Some things I learned at the Science Museum of Minnesota yesterday:

1. Never, ever, ever go to downtown St. Paul at the same time as a hockey game and some cultural festival in which hundreds of children and their families run around the area dressed in silver-and-black lame and neon tassles and ribbons. Unless you LIKE spending an hour trying to get into the museum's parking garage. And why the hell do they call parking garages "ramps" around here? Did the locals decide they wanted a clear, unambiguous "Please rob me" sign for when they visit real cities?
   
2. Minnesotans possess a truly remarkable power to stand exactly where you want to go, and possess no understanding of the concept of a "straight line," let alone walking in one.
   
3. Just about every single non-extinct major fauna in the museum was shot by a Twin Cities businessman and donated to the museum after his death. One imagines the wives of all of these businessmen waiting for their husbands to kick off so they can get the freaking polar bear out of the foyer.
   
4. Forensic entomology is really, really cool.
   
5. Even the museum store doesn't carry stuffed toy penguins.