FREE MAN: One of the great ironies of the Obama era is that it both spawns new conversation about race even as it encourages too many to buy into the strange idea that Obama's election moves us into a post-racial era. Tonight at the Northwest African-American Museum, Regina Mason is discussing her co-edited new edition of story of our lifetimes, the meaning of which is, as yet, unapparent. So stop watching TV and go see Mason speak. more ›

Last Friday we got a chance to poke our noses into the Northwest African American Museum before it opened, as part of a test lunch group for the St Clouds Museum Cafe. The Museum is in the historic Colman School, at 23rd and Massachusetts. It's historic now, that is -- back when we lived across the street, on 25th, it was condemned, boarded up, and left a home for pigeons, until a group of black activists arm-wrestled the city into letting them do something with it. Upstairs there are two floors of "affordable" rental units (studios are $620) for artists, historians, teachers, and anyone else with a good reason to make their home above the Museum. more ›