davejenbarnes

I spent the weekend with my mom in Minnesota, don’t'cha know, and we visited the Mall of America. Oh yah, it was great fun. …. *cough* …. okay, I don’t think I can type in a Minnesotan accent any longer, but hearing the natives talking was great fun! The secret is in their vowels. I think is has something to with the back of their tongues being higher in their mouths when they pronounce the vowels which gives them a more nasal sound. At least, that’s what I have to do to sound like a native Minnesotan. (I wonder if it’s easier for them to play clarinet since your tongue has to be high inside your mouth to get a decent tone)

The flight up was pretty uneventful and smooth. We flew out of GRK, the new airport in Killeen which utilizes the 2-mile runway of the old West Fort Hood Army Airport. Hey - I’ve landed on the same runway as Air Force One! I didn’t realize how close that part of Killeen and that part of Fort Hood were untill I saw it from the air. At the airport in Minnesota, we waited for the Hotel Shuttle. Man, the guy driving had a lead foot. His acceleration alarmed us! I have never used a shuttle service, but it was nice and prevented us from needing to rent a car or use a taxi. We used the shuttle service to and from the Mall of America, which I will describe for you:

Imagine a big square donut. Not just big. HUGE. At each corner of the square donut, a three or four story department store. All the shops line the insides of the donut and there are three donut levels stacked on top of each other. Now in the middle of this concrete stack of donuts, sits Camp Snoopy, a theme park complete with roller coasters, big snoopy mascots walking around, and funnel cake booths. Camp Snoopy was open to the public and used a bracelet system for the rides (which we did not do) so we were able to walk around down there and get some cool pictures and movies.

I have to say, whoever designed the Mall of America made it very simple to understand with easy-to-access restrooms. I really liked the North-South-East-West design (all the roads from the sky appeared to be NSEW in layout as well) and the open-ness in the middle of each floor (like halfway down the west side was a big opening which you could see all the way down to the first floor from whatever floor you’re on so they had concerts and a “Beauty” appearance (from Beauty and the Beast) for the little girls to get pictures with..) The easiest comparison I can make for you Dallas people is that it’s like a Grapevine Mills mall, but on steroids. The only confusing part is that there are two of some of the stores which makes it easy to get disoriented.

The weekend was the perfect amount of time for us to spend there. On Sunday, we even visited the GIGANTIC IKEA store next door. Man, that place was amazing. I have received their catalogue before, but the store, to see the actual furniture in work and to be able to sit on it… that was something.

Pictures from the trip are up for you to enjoy. I had a good time.