Snow-Fort City, Day 3
#snowfortcity Day 3: it’s a thing now. There are 7 nodes of activity in various stages of completion, but we have successfully transformed Leif Erikson Park.
#snowfortcity Day 3: it’s a thing now. There are 7 nodes of activity in various stages of completion, but we have successfully transformed Leif Erikson Park.
It was a great day to build a #snowfortcity with volunteers Stephen Bockhold, Sean MacManus, and others including an unnamed mom with two kids in tow who attested she was a #peoplesfreeskate participant last winter. One of the kids she was with, who I’ve never seen before, called me “Aquaman” unprompted on camera while KBJR-6/CBS-3 was filming: hope that makes the final cut.
#snowfortcity
Day 1. Duluth’s Leif Erikson Park. Most of my time was taken up by Duluth News-Tribune reporters who showed up – oops got in the paper again. Otherwise slow going with cold powdery snow – spray bottles and water make the job easier so bring those. It’s sort of Day 2 since some folks built this formidable snow fort yesterday, and got the base of another one started. It’s sort of Day 3, since I built a proof-of-concept wall before the blizzard, but it blew down so I restarted it today. A huge help was Morgan Pirsig et al. who laid down a solid sled trail which helps define the space. It goes so fast we need to bank it by the stage now. Troy Rogers aka Robot Rickshaw showed up and we demonstrated proper wall-building technique for the media. A season-long project to turn the park into a citizen-led collective art installation and playground.
The Thanksgiving weekend blizzard wreaked havoc on Small Biz Saturday and some of the Pop-Ups in town, but we have tried to update this list with the rescheduled events.
These are the true “get ’em while you can” offerings, pop-up markets where a wide variety of art, food products, clothing products and more are on display. There are usually snacks, maybe some hot chocolate, and lots of other people milling about, so the atmosphere is a lot more fun that adding things to your online cart.
Some are small, some are huge. Each market has its own vibe, check the websites and event pages for special instructions on parking, hours etc.
Let us know what markets we’ve missed in the comments, or by sending an email.
I built this Snowhenge wall segment in Leif Erickson Park today in three hours with a bucket. Will it remain after a weekend of playing children, and snowstorms including 30-mph winds? Probably not. But rebuilding and rebirth are central to this season-long project where work and leisure are indistinguishable. The blizzard should die off Sunday and the upcoming week should be clear to terraform the gift of snow.
Calling all guerrilla snow-fort builders, amateur igloo engineers, wintertime sculptors, snowmen whisperers, and anyone haunted by dreams of city-wide snowball fights: It’s time.
Last year’s FeMN Fest organization team was made up of Diona Johnson, Jesse Dykhuis, Abigail Mlinar, Brittany Lind, McKenzie Howe and Melissa La Tour. Photo by Jes at Mad Chicken Studio.
Since 2017 “a team of womxn-identified bosses” have brought “an unapologetically feminist festival” to Duluth. In its first two years FeMN Fest featured womxn-lead music, art, workshops and vendors. The third annual event on Friday, Nov. 15, at Pizza Lucé is a scaled-down version featuring three musical acts: Me-N-Her, One Less Guest and Wild Flower.
I went to the Day of the Dead / All Souls event at the Depot Underground on Friday. The theme of the reading was remembering ancestors who have played important roles in our lives and community. Featured readers, of whom I took pictures, were Zomi Bloom, Brady Kamphenkel, Sheila Packa, Ellie Schoenfeld and Gary Boelhower. An open mic followed; I got a pic of Eric Chandler reading. Richie Townsend played electric guitar.
I was all-out nerd at Lake Superior College today, where the Erickson Library hosted LibraryCon.
The Haunted Shack has been bringing the scare to northern Minnesota for 26 years. The year’s spookenings are at Ru-Ridge Corn Maze in Carlton, about 10 miles southwestish of Duluth.
In its series The Slice, WDSE-TV presents short “slices of life” that capture the events and experiences that bring people together and speak to what it means to live up north.
It’s the Halloween season, which of course means it’s time for witches and ghouls, but it’s also the time of year when the region’s theater companies get down to business. Here again is the PDD Theater Primer, where we hip you to all the haps on local stages for the next year.
A few views as the Festival of Sail blew into town Sunday. The festival continues today and tomorrow, Aug. 12 and 13.
I wanted to see the new Spider-Man movie, and five dollar night at the Marcus downtown is always tempting … but wait. The West Theater is showing Spider-Man?
Duluth skipped its way toward competing internationally yesterday at the inaugural People’s Free Rock-Skipping Contest.
With Duluth’s natural renewable bounty of perfect skipping rocks, the time is now to claim the mantle of one of the top rock-skipping destinations in the world. I propose a Duluth League that plays by its own rules, owing to our iconoclastic position as Outdoor Adventure Capital of the United States. Envision a day when Duluth’s rock-skipping force fans out over the globe to win championships and decimate festivals. Tomorrow (Saturday July 13, 2PM Leif Erikson Park) will usher in such an age. A Facebook comment about the contest said, “I remember a rock-skipping contest in Duluth in the 1950s.” It’s revealing of Duluth’s decades-long funk that this never blossomed into an annual contest, or festival, in the intervening 70 years. By comparison, look at what the Michiganders of Mackinac Island have going: they just had the 51st Annual Stone Skipping Competition and the Governor comes and skips the first stone. If Duluth had kept its 1950s contest going, we’d be ahead of Mackinac Island by 20 years…
