gomango

Within a ten minute walk of our house in St. Paul, we enjoy the following:

Six very fine public elementary schools. Some even offer total immersion programming in Spanish and German.
Six excellent private elementary schools.
Four very good public and private middle schools.
An award winning public high school with an AP focus.
A Bill and Melinda Gates public high school with an IB focus. Our oldest son goes there and is absolutely thriving in all measures. We are very proud of him.
Two top ranked private high schools.
...and four top notch universities.

All of our needs are met in St. Paul, and we couldn't be happier.

I won't even go into amenities/perks, property values, sports opps. for the kids and parents, and low/manageable crime rates.

Is it perfect?

Hardly.

Are we happy and content?

Absolutely.

fender1

The Amish also sell a lot of meth and operate some of the most horrific puppy mills in the state. They are regularly in the news for animal cruelty and fraud, regarding sick & diseased animals sold as healthy to unsuspecting buyers.

Drillium Dude 

I'm going to be commuting this winter for a couple reasons:

1. Got my first-ever set of fenders in the pipeline and have to justify having them on the bike
2. I feel a very real need for an uncomfortable challenge I can meet and exceed

It's nice to know the car will be there, though

DD

iab

It's really friggin' cold there. That's a deal breaker for me. I do like visiting your town. Very nice.

I lived next to a magnet school in Chicago. Except when your kids are babies, they could be morons, you just don't know. As it turns out, my kids are smart and would have gotten in the school. 3 blocks from my house. When my oldest was in first grade, they closed the school and my kids would have been bussed for 75 minutes, each way. My taxes are twice that of Chicago. And it is worth every penny for not attending those schools.

bigbossman 

I had the pleasure of passing though Chicago one winter. On the day I was stranded at O'Hare, the wind off the lake was producing a wind chill factor of 60 below zero. How much colder can Minnesota be?

iab

Honestly, a boat load. Yes, we will get a day like you describe. Rarely. 60 below would be once a decade. They get 3 weeks of that crap every year in Minneapolis/St Paul.

khatfull

I've lived in MSP going on 14 years now. While I've felt the lowest wind chill here the lowest air temp I've felt was back when I lived in KY! We had, one day in 26 years there, 30 below (but zero wind). Haven't seen that in MSP yet.

Captain Blight

And I make it a point of pride to ride every single one of those days.

We're not in the same league as 65er, where for pretty much 6 weeks a year, the high might be ten below Fahrenheit. But it gets pretty damn cold... or it used to. It's been warming up a little, more snow and less glassy bright cold. I kind of miss it, honestly.

So is it worth the tradeoff, for me, to live in hired lodgings in downtown Minneapolis, to live car-free in an urban core? Am I really saving money? Probably. I live in Minneaposis' last flophouse, and I live with a pack of welfare queens and the their babydaddy thugs. I've come to understand that they are fellow humans no less and no more than I. I've also come to understand that some of them are just horrible, horrible people.

But.

But I trade off 16 hours/week working the front desk against my rent, and I live there for free. It is just (barely, thinly, an iota) worth it to me to be able to live in downtown Minneapolis rent-free, and to be able to not need a car. There is no point in the greater metro I can't get to in an hour (give or take 15 minutes) between rail, bus, and bike. Mostly the bike. With a day's hard ride I am well out into the world in any point of view. I didn't post anything about it here but I took my VeloSoleX on a fast trip down to my family home just north of Madison (less than a mile off the Elroy-Sparta Trail), in late September, and it took me about 17 hours of riding in 2 days. It was pretty easy.

But. I'm single with no romantic interests right now, no children and very few bills. It's easy for me to live within my means, as my means are so small. I'm getting ready to get a better job and start trying to put together a business of my own, and I imagine it will be an education. I know I'm going to have to change my living situation soon, and probably buy a car before 2012 is done. Dammit. I'm going to try to keep from using the car, but 35* and raining is snivel territory for all but the elite to ride. Anyone know where I can get a reliable Volvo 240 sedan?

iab

The winter of 93/94 we hit 25 below air temp. Last year was the first year we dropped below 0 in 5 or 6 years. Sorry, but Minnesota is friggin cold.

But so is Chicago. When real retirement comes, San Diego (which of course in German means whale's vagina) here I come.

bigbossman 

Must have been my lucky day.

gomango

My Norwegian grandpa said it kept the riff-raff out.

I don't know about that, but our family skis, downhill and x-country, in this stuff all winter.

In fact, a friend of mine just bought an ice boat.

As if the darn wind chill isn't scary enough.

Let's go out on a frozen lake and go faster!

Interesting place we have here.

...and btw, we go up to the Canadian border where our cabin is located 5-10 times per winter.

Nothing like a little winter camping and wolf tracking to set you straight.

gomango

It can kill you if you aren't careful.

I'm not kidding.

You should see the emergency supplies we carry in the car when we go up to the cabin in January and February.

No playing around on desolate wilderness roads, as it invites real emergency situations.

bigbossman 

Oh - I'm no stranger to cold weather and outdoor activities. The Sierra is a pretty harsh winter environment, as the Donner party found out. I spent much of my youth chasing powder, and even jumped out of a few helicopters (up in Alberta) in my time. The last time I hunted pheasant in the Oklahoma panhandle, it was about 20 degrees but there was a good prairie wind blowing, so God only knows what the chill factor was. At least I was able to move around then, not like the few days I spent last winter on the Chesapeake in that little 16' duck boat.

You do have to know what you're doing, be prepared, and pay attention to what's going on in the sky - even on bluebird days.

I'm all for playing in it and visiting it - I do that pretty regularly. I just don't want to live in it.

mkeller234

I haven't read past the first couple pages.

I do commute on a bike, all weather, all year.... BUT my wife works at the same building and drives a car, at the exact same time that I ride a bike. I suppose that means I save nothing and my bicycle commute is just an exercise of futility. I enjoy it... ok, sometimes it sucks during the winter.

KonAaron Snake 

Especially when you come across copies of the Necronomicon. ALWAYS have a shotgun in your trunk when going to a cabin in the woods.



Happy Post-Halloween!

gomango

Even scarier!









Pics from the Armistice Day Blizzard!

November 11, 1940

DavidW56

Nope, I don't consider the Detroit schools a homogeneous system; after all, I graduated from U-D High (a private, Jesuit-run school).

I was referring to the DPS schools. And, yes, Cass Tech and Renaissance High are fine public schools, but not everyone gets to attend those.

And even if your student does, there remains the transportation issue -- either walk, bike, drive, or rely on the unreliable public transit system. Bike in Detroit? Sure -- but either in daylight or in a group.

Yes, functionally illiterate is not the same as purely illiterate -- but the effect is the same: inability to handle everyday tasks in one's daily and work lives that involve reading.

Poguemahone

Enough reason to withdraw our aircraft carrier protection from them right there.

KonAaron Snake 

Do we really want a power vaccum that the Unitarians and Quakers might fill? Sure - they preach peace, love, understanding, tolerance and oatmeal, but that's downright un-American!

fender1

If you see one Unitarian in your house, you know there are at least a hundred inside your walls.......

KonAaron Snake 

On the plus side, they're probably in your walls helping you to remove asbesthos and providing insulation to keep your children warm.

formicaman

Sad, but true, unless you live in Queen Village and your kid goes to Meredith.

cleon

"means" is so overstated anyway. it's unbelievable what's considered necessary today to 'survive' vs what's actually needed to function as a normal human being.

KonAaron Snake 

There's a great school out in West Philly as well, but it's tough to get your kids in, even if you live there. They get major UPenn backing.

jet sanchEz

Winter riding in Toronto is pretty cold too, I live near the lake and the winds can get the temperature down to -40 celsius very easily.

The coldest I have ever been riding was in -32 °C a few years ago. I rode my bike because it was very dry out and most of the snow had been cleared by the city so the terrain was quite manageable. The funniest part of the ride was bumping into my brother in law; he was driving home and slowed down to see who the nut out on his bike was. He later told me that he wasn't surprised in the least that it was me

Ever since that ride, -20 is child's play.