Impressions of Minnesota

No real time to post news today, as I try to get back to work, but I thought folks might be interested in a few of my impressions of Minnesota from staying in Minneapolis.
- Friendly, bright, and clean bunch of cities (i.e. Minneapolis/St.Paul). Only Denver was cleaner when I visited there.
- Minnesotans have no idea what a "real" inner city is like. They called the location of the church "just like Brooklyn" in referring to the run-down nature of the area. Honestly, it was more like downtown Shelton or Stratford, CT. Almost no trash in sight, the only grafitti was on one dumpster, houses were generally farther apart than in some suburbs of NJ I have been to, and I never felt unsafe.
- Most Minnesotans appear to be fighting their natural "Ya, you betcha" accent. They would speak TV-style english (what I think of as "normal") in front of me, and then I'd hear them lapse back into "Ya, ya" when I turned a corner, or they were speaking to a coworker.
- The Mall of America was VERY nice, and impressive in its own way. But if you have been to a large mall elsewhere in the country like the one in Palisades, NJ, you are not going to see anything new in the way of stores. The impressive parts were the lego world store with life size lego dinosaurs, the indoor amusement park, and the Dinosaur Walk Museum.
- For some reason, Minnesotans like more letters in their highways than we do in the Northeast. I'll never forget the first time I saw a sign for "35W N" and had to figure out if that meant "Highway 35 West N" or "Highway 35W North" or "Highway 35 Northwest".
- Minnesota women are very attractive, but don't assume you are seeing them in the crowds at the airport. It was not until we got away from the airport and hotel into the Mall of America and other attractions that you got a real feel for the place.
- If you are in town, definitely stop at Christos Restaurant in Minneapolis, and get the flaming cheese dish! Fun to watch and delicious!
- If you are visiting and don't plan to only stay in the city, bring/rent a GPS for the car. One of our fellow guests learned that there is more than 1 (or 2 or 3) "Route 15"s in the Minneapolis area, and wound up sampling them all while trying to find Lord Fletchers in the backwoods. We had our Garmin iQue 3600 and arrived quickly and without any problems.