Things I didn't know about Grand Forks #24

This is super overdue, but, seeing as how Josh and I only complain about how cold we are these days, you need to know something. When Josh left at the end of August, I was hating Grand Forks pretty intensely. Then October came, and I had the most beautiful day I've ever seen. I had a moment walking from my car to the office where I felt like my heart would burst with gratitude because Fall had finally come.

So I took this picture:

Everything about that day reminded me of the best things about Oregon and my favorite season. I finally felt at home.

Then, literally three days later, this happened:

my drive to work

my view from my office

Autumn lasted three days! 

I have learned that winter here does not look like what I had imagined-- huge snowdrifts, snowplows, and winter sports. Instead, it is intensely cold. It snows a little bit, then melts a little bit, then freezes, so while there isn't a lot of snow, there is a lot of ice, and the snow never goes away. 

Also, they don't salt their roads or their walkways. We got a university-wide e-mail about the proper way to walk on ice, including not wearing high heels, walking with a wide gait, shuffling, and curling your toes under. We talked in staff meeting about the proper way to fill out a workplace accident complaint because they don't shovel the sidewalks! 

North Dakota, I don't understand you.

The Other Interns

As part of my internship training I had to go to Minneapolis with the other interns and some counseling center staff members in November. We spent a weekend learning EMDR, which is an intervention I never thought I would use, but have to (get to?) now.

The bonus was that I got to spend a lot of time with the other interns. There are three of us:

We spent our free time (away from the training) going to the Mall of America (four times), where I bought this sweater:

And these pants:

But not this vest:

We also bonded by watching American Horror Story: Asylum, knitting, watching YouTube videos, and talking a lot. 

Napo, one of the psychology residents, hung out with us because we made him:

He also went to the Mall of America with us a bunch of times, but he didn't buy much. He just wanted to take pictures.

at the Peeps store. it exists. not joking at all.

When the weekend started out we were all full of energy, probably fueled by the huge doughnuts we ate at a truck stop in Anandale, MN:

That energy dissipated, however, and on the ride home we were very tired, very silent, and apparently incubating flu germs because we all ended up very sick. I had to (got to?) miss two days of work because I couldn't even get out of bed.

We will be doing this again in April, which will be an interesting experience because we know each other a lot better after that weekend. To say we got off on the wrong foot would be putting it mildly, but we're enjoying each other now. Internship is a very unique experience.

Still Alive, Though Freezing

No, we were not killed by North Dakota (though it seems sometimes like we might freeze to death). Blogger decided that I didn't need to post pictures anymore, so it limited that function for me then returned it for some reason. Only once I tried to fix the problem did it turn out to not be a problem at all.

There are many updates to be given and many adventures that we've had. But it's been blizzarding in the Forks and we're holed up in our apartment making our way through the AFI top 100 movies list.

But if we were outside, it would look something like this:

Things I didn't know about Grand Forks #23

I have been meaning to write about this for awhile, because it was one of the first things I noticed, mainly because we went to four movies in our first week of living here.

I am impressed that mental health organizations are openly advertised here, like the  Community Violence Intervention Center:

Before leaving for internship, I had a Business of Psychology class where we talked about marketing and how you very rarely see ads for psychologists the same way you see advertisements for, say, medical doctors or car salesmen. But in Grand Forks they are much more open about their mental health care. I find it admirable and I wish Portland would get on board. 

Things I didn't know about Grand Forks #22

Now that Josh is back in Oregon, I have been driving myself to work. I didn't want to buy a parking pass for just a few months, so I park a few blocks away and walk. There are only a couple major streets in The Forks, but I have to cross one of them to get to my building.

Thankfully, the people of Grand Forks, ND have thought up a plan to make it easier for me: an underground tunnel.

the entrance, and on the other side of the street there is the exit

I'm not sure whether I'm being sarcastic or not when I say that this is a good idea. Because it gets so cold in The Forks during the winter, there are actually multiple tunnels all around campus to make getting from building to building without needing to put on snow boots and mittens.

inside the tunnel

I think the idea of the tunnel system goes along with another thing I didn't know about Grand Forks, which is that there is a very small homeless population. If there were tunnels in Portland, I don't think anyone would use them because they would be filled with homeless people (much like parking structure stairways downtown). 

I like using the tunnel every day because I don't have to wait for the walk signal. It smells like pee, of course, but I think that's because of drunk college students. Most things can be attributed to drunk college students around here.

The One That Got Away

As soon as we got to Grand Forks, we immediately began asking what there is to do outside Grand Forks. Everyone talked about the white buffalo in Jamestown, North Dakota. They have three of them now on a preserve with other bison. They are sacred in the Native American culture, and to have three of them is pretty amazing.

First we went to the museum,

where we saw:

a bison head

 the world's worst petting zoo

a picture of a mountain of bison skulls, used in the refining of sugar (yuck!)

another huge bison head that freaked me out so much, I made Josh take the picture while I hid in the other room. Wall-mounted heads are freaky.

a full-bodied bison

The museum also had an observation deck that overlooked the preserve where the buffalo, literally, roamed. We did catch a glimpse of one of the white buffalos, but we didn't realize what we were looking at until it was too late to take a picture. 

this is an artist's rendering of what we might have seen

We found out later that albino buffalos tend to prefer the shade because the bright sun can be too much for their unpigmented eyes. Unfortunately, we were there at 2pm on a very sunny Saturday, so   we only got that one glimpse of the white one, but we saw tons of brown buffalo:

We also lived it up in the gift shop:

We bought our own white buffalo:

this one will never get away

She made many guest appearances in our pictures:

Jamestown is also the home of the "World's Largest Buffalo":

26 feet tall, 46 feet long, and weighs in at 60 tons

This sculpture was commissioned in 1959 by a local businessmen and was completed by art students from Jamestown College. This led to Jamestown being known as "The Buffalo City."

family portrait

Josh is braver than I-- that particular part of the buffalo leaks water

our buffalo is bigger than your buffalo

relaxing after a long day of buffalo-watching

we even enjoyed their nod to the Haunted Mansion graveyard

If you are ever passing through ND, I definitely recommend stopping in Jamestown. It includes a replica wild west town and everything, except the museum, is free.

This was our last trip before Josh moved back to Oregon, but don't think that just because Josh isn't here I won't continue to have Adventures in North Dakota! 

Things I didn't know about Grand Forks #21

People in the midwest love their vanity plates. And why not? They only cost $25 in North Dakota. We have seen all sorts, but I never remember to take a picture. But on the way home from church the other day we were behind this:

There are also a large amount of vanity plates parked in my apartment parking lot, like this:

Driving home from work the other day, I saw this one:

I know vanity plates aren't an isolated midwest trend (my best friend's husband had the plate "IM007" when we were in high school), but they do seem extraordinarily prevalent. I see one at least every time I go out in public. I never would have guessed that this was a thing.