"Central America" - Mid-West and Great Lakes States
	Day 4:  Tuesday, October 8, 2002

With the day's plans including a stop at the Spam Museum, which didn't open until 10am, we figured it's as good a day as any to sleep in.  So, we did, getting up around 7:30am and hitting the road a bit after 8am.

Our first visit was to Bassett, but unfortunately, by the time we'd gotten back onto the paved roadway, we'd missed the one intersection of town.  (According to Census records, the population in 1990 was 74, down from 128 in 1980.)  Not one to cry over spilled milk, we pushed ahead to Charles City (7,878 people in 1990, down from 8,778 in 1980).  Please note they saved a couple of bucks by including the airport sign with the 'welcome to town' sign - and very clever of them, I may add.

Charles City has a quaint river running right through the middle of the place... perhaps it's much like the railroad tracks that separate you from the people you shouldn't date -- they're from the wrong side of the river?  Dunno, anyway.  The Dairy Queen is cleverly styled as a barn, in a state where barns are the sizes of houses, and houses are much more reasonably sized.  (You'll be hard-pressed to find a single person or a childless couple in a five-bedroom house here, it seems... if you've got five bedrooms, you've got at least four kids and yourself.)  If you do see a big, old house, odds are it's a bed-and-breakfast; the "regular" homes, again, are more reasonably sized.

We passed through Mason City as we turned from rural roads back to Interstate 35.  Sorry... I didn't like the rest of the pictures, so you just get the water tower.  But by now, you either love water towers, or are just ignoring them completely. 

From there, it was about an hour drive to our mecca, Austin, Minnesota, home of Hormel Foods and the makers of SPAM^™.  We figured that we were close when we found SPAM Boulevard, and the signs confirmed that feeling.  And so, we're off into the museum!  Once inside, we found we walked under a wall of SPAM cans, comprised of 3,390 cans (empty), with a six-foot globe spinning, to represent SPAM being sold on every continent except Antarctica (they eat it there, but there's no where to sell it, as we learn later on, here.)  The boy was also heard mumbling something about using the concept to decorate one room in the place... more disturbing, I could see him doing it.  Eek.  I had my picture taken with Happy SPAM.

The introduction is given by one of the Spambassadors, and takes us into the 1950s style diner.  Here, you can sit on one of the stools and surf the various official SPAM websites.  For basic mouse functions, use the egg yoke to navigate, and the butter to click... clever.  This, of course, is the busy-time area while you wait for the next showing of the SPAM film to be presented.  Fortunately, we only had to wait a few minutes, but I still had time to click the butter several times before going in and making myself at home in the mini-theater.

The film ran perhaps 12 minutes, and we were free to wander about the place.  One of the first displays was one of those halogram things, about what's in SPAM.  We start with the outside of the can, and then see the ingredients, inside.  The sign even notes the rumors about what's "really" in SPAM are all false (except the few ingredients that are listed and actually in there, but those rumors do make for a colorful tale.

We wandered through a mock-up of the assembly line, looking at the outfits the staff wear.  I tried it on, as suggested, but they aren't sized well for us more diminutive folks, sadly.  There was also an assembly line area to time yourself against the real assembly line.  I didn't do too badly, although the real factory blew my socks off.  (In the 2 minutes, 1 second it took me for one can, the Austin, MN plant produced 847 cans.)

The Monty Python skit involving the Green Midget Cafe, whose menu consisted of nothing but SPAM-related dishes, was also featured.  I decided I, too, should be featured, so I perched upon the table.  (I'd have sat in the chair, but without a booter seat, I couldn't have seen the table top.)  After a visit to the gift shop (featuring tons of SPAM merchandise, to be seen at their web site, here), we were about ready to go.  Almost.  The boy had to use the potty, so I decided to relax in the SPAM lounge until his return.  It was rather comfy, I must confess.

Overall, how would I rate the place?  I'd agree with this sign's view of things.  Tidbits and trivia of SPAM:

• SPAM was invented in 1937, so if you thought the name meant "Specially Packaged Army Meat", you're wrong.  WWII didnt' break out for another two years.  There's a tribute to the WWII veterans from Hormel that fought in the War to End All Wars.
• The name is rooted in a contest where you could enter a name suggestion toward winning a prize of $100 (hey, it was 1937, that was a lot of money then).  By absolute, sheer coincidence, the winner was Kenneth Daigneau, the brother of Ralph Daigneau -- the vice president of Hormel at the time. 
• SPAM isn't Spam, or spam.  It's all in capital letters.  Hormel has tried without success to challenge the reference to junk e-mail as Spam in the late 1990s, but as you've probably guessed, that didn't work out.  (This, of course, isn't noted anywhere in the museum that we could see.)
• SPAM is the only real hamburger, if you think about it.  A hamburger would be made from ham, and SPAM is made from pork, thus, ham.  Hamburgers are made from beef, which isn't pork or ham... so those are really beefburgers.  Think about it.
• If you like Haiku, and SPAM Haiku in particular, I'd suggest you check out the SPAM Haiku site.  Enjoy.
• Want to know how to read the factory codes on the bottom of a can of SPAM?  It's explained here.

We did wander around the town a bit, as to not look like snobs only here to see the SPAM place (even though that's mostly true).  I'm guessing that either this furniture store was going for a colorful name appeal, or their stuff is very uncomfortable.  The downtown was very tidy, too... almost as though it were more a movie set than an actual town (here and here).

And we were on a run to Interstate 35, by way of county roads (you can get tired of the interstate, too, y'know). The very same roads that can be all but empty at noon on a Tuesday, such as today.  But no complaints... instead of the posted 55 MPH, we were able to notch it up a bit.  (Enough said.)

We were making such good time that I didn't even want to get out of the car for a picture of the sign in Blooming Prairie.  But the town wasn't that big, so it'll probably be okay.  The downtown was stretched out a ways, leading me to guess the town was long, but not wide.  But before long, we were back in I-35, and in good shape for staying on schedule for the day's plans. 

Until we hit the "road construction ahead, left lane closed" signs.  Well, that didn't seem too bad... we've driven through dozens of construction zones like that without a problem.  Sounded good, until you saw the smoke of the tractor-trailers ahead locking their brakes to avoid a collision.  We ended up sitting at 0-5 MPH for 30 minutes before we got to the state trooper, and he was apparently just sitting with his lights running.  Nope, no accident.  So, what gives?

It seems it's not one lane, but the entire highway, in both directions, being detoured off of the interstate onto a two-lane country road.  Yup, everyone, cars, RVs, big rigs with one or two trailers.  On a two-lane country road.  Of course, it took us another 30 minutes to get to that point.  When we did, Tubby did well, and avoided following the herd, instead taking us along another country road (but without the volumes of people) to eventually get to St. Paul, and only an hour behind schedule (but 10 miles faster than had we stayed on the highway.  Weird.)

At 2:30pm, we arrive at the Mall of America (web site).  It's not a favorable first impression, but it could be we tend to make our own entrances, which may vary from that of the designs of the place.  It does get better as you approach the doors.  I liked this - if you're a teen or younger, bring mommy or daddy on the weekend evenings.  No hooligans in the mall during those prime loitering hours.  (And because I have the bald guy with me usually, even if The Man tried to hassle me, I've got an escort with me already.)

So, we're inside.  As malls go, this isn't too different.  Shops and stuff to buy.  It's four levels high (but not as impressive as Shoppingtowne in Chatswood, NSW, Sydney, which was six levels... but without the bonus stuff.)  The bonus stuff is the mini-amusement area in the center of the roundish-shaped mall.  The Snoopy bounce-house.  The full-scale roller coaster.  And some other stuff I'm being too lazy to post.  There was also a LEGO play area, with some dinosaurs and a place to sit and rest after a long day of shopping and/or playing.

We took off, and about 20 minutes later, found ourselves looking at the state capital in St. Paul.  A few streets over was St. Paul's Cathedral, in the midst of a $21.7 million dollar renovation, according to the sign.  We opted to back up and take the picture, since the sign was a bit ugly. On the way to wander out, we got a glimpse of the state capital from a distance, and well, variety is nice.  So we took a picture of that, too.

In the hopes of seeing the mythical White Bear Lake as featured in the movie Fargo, we stumbled across, well, the city of White Bear Lake.  With a lake beside it, called White Bear Lake.  (The sign wasn't conveniently placed, but I do have the usual water tower you can admire.)  The lake was like most any lake, full of water and even had a place to float your boat.  (As drawn upon from the past phrase of, "Minnesota, with many lakes to float your boat-a.")  If nothing else was accomplished here, at the early hour of 4pm, we stopped for lunch. 

And drove, and drove, and drove, for the 140 miles to reach the final stopping point, which was going to also be a bit of care for the car, but the famed Wal-Mart is not in that town, thus, there will not be an opportunity for maintenance until tomorrow.  Bygones.

We hit Duluth a bit after 6pm, and wandered first to see Lake Superior.  This was accomplished by parking near the Lakeside Walk (East) area, and walking on down.  Walking, you're thinking... no, I was carried.  From the rocks along the path was nice, but I wanted more... so I headed down the path to the water's edge.  Cold.  So very, very, cold.  In turning around, I saw a curious old foundation or structure.  An old fortification? Why?  It's a lake, after all.  Was there some past worry the Canadians were going to invade Duluth?  It's all so odd.  Figuring I wasn't going to sort it out on my own, I gave up and moved on.

The hotel check-in was a breeze (but we're sort of good at it after all these trips), and we wandered to the room, out for food, and then to the updates.  The boy has disappeared with a phone in his ear for the last 90 minutes, which is a bit comical in that I don't know anyone that finds him interesting for 9 minutes, let alone 90.  And I can say with absolute certainty that it's not a 900/976 phone call thing, because, like his forefathers, he's extremely cheap.  Maybe it's a conversation with a dial tone.  Dunno.  Anyway, I'm going to head off to sleep in short order, to prepare for a journey into Wisconsin and the great beyond...