Growing Up in a Smaller World in St Louis Park

Park Bench Perspectives: Growing Up in a Smaller World

First off Mike Hammer and Carlos Figueroa really appreciate all the great feedback.  We recorded this episode before receiving comments but rest assured SLP Food Part 2 is on the agenda for next week.

Park Bench Perspectives, as two longtime friends chatting on a virtual park bench about their lives, the St. Louis Park, Minnesota community they grew up in, and current events. They discuss how friendships can resume effortlessly after years and reflect on how their childhood world felt geographically small, expanding through bikes, sports, and later broader social circles, contrasting that with how the internet expands kids’ worlds today. They reminisce about the Eliot neighborhood and Eliot Elementary, teachers and school memories, hiding chocolate milk, and sports and biking adventures, including Evel Knievel-inspired jumps. They recall anxiety about mixed-grade “Team Room,” Eliot’s closure, being merged with rival Cedar Manor, and resulting friendships. They touch on social anxiety, learning about people through conversation, bar-industry dynamics around “freebies,” and invite viewers to comment and join the community.

00:00 Theme Song Intro

00:39 Welcome to the Bench

01:02 Why the Bench Matters

01:33 Old Friends Chemistry

03:02 Growing Up Pre Internet

03:45 Eliot Neighborhood Boundaries

04:33 Sports and Skating Days

05:47 Bikes and Dirt Jumps

07:20 Eliot School Memories

07:38 Chocolate Milk Heist

09:57 Name Stories and Chuck Norris

11:27 Teachers and Team Room Anxiety

13:23 Childhood Crush Memories

13:33 School Closure Shock

14:05 Rival Schools Merge

15:58 Classroom Chaos Stories

17:18 Friendships Over Time

18:16 Small Talk And Anxiety

20:18 Avon Collectibles Tangent

21:08 Bar Friends And Freebies

23:39 Growing Up And High School

24:05 Community Call And Signoff

Sponsors

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If your feet are barking louder than your opinions, check out Foot Pain Authority for insoles and relief. Mention that you “heard about it on the bench.” 

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From Carlos

Carlos also shares an update on his upcoming psychological thriller, The Ghost of Lake Osakis, andI write essays on my Substack about institutions, technology, and change.  https://substack.com/@carlosmfigueroa

Join the conversation

What St. Louis Park restaurant do you remember most? Drop a comment and tell us which places still live rent-free in your memory.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:25

Are you doing my camera? Come on, Lister Finger Room. I am outstanding or standing out.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

As long as you're not out, you're not outstanding in your field, right? Oh, yeah, I'm doing good. Good to see you, my friend. Good to see you. Hey, welcome folks to Park Bench Perspectives. We're two longtime friends. See, I didn't use the word old that time. I spent time on a on a virtual park bench talking about our lives, the city we grew up in, St. Louis Park, Minnesota, and what we see is going on in the world today. Just a couple of old friends having a conversation, and we're happy to have you sit on the bench next to us and have a listen. I like that the bench.

SPEAKER_02 1:03

Put it on the bench. Get on the bench, you know, on different things. It means if you never get off the bench, you always on the bench. I'm a bench player. But you know what?

SPEAKER_01 1:10

Here's the thing: people people complain about the bench, but you know, there's a sixth man award in the NBA, right? No. Right? Where does that sixth man sit? And sometimes, you know, sitting on the bench, you get a good perspective.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

Boom.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Oh wow. Do you like stay up all night making these up?

SPEAKER_02 1:24

Or just during the day when I'm sitting here. We're gonna get this tambourine work. And that's an interesting term because it's been a lot of years that we have been friends. And you have friends that are just like uh wearing glove. You dive back into where you were last time you saw me in a sneeze, and you're always like it's so good to see so and so because it it takes no effort. And that's a beauty of it. Some people, you're really good friends, but you're like, gotta have some energy for this one.

SPEAKER_01 2:06

You know, my Mike, you and I have known each other for 56 years about that. And you know, so when we talk, we basically our conversations are remembering our life as we grew up, talking about the world today, and maybe talking about how the world's different than that. So we're basically throwing a microphone on our conversations here.

SPEAKER_02 2:27

And it's kind of like brother from another mother type thing, where I say your siblings, no one's gonna know you better than your siblings because you're gonna be in a relationship with them longer than anybody else. Parents go, whatever. But but friendships like this is borderline that because you at this point now where you know you can't get rid of me. And it's kind of like it's a brother, you know, how he does those things. Why do you stay?

SPEAKER_01 2:59

Why do you stay it's not like she was like, why do you stay brothers with him? Well, one of the things I love about you, Mike, is I love your perspective. And you shared with me a perspective that I found interesting, and I think we should pursue it, which is thinking about the world we grew up in and how small that world was, and as we got older, how it got bigger. And I don't I don't I don't think you can make the same analogies to today's world for kids growing up because the internet opens up the whole world. I mean, to us, if we wanted to know about the world, we either go to the library or I'd grab, you know, one of the encyclopedia britannicas that my parents had purchased for us.

SPEAKER_02 3:35

There was a funny story. I was talking to somebody earlier on the on the encyclopedia, but real quick about how small our world turned out to be, but how big it was in our eyes. Yes, and it was bordered by Highway 12, Sheeta Lake Road, Louisiana, and as far east as you could go, because the Highway 100 or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

But and and just you know, let's give some people an idea of what our youthful perspective was. You know, we grew up in the north side of St. Louis Park, but it was called the Elliott neighborhood. Elliot Divine and You know, I mean, I my world was school, yeah, it was friends, and then and expanded a little bit with Cub League and Blue League Baseball and Cub Scouts, but it really was my entire universe was the people that I went to school with and I played ball with, and the ones I played with in the neighborhood.

SPEAKER_02 4:28

The neighborhood was it was just it was big, but it was so small when we got older. But the funny part about the neighborhood was there wasn't a lot of hockey players, and I bring this up. When you get into hockey, you know, it was like our neighborhood didn't play hockey, we played basketball for some reason. Yeah, and the dads were like, I don't know anything.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

I mean, there was there was there was the you could skate over there behind the firehouse right there in in you know off Louisiana and Cedar Lake Road. But I skated there all the time. Saturday and Sunday, it was great. You went out there until your feet hurt and whatever.

SPEAKER_02 5:00

When you could get off the two blaze out of one, that was a big step.

SPEAKER_01 5:03

I I actually I think I picked basketball for my winter sport because I can't play baseball during summer or during winter in Minnesota, but the more important thing was I was tall. You were tall that you were told. I was tall. I was you know, I was basically this height when I was 11 or 12, and then something happened. I I used to play on the traveling team there in St. Louis Park in my sixth, seventh grade, and you know, Mike Gavrin was her coach, and I was really good because I was tall, and then I something happened between 13 and 14, where I went from the tallest kid on the team to like the seventh tallest, and it was all the same kids. That was funny. I I peeked early, Hammer. I peeked early. You know what? I I you know I led in scoring and also in the lowest uh shot percentage, and the most rebounds, right? Yeah, I was a rebounding machine. Yeah, so our world was small and big, and when we didn't bikes were the first thing that expanded our world.

SPEAKER_02 5:55

Oh, and Kenny got the stingray, the banana seed, yeah, the lowest stingray with the gear shift of the three seeds. Did you have bike envy? I just I think a lot of times you get into bike not really, it wasn't like there was people running out buying new bikes, but we put together a lot of bikes. We got parts, yeah, and we learned how to put together.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

You know, I don't maybe that's I never was part of car culture, and maybe I uh because I wasn't part of bike culture, but I never I never I had a bike. I don't remember doing anything other than maybe as a little kid, I put turbocharger in it by putting a baseball card against my spokes. Beyond that, that that's the limit of my my my attempt to be Greg Lamond or or Lance Armstrong.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

And you're like, don't do this to me. You you're marking me. Don't do it. But across the street, so that Elliott is funny. You know, the older kids would have their bikes, and like I said, it was part when you got all you got a dirt bike. Yeah, a dirt bike. Yes, yeah, not a power one.

SPEAKER_01 6:52

You know what? We were all idolizing evil can evil. So we wanted to do jumps, robots up the street.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

They had real dirt bikes motorized.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

Just to clarify, that was the family name. He wasn't insulting the family.

SPEAKER_02 7:03

Nope, that was the last name. And then at Elliott across the street, we would go in the one parking lot where the faculty parking lot was, and we would go off that little four or five foot embankment and we'd try to clear the pavement. And if you didn't, you got hurt. But if you did, you were up to the biggest.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

I miss old Elliott Elementary. You know, the number of hours I spent hitting a tennis ball against the side of that brick building.

SPEAKER_02 7:27

Yeah, and the in the back in the playground area, yeah. There, how many game sevens of the World Series I picked? Because I I painted I painted a strike zone in the bricks there.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

I and actually, you know what? I mean, my world was Elliott Elementary, and and I think one of my very first memories of you was you and I showing up very early before school. And one of the things of the joys back in that day was that you could use your milk ticket to get chocolate milk. The only problem, there was only like four or five or six pints for the whole school. So the odds are you wouldn't have them. So Mike taught me if we show up early and then we take a couple of chocolate milks and we bury them underneath in the bottom milk cart milk crates. Then when we go to lunch, we can just pull it up and grab my chocolate milk, which worked brilliantly. And once again, I I'm in awe of your problem solving skills, even back then. Just if they don't see it, it's not there. Yeah, Mrs. Towy was the principal, Miss Connors was my kindergarten teacher, Miss Granzo slash Allenbeck, because she got married mid-year, was my first grade teacher. My second grade teacher was Mrs. Quartz. You had quartz.

SPEAKER_02 8:40

That's that's where we split up because we had kindergarten and first grade. And I remember, and then I'll be let you get back to Mrs. Quartz after Mrs. Quartz's second, but Mrs. Connor, first day of kindergarten. Yeah, no matter how boisterous you become in life, you're trying to fly under the radar. You just want to get through this day. Like I just said, what's going on? First day of class in Mrs. Connors goes. Well, you know, class, we do have a celebrity amongst us. Oh, yeah. And everybody's like, whoo, what does that mean, even? Yeah, Mike Hammer, Clark Executive, and I'm looking, going, Why is she picking on me? What whoa, this isn't on the radar. This is whoa, way over him. I didn't even know what radar was back then. But she said, I had I go, hold on, I go, Mom, why do people owe me? You don't know what I mean. Mickey Splay was a writer in this, and when he wrote his book, Mike Hammer was a character. Everyone was a private eye. It was a character, and it was in a couple movies, and it was in a show with Stacey Keats. He's Stacey Keats. That was on when we were in high school, I think. Mike, private eye. But yeah, one of my children said, Dad, you never said, told me about Mike Hammer was a character. And I said, I said in all my life, Mike Hammer private eye for no other reason that that was that there wasn't Mike Hammer Private Eye.

SPEAKER_01 9:57

I'm gonna give you an analogous story, then go back to the teachers. Your story about Mrs. Connors and Mike Hammer reminds me of me in college as an undergrad at St. Thomas, and I think I was probably a sophomore junior, and I was taking a foreign policy class, and I cannot remember the name of the professor. But he says to me, he goes, Oh, are you the infamous Carlos? And I had no freaking clue what he I eventually learned as a foreign policy class that for over 20 years, the most infamous terrorist, the number one on the most wanted list, they'd never seen a picture of him, they didn't know his name, and they referred to him as Carlos, the jackal. So if you've heard of the jackal, it was Carlos. So once again, I had that same reaction. Like, why are you picking on me? Why are you singling me out now? Yeah, and I, you know, and I wasn't I wasn't five, I was, you know, 21. Tie it all together.

SPEAKER_02 10:47

Today the news came out that a famous person passed away, and that in our life he was Mr. Karate. So when he punched lines about Chuck Norris, did you know his name was Carlos?

SPEAKER_01 11:00

I you know what? I actually was telling Pam that last night. She didn't believe me. And I'm like, no, it says it right here. I saw it on the internet, it must be true.

SPEAKER_02 11:07

So and so for me, I'm like, oh, is he Latin? Somewhere along the lines of the Lord. Exactly. Like, where did that come from? You can't be uh just you can't be Norwegian and call Carlos.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

Or or you know what? Maybe his dad just likes to screw with people. Thank you. Look at Mike Hammer doing the research that I didn't do. Yeah, see, Chuck Norris didn't need an ethnicity behind his name. He made it his. All right, I'm gonna pull that string and get us back on track and talk about my third grade teacher who I remember, yeah, Mrs. Thompson.

SPEAKER_02 11:34

Oh, she was fun.

SPEAKER_01 11:35

Fourth grade?

SPEAKER_02 11:36

In a good way.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Fourth grade, Miss Popovich. Popovich, she was yeah. She also attended my church, Ascension Lutheran, our little Lutheran church that no longer exists on Cedar Lake Road in Hampshire. But she was a member, she was always supporting the youth. Then in fifth grade, we were in a science experiment called Team Room, where they said, let's throw some fifth and sixth graders together. And you know, my anxiety-ridden body went crazy because I'm like, My God, sixth graders.

SPEAKER_02 12:03

Each grade had a separate one. If you didn't want to be in the team room, yeah, fifth grade had a fifth grade class for the people that didn't want to get sixth grade. No, but so did you think you were did your parents make you go, or did you want to go?

SPEAKER_01 12:16

I do not know how I got in there, but I will tell you this you you bury your soul on these things. So, you know, I have struggled with anxiety my whole life, and I had a massive bout of it. I don't know if you remember, I missed the first two weeks of school in fifth grade because my body couldn't handle it. I was freaking out, and interesting. I don't remember what the prognosis was and this and that, but I know it was.

SPEAKER_02 12:35

I was scared shitless to be around sixth graders, you know, talking about how big or smaller the world was. Yeah, let's just talk about for a second our own little world in our mind. Because I don't remember not seeing you for two weeks because I was stuck in my little old mind, like whatever. But I think part of why we went in it because my sister was two years older and she was in it, yeah, and she told me how cool it was and how fun it was. You didn't have a desk, you had tables, and you had a tote, and your tote was up there.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

So we had two teachers uh Miss Workheimer, yes, and Miss Saturday, anyways. If we pulled out no, Hollandbeck was my first grade teacher, anyways.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

This is my sister's oldest had her as a teenager. Miss Albeck as a teacher. Oh, funny. Her hair still looked the same.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Was it she had the beehive? No. Oh my god, she broke my little hawk with five-year-old heart when she got married mid-year because for sure I was gonna propose if that other guy didn't jump in. So, sixth grade, they shut down our beloved Elliott school, and we have to go over again and share a school with our rivals that hated Cedar Man.

SPEAKER_02 13:43

Cedar Manor, half of us went to Cedar Man, another half went to Peter Hobart. Now, do you remember back to small world, small mind? Do you remember any of the discussions going on?

SPEAKER_01 13:54

I just could not understand. Like, I was told that I could not cross the railroad tracks, and that was why I could not go to Peter Hobart because I didn't want to go to Cedar Manor because we hated them because we always competed them in sports. And I've got some tremendous friends that went to Cedar Manor, but I'm talking about my 11-year-old mind thinking about having to go, and I want to go to Peter Harbor, and I'm like, how the hell did Mike Schultz able to go to Peter Hobart? He's got to cross the Satan railroad track.

SPEAKER_02 14:18

Peter Hobart was three quarters of a mile from Mount Hill, Cedar Manor was two miles, and it didn't make sense, but things happened for a reason that I don't remember. I I want in my mind thinking back, it was just all of a sudden somebody got up today. Today we're closing Elliott, and that's it, and there's no discussion, boom, and all of a sudden we went along with it. But I'm sure it happened more like there was discussions and talk.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

That's why, as we were growing up, we're watching schools get closed right behind us because not enough kids, not enough babies. Sam Louis Park used to graduate 1200, 1400 kids. And what was it like 253? No, for us, we had 485. Wow. I knew like three of them. Oh, I mean, I knew I knew you and Kenny, and that's about it. I knew all of them, I think. You do, you you are Mr. Social.

SPEAKER_02 15:05

And it wasn't like we didn't random rave and stop. Also, it was like, well, this sucks. You gotta go over there. All right, I'm going out to play now.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

This is this is this discussion over because just tell me where I gotta be when I gotta be there. I remember, and I think that this was in the Sun Sailor because I remember seeing it as a quote, and it is so innocently sweet that I remember it. George, our dear janitor at Elliott, said when they combined us with Cedar May, because what's this gonna mean for youth sports in St. Louis Park? He was very concerned that fourth and fifth and sixth graders were not gonna have proper competition. And you know what? Good for you, George, caring about the things that nobody else was caring about.

SPEAKER_02 15:46

But remember that we were the only here that got to keep our.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

We did. We actually did compete as Elliot while we were in class with Cedar Manor, which I don't know, it doesn't strike me as smart planning, but that's how they did it. And they put me, uh Kenny, and Roger Cruzy in the same class. We were in Mrs. Johnson's class on day one. We were sitting next to each other, all four of us in the corner. And on day two, we were all sitting in the four corners of the room. And on day three, well, Mike was out in the hall. Yeah, and let's just say that was day after day after day after day. I think you and I got kicked out of class one time for playing cards during a film strip or a movie. Yeah, and so we got kicked out and we went out in the hall with the cards, and so we were sitting outside playing, and then Mr. Siegel, our wonderful principal Cedar Manor, said, Wait a minute, why are you guys outside in the hallway playing cards? And he made you and I go on separate sides of the hallway, not across, but a long way, like 100 yards away from each other.

SPEAKER_02 16:48

One thing to do uh out in the hallway to cheer my boredom. A couple times I brought jacks in the Super Bowl playing jacks until yeah, someone spotted me doing that. Buzz kill. Todd used to get kicked out once in a while on the same side. Yeah, and we used to both Super Bowl back and forth. Let's go now. We met, and I Mr. Nelson, I think, was a teacher, the fifth grade teacher of the classroom that so it was we got to be friends because he'd always come out and say, just thought I'd come out and say hi to you for a bit and talk.

SPEAKER_01 17:18

And yeah, that was you know, I mean, long term, so many friendships were created there, right? I mean, you know, lifelong friendships and so, but once again, the world is very small when you're 11 years old and you don't see that, you just see how is this gonna affect my little league, well, not my little league game, but my basketball game or my football game.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

When I have old friends, you gotta start early. I've made friends way back then, and all the way along, I've had friends that some are only a year long, but they feel like they're a lot longer.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Yeah, and it just I actually have folks. I mean, you know, we're Facebook friends, right? We're acquaintances. Yep. But they're folks I've kind of picked up along the way that I worked with them for a year, like 20 years ago, and we still have so many great stories and stuff that I kind of want to see how he's doing and what's going on. And if if fate ever puts us in the same city at the same time, it'd be nice to have a beer with them. I those relationships for me are harder to create. I I find it fascinating that I grew up. My father and you are so very similar in terms of how social you are and how genuinely interested you are in other human beings. And I am equally genuinely interested in other human beings, but I do not have the whatever it is that allows me to spark up a conversation. What's the strange kind of like the commercials? Uh what is it? Don't don't become your parents' commercials, but I'm like, oh, and those I don't like it. Yeah, I'm seriously, uh, you know what? Everybody should at the ballet. Hey, what's the coolest car you ever drove? You ever got a chance to drive? You're in Vegas. I mean, come on, yeah, they have to ask that. Or, you know, Pam always asks when we're in a cab. So, any celebrities you've ever had in the cab? What are the stories? Because it's like going, you're in the car, anyways. You might as well hear fun stories.

SPEAKER_02 19:03

If we're all there, they they're just as bored as you are. So talk to them, you know. They don't want to talk to turn the radio up louder. It's it's fun to find out other people's things, and a lot of times you find uh what they're doing, the perspective, and then you find out, hey, we got a lot in common, and sometimes you're like, but I don't have time to reminisce with my old friends to make new friends.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

I'm sorry, but I mean, here's the thing is I you know, people are often shocked when I tell them about like social anxiety and stuff because if I know you and I'm comfortable with you, I will talk your freaking ear off. You'll wish that I wasn't able to talk. Yeah, but I'm just you know, to me, there is no more horrible event than going to like a cocktail or a social hour that's professional. I hate that. Like I have to go with somebody that's social like you and be on your hip the whole time because like God, walking up to a group of four or five people that are talking and having them stop talking when you show up. I mean, my brain is making up all kinds of scenarios that are crazy.

SPEAKER_02 20:09

I guess a lot of it's been from a young age, being, you know, my friend my mom and Torus Rell. So on Avon has other stuff, isn't it? But just that ability to look and see and ask questions.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

And uh my mom was an Avon lady too.

SPEAKER_02 20:23

Uh Avon, that was funny back then. How many little figurines of clone aftershaved you have saying that?

SPEAKER_01 20:29

Okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Have you ever looked up on eBay what people get for those Avon cologne containers that are not they're still sealed, not open? Oh no, no, no, it doesn't, it can be empty. It's like, you know, the I can I had them all and it pisses me off. I throw them all away. Like the little race car. He's carrying a cowboy hat, cowboy hat. No, but you go on eBay, those things sell for a fortune.

SPEAKER_02 20:53

We had a bunch of them too. My grandpa had a bunch of them too.

SPEAKER_01 20:56

Well, my my dad would say my Maria did not sell Avon, she just bought samples.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

Yeah, and and told the neighbors what she bought. I'm not trying to sell it to you, really. I'm just gonna have to tell them to knock on your door and show them what I bought. It was easy to somebody walks in, you're gonna be like, hey, yeah, hey, you're my new buddy.

SPEAKER_01 21:13

I mean, you have to be, I suppose you have to be there anyways. They're coming in, and and and the more they feel happy, the bigger your tip, right?

SPEAKER_02 21:20

Well, and the more they come back, and that's a bigger tip is you get these the lifelong value of the customer.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

My friends in the bar business that are your bar friends, yeah, in a sense that from a working customer standpoint, they come in to see you, you talk to them, and then maybe you go out once well outside of the bar, and a lot of times you're like, no, let's just keep it so so let me ask you this because this is a massive tangent, but I'm curious about it, and I'm actually also writing something about the bar business right now. What is the danger of having friends that want to have freebies? Because to me, I've always had the rule. If your friend is selling a product, you need to. Purchase it at full price to support them and not try to get freebies and discounts. That's what you should do if you have a friend in business. That's just Carlos's philosophy. But I would imagine that you have a lot of folks who are like going, you know, I don't want to pay.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

Well, here's the thing that's funny, and I you find this out in that industry, you find a lot of things about human nature. And uh it revolved around birthdays about time. Somebody buy me a drink. It's my birthday. And you're like, So a birthday present is something you buy someone, but now you made a request. So I'm gonna I'm fulfilling an obligation, not giving you a present. So I don't want to buy you a drink now because so what? I you had a birthday.

SPEAKER_01 22:39

I gotta I gotta interrupt because it's one of my dad's stories about my dad. My dad had an employee, a God lovem. I won't mention his name, but he said to my dad, my wife's pregnant, I'm gonna need a raise. And my dad's like, I'm fairly certain I did not get your wife pregnant, so I do not see how this is a Carlos problem. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 22:57

And it was their birthday, they didn't say a word. Yeah, they had more drinks lined up in front of them. They could do it. But as soon as you forced the hand and say, It's my birthday bite. That was not a gift.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

It's no, it's no, yeah, it's an obligation, nothing, something nice for you.

SPEAKER_02 23:11

I'm a you're taking that away from me. I'm feeling this obligation you feel like because your parents had sex so many years ago, I owe you a drink. I don't know where I fit into that scenario. But also, but would friends come in? Yes, you want to do nice for now, but and people that would do some labor, some stuff that like, oh, I got the cheapest. Like, no, don't sell me out. You say I got a guy that does a really good job and at a really fair price. Well, my my when we started drinking, yeah. Not to say that that was part of our life, but it was how it got a little bit bigger and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

But well, you started partying and meeting and you know, meeting people from different schools, like different walks of life, and it's like the world gets bigger as you get older.

SPEAKER_02 23:54

I got Bandworth Central, and as we got the high school, and yeah, first saw a freshman at the high school in 34 years or something. We were well received.

SPEAKER_01 24:04

Yeah, yeah, that's great. I'm gonna just encourage folks, please, to leave comments if there's something that you think we should talk about, or and if we've given too much of a north side of St. Louis Park bias, tell us what was going on on the other areas in St. Louis Park. Tell us your favorite restaurant, leave a comment or send us an email, or we're happy to have you on the show to share your perspective because we really want to make this conversation in a community talking about our community. Where do they find your stuff too? You know, I actually will have some links shortly to my new novel called The Ghost of Lake Osaka. And then right now, I'll put the link in the show notes for my Substack where I write articles, systemsunderpressure.substack.com.

SPEAKER_02 24:46

And let's leave them with this till they'll come back for another episode. But you know, I guess it's time to park it. All right, where do we park it? On the bench, my friend. Because we just shared with you our perspective. Bench perspectives. I'm dropping the proverbial bike hammer out.

SPEAKER_01 25:03

All right. Next time, thanks for joining us.

SPEAKER_00 25:07

Watching all the world go by now. Underneath the hazy sky now. Got my ticket for the long ride. Yeah, from my park bench perspective. I got that wide-eyed view online. From my parkbench perspective, helping me to win the top five.