Secrets of the City

Targetrons

Who the hell is Rex? And why was it better when he was here? Why does this thread suck?

The source of the midget clown obsession.

The unholy origins of the Bartel Cartel.

The rigorous training regimen required to earn your white belt.

Anything citing the Rollergirls is welcome.

I can only think of one MNspeaker who has admitted to wearing a white belt.

Oh, there are definitely more.

Um, wha-huh?

That’s Bartel Cartel ^TM or Bartel Cartel®

Mind your AP Style, Tom.

Taylor’s not a hot chick? That’s not what he told me.

The multiple First Ever MNspeak Get Together! I think the upcoming pub quiz will be, what…the Third or Fourth First Ever MNspeak Get Together?

Flash Mob, my place!!!!

…kidding…

Old people who get up early: tbartel, aeklund.

Then I guess that makes me young person who gets up way too early. I sit around here refreshing and refreshing and refreshing from like 6 AM until the links pop up…or until tbartel shows up with some Latin.

Speaking of, I have a phrase for you to correct on the poop thread. You know who you are.

What the fkk are you guys babbling about?
I see incoherant rambling, and not much else.

Do you guys all know eachother, or something?

indie, isn’t that because you’re used to gettin’ up to milk the cows?

I kid! I kid!

HELLO THAR UR NOT 1337 IF U DUN TALK LIKE THIS ON TEH INTARWEB. KTHXBAI.

Oh snap! Oh no you didn’t!

I ain’t never milked no cow…but I did get a nice residual check with gramps sold mama’s farm.

If today were my first time visiting the site, and I was the kinda person who only read the headlines and not the body text, and I saw the word “FAQs” in the title, thus figuring this might make a good first choice of thread to read as a representative sample of what MNspeak is about, and after so clicking I read the comments up until now…

Well, I admit that’s all probably extremely unlikely and anybody who would actually do that probably deserves the impression they get.

speaking of white belts, where’s sarah been?

Indie, do you mean “noli tangere” which is usually “noli me tangere” translated as “Don’t touch me”. Jesus said it to Mary Magdalene, evidently before he read the DaVinci code and found out they were married. After they were married, she said it to him. Ta dum dum.

“Don’t touch me!”

“That’s hot!”

Sarah’s been covering fashion for The Rake. Notice she mentions everything except Ice Cube’s belt.

Old people get up at 6:30 and post to MNSpeak because they have to pee…again.

I thought old people got up at 6:30 because they have jobs.

Yeah but does writing for the rake keep her from posting? You find the time, Tom, why can’t she?

Also re: getting up at 6:30, I sleep in until 7:00! Ha! Big ups to flex time and being salaried.

If I had a job that actually entailed me doing any work whatsoever I would never post on here. It’s just not that entertaining.

wah wah wah, go troll on craigslist or something.

I was up until 4am getting turned into a werewolf. You can’t expect a fella to get up at 6am after a weeknight like that.

I was up until 4am getting turned into a werewolf. You can’t expect a fella to get up at 6am after a weeknight like that.

New moon tonight, sorry. Or are you one of them fancy new fangled werewolves?

Wow…baba need its bottle.

You try sitting in one spot for 40 hours a week and do nothing.
It’s not particularly interesting and it saps the life force out of you bigtime.
I’m seriously considering talking to my boss and saying this isn’t really working out and hoping they can do something about it. I hate the fact that they make jobs sound challenging and difficult and they turn out to be nothing. I made a point of asking in the interview process, “is there enough work to keep me busy because I hate to sit there and do nothing.”
I was assured that there was plenty to do.

I sort of have to pay my mortgage so I can’t quit.

Watch the movie. I’m a werewolf who turns at the site of any round, silvern object.

Noli Tangere is right, I believe. “Do Not Touch” – Before the field of cardiac surgery was launched it was commonly thought that you could not touch or operate on a heart unless it was stopped (aka dead). And that’s what I was referring to…

At the risk of totally annoyingly going back to the original question, I could use answers to the first five questions Max raised in this post. Illicit substances I can locate on my own, thanks.

And seriously, don’t all of you know each other? I’d love to see a MNspeak family tree detailing who’s met in person and how long you’ve been carrying on in this scandalous fashion.

Hey nerdgrrl – I’ve been waiting to see if anyone would answer your questions…and it looks like I need to step up.

What do n00bs need to know?
That posting instructions/guidelines are listed once you follow the “submit post” link. That’s why everyone gets crabby when there aren’t any links in a post – and make comments like, “this is the worst post ever.”

An introductory course in 1337?
I can’t locate the discussion where that originated (okay, I’m actually just too lazy to search for it) – but I recall it having to do with “kids these days (and Prince)” and their obnoxious text messaging language (LEET or 1337). It then, of course, spawned an absurdly long thread in 1337.

An explanation as to why we’re obsessed with midget clowns?
About a week before the new Minneapolis Central Library opened, a handful of mnspeakers were invited to take a private tour of the place. Cristina was on the tour, and brought up the question of signage and general navigability. A rapid-fire discussion ensued about how to rectify the problem, and it was finally determined that midget clowns would be awesome guides at the opening. The library didn’t seem very amused by the suggestion.

What makes a good FPP? What the hell an FPP is anyway?
Hell if I know.

And seriously, don’t all of you know each other?
I think there was a core group of people (Rex’s friends – Taylor and Alexis?) that were here from the start who knew each other. And I think there have been quite a few meet-ups/parties since then. For the first month or two, I didn’t know anyone (I thought hipmn was a girl – turns out hipmn was Max, who I did know). Then I met Rex right before he moved out of town. And then I met a handful of folks at the library tour. I think a lot of other people are in a similar boat.

Okay – it’s too hot to type any more. Hope this helps!

Ha! Taylor’s not the only hot girl on this site!

An FPP is a Front Page Post. When you comment on an FPP, it is called a “comment.” People sometimes mistakenly refer to a comment as a “post,” which, you can imagine, gets confusing.

For the history books…

I actually met Taylor through MNspeak.

This site really developed out of conversations I was having with Chuck and Alexis and Sarah, and all three (plus Geoff and Jaime and Rachael and Taylor) contributed heavily early on.

Although sites like Metafilter, Gawker, Gothamist, and Flavorpill were all big influences on this MNspeak, the greatest influence was probably a combination of talking to Chuck about web communities and watching Alexis’ web habits. It got me interested in ways that people carve out identities online, and I wanted to build a community around these ideas, starting with my friends.

I met Leigha in literally my last hours in town. She and Taylor are both super hot.

I’ve never met indie or tmayhem or mpls simpleton or bud or several of the others with nom de plum’s.

And I still haven’t met Max, but I hope to buy him a beer when I’m back in town in a few weeks.

At first, MNspeak released a new feature every couple weeks (commenting, for instance, just barely made it into version 1.0), and if I could add anything now, it would be more social networking (Friendster, MySpace, Facebook) functionality, because people seem really interested in knowing each other.

Thanks for stepping up, Leigha! And thanks for the supplementary answers, Max, and Rex.

Now that Rex has provided the roots of the MNspeak family tree, I’d like to hear more…

I only knew Rex from this site until he invited me to be on the aggregator. I met him personally when I did a story on his fimoculous list of lists. I met Alexis first because I did a story on her concierge business. How did I meet Max? Oh yeah, I did a story with him on wasting time online.

Taylor I met at Geek Prom. S4xton (Aaron) at the Prairie Home Companion Premiere. And I met Steve Marsh for the first time at the Twins game Friday night. I had lunch with the Bartel Cartel. And I stumbled into Kristof’s store. And ALAMN Bob has been in a story or two as well. I believe that’s my MNSpeak family tree as far as off-line meetings go.

Back to work.

I was turned on to this site by my good friend Ben (who posts under the conspicuous name “ben”) sometime in late aught-five.

I met a few folks at aecklund’s super cool (albeit insecure) downtown hangout and also on the now infamous library tour. Before then I knew of no one personally, if you don’t count having read Killing Yourself To Live.

My nom de plume comes from a song title (not some presumptuous status statement), but “convincingindie” was deemed too long by the lords of how-long-your-mnspeak-handle-can-be. And “cindie” would have been misleading (ala taylor and hipmn).

I used to think Max was always drunk when he commented. Now I know he is.

And I was the guy who found Apesgrapes – the face for MNspeak’s midget clown obsession.