MINNEAPOLIS IS CLEAN

Minneapolis is clean. Like, squeaky. The streets are free of trash. The commuter train gleams. The airport is shiny. The only thing that seemed vaguely dirty was the Mississippi, and I’m pretty sure that’s supposed to be brown. Bay Area cities must make way more in tax revenue than Minneapolis, given all the rich software, biotech, and financial companies around here, but for some reason we can’t keep our trains clean. On the other hand, the grit and grime around here certainly lend some personality. Minneapolis did seem a little too clean, a little affected, but not that much. I mean, everyone talks like they’re Canadian or something. It’s adorable.

Actually, most of the people I talked to were Canadian, because I was at the Open Source Geospatial 2005 conference, and most of the North Americans involved seem to hail from the northern lands. Everyone kept saying “eh?” Ironically, this conference was right across the road from the only other conference I’ve ever been to, which I attended in college. This one served better food though. I actually ended up talking to some people I’ve interacted with online, learning about a bunch of new software, and possibly making some useful connections. Networking is such a lame word when applied outside of a computational context, but I guess that’s what conferences are all about.

For some reason, I felt very proud of the fact that I made it to Minneapolis using my own money (soon to be reimbursed), my own car, a plane, a train, and a bus, with no difficulty at all. Obviously that’s a little stupid. I am an adult, after all, and a relatively well-travelled adult. Perhaps it simply made me realize that I could theoretically go to almost any point on the globe if I really wanted to, with the possible exceptions of the poles. It’s a good feeling.