    I was a little disappointed by the pan-fried half-chicken ($13), but only because I expected the traditional southern version, breaded and fried in lots of fat. Buster’s version is lighter – boneless slices of chicken sautéed and served over a mound of sweet potato fries with a lively ginger-apple chutney. There’s also a smart selection of beers – nearly sixty bottled brands, plus 20 brews on tap, ranging from locally brewed Surly, Summit and Flat Earth beers to Delirium Tremens from Belgium. Most are described in considerable detail, but the description of Miller Lite is short and to the point: “It tastes like Miller Lite.”

    Buster’s on 28th Avenue, 4204 28th
    Ave., Minneapolis, 612-729-0911.

  • Worship David Beckham for 200 Bucks

    I’ve been puzzling all morning over the logistics of this thing, but I think I’ve finally got it figured out.

    Seems David Beckham is coming to town with his soccer team, the Los Angeles Galaxy to play OUR soccer team, the Minnesota Thunder (what is it with soccer, by the way, aren’t team names are usually plural: Bears, Bulls, Timberwolves?) in something they have dubbed Copa Minnesota — which I frankly don’t get at all — tomorrow at the Metrodome.

    My initial confusion came in because the website devoted to this event lists it under Current News and claims it’s happening. . . .or rather happened. . . .on October 10. But apparently it didn’t, David had some reality TV-related or Spice Girlesque emergency. Some problem occurred, in any case, and the game was postponed.

    Further obfuscating my understanding was this quote from the Galaxy manager, Alexi Lalas: “We are pleased to be able to bring the Galaxy to
    Minnesota and give fans of that state and the entire Midwest a first
    class friendly." I’m not sure what a friendly is or what it has to do with soccer, but as I said, I’m not a sports fan.

    For those of you who are, Temple Restaurant and Bar is hosting a private reception tonight, from 6-9 p.m., in honor of Beckham and his teammates, with hors d’oeuvres and a complimentary host bar. And I think that’s just about as friendly as you get, because don’t we usually revile the incoming team and boo the players and make all their fans sit on the opposite side of the stadium (or have I just been to one too many St. Louis Park – Edina high school football games?) rather than fete them with spicy tuna rolls and Grey Goose?

    Anyway, the good news is that for $200 you can enter the Temple and brush shoulders with Beckham himself — or so I’m told — eating what’s bound to be excellent appetizer fare, and giving the soccer king whatever sort of friendly you like. No word on whether Victoria will be there.

    Temple will re-open for regular business at 9 o’clock tonight. For more information, call 612-767-3770.

  • The (Perhaps Deservedly) Lost Recordings Of Burt Sikorski, DBA The Burt Sugar Trio

    Every town and city has its share of genuine characters and eccentrics, but I think you could say that it’s somewhat easier to get a real feel for the personalities of such characters in a smaller town, where there are so few public secrets and mysteries, and where what might be mere sidewalk spectacle in a big city is often fleshed out with well-known family histories and personal anecdotes from actual encounters and conversations.

    True oddballs also seem to appear in even starker relief when looked at against the largely homogenized backdrop of an average midwestern small town.

    In my own hometown, a place of almost abject modesty and blandness tossed up in the middle of flat farm country, there were a number of such characters –flamboyants and dandies, for the most part, colorful fellows whom I now suppose were probably homosexuals– but the one who made the biggest impression on my adolescent self was a guy by the name of Adelburt "Burt" Sikorski.

    Burt was perhaps a dozen years my senior, and by the time I was really aware of him he was a rumpled, shaggy character who always wore bright polyester pants and what I now recognize were ironic tee-shirts (featuring musical acts like Rick Wakeman or Styx, or phrases along the lines of "Up Your Nose With A Rubber Hose," "Kiss My Grits," and "Keep On Truckin’"). He was also one of those muttering guys who was constantly walking all over town, and I guess in retrospect he was sort of the local one-man counter culture.

    You’d occasionally see him downtown, standing on a corner across the street from the courthouse and waving a sign that said something like "Don’t Rush Me Out!" or "Stop It!" He was also, so far as I know, the town’s only street musician, and he’d often play his guitar outside the Sterling Drug Store. I remember one time a friend and I rode our bikes over to the store to buy some candy –we were probably 12 years old– and Burt was out front with his guitar and said to us, "Hey, little dudes, want to hear something by your main man John Denver?" Which, even then, we thought was funny. I also recall him playing a manic version of "Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree," which was at the time in heavy rotation on the local AM radio station.

    The town’s only movie theater was a single-screen affair that mostly showed family films, and it seemed like Burt Sikorski would be there every Saturday afternoon, sitting by himself in the back row, heckling and lobbing Sno Caps at the screen. One time I was with my parents and my little sister, and we were watching some Disney comedy –"Son of Flubber," or something like that– and Burt kept shouting out stuff like, "Fred MacMurray’s an adulterer! He’s a sociopath! The man’s a stone-cold killer!" until some of the grown-ups complained to the manager and Burt was asked to leave.

    By the time I was a teenager Burt Sikorski was regularly engaging my friends and me in conversation on the sidewalks around town. We were always "the little dudes," and Burt was always after us to join his band. His old man, Adolph Sikorski, had a meat market on the east side of town, and there was an abandoned smoke house out back that was Burt’s purported "practice space." Sometimes we’d ride our bikes by there and we could hear him pounding away on drums or creating distortion on an electric guitar.

    I knew a few guys who eventually got roped into jamming with Burt, and they all said he was crazy.

    When I was a junior in high school Burt opened, for a very short time, the town’s first and only head shop, The Soviet Revolution, and once when I went in there to poke around with a couple buddies Burt gave us a cassette tape of his band (which, of course, we all knew wasn’t a real band; to the best of my knowledge they never played a single public show in that town, or anywhere else).

    "What’s the band called?" we asked.

    "It used to be called Burton Veal and the Dead Baby Cows," he told us, "but that proved too provocative for local mores, so I’ve settled on the less threatening but classy Burt Sugar Trio." We spent a lot of time driving around in the country outside town getting high and listening to the Burt Sugar Trio, and I have very fond memories of that time in my life.

    After I graduated from high school, though, I moved to the Twin Cities, and I’d been living there for almost a decade when my mother called me one night and told me in passing that Burt Sikorski was dead. He’d died, she said, from an allergic reaction.

    "To what?" I asked.

    "I have no idea," she said. "The obituary didn’t specify."

    My father, who was on the other line, said, "My best guess would be life."

    "Burt had grown very fat in recent years," my mother said, "and he always seemed so depressed. Last time I saw him he was working at his father’s market."

    My parents are preparing for a move to Arizona, and I recently went down there to help them clear out the house. As I dug through the boxes in my old bedroom I was surprised to find my original tape of the Burt Sugar Trio. I listened to it on my drive back up to Minneapolis and it sort of broke my heart.

    Listen to a sampling by clicking the audio links in the left column (go to permalink).