While there I was able to experience a great sporting event. No, not an NFL game as I did on a previous trip. In fact it wasn't even a professional event. In other states THE thing to catch is a high school game. For instance, Indiana packs local gyms for high school basketball games (one of the best sports movies, Hoosiers, depicts this phenomena quite well), and in Texas communities Friday nights are for football... high school football (there is a movie and a TV show about all that).
In Minnesota the appeal is for high school hockey. Last Thursday I took in this experience as I watched Farmington High School take on New Prague. Let me just say that the kids are fantastic, and the crowd at the game gets into it. I never lived in an area that had high school hockey and never played at that level. I've been playing in adult leagues for many years and have been a fan of the game for as long as I can remember.
I was surprised by the speed and the intensity of the game. According the banners on the wall, Farmington has a great tradition of winning in both boys and girls hockey. The girls team is ranked number one going into the playoffs and I'm not sure how the boys team is doing (they lost on this night by a score of 7 to 3).
I stood along the end boards as I watched the game and was able to witness some clean checks right up against the glass. Those boys meant business. I could see the kids 'chirping' at each other after such hits and at times the ref's had to separate the combatants. Other excellent teamwork created scoring chances that were often met with timely saves by the goaltenders (the New Prague goalie had to be six foot two, he was a monster). Most of the goals I saw were scored on the power-play and the refs were handing out penalties at will.
It was a tough game for some of the people that showed up as well. During the game, an errant puck struck a fan in the face. The girl appeared to be of high school age and she needed medical attention and had to be escorted out of the place (a plastic baggie filled with snow was hurried over to those attending to the girl). I never saw the damage, but I did notice many other students busily using their cell phones to either text or send pictures to others shortly after the incident. The new media... if you will.
Some of the temperatures during my visit were extremely cold. Minus 17 was the coldest that I saw in the area I was at... with the wind chill... it made it feel like minus 39... whatever that means.
So in conditions like that I took in some TV viewing from the comforts of home. I like to watch CNBC types of programming at times and with the cold outside, there was time to catch up on the world of investing.
Of course the housing market was a big topic and I watched the National Association of REALTORS president Dick Gaylord give his spiel about how 'now is a great time to buy a house' type of thing. I have nothing against the guy and I am a loyal Member of NAR, but enough with that talking point.
Look, NAR is a large trade association and of course the association is always going to support the notion that it is a good time to buy property and homes... and of course the value of hiring a REALTOR to help with the transaction. Honestly though, to me, the effort is looking rather weak. There is obviously change in our industry and I believe our efforts should be looking internally at what we can do to best meet the needs of clients going forward. We should be having a real debate about the broker-agent business model and updating it to offer more specific needs to the changing needs of clients as the market corrects itself. There are other issues as well but I'm not going into them right now.
For now though, I guess Mr. Gaylord gets to take the punches with the NAR talking points from the talking heads on the cable shows.
Lastly, I finally took in the Mall of America in all its glory. Big place. Here are a couple of photos...
If my wife and I ever get the grandkids up to Minnesota, I'm sure the parents can get some serious shopping in while I take the kids on the rides... fair exchange.
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