Before Holy Mountain

Originally published as a Facebook Note in 2011; revised June 25, 2014. As of current date only two of these remain: Coffee Emporium and Roasters.   Perhaps because we possess an extra portion of the entrepreneurial initiative that has made this country great, or perhaps because the multinational corporations were late moving in, Cedar Rapids has an excellent variety of local coffeehouses. Your humble correspondent now undertakes to introduce you to them; even local residents may not know about all of these. However, you’re not going to get the nuanced descriptions of a discriminating palate, at least not from me. I am only qualified to rate them for ambience, accessibility, and information, as well as size and density of baked goods, and this is what I’m going to proceed to do.                 Fortunately I got my introduction to the coffeehouse world through one of the best: Brewed Awakenings, 1271 1st Av...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note March 23, 2013. The Lost Cuban closed in 2020. They now operate a takeout only place down the street. The Lost Cuban in 2016 (Google Earth screenshot) The boys were on spring break, and I'm on sabbatical leave, so there was no good reason not to go out to lunch Friday. I'd been wanting to check out the Lost Cuban, which has moved into the space at 209 3rd St SE that has been a number of things in recent years. We did the downtown parking thing without too much difficulty, then wended our way through the skywalks which wasn't really necessary but I do have a thing for the skywalks. (For the record, the Lost Cuban is near the Armstrong's Building, so the nearest Skywalk entrance is by Hills Bank and the temporary library.) There weren't too many people there, which made figuring things out easy, but I'm here to tell you the place should be packed. Eli and I went with the Cuban sandwich, which features pork and ham and chee...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note September 26, 2009. Kingston Stadium (source: tourismcedarrapids.com)   High school football on Friday night is a hugely popular tradition in much of America, so hugely popular that it gets along fine without me, which is fine with both of us. However, recently Friday night lights in Cedar Rapids have shown on Robbie and the Warriors, a.k.a. the Washington High School Marching Band. So off we trundled on a fair evening last night, with our Japanese visitors in tow: Teppei from Waseda U. and Nuri from Nagoya U. They were in for a dose of American culture, and they got it. "Exciting," said Nuri. Words hardly do justice to their responses, though. Teppei's English is pretty good, but he's most expressive with his face and variety of vocal noises... think someone with the facial plasticity of Susan Young and the emotiveness of Ron Santo... and every bonecrunching tackle or trip to the concessions stands got a volume of expression...

  Originally posted as a Facebook Note April 14, 2009. Police substation at 1501 1st Av SE (Source: kcrg.com) Cedar Rapids, or my section of it, is undergoing a bit of a crime wave. It may not be much by big city standards, but police calls in the 1st Ave area (10th St to 19th St) were up in the first three months of 2009 by 35 percent over the same period in 2008. Moreover, they were 35 percent higher in 2008 than in 2007. A few weeks ago, a Cedar Rapids police officer, Tim Davis, was severely beaten by a suspect, and remains hospitalized. A Coe student was robbed at gunpoint in her car one morning. An apartment in the Mound View area experienced an armed robbery. Coe students have been assaulted by thugs on A Avenue. And these are just the ones I know about. Maybe it's the accumulation of stories, or maybe I'm getting older, but I'm feeling rather querulous about walking to work and back, which inevitably takes me through this neighborhood. I've been walking o...

  Originally published as a Facebook Note March 8, 2009. Carlis Faurot, a regular at the Maple Syrup Festival, in 2015 (Source: indiancreeknaturecenter.org) We had a busy Sunday morning, despite a bleak, cold, rainy day in Iowa. First we went to the Indian Creek Nature Center for their annual maple syrup festival. (It's the 22nd annual, according to someone I heard, which means we've attended most of them.) ICNC is located near the Cedar River, southeast of Cedar Rapids, in a rustic old-looking cabin. They've been around 30 years, and have been strong voices for conservation, ecology, and wild area preservation in this community, causes which in any community are often tantamount to blowing against the wind. The rain made the parking lot and grounds muddy, but the crowds were out and in good spirits. (I find myself hoping on festival days for a weather middle ground, nice enough that the Center gets a good turnout, yet not so nice that we wait in line for two hours lik...