Throughout my whole life, and probably most of hers as well, my mom used to say that Duluth is 10 years behind the rest of the country. Any fad or trend or way of thinking that became popular in the rest of the nation would eventually make it to Duluth, only 10 years too late. When I was a kid, this used to make me mad, with good reason. Duluth was all I knew, and if my whole world was hickishly behind the times, that meant that I was probably equally as backward. I chose not to believe my mom's philosophy. More and more, however, I realize that she was absolutely correct.

In some ways, 10 years is a generous estimate. For example, we got our first sushi restaurant in 2003. I think I first heard about sushi from TV and movies in the early 1980s. My sources tell me it was pretty trendy back then. Before 2003, Zak Sally, former bass player of Low, said in an interview that Duluth is the kind of place that, if it ever did get a sushi restaurant, the TV news would do a story about what sushi is. I'm pretty sure he predicted that one perfectly.

The TV news did do a story on Indian food when India Palace first opened. I remember it vividly, because one of the driving themes of the story was that Indian food contains ingredients you would recognize -- chicken, rice, etc. So don't be afraid, citizens of Duluth! We know this isn't Perkin's Cake & Steak, but our sources indicate that it is, in fact, actual food!

I think that the new Arby's that opened up in Kenwood last week has already had far more business than all of the sushi and Indian restaurants in this city combined.

And there, I think, is the very reason that we are so behind. People in this part of the world are very reluctant to try anything new. We're afraid of everything until it is so deeply engrained in the mainstream that a person could fall asleep from boredom by merely mentioning its name. When entering into any experience, we want to be able to predict everything that is going to happen. We want our conversations to be repetitious (the weather is a great topic), our films to be formulaic, and our food to be the stuff we grew up eating.

I've really been intrigued lately by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune's new website, vita.mn. On its surface, it's an entertainment/calendar website, but actually, it's so much more. There's tons of actual, interesting, and most importantly original content. The interactivity is amazing, allowing users to generate (actually useful) content, and to browse each other's suggestions, etc. In short, the site is a pleasure to use.

Every time I go to it, however, I can't help but think that no paper around here would ever invest so much into this new fad called the "Inter-net," at least not to the extent and with the forethought that the Star-Tribune obviously has. And if it did, Duluthians would protest and cancel their subscriptions, because there's a sex columnist on the site.

And the ironic thing about that is that sex columnists stopped being cool in about 1999.

I don't think this is ever going to change. We're doomed to call each other up on our landlines and make plans to meet someplace safe like Applebee's or the Olive Garden, whichever has the shortest line. When we're finished, we'll pay by writing a check.

Sigh.

But it's pretty here. And there's nothing to be afraid of.