Lake Minnetonka from Lake Street, Wayzata.

Signs, tracks, bare trees, and setting sun over calm and beautiful Lake Minnetonka. Today has been a exceptional Black Friday, but cold, cold, cold!!

Weisman Art Museum, U MN Campus, 11/24/13.

With a James Rosenquist massive mural as backdrop, Grandma B, Poppina and I get started today with our tour of the Weisman Art Museum on the Minneapolis campus of the University of Minnesota.

Boy, was there a lot of art to enjoy: Mimbres Pottery;  works by Marsden Hartley; a room-ful of classic Korean furniture; stunning portraits of young Somali men, active in service to their communities; and on and on it goes.

That was inside the WAM.  Outside there's an exceptional exhibit of public art installations, 25 of which in particular are being celebrated by WAM and the U.  With temps in the 20's and a wind chill lower than that, we normally intrepid art fans wimped out and instead of cruising the campus, we watched an excellent video loop of the public art, instead.

Me and a Cozy Pooch, E. Lake St., Wayzata, MN 11/23/13.

When Britania Ruled: Bombay Britches Gurkha Shorts.

Remember the Gurkhas?  Fierce indigenous fighters on the side of the Brits, protecting the Khyber Pass and a great deal of the Queen's Empire in Ceylon, In-ja, Madagascar, Malaysia, Burma, and far-flung islands throughout the East.   The Gurkha's were special, and so were their uniform shorts back in the day.

Years ago I found hundreds of pairs of "Gurkha Shorts" in a surplus store on Canal Street in lower Manhattan. Shorts were, brand new, in pristine shape -- bundled and baled, wrapped in water-resistant paper with burlap overlay, for sale at $2.00 per pair.  The shop owner gave me access to the attic, and I climbed over the bales to my heart's content: taking in the aroma of an era now gone, and imagining the battles and dominions these uniform shorts might have seen.

Not only did I acquire bales and bales of the olive drab shorts -- made of the highest quality Egyptian cotton, big, wide waist band, deep front pockets, pleated and blousey and roomy around the thighs --  but the shorts came in khaki and white as well.  Each branch of the British Military in the Far East seemed to have its own style and color.

In time I sold hundreds of pairs of Bombay Britches.   Advertising in the classifieds of magazines like Rolling Stone,  I priced the shorts at $17.95/pair, built awareness, and sold a ton of product.  My money back guarantee and personal thanks-for-the-business note seemed to produce repeat sales far beyond my expectations.

My shorts ran out just as retailers like Banana Republic began to sell their own version of MY Bombay Britches !! It was a helluva run and a lot of fun while it lasted. Thanks to any former customers who might be reading this blog, and to R. Scott Samuel of Southern Pines, NC, who designed my ads and promotion material.

PS - Thanks to my brother Joe Hoyt of Miami, FL, who found the old Bombay card in his attic, and reminded all of us what the glory days of short pants were really like!

Me and Arty Didact and Mr. Arty D.

At the uber-creative handmade show last weekend at Minneapolis's Book Arts Center, Sharon Parker, a.k.a Arty Didact had one of the most impressive exhibitions I saw. Here she is, behind her display, and in between her hubby Craig Cox, and yours truly, old Poppy.

Sharon's remarkable talents extend to illustration, calendar making, witty gifts, hand-bound books, and much, much more.  If you ever get the chance to shop "Arty Didact" at one of Sharon's shows, plan to spend big and get even bigger pleasure in the process.

Dan's Got an Eye for the Alhambra.

My good buddy Dan and his wife just returned to the Twin Cities from a two-week trip to Espana. Ole!  

They saw all the sights (like the fabled Alhambra pictured here), hung out in the coolest, most sophisticated cities -- Barcelona, Madrid, Sevilla, et al -- and treated me to an occasional e-mail update and a superb pic from time to time.

Readers of the Poppy Blog know how much your humble blogger here enjoys taking and posting fine photos. And while I think we give a pretty decent accounting of ourselves with home-grown talent, I sure am glad that Dan came along.

Buddy Dan is an artist, designer and craftsman, you see, and he has a remarkable eye for just the right shot.  What do you all think?

Lovin' The Layered Velo Look.

Poppina thought I looked a little weird as I headed out for my ride on a chilly, windy late fall day.  Weird, yes, but layered and, hopefully, warm and cozy, I took the ribbing in stride.

I asked my bride to snap a shot so I could post it on the Poppy Blog, showing all you non-lycra, non-hard body riders like me, one way to get the job done.

Life, Love & Letterpress at LunaLux.

Jenni Undis of LunaLux on Harmon Place in Minneapolis, operates this old Letterpress equipment, wooden type and all.  And she lets her customers try their hand!

While visiting the shop during their 20th birthday party last weekend, Jenni and her pressmen interns, Forrest and Andrea, gave me free rein of the typebox, and ink sump, but just enough close supervision to keep me out of trouble.

I had a blast printing a broadside that read: Life & Love is What We Do Together.

You'll have to pay a visit of your own to the store, roll up your sleeves, learn to think dyslexic, and crank out some prints that are guaranteed to bring great joy of accomplishment.

Jimmy Choo - Eat Your Heart Out!

C'mon. WTF. Have you EVER seen a boot like this?  Fashionista Footwear in the extreme. Whoa.

My friend Dan is on holiday in Spain with his wife.  They've e-mailed me a few pictures of their adventures and discoveries:  in Toledo, Sevilla and Barcelona. Dan's got a good eye for a foto, and some of his memories match the ones Nancy and I have from our trips to Iberia.

But THIS. Unidentified and unexplained.  We've never seen anything like it.  As Nancy says:  how does the wearer balance herself in these heels?

And I say: I'll bet these damn things cost more than a pair of Chanels.

See Mike Hoyt's Mobile Drawing Table at MCAD.

Minneapolis artist, social chronicler, and Jerome Fellowship recipient, Michael Hoyt, pulls this mobile drawing studio behind his bike all over the Twin Cities. He invites local residents -- of some of the area's least reported-on communities -- to sit for a portrait, and tell Mike their stories.

The resulting art, scanned on the spot, and copies shared with subjects, bears the names of the citizens interviewed and sketched.

As the Jerome Fellowship show book at the current exhibit at Minneapolis College of Art and Design explains, "The premise of Mike's project is simple: seen together his portraits suggest a host of questions about place and identity,  pride and community, and the role of an artist when he 'pedals' beyond gallery walls."

Check out this exhibit for yourself.  It's at the College of Art and Design now through the 10th of November.

Bring the Troops Home.

I was standing next to a fellow vet at a Don't Bomb Syria protest in Minneapolis earlier this summer. When I noticed his tatts and wristbands took this foto -- as much out of curiosity as in contrast to my barren arms. One of the organizers asked for "a show of hands" from first-time protest attendees.  Mine shot up; this other guy stayed rock solid.  He'd been here before it seems.

Minnesota's Hautman Brothers, Primo Wildlife Artists.

Our local Twin Cities media is a buzz with news of the Hautman Brothers, Minnesota Wildlife Artists and Conservation Stamp contributors.  

Poppina and I took in the Hautman exhibit at Minnetonka Center for the Arts -- impressive, humbling, prolific.  Birds, deer, bear, dogs, fish, and landscape abound.

You'd be making a big mistake if you didn't see this show.  And, read all about it in the StarTribune, too.

This Guy Jeff Can Paint Like No Other.

We've written here about the flood in our basement as a result of a huge storm back in June.  Little by little the pieces have been picked up, the destruction repaired, the house put back together.

One of the final steps on the road to sanity is a fresh coat of paint (primer first, of course) over new sheetrock.  There is also new trim work and baseboards; fresh paint covers that real estate as well.

Jeff was the craftsman/maestro/artiste.  Wonderful job he did. Thank you. As for you readers and viewers, we're only sorry we can't show you all Jeff's handiwork here on the Poppy Blog.

This Guy Hillegass Paints a Different Way.

Minneapolis entrepreneur Jim Hillegass took up painting (self-taught) barely a year ago.  He paints, paints, paints like a man possessed, and is very good at it. He loves nothing more than finishing a canvas a day.  Not those big babies you see him working on in this photo.  But art like the one I commissioned from Jim -- took him no time and the result -- c'est magnifique!

Brother Joe Saddles up the New Brooks Cambium C17.

C'mon. You just KNOW you want one of these new Brooks "Cambium" C 17 Ltd.  saddles on YOUR road bike. Just check it out.

My brother Joe ordered one direct from England, installed it on his Le Mond as soon as the seat arrived stateside. Fifty miles into Joe's ride around Dade County, his home, and his rear tire blew.

My bro gets a new tube while I get a photo of the new saddle to share with readers of Poppy's Velo Ventures.

I've read the seat's specs:  organic cotton covering proprietary vulcanized rubber, plus a stiff pad of fabric. The saddle is light-issimo, requires no break-in, is waterproof and durable, and costs a pretty penny (farthing).