Commercial Beef Sandwich

I ordered the Commercial Beef Sandwich at Lau's Bakery in New Prague. After feasting my eyes on it for a minute, I decided to step outside and grab my camera from the car.

The waitress thought I was running away.

International Eelpout Festival

I went to the 29th Annual International Eelpout Festival in Walker this year.

It was a drag.

The JGG

The Jolly Green Giant stands quiet in his space, rising up from behind an abandoned gas station, between the Dairy Queen and the high school in Blue Earth, Minnesota.

Innocence Project

Late one night in 1997, on his way to buy cigarettes, Sherman Townsend was picked up by the Minneapolis Police in Dinkytown and sentenced to 20 years in prison - for a crime he didn't commit.

Photographed for Minnesota Monthly.

Prisoner

The waiting room at the maximum security prison is empty and dark, with a massive front desk made of diamond-plate steel. A sudden voice squawks through an intercom. I see figures in the next room, through a tinted glass wall. The voice doesn't match their lips.

A guard eventually enters through a sliding steel door, dressed something like a marine. He doesn't acknowledge me, but shakes his head in disgust, angered by the responsibility of sorting through my equipment.

"All this," he asks, "for one picture?"

David Jones, photographed for Minnesota Monthly at the Rush City Correctional Center. Jones' confession freed Sherman Townsend from prison after 10 years.

Container Cabin

Readymade Magazine sent me a few hours north to shoot this cabin that a couple of brothers made out of shipping containers in the backwoods of Minnesota. It doesn't have heat or electricity.

It is 0 degrees out. The snow is deep, and powdery, like quicksand. I need snowshoes to hike into the location, which is about half a mile uphill from where I park.

First trip in, I bring my small camera, hoping for the best. Second trip, I pull a sled with my 4x5 gear. Third trip, I go back for something I forgot. Fourth trip, I grab some lights and stands. Fifth trip, I grab more lights and stands. Sixth trip, I return to the car with my gear, in the dark.

Back on the road, I'm sweaty, exhausted, and happy. I land at a Travelodge, where a Russian lady checks me in. There's only smoking rooms available. I buy a sandwich next door and watch My Name is Earl.

Dancing Monkeys on the Streets of Brainerd

17 below zero

17 below zero is when your automatic garage door stops opening. It's when the zipper breaks right off your parka, into your hand. 17 below is when your coffee becomes a round, brown block of ice before you've finished drinking it.

17 below is when the shutter in your camera makes a funny noise and stops working, forever. And your tripod shatters. 17 below makes you realize there's not much between Minnesota and the Arctic Circle except old rocks, trees, and a bunch of lakes without names.

17 below is the same temperature it might be at the North Pole right now.

17 below zero is almost as cold as 20 below, which is the threshold temperature at Minnesota's open pit iron mines for working outside. If it's 20 below, the miners stay in bed. Anything warmer - and they need to quit their crying and get back to work.

Which is exactly what I have to do at 3:30 this morning. I have to get up and drive 3.5 hours north to shoot the interior of a restaurant for a publication in California. This place they want me to shoot is totally remote, located somewhere near the source of the Mississippi River. And it's closed for the season.

I tracked down the owner by phone on Friday - a squirrely guy who won't talk or listen for very long. I ask him to meet me there Monday at sunrise. "Alrighty," he said, "but it's gonna be 17 below."

Monday morning I'm there. The restaurant is covered in snow. He approaches the door, and begins acting like it won't open. His hands move like a street magician's; turning the key, pulling the handle, pretending to struggle.

"Oh jeez", he says. "This door is not going to open. Oh jeez - it's frozen shut."

He climbs back in his truck and says through the open window that I can take pictures of whatever I want, so long as it's outside. He signs a release, says he's real sorry, and drives away.

I look around, not sure what to do. I grab my camera and trudge further into the property. Around a corner, I find a young deer, huddled around itself, curled up for warmth, cozy like a dog by the fire.

I move in closer. He's frozen solid.