Twin Cities, part 1

No, I have not run away to join a cult or a commune or sunk an internet black hole.
I have been away from the computer. This might be hard to imagine... in my usual life I'm on the laptop multiple times a day. But this is not usual life. This is "hey I'm back in America and you should hang out with me before I leave again" sort of life. This "let's eat out and drink beers and have a good time" sort of life. Every day is like a weekend. Brian and I have each put on a few pounds.

We spent last week in the Twin Cities. We rolled in with style on the Megabus on Monday and the action started there. There was dinner at Moscow on the Hill, a visit to my old office, Como Zoo with my pre-teen girl pals, and large group get togethers with my work friends and Brian's work friends. It was a little exhausting, but that's ok - we can sleep in Germany. Our house is still small and blue, the plants are alive, and the inside looks even cuter than when we lived there. We dodged light rail construction, drove through Minneapolis rush hour, crossed the Mississippi a few times, a and even went down for a visit to Apple Valley.

Since my very loyal reader Nick requested it, I will share a few thoughts on the suburbs for you. Before we moved, driving to Apple Valley felt like going to Iowa. It still does. It's a foreign land of strip malls and subdivisions that look (as my friend Julie, also an Apple Valley resident says) like a Dr. Seuss Whoville. Nick's house is huge and the carpet is soft and I am completely envious of its dishwasher and shiny countertops. Driving around the housing development in our borrowed car made me a little dizzy - the streets are curvy  and all the Who houses look the same. It's not just Apple Valley that's like this - Germany has suburbs too. It's just that I generally don't go to them. My life has become more urban even though I now live in a much smaller city. And I can't really dislike strip malls. They are home to Super Targets, after all.

It felt good to be back in St. Paul. It felt like home. In many ways it felt like we'd never left, which makes me think that if we're not back for a few years, we won't miss out on much either. With close friends I could just  pick up a conversation like everything was normal.
 
With more peripheral friends and other people we ran into it was more work, like I was on a strange sort of job interview. "Tell me about your life in Germany,"or "What is your favorite thing about living abroad," or my favorite "Rate your experience from one to ten". Even those people who didn't sound like they were reviewing my resume liked to ask "what are you doing over there, are you working?" and the favorite, "'when are you guys planning to move back?". They are obviously not blog readers. You guys would never need to ask.

There are several things we didn't get to do in the Twin Cities. I didn't make it to the Cleveland Wok. Brian didn't get to eat a Tex Mex for breakfast. We didn't make it J.D. Hoyt's or to a Twins Game. But we did get to see almost everyone we wanted to, at least for a little while. Maybe the next visit we will stay a little longer. Or maybe the list of people who want to see us will get shorter the longer we are away. Or maybe we just won't sleep again until we get to Germany.