Thursday, June 15, 2023
Rachel is 45
Jon is 44

I arrived on a Thursday. Rachel picked me up in the fourth of like six lanes of traffic in the shitshow that was the arrivals curb at the Airport in Minneapolis, which was the first of only two times I would set foot in Minneapolis on this trip. We drove straight to the Hilton Doubletree that I was staying at in St. Paul, just on the other side of the river from Rachel's neighborhood, "West Side". After I checked in, she drove me over to her side of town and we checked out a great little cafe called Amore. This was a fitting name for a first stop to start off a visit during which we would heavily discuss the nature of love, relationships and friendships of all kinds, including the nature of our own friendship, which has spanned over 21 years. That's right, folks: our friendship is old enough to drink. And drink we did. We drove to her house, dropped off her car (safety first!), and wandered right back to that general area to go check out a place called Foodsmith, a fun restaurant that clearly had an eastern/German-style menu and some good cocktail options. After browsing the menu for a while, we asked about the influence and - sure enough - the head cook is Austrian. We got just tipsy enough to walk our way over to a place called Wabasha Brewing Company and drink a little more. Then we wandered back to her place, where I grabbed a Lyft back to the hotel.

And then there was night.