It felt like it! (And on the Celsius scale, it actually was.)
Consumer confidence may be down at COVID levels, and Black Friday ads are increasingly oriented to websites, but it's still Black Friday. If you give a boy a parking lot, he's going to want to take a picture of it. At least it was warmer than last year, though at first not by much. Eventually the sun came out and it was all right.
Along the way, I saw this marquee.
Question, 224 Collins Road NE
It was not funny, which weirdly reassured me I was not becoming hypothermic.
Answer, 224 Collins Road NE
Strong Towns started Black Friday Parking in 2013; my first year was 2015, covering roughly the same territory as this year. For the record, I also wore the same Garfield School sweatshirt. The Parking Reform Network has taken over the promotion, but the point remains the same: to document excess surface parking, even on what is arguably the busiest shopping day of the year (Lefebvre 2025).
I started a little past 9:00 at the bus stop on Twixt Town Road, close by the Collins Road Square shopping plaza. It was maybe one-third full.
Collins Road Square, looking towards Petco
Collins Road Square, looking towards Michael's
Across Collins Road is Lindale Mall, which dates from the early 1960s, but the Collins Road side has gotten quite the facelift. Its many parking lots were half-full, maybe more.
Lindale Mall, parking lot facing Collins Road
Hobby Lobby had the fullest parking lot I saw, easily 60 and maybe 75 percent full...
180 Collins Road, looking towards Hobby Lobby
...but even that plaza had plenty of empty spaces.
180 Collins Road, other side of the plaza
There were no cars parked in the huge lot on the other side of Collins Road. It has been vacant since the Hy-Vee grocery store. I don't know for a fact that Hy-Vee is retaining ownership of the building and just leaving it vacant, but I wouldn't put it past them; they tried that at their Mound View store, which also remains vacant anyhow.
empty parking lot at vacant building, 279 Collins Road (utility pole cleverly used to block sun)
Across Northland Avenue from the former grocery store, however, Northland Square plaza's parking lot was well used, being at least 60 percent full.
Northland Square from the east
But even today, there were plenty of parking spots going unused.
Northland Square, middle of the plaza
I cut across the Collins Aerospace parking lot--mostly empty, with a skeleton crew working today--and ended up at the Blairs Ferry Road Target. It had a lot of shoppers, and its parking lot was at least two-thirds full...
Target parking lot, east edge
...but a great big parking lot is hard to fill.
Target parking lot, west edge
I've said most years that I don't think these particular parking lots are driven by mandates in the zoning code (though those do exist). It's just how we develop commercial strips. Collins Road may be the ghastliest such strip in our city--though the Westdale area gets some votes, too--but it's just one example of development we shouldn't be doing. The parking lots themselves are just part of the damage, but they do more damage in town than they do on the suburban edge. I'll have more to say about that in a future post.
In a Strong Towns post entitled "What Comes Next After Abolishing Parking Mandates?" Tony Jordan of the Parking Reform Network argues that repealing such mandates is the first step on road to truly walkable cities:
To build the type of cities we want, to take advantage of zoning reforms that re-legalize compact, walkable, and transit-rich neighborhoods, we have to continue to pursue comprehensive parking reforms that go beyond repealing minimums and actively combat car dependency. Fortunately, these additional reforms and strategies are also simple, impactful, and fiscally advantageous. Cities should price their curbs to manage demand and spend the revenue on infrastructure and programs that improve safe, convenient, and equitable access to our communities for people traveling by any mode, not just in their cars. (Jordan 2022, italics mine)
I don't know quite what to make of the whirl of events surrounding Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), third term member of the U.S. House until recently known for a series of inflammatory statements that made her one of President Trump's most vocal supporters in Congress--and, however weirdly, one of the most effective at rallying the base and getting under the skin of Democrats: "Once greeted with derision by Washingtonians as a shrill and zany show pony, she is now seen more as a savvy operator who understands the conservative base like few others" (Draper 2025).
I also don't know what to think about the Epstein files, information related to the superpedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who died in 2019. Releasing the files won't get anyone fed or access to health care, nor will they help us mitigate climate change. Nevertheless, the Trump administration has been turning themselves into pretzels to keep them under wraps, so I can only conclude there must be something in there that Trump needs us not to know.
Yet, while Attorney General Pam Bondi, House Speaker Mike Johnson, and Sassmonger in Chief Karoline Leavitt have done what they can to protect the President from Epstein revelations, Greene was one of four Republican House representatives to sign a discharge petition directing the files be released by the Justice Department. All four personally resisted Trump's calls to unsign the petition, which passed both houses and then was signed by Trump. Shortly thereafter, Greene (alone among the four hardheads) announced she would resign her congressional seat after the first of the year.
[A}ccording to interviews with friends and associates... she had become politically isolated, feeling betrayed by Mr. Trump, disgusted with her own party and friendless among the Democratic opposition. When Mr. Trump announced on Truth Social last week that he had had enough of Ms. Greene’s apostasies, labeling her “Marjorie Traitor Greene” and threatening to run a primary opponent in her district, Ms. Greene felt blindsided. Terrified by the ensuing wave of death threats aimed at her and her family from apparent supporters of Mr. Trump, she could no longer see any upside to duking it out in the political arena. (Draper 2025)
I am not imagining that Greene has had a road to Damascus experience, and that she will now be advocating for abortion rights and citizenship for immigrants, or that she will join a holy order like Duke Frederick at the end of As You Like It. If she is a candidate again, or if she attempts conservative media stardom (Drenon 2025), I expect she'll be the same old MTG. (Call it the Megyn Kelly rule?) I don't feel at all sorry for her; she is reaping the whirlwind that she herself sowed. I am, however, impressed that she found her moral core, a line across which she would not take her partisan hackery.
In our city, we're not going to agree on everything, and on some things we will find ourselves to be strongly opposed. But I for one can respect, and deal with, people who find some core values that are more important to them than partisanship or financial advantage.
Vivian Gornick, The Odd Woman and the City: A Memoir (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2015), 173 pp.
He strikes a match and holds it to his cigarette.
"I'm not the right person for this life," I say.
"Who is?" he says, exhaling in my direction. (36)
Ten years ago this month, I reflected on the defeat of a local referendum to raise the library tax, and read Vivian Gornick's celebration of life in New York City, while the world around me was showing gun violence, terror attacks, and anti-Muslim sentiment. This month, Cedar Rapids voted down bonds that would have funded public school capital projects ("Cedar Rapids Schools Thank" 2025), and a white nationalist cadre is fueling the Trump administration's tear-gas attacks on American cities and their terror campaign against immigrants (cf. Schulze 2025, Carrasquillo 2025). Seemed about time I revisited Vivian Gornick.
Ready to read, at Brewhemia in New Bohemia
On second reading, her segmented essay proved to contain so much more than I'd caught the first time through. She indeed celebrates the life around her in her long-time hometown, but out of need more than pleasure. Like Thomas Merton, her days have included both dark nights and promising dawns. Parker Palmer (2011: 36-38) would describe hers as a "heart broken open," with love born from pain.
As I reread The Odd Woman and the City, I found myself underlining and circling, marking passages with abandon. It's worth noting that I almost never do this. Some people do. U.S. President John Adams engaged in a running dialogue with whatever he was reading, at least once scrawling "Fool! Fool!!" at some work that displeased him. I wasn't arguing with her, though, just trying to keep up with the numerous dimensions in her reflections, as she jumped around in time, and roped in exemplars from street people to other writers. There is so much I wanted to show you in this book that I didn't discuss in 2015. It would probably be easier on you, me, and Gornick, though, if you just read it.
"The City" is, after all, only part of the title. "The Odd Woman" is Gornick herself, which she announces early (p. 4), but without telling us why or how. In time she tells us that, growing up in the Bronx, she and her friends were already walkers, and what she saw as she walked up and down the streets of Manhattan showed her what she anticipated would be her life (p. 11, p. 51). But it was not to be, despite advanced degrees, relationships, and jobs. She simply could not--would not?--fit in anywhere. Her longtime friend Leonard tells her:
"Fifty years ago you entered a closet marked 'marriage.' In the closet was a double set of clothes, so stiff they could stand up by themselves. A woman stepped into a dress called 'wife' and the man stepped into a suit called 'husband.' And that was it. They disappeared inside the clothes. Today, we don't pass. We're standing here naked. That's all." (36)
Freedom from traditional roles had become freedom from any role, intolerable because "no one wanted freedom" (p. 121), an insight she attributes to Henry James. She identifies with Mary Barfoot, the main character in George Gissing's novel The Odd Woman; Rose, the mother in the musical Gypsy; and John Dylan, an actor whose stroke left him with a speech impediment that he used to disturbing effect in a public reading of a work by Samuel Beckett.
Gornick's oddness, and her "inability to make peace with" herself (p. 19), is survivable only in the city. Walking becomes a sort of therapy once "nothing turned out as expected" (p. 14), but it is even more than that. It is her connection to people: Leonard, with whom she converses so intently that time becomes unreal (p. 17); the active residents of Manhattan's West Side, which she prefers to the "calmer, cleaner, more spacious" East Side (p. 94); and even the men in line at a soup kitchen, who remind her of journalist's line about "ruined faces worthy of Michelangelo" (p. 152). "It's the voices I can't do without" (p. 173), like the three she samples in rapid succession on pp. 37-38, but she is also comforted by all the nearby presences as she goes to bed at night (p. 21).
Frank O'Hara (1926-1966)
Along the way we meet her mother, ex-lovers, other friends, and any number of writers on these themes, including the poet Charles Reznikoff (p. 38), the novelist Isabel Bolton (p. 79; see also Bloom 2016), and Frank O'Hara, who wrote: I can't even enjoy a blade of grass unless I know there's a subway handy, or a record store or some other sign that people don't totally regret life (p. 42). Once you allow for the possibility of oddness, it's everywhere.
Gornick is still with us at 90; she turned 80 the year The Odd Woman and the City was published. In old age, she seems satisfied she's figured out what her problem is. But it continues to be the people of her city who make the "odd" life satisfying. She concludes:
I am home, having dinner at my table, looking out at the city. My mind flashes on all who crossed my path today. I hear their voices, I see their gestures, I start filling in lives for them. Soon they are company, great company. I think to myself, I'd rather be here with you tonight than with anyone else I know. Well, almost anyone else I know. I look up at the great clock on my wall, the one that gives the date as well as the hour. It's time to call Leonard. (175)
Goodyear, Sarah; Gordon, Doug; and Naparstek, Aaron. Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile. Penguin Random House, 2025, xix + 282 pp.
Like every American younger than 80 years of age, I have lived all my life with cars. When I was a mere tot, my mom used to take my sister and me for rides around town after lunch. Later, a car became my preferred way of getting to school, and once I got my drivers' license, a ready and able way to get anywhere I wanted to go.
In a country where most adults drive to get almost everywhere, our towns have been designed around making driving convenient and parking readily accessible. It's how our world has looked since before we were born, and we've heard its attributes celebrated in advertising and entertainment media. Only with effort can the substantial social costs of all these cars and all this driving become apparent, and it takes even more effort to imagine a different way of designing places.
Life After Cars is a handy survey of all those social costs of driving. I have long been a fan of The War on Cars, a slightly edgy but erudite podcast out of New York City that began in 2018 as a three-way collaboration between journalist-activists Sarah Goodyear, Doug Gordon, and Aaron Naperstek. I don't remember how I found out about it, but it can't have been too long after the podcast began. Somewhere on the road to 160 episodes, Naparstek, who also founded the website Streetsblog, withdrew from the podcast, though he is listed as a co-author of the book.
The title of the book is overstated, of course, even though it is not as contentious as the (ironically intended) title of the podcast. Motor vehicles are here to stay, and they know that. What the authors actually seek is "[a] world where those who truly need to use cars and trucks--workers delivering heavy loads, residents of rural areas, some people with mobility disabilities--can do so without competing for space and resources with people whose use of personal motor vehicles is unnecessary, wasteful, and inefficient," and walking, public transit, and cycling are accepted as part of the mobility mix (pp. 225-226).
The social costs of motor vehicles are mostly explored across five chapters in Part II, "How Cars Ruin Everything." Cars make force children to choose between their personal safety and exploring their world (ch. 3); cause a host of environmental, noise, and other public health problems (ch. 4); kill more and more people each year (ch. 5); create social isolation and all the problems attendant to it, not to mention making enemies of our fellow drivers (ch. 6); and create extra burdens for people who are poor, physically handicapped, or otherwise socially marginalized (ch. 7). A lot of these phenomena are explored in more detail elsewhere--they cite a lot of recently published books, many of whose authors they've had on their podcast--but rarely are they presented in one place in such a convenient way.
Are these social costs of driving "worth it?" Have we as a society, somewhere along the line, collective decided that some collateral damage was acceptable given the benefits car provide us? The authors argue otherwise in Part I, "How We Got Here." They spend a lot of Chapter 1 in the pre-World War II era, when cars had to fight for space on streets with pedestrians, streetcars, and so forth. They credit cars' ultimate victories, on the streets and in the halls of government, to powerful and ruthless business interests. Today, with fewer and fewer people around who remember a non-autocentric world, it's easy to see cyclists and other advocates of transportation alternatives as threats, because whatever our ideals, we have to get to work in the world cars have made.
The authors try to end on a hopeful note in Part III, "How We Get Free," although they frequently revert back to Part II world, as in their critique of city-supplied free parking (pp. 162-172). They hail academic studies of the effects of cars, and while noting the difficulties officials have faced even where (Ghent, Paris, e.g.) some space has been reclaimed, argue that politicians can look past the loud objectors to a quieter supportive majority; citizens can make themselves heard; and people in some cases can be proactive, as with tactical urbanism (pp, 205-214).
They have faith, backed up by some experience, that once we are able to provide space for alternatives to cars, people will enjoy and defend it. The trick is overcoming the fears of chaos that are easy to gin up.
It's a beautiful world, this one. A quieter, greener world that is more sustainable both environmentally and economically. It's also a happier world, where people are more likely to let their children roam free, to know and trust their neighbors, or to have spontaneous interactions with friends they bump into on a sidewalk. This is what life after cars could look like. (226)
I'm not sure I share their optimism, but they do lay out the choice urgently before us. The fantasy world of SUV commercials, in which we zip confidently through empty city streets or about the scenic wilderness, is just that--a fantasy. The reality, however, of traffic-choked suburban stroads was constructed to serve those fantasies as well as the economic needs of auto manufacturers. Reclaiming our streets will be strenuous, even if everyone reads this book, just because of how our towns have built those streets for the last 80 years.
Promotional sticker is appropriate for guitar case placement
The Linn County Planning and Zoning Commission had a long discussion about proposed large-scale data centers at their Monday meeting, led by Planning and Development director Charlie Nichols. They are anticipating a formal ordinance at their November 17 meeting.
Increasing use of computerized data, particularly with the rise of artificial intelligence operations, has resulted in the burgeoning construction of "hyperscale" data centers nationwide. Linn County, Iowa, is getting into the game, with two planned for unincorporated areas, to be operated by Google and QTS. These were approved "by right," because the historically small scale of data centers led them to be considered a normal industrial use.
Linn County is discussing an ordinance related to future data centers (Nieland 2025), and has requested bids on a study of water impact, which will be paid for by Google. Meanwhile, local officials are bragging on the size of the investments Google and QTS are making in their data centers. But does that signify in any way to the average metro resident?
So quickly has the data center phenomenon taken hold that there aren't really good data on their impacts. Several Minnesota groups have raised questions about the effect data centers in that state are having on water supplies and rates (Meyer 2025). Rosemount, Minnesota, on the edge of the Twin Cities metro area, is seeing construction of a hyperscale data center, and Streets.MN lists six other projects at various stages. Dr. Carrie Ferguson of the nonprofit Freshwater told Streets.MN: "We don't understand the total water footprint at all. There is opacity and nondisclosure all along the way." Cathy Johnson, chair of a citizen group in Farmington, south of Rosemount, called Coalition for Responsible Data Center Development, told of the difficulty in getting information from the developer of the data center in that town: "The coalition learned that water demands for the proposed data center campus would require 2.93 million gallons per day, according to the agreement the city signed with Tract in December 2024; normally the city's total daily consumption is 2.3 million gallons a day. (All quotes from Meyer 2025; italics and bolding are mine.)
Other communities are finding their electric bills shooting upward: Watchdog groups like AEP Ohio attributed hikes of $27 per month to the average Columbus family to the energy demands of area data centers (Whoriskey 2025). Abe Silverman, who studies energy markets at Johns Hopkins University, told The Washington Post: "We are seeing every region of the country experience really significant data center load growth. It's putting enormous upward pressure on prices, both for transmission and for generation." Power demands of data centers will rise sharply in the next few years, according to the U.S. Department of Energy cited by Nichols.
This year, incoming Washington governor Bob Ferguson created a task force to study the environmental and economic impacts of data centers, after 87 centers were built in the state, often by companies who were awarded massive tax advantages (Ramadan and Brownstone 2025). The task force, which has yet to make its report, was created after a series of articles published by the Seattle Times and ProPublica suggested the tax breaks were buying less job creation and more energy use than had been sold to state officials (cf. Ramadan and Brownstone 2024).
Photographer Steven Voss (2025) took pictures of data centers in Northern Virginia, which he calls "the world's internet hub" processing maybe 70 percent of global data. Almost half of the state's 600 data centers are located in two unincorporated communities, Ashburn and Sterling, close by Dulles International Airport. He depicts the centers' enormous land use, light pollution, and noise. (Nichols of Linn County points out that part of Virginia is "much more built out" than the corners of Linn County where hyperscale data centers are going. Google, for one, has proposed building a data center near Palo.)
Linn County Planning and Development director Charlie Nichols addresses Planning and Zoning Commission October 20 (screen capture from county-provided video)
The experience with data centers illustrate our vulnerability to market forces: when a new, powerful player(s) enters the market for, say, water or electricity, ordinary users with ordinary market power get priced out as higher demand jacks up the equilibrium ("market") price for that good. Other effects are negative externalities, including the environmental impacts of higher resource use. If hyperscale data centers increase their electricity consumption by 22 percent--what's projected for 2025, cf. Robinson 2025)--that's not going to be easy for either households or the natural world to absorb.
As you can see, I'm ambivalent about the sudden rise of data centers, and by the sudden rise in use of artificial intelligence that causes it. Investment in data centers seems a poor substitute for sustainable economic development, even as the big-win-fixated governments shower them with tax breaks. The risks are spread among all of us, while the benefits are concentrated at the top. As Mary G. (2025), who shepherds the coffeeneuring movement over at Chasing Mailboxes, said after an AI incursion that she's "learned that tech companies fervently believe that AI is going to make them rich and that our data will feed their money-making machine. It's one of the many reasons I remain mixed about using Facebook, while some of me has still found that it can be a helpful tool for some things."
I wish I could be more hopeful that we can have data without scorching the Earth. I'm encouraged by local protests like those folks in Minnesota, and in Indianapolis, and elsewhere, but I'm not naive about the ability of large corporations to snow revenue-starved localities.
"Large Language Muddle," n + 1 51 [Have we considered why we're building all these data centers?]
Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Kuhaneetha Bai Kalaicelvan, "Data Centre Investments Bad Deals," Challenging Development, 28 October 2025 [Malaysian economist summarizes the case against them]
Coffeeneuring is back for its 15th year, and I'm back for my second year. This is a great way to celebrate cycling and small businesses (as well as natural spaces, which feature in some coffeeneuring projects but not this one). Last year, my rides-to-fall-drinks occurred on days with high temperatures between 55 and 84 degrees, and as the weather turns colder with occasional rain, I could use some motivation wherever I can find it. The rules (Mary G 2025) call for seven rides of at least two miles round trip, to six different places, between October 11 and November 24, with no more than two per week. With so many coffee places in the core of Cedar Rapids, these rules pose no difficulty. Outside of the core, though, chains predominate--not a problem for the rules, but I'd prefer to keep it local. Given the length of some of the rides others reported on the Coffeeneurs Facebook page last year, I feel challenged to get out of town some in 2025.
Cedar Valley Nature Trail in Cedar Rapids under cloudy skies
Today was cloudy and chilly. I rode, mostly on the Cedar Valley Nature Trail, to suburban Hiawatha. To give myself an extra mile, and to avoid a complicated intersection at Center Point and Boyson, I stayed on the trail as far as Tower Terrace Road before riding back through the factories to Stillwater.
Cedar Valley Nature Trail splits off from Center Point Road
That might have been unwise; I only had to be on Tower Terrace for about 0.1 mile, but it's a two-lane high speed road with gravel shoulders. Fortunately, no cars appeared as I panic-pedaled.
Stillwater has no bike rack, despite its proximity to the trail--maybe I'm the first person ever to cycle here!--but I did find fellow blogger Robert Manson as well as a lot of Johnny Cash references in the decor, and free refills. Free or cheap refills are everywhere in eastern Iowa, but not in "real" cities... I'm guessing the rental prices (which are comparatively low here) determine this.
North window at Stillwater Coffee
While enjoying my coffee and apple muffin, I watched the biweekly Cities for Everyone webinar. This week Gil Penalosa hosted the legendary Ellen Dunham-Jones. She talked about the need through policy to "disrupt auto dependence" in order to meet the many challenges of aging suburban areas. A lot of her examples were from high-demand areas (Atlanta, Austin, Bethesda, Denver, e.g.); I'm glad she also talked specifically about areas without change-forcing levels of demand, because that's where we are here. I imagine retrofit is a tough sell anywhere, though, as witness Addison Del Maestro's post today quoting someone from Vienna, Virginia, worried about how increasing population through denser development would disrupt basic aspects of daily life like grocery shopping.
Blairs Ferry and Center Point Roads, Cedar Rapids: One of several complicated intersections on the CVNT
While I was inside Stillwater, we got a brief rain shower outside. It was over before the webinar was, but my ride home made my butt look wet.
2. Thursday, October 16 (Sunny, 75F)
Coffee at:Dash Coffee Roasters,120 3rd Avenue SW [round trip 4.6 miles + 0.5 miles swimming]
bike, mural, and front window at Dash Coffee Roasters (this mural is across the alley from the Lucille Ball one pictured last year)
Part of the fun of coffeeneuring is following the exploits of others on social media. Several people were out before dawn this morning, and took lovely pictures of shops' lights in the darkness. Several people are doing themed coffeeneuring, and some of their themes are quite ambitious: one person is creating a haiku out of coffee stops, another is doing all Middle Eastern coffee shops (in the south suburbs of Chicago!), and another is devoting each stop to a color of the spectrum (today was "red").
Consider the curve wrecked, folks. I am not going to match that level of creativity. It occurred to me, though, that after seeing Bob Manson at Stillwater Tuesday, and meeting Bob Untiedt at Dash this afternoon, that I was on my way to a "Bob" theme. I don't know how long I can sustain this, but if your name is Bob and you like coffee and are near Cedar Rapids, Iowa, please message me!
Today began with showers that lasted longer than expected, but by 11:00 a.m., out came the sun and dried up all the rain. So I had a dry afternoon ride across the river to Dash via the Helen G. Nassif YMCA, and no worries about the possibility of a wet butt theme to my #coffeeneuring2025.
I met my friends Bob and Phillip at Dash to talk about the history of efforts to reactivate Redmond Park. Dash, praise be, is open til 6:00 p.m., which makes them one of two independent coffeehouses in the core that's open past 2:00. I had a double chocolate scone (not pictured) with a one of their pour-over coffee offerings; my unpretentious drip coffee order is not available past 1:00.
my coffee, and some beans for home, under the approving eye of Elton John
On my way home, I saw a car run a red light; a car turn left in front of oncoming traffic; and an SUV parked in the bike lane. Coffeeneuring is a challenge, in more ways than one! But on this lovely afternoon, the weather was not one of those.
Elsewhere, Planetizen reports Austin, Texas, has put their back into building sidewalks and bike infrastructure, which has resulted in sharply reduced street fatalities (Ionescu 2025).
It was windy this morning, but not painfully so, and the traffic was extremely light as is usual on a Sunday morning. I took a somewhat indirect route downtown, and encountered less than five cars on the way.
I met some friends at Lightworks, a coffee shop located behind Benz Beverage Depot on the edge of downtown. They were doing a pretty good business, but we were able to find a table without difficulty, and borrow chairs from the other tables when more people arrived. I had a bag of beignets, one of their specialties, and managed not to cover myself in powdered sugar.
beignets and coffee at Lightworks
My friends discussed city politics, what with local elections coming up in a couple of weeks. Half of us arrived on bicycles, which is a good sign, and I was able to spread the coffeeneuring message. I think I'm still the only person in Cedar Rapids doing it.
I went to Craftd on Tuesday, but it was too chilly and windy to ride
It's been a chilly week, but I could no longer delay ride number 4. What was I going to do, put it off until November? In the Midwest, that is not such a hot idea, if you'll pardon the pun.
Once on my bike, it wasn't so bad. The wind that has brought us this (admittedly seasonable) weather finally had died down, and I wore gloves and a heavy jacket against what was left of it. The autumn leaves are well underway...
view of Loftus apartments from Bottleworks Park, across 3rd Street from Kismet
...and I left late enough that the ride towards downtown wasn't too bad.
My destination was Kismet, a delightful coffee/flower shop that opened in New Bohemia in late 2021. New Bohemia already had a lot of coffee offerings, but none were florists, and Kismet has been prospering fragrantly for four years.
More (but not much more) seating is upstairs, along with more (many more) flowers
The young couple that operates the shop has a young child who makes occasional appearances; whether for that reason or another, it's a particular hotspot for young people with tiny companions. With the Loftus apartment building almost ready for occupancy on the other side of 10th Avenue, they seem about to have a lot of potential customers nearby.
Bike parking at 3rd Street and 10th Avenue SE
Kismet usually doesn't have food available, but when they do, it's memorable. Today's offering: maple scones.
Coffee and scone by the window
However, even the seemingly innocent pleasures of coffeeneuring are fraught with worry. Today's New York Times included a story about a new report by Coffee Watch showing that in Brazil, clearing forests for coffee farming has resulted in drastically declining rainfall (Livni 2025). Coffee Watch director Etelle Higonnet is quoted as saying "The ecologically destructive way we grow coffee is going to result in us not having coffee." I should surely pay more attention to coffee sourcing than I do!
Say it ain't so, Frank!
Week Three
5. Tuesday, October 28 (Cloudy, 51F)
Coffee at:Uptown Coffee, 760 11th St Suite A, Marion, IA [round trip 15 miles]
Uptown welcomes you!
Big thanks to Mary G. and all the folks at Coffeeneuring HQ, because absent this project I would not have ridden today, and I'm glad I did! It was deterrently chilly this morning, but the rain was going to hold off until afternoon, and what was I going to do, wait until November for nice weather? As it turned out, the ride was not bad at all, though I didn't stop for pictures or to check the trail counter. I had broken a sweat by the time I got to Uptown, though my ears were cold. I met two riders on the Lindale Trail into Marion; one had a plexiglass face mask, while the other had a wrap for his head that fit under his helmet. I should at least look into the latter.
Uptown is adjacent to Marion's wonderful Art Alley
Uptown Coffee operates out of the front of a bar in a historic downtown building. It was doing a brisk business today, though mine was the only bicycle parked outside. The multitude included, for the second time in five coffeeneuring efforts, Bob Manson of The Indie Bob Spot. (See ride #1.) For those of you keeping score, this makes three encounters with Bobs in five, though only two unique Bobs. (My son Robbie joined me at Lightworks last weekend, but he goes by Robbie and therefore does not qualify as a Bob.)
My workstation at Uptown. Not pictured: gooey and delicious peach pie bar.
I put in my earpods for the Cities for Everyone webinar (episode #98), my "must see TV" every other Tuesday morning. (See ride #1.) Host Gil Penalosa interviewed Kristian Villadsen, an architect formerly with Jan Gehl's firm, and now co-creative director at BRIQ, also in Copenhagen. He talked about designing communities in ways that make it "easy" for people to make the more sustainable choices, and "We want to create places that invite people to partake" (italics mine). (Villadsen also said: "90 to 95 percent of zoning regulations were written between 1950 and 1970, when, to be honest, we did some of the worst city planning of all time.") My ride to Uptown today was rewarding, but could not be described as "easy, fast, convenient," which would be the ideal.
I left directly after the webinar, and was home well before the rain started. I did stop to record the reading on the trail counter. As I did, a longboarder and a cyclist went by, so I added them to my count.
The tree on my street has more leaves than it did same time last year (see last year's post)
Today is warmer and lovelier than was Tuesday, but after nearly freezing last night my morning ride was chilly. I added a few extra miles by riding through downtown and then along the river by the Mott Building, the southwest side's answer to the Cherry Building. No pictures of my trip, because it was too cold to stop! It was lovely, as witness the tree by my house pictured above, and I stayed warm except for my ears and neck. I really need to get one of those head goiter things.
Grass was soggy with dew: Bottleworks Park between Full Bowl and Kismet
I returned to Kismet--coffeeneuring rules allow one repeat visit per year--for my biweekly coffee with Randy the Wizard. Unlike last week, they did not have maple scones today... no food at all in fact. Happily, Tim Salis was on the job at The Full Bowl a block away, and I scored a couple buckwheat banana muffins.
The Full Bowl, 129 10th Avenue SE
The mums are still vibrant at Kismet.
mums on the steps leading to Kismet's front door
I sat on the second floor at Kismet this week, which almost qualifies as a new place, but probably doesn't.
My coffee and muffins are on the coffee table
Besides the prodigious couch--sufficient for family reunions! or business meetings if it's a small business!--this is where their floral workshop is located, so there are plenty of green things on view.
Second floor shelves
On the way home, the sun was fully out and taking full effect!
Friday 10/31 brought an update from Chasing Mailboxeswith great pictures from the field. Meanwhile, I have one ride to go before I qualify for a patch...
Week Four
7!! Tuesday, November 4 (Cloudy, 67F)
Coffee at:Apple Creek Coffee Co., 4215 Lewis Access Rd, Center Point [round trip 38.5 miles]
Greetings from Center Point!
I chose a long ride to close out my coffeeneuring card, and to celebrate what's probably the last warm day of 2025 (although these days, who knows?). I began by voting in our local city council and school board elections...
Bethany Lutheran Church has no bike rack, but it does have trees! and voting booths!!
...then rode to the Cedar Valley Nature Trail, and up to Center Point. It was still chilly, but I was dressed for it, and after awhile I began to feel too warm. If I unzipped my jacket and took off my gloves, I was too cold. So it goes. Averaged out it was a pleasant ride on a lovely late fall day.
Cedar Valley Nature Trail 7 miles south of Center Point
I passed Lafayette, a former town which used to have a train depot.
1914 depot site, Lafayette IA
I met my friend John at Apple Creek, Center Point's gathering place that serves coffee, breakfast and ice cream, and is open til 6 on weekdays. It's not easily accessible from the trail, which goes to the business district on the other end of town, about a mile north of where Apple Creek Coffee is. I tried to cut off the extra miles by going over on Fay Road, a packed gravel country road that was fine, but required me to enter town on the county highway. The long way is probably better.
Apple Creek is located in s strip mall near the interstate highway entrance, next door to a chiropractor, whose services I might have utilized after my long ride.
my bike parked at Apple Creek Coffee Co.
I had a brownie and coffee. There was a table full of locals, and some customers at other tables as well.
my beverage and snack
In time I rode home. This time I went north to the trail along Main Street, through the suburby area behind the strip mall, eventually reaching the charming downtown. There I caught the trail and headed south. A number of other people were taking advantage of the weather and the trail: I met 15 cyclists, a few walkers, a couple guys standing having a conversation, and one guy doing push-ups. But the south wind that was blowing in the pleasant air was in my face for the whole time. The return trip took me 25 percent longer than the ride north (1:40 instead of 1:20), and I was a wreck for the rest of the day. I salute my fellow coffeeneurs for whom a nearly-40 mile ride is barely exercise. I tried today to keep up with you, and I'm still feeling the effects.
One of four (!) rest areas along the trail
c+1. Thursday, November 6 (60F)
Coffee at:Brewhemia, 1202 3rd Street SE [round trip 5 miles]
one of several bike parking places around Brewhemia
The official coffeeneuring rules allow for "bonus rounds," so I decided to get one more in before the weather turns foul this weekend. I rode to this popular spot in New Bohemia, a brisk but not terribly ambitious ride. I brought The Odd Woman and the City, which I'm rereading for an upcoming post, but I often run into people I know. (Did I mention it is popular?)
Today, I saw people I know only because of their fame, actor/director Jason Alberty and, coming out of the cafe across the street, city manager Jeff Pomeranz. I also saw my friend Dorothy, who used to be president of the Oak Hill Jackson Neighborhood Association, which I think makes her a celebrity as well.
all I need for a coffee shop morning
On the way home, I was nearly hit by a truck turning left in front of me (not aggressive, just oblivious), and then I had to go around a car stopped in the bike lane (driver was on his phone maybe looking for diretions). For good or ill, cycling and its inherent vulnerability puts you in touch with other people more than driving does. I enjoy the fresh air and exercise, but at some point I'm probably going to get tired of riding a bicycle in a persistently auto-centric world. In the meantime, there's coffeeneuring! I've loved connecting with people across the world who are doing this crazy challenge. Catch you next fall!!
