The defense finished, we moved to the graduation ceremony, which took place on the very next day.
Shawn holds Sara’s robes.
The graduation took place in the hockey arena and was for the College of Education and Human Development (CEHD). This was all the future teachers, who sat on the house right side, and then a bunch of psychology-type (ish) majors. All the majors are listed here. The Human Development people sat on the the house left side and took much longer to seat themselves. Teachers know how to form an orderly line.
Looks like this graduate has a job waiting.
The nice thing about the hockey arena is that there was a big screen where the happenings were projected. That made this ceremony slightly more intimate.
After a long wait, we got to see Lee, Sara’s writing partner, hooded.
And then Dr. Sara Sterner herself.
Here’s the program:
You can see it has many pages. Look how many people also received PhDs at the same time as Sara. And this is just in the College of Education and Human Development!
I killed time between the defense and the big party by talking one of the walks in my walking tours book. This was of the Phillips Neighborhood.
I was staying in Ventura Village, but that’s the next neighborhood over. On my walk to the start of the walk, I snapped a picture of this church, where you can attend services in Norwegian!
When you have too much car for your garage…
Basically, Minneapolis is chock full of houses that leave me weak in the knees. Here is one.
All you need to know about Phillips.
Along with a close-up of the neighborhood boundaries.
Most of the walk was on Park Avenue, which has been redeveloped many times over the years. Thus, it was not unusual to see this lineup:
A grand building of apartment homes, built when that was a thing rich people lived in.
Right next to that, a 60s or 70s development.
And right next to that, a small office building.
Here were also huge mansions, like this one, which is now the American Swedish Institute, which I visited in 2015.
And this one:
And this one, which has moved on to a new life as a mosque. I did like that about Minneapolis. A lot of the grand houses have been converted to office space.
Very fancy looking office space, like this one, which houses the American Indian Services.
I liked the look of this stucco, and couldn’t decide if it was the pattern, or stucco suffering from neglect.
Look at this great church!
And these beautiful houses!
It wasn’t unusual to come across these views of fin de siecle houses with downtown towers looming in the background.
Look at the turret on this house!
It seems that bicycle theft is a problem here too.
Here’s an interesting corner. An older apartment building:
And across the street an apartment tower with its first four stories attempting to blend. This works for me.
And then this other corner with some new contstruction totally blending with a new tower looming in the background.
This is a pretty red house with a widow’s walk.
This might be my favorite picture from this walk. A nondescript low brick building next to a beautiful stone house, with a colorful Hannapin Healthcare buiding nearby and the prow of the football stadium poking up in the back.
I could have spent a solid week wandering through Minneapolis and St. Paul neighborhoods.
While Sara was doing Defense Part II with the members of her committee, friends and family wandered over to the building on campus with the performing arts hall, and waited at a coffee shop.
The building was gorgeous, and lovingly renovated.
It was a long wait (I think there was also some paperwork processing in there) and I had time to catch up with Sara’s family members, which was nice as I hadn’t seen them in a very long time.
Behold! Dr. Sara Sterner (alas, not the best photo of her)
Also pictured: Shawn (to the left) and Sara’s brother-in-law, sister-in-law, mother-in-law and niece.
Three of Sara’s professors had traveled to Minneapolis to be present for the defense, so photos were taken.
After photos, some catching up, and Sara’s stepmom Barbie snuck around for a different angle.
Sara booked the biggest room available for her defense and it was full! She had a lot of friends and family visit. When I sat down, I introduced myself to the woman sitting next to me. She turned out to be a fellow PhD candidate. Her observation: “I go to these things all the time and usually there’s like four people watching.”
Sara’s adviser introduced Sara and the defense. He had a special message from Hogwarts and also pointed out that a royal baby waited to be born until Sara was ready to defend.
Sara explained the work she had done on a post-intentional phenomenological exploration of reading whitely. There were handouts.
At the end we got to ask questions.
Once the public defense was done Sara stayed behind for another hour of questions. After that, her committee voted though we weren’t there for that part.
My first full day in Minneapolis was also the day of Sara’s defense. I decided to use the Nice Ride bikes to get myself to campus.
On the same street where I was saying was this gorgeous apartment building.
My neighborhood had a lot of churches in it, including two across the street from one another.
About four blocks from my house were the bikes.
I checked one out and was on my way. Look at the great bike infrastructure they have! I rode bike lanes the entire way to campus.
This bridge took me over the freeway.
Here I have a great view of the Mighty Mississippi.
I got to campus quite easily using the Google Maps directions. From that point, I had a bit of trouble finding a docking station. The campus is large. I ended up docking at the Student Union because I knew where that was and vaguly in which direction it was located and then power-walked over to the defense.
Thank goodness I’d visited campus on previous trips.
I booked a room in an AirB&B for my lodging. It was not far from the football stadium and very close to many transportation options.
The picture of the house on the website cleverly cropped out those crumbling steps, which were all I could see as I stood on the sidewalk. Had I made a mistake?
My room is the second floor window on the left.
But no! Indoors, it was lovely. Here’s the sitting room with a bit of the dining room.
The kitchen still had its butler’s pantry which included pull-out bins for flour and sugar.
The more modern kitchen.
Here’s my bedroom, which was quite large.
And included a big walk-in closet with a window to outside.
The view from my window.
There was a lot of original hardware that was just gorgeous. This is my bedroom door looking out into the stairwell.
Look at that vent!
My favorite feature of the house was the servant’s staircase. Here’s where the servants walk up.
And here’s is where the family walks up. You can see how you can close a door to shut off the kitchen area.
But the funny thing about the two staircases was, both staircases traveled to the same landing.
Sara K, whom you might know from her regular comments on this blog, is almost Dr. Sara K. She’s spent the last few years working toward a PhD, and I’m in Minneapolis to see her defense.
After navigating myself from the airport to my AirBnB, (thanks light rail!) I used the app on my phone to find a Nice Ride. Those would be the bike share bikes in the Twin Cities.
There was a bank of bikes not far from my place, and I rode about 25 minutes to Lake Nokomis, where I locked up my bike at another station. Easy as pie!
One thing I enjoyed about Lake Nokomis, was that they had seperate paths for walkers and bikes. The path in the foreground is for walkers; the one in the back is for bikes. Very smart, Minneapolis!
While it was full-on warm spring in Portland, it was still early spring in the North Star State. I would call what I experienced mid-to-late-March weather.
A variety of Sara’s relatives (and Sara herself, plus Shawn) arrived and we ate and chatted.
Shawn and Sara gave me a ride back to my place, which was also nice, as I was not wearing a mid-to-late March coat and I was a bit chilled when the sun was going down.
Sometimes the experience of watching a movie is an exercise in picking apart why the film isn’t working and so it was for James Wan’s Aquaman. I came up with a host of reasons: big gaps in the origin story; villains who had already turned evil, leaving me without reasons to “feel” for them;* flimsy story with not-great writing** that leads to too many action scenes; a very fit guy is only part of the reason to watch a movie, the character he creates has to also be compelling; lack of day-to-day stuff about his life.*** Overall, this was a great example of all style, no substance and I just didn’t care.
*Green Goblin from Spider-Man and Doc Ock also from Spider-Man come to mind as good examples of villains I felt for, even while rooting for their defeat. Even Ultron managed to by sympathetic. **For most of the movie Aquaman is all, “I’m totally not going to be your king!” and then at the end it’s suddenly, “This is gonna be fun!” Why the change Aquaman? ***The movie has placed him firmly as a laid-back surfer, and Aquaman himself says he’s dumb at one point. But he speaks, Russian, Italian, Maori and English? When did he learn all of that? Also, how does he eat? Or drink at the bar? Is he paid for his work? Who pays him?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
Arthur and Orm are elder and younger brothers, but Patrick Wilson is five years older than Jason Momoa, while Nicole Kidman, who plays their mother, is seven years older than Wilson.
If I had a dollar for every movie with a woman playing a “mom” with this age span, it would add up quickly.
Since they don’t make movies like Stanley Donen/Gene Kelly’s On the Town anymore, this movie gets a pass on a lot of things.* But it does have great musical numbers*** and that great color saturation that comes with movies from the (almost) 1950s. There are musicals where the story, song and dance meld together into a cohesive wholes and then there is this type where the story is something to pass the time while waiting for the next musical number.
The verdict:
Good, though only because I gave it a pass on a lot of things
Cost: free from library Where watched: at home as part of Filmspotting’s Stanley Donen marathon.
Consider also watching:
Singing in the Rain
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers****
Chicago
The Sound of Music
Further sentences:
*Outmoded social norms,** a bit too long, a lack of even one very good song. **Although the character of Brunhilde Esterhazy reminded me a lot of Melissa McCarthy’s character in Bridesmaids. ***I cringed through “Primitive Man” but did enjoy Ann Miller’s awesome green dress with the plaid lining. ****Also a cringe-y plot, but with amazing dancing, great songs and a cohesive story.
Favorite IMDB Trivia Item:
There was a real-life version of the “Miss Turnstiles” contest in New York City. “Miss Subways” was a beauty contest run by the New York Subways Advertising Company from 1941 to 1976. Subway cars featured posters of pretty young women who lived and worked in New York. Link is here.
