The Manor.
Ah, yes, the Manor.
I was all of 21 years old, still in college and I would bike all over the Twin Cities. As the cities are laid out, two roads and a fair amount of bike trails follow the east and west side of the Mississippi river and so I became very familiar with those areas. But on the east side of the river, right across an old fort called Fort Snelling, there was this 1950's type style place called "The Manor."
It looked like an old fart's place and I was compelled to poke my head in there during a Saturday afternoon. When I got in there was a piano bar, tons of smoke (as this was before the Nazi's took over and banned smoking) and a medieval suit of armor in a glass display case. Most important though was a dance floor sunk in below the seats that surrounded it and paintings reminiscent of the Kramer portrait done in 1960's style.
For the next 8 years me and my friends would go there and take over the place. There was a horrible swing band, but it didn't matter because they were our swing band and we could dance all night long to them. The owners and staff loved us because I think we were the first new blood they had in the place since 1970. And we had a waitress that was with the place when it originally opened. She would repetitively return and ask us what we wanted to drink because I think in all seriousness she had Alzheimers, but to the dismay of my male friends she did remember me and would always remember what I had ordered. Then she would act insulted when everybody reordered their drinks again.
But what I think has to be the coolest thing about The Manor was that Jim Tolck's Little Big Band would go on break and while on break me and Jim (three times my age) would exchange horrible jokes, and whilst Jim got himself a drink, he'd allow me to do stand up comedy (for an audience that was pretty much all my friends anyway). Jokes such as;
"Guy walks into the doctor's office and says, "Doc, there's something wrong with me."
Doctor looks at him, runs some tests comes back and says, "I'm sorry, but I have bad news. You only have 10 left to live."
The guy says, "10? What do you mean 10? 10 years, 10 months?"
The doctor says, "9...8...7...6..."
Another one was, "Hey Jim, you know why when ducks fly in that V shape formation one line of ducks it always longer than they other?"
"No, why?"
"There's more ducks in that line."
Other jokes such as "Where's the rest of my band?" And I would reply, "they're either out collecting their social security checks or they're dead." And the drummer who was an old refined black gentleman would be about to do the rim shot, but on second thought just shook his head and denied us the rim shot on account the jokes were so horrible. It was a grand time.
Of course since it was a grand time, it meant it had to end. And in 2004 the owner of The Manor sold out to some real estate developers who were going to put in (what else?) condos.
And so arguably what was the best venue in all of the Twin Cities was demolished (though I kept a piece of brick from the rubble as a memoir) and in its place soon went condos.
I had a personal grudge against these condos and hoped they'd fail miserably, but this was 2004 and this was when the condo market was hot. Everybody was moving into condos. Why that was the cool hip thing!
"Are you a baby boomer looking to downsize?"
GET A CONDO!
"Are you an up and coming young Gen X'er that doesn't have a family, but wants to not waste rent?"
GET A CONDO!
"Are you just some dumb schmuck who has a pulse?"
GET A CONDO!
But I would have my revenge. For I knew the market was getting flooded with condos. I had seen enough proposals for condos come across my desk. But I had also been one of those foolish analysts that researched the market and knew there was such a glut, that inevitably the condo market would crash;
Sure enough with over 30 times the historical average annual amount of condo's hitting the local market, the market collapsed and soon over night, these "luxury condo developments" were converted into "Luxury rental/for sale/lease/timeshare/helpuswe'resodesperate apartments/condo's/whateverwecanget."
And not just locally, but nationally the condo glut took hold.
Now basic economics, which it seems most bankers and real estate developers were woefully inadequately educated in, tells you that when supply goes up without a corresponding increase in demand, prices go down. And they might go down so much that you can't sell your condo's for what it cost you to build them and you're going to take a loss. Thus I was happy to see when I drove past the old site of The Manor yesterday just how many extra units were for sale/lease/rent/etc. No doubt many condo developers are suffering losses and tears right now.
But that's what you get when you tear down the Captain's favorite hang out joint.
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