Father/Son Moments In North Minneapolis, Before I Left For Afghanistan...

Photos by Megan Goodmundson, xoxo

In the last few months, not a lot has been posted on this blog, though Jordan Neighborhood Super Citizen Megan Goodmundson has been kind enough to keep Johnny Northside Dot Com on life support. This is something Megan has done virtually every time I've been away trucking or absent because of duties associated with my military service, such as a long stretch of time I spent in Columbia, South Carolina.

As those in my social circle know quite well, I am currently in Afghanistan...

...living in a fortress of sun-baked mud and straw known as a "qalat" and sleeping within arm's reach of my loaded rifle.

That's not the joke font. That's not the sarcasm font.

I am in Afghanistan.

Seven times an hour my mind wanders to the possibility of mortar fire coming down on me without warning, but then it's like, oh--! Check out that pretty bird! I do believe it's an oriental magpie robin.

Getting a dependable internet connection in a fortress of sun baked mud (and straw, let's not forget the straw) is nothing less than a modern miracle, but somehow this miracle has been accomplished, FINALLY.

Therefore, to the degree it is possible, I intend to keep blogging about North Minneapolis, all the way from Afghanistan. And when I come back from Afghanistan (inshallah) this blog will once again gain velocity and crank out gobs of content. But I'm glad--very very glad--that I'm not the only revitalizer blogger in North Minneapolis. When I am not around, when I am busy, when I am preoccupied and not my usual prolific self, there are plenty of others to take up the slack.

Yes, it would be interesting to write about my experiences in Afghanistan here on Johnny Northside (and maybe sometimes I will, just like Jeff Skrenes wrote about his trip to Tanzania) but this kind of travelogue thing is only relevant in small doses.

This is, after all, a blog about North Minneapolis.

Having said that...

I thought I would celebrate my recent re-arrival on the North Minneapolis blog scene with a post about my son, Alex, who turned 14 while I was away in Dixieland gearing up for deployment. One of the last activities we enjoyed together in late April was a perennial father/son favorite: removing utility pole sign spam.

In the photo above (note my military haircut, and combat boots getting broken in nicely) Alex stands on my back so he can reach a sign to pull, yank, tug and brutally batter it down. What's odd about this sign is...it's blank. I mean, somebody went to all the trouble of nailing the sign to a pole (rather high up, too!) and THE SIGN IS BLANK.

Well, whatever.

Now the blank sign says even LESS because we took it down.

For the record, that is NOT my butt crack in the photo. I would never publish a photo of my butt crack, unless there were a substantial amount of money involved. No, rather, that is one of my belt loops contrasting against my light beige army-issue belt. That belt is now on the other side of the planet.

I wish, I wish, I wish...

I wish as I slept, with my armored vest beneath my pillow, I wish in my dreams I could teleport myself to the streets of North Minneapolis, where it would be the middle of the day, and I could roam around taking down sign spam. I fear the sign spam is growing in my absence, that nobody is as compulsive about it as me.

Sigh.

It is possible to generalize about the things soldiers miss while they are deployed overseas: friends and family, home cooking, the family dog. But each soldier is an individual, and the things they miss are very SPECIFIC.

I miss taking down sign spam with my son, Alex.

Dear Sign Spammers: Please Use Wooden Signs So We Can Burn Them In Cheery Bonfires!

Photo and blog post by John Hoff

Don't be fooled by the smile on my face. I don't like sign spam. But I especially dislike the sign spam composed of yellow corrugated plastic, because I can't burn it. Burning plastic creates dioxins. Bad stuff. This puts me in an awkward position for a tree hugger: I find myself preferring the wooden signs.

Recently, Hawthorne Hawkman did some digging to discover the identity of the prolific "2 BR For Rent Heat Paid" sign spammer, click here for his article.

Me, I just like to knock 'em down and throw 'em in the trunk of my car.

In looking at this photo, I realize there is actually quite a bit happening in the image. Let's go through all the threads and tangents, shall we...?


First, yes, that is my vehicle, the one I took on a joyride through "Craterville" near the Washington Ave. N. holiday station with a television crew from KARE-11, click here. My vehicle survived the experience but "Craterville" is still in existence, despite some minor "cold fill" repair efforts.

Second, check out the business in the background. That's new new Pappy's restaurant at the corner of Washington Ave. N. and Jugg Liquors. I made passing mention of the restaurant opening before any other blog, click here, but the Hawthorne Hawkman wrote about it in more depth...with, oh my word, RANDOM PARROTS, click here.

Gotta love the blogosphere.

Now, look at the trunk of the car. It's a cup of Caribou Coffee. Yes, the new Pappy's restaurant has CARIBOU COFFEE. This is, like, a HUGE MOMENT IN THE HISTORY OF NORTH MINNEAPOLIS. Big coffee shop chains don't come up here to North Minneapolis, leaving the market to local "mom and pops." But you can get Caribou Coffee at Pappy's.

Pictured below is another thing you can get at Pappy's: a Greek omlette. This dish is my personal favorite, though I add my own twist: I save the olive pits for composting.



Looking at this photo I realize my life and the blogosphere are so intertwined, I can't tell where my life ends and the blogosphere begins. The internet has become the tribal campfire around which we sit and tell stories, and relate information useful to the people of NoMi.

But sometimes our tribal campfire is not virtual, but a real live bonfire...

Fueled by wooden sign spam.

Ah, Spring! A Lovely Time To Remove Utility Pole Sign Spam...

Contributed photo, xoxo, blog post by John Hoff

NoMi sportsmen will be glad to know there is NO LIMIT on utility pole sign spam. You can catch as many as you want, just don't release them.

The wooden ones make a great...

...bonfire, but be sure to peel off any plastic shrink wrap.

The plastic kind are not nearly as useful, but recently we "re-purposed" a few and put them to good use at a protest against Level Three sex offenders being dumped in North Minneapolis. The signs are visible five seconds into this parody music video about sex offenders, click here.

This little catch of three signs is NOTHING compared to the major haul some of my fellow NoMi bloggers recently landed, but I will hang back and let them tell their own story.

Oh, a word to the sign spammers:

Give up! We can take your signs off poles faster than you can put them up, and it costs us nothing to remove them. The 311 system knows we're removing your signs, but every time we spot a new sign with a new phone number, we call it in. SO JUST STOP PUTTING YOUR STUPID SIGNS ON OUR UTILITY POLES AND WE WON'T NEED TO CALL 311 ON YOU, WON'T NEED TO MAKE BONFIRES OF YOUR SIGNS, WON'T NEED TO POSE FOR TROPHY PHOTOS AND THEN PUT THAT STUFF UP ON THE INTERNET.

Thank you for your attention to this minor but annoying aesthetic issue.

Hey Hey, Ho Ho, Utility Pole Sign Spam Has Got To Go!

Contributed photos, xoxo, blog post by John Hoff

When my son Alex sees me during visitation, it's always a question of how are we going to entertain ourselves BESIDES letting Alex play online video games all day long? Today part of the answer was: take down sign spam on Lyndale Ave. N.

We found these two signs advertising a...

...slummy 3-bedroom hovel for rent, so we removed the signs. Legitimate landlords advertise in legitimate ways, not by placing sign spam on utility poles. Sign on utility pole equals illegitimate business. We don't feel the need to inquire more deeply. We have more right to take the signs DOWN than shady operators have to put the signs UP.

The signs were made out of some kind of plastic, so we won't burn them. Since the back of the signs are blank, at some point we might re-purpose the signs to protest a slumlord. For now, the signs can rest in a big pile of political yard signs in some dark corner of a garage, but they WON'T be on Lyndale Ave. N.

Sign spammers should just give up on North Minneapolis. We will remove your crap from our utility poles, then mock you on the internet.

Utility Pole Sign Spammers Should Stay Out Of North Minneapolis...

Photo and blog post by John Hoff, photo digitally altered to remove phone number

They've been warned on this blog and other blogs again and again: if we see your "utility pole sign spam" in North Minneapolis, we will not only remove your signs, we will use them as pinatas and...

...burn them in bonfires. (As long as there is no plastic or paint involved) We have more legal right to remove your signs than you have to erect them and, by golly, we will do it.

Still, sign post spammers apparently don't get the word. In fact, sometimes their signs seem to be evolving: this sample above is shrink wrapped so it could be on the pole a long time. I didn't have a stick or hammer handy so I beat this one down with my fist, but plenty more of this "Let Us Do Your...Hardwood" type remain.

I mentioned in another post how I like winter because it keeps the thugs inside and off the streets. Another thing I like about winter: the snowdrifts make it easier to reach utility pole sign spam, and knock it down.