Cottageview Drive-In

Cottageview Drive-In

Cottage Grove, MN

Reviewed June 19th, 2005

Don't drink the water. Thats what a scary red sign says above each sink. You wouldn't need the sign to know you shouldn't drink the water here unless you were severely intoxicated or utterly insane. Clean (for now) wrap-around, reusable cloth towels hang from white boxes speckled liberally with rust. Come on, just wipe your hands off on your jeans for once. It ain't gonna kill ya. With the door open to the men's at all times, I had to avoid looking in that direction because I could see people peeing from my girlfriend's truck. After inspecting the bathrooms, I stuck with the plastic portables outside instead.

The bathrooms were nasty and falling apart but so what? Batman Begins rocked from the back of the truck. It was also fun to watch the antics of the family next door in their big van and load of kids yelling at the sun to make it go down so the movie would begin faster. "Sun, sun, sun, sun! Down, down, down, down! Sun go down! Sun go down!" they chanted defiantly toward the brilliant sunset. The impatience of children is so intense at times its primal... a thing to be feared and respected. While the kids yelled at the sun, Dad lit sparklers... from inside the van in the driver's seat. He held the 2,000 degree fun stick out the window. "Aren't these neat?" he said out of the corner of his mouth when I made a remark. Then a spark went the wrong way, landing in dad's lap. "Oh shit! Get this thing outta here!" Smoke filled the van for a second as he passed it off to someone who put it out.

I write this review as an elegy for a great dying tradition. Drive in movies aren't about bathrooms or food. They're about fireworks, family antics, loose dogs, beer, and fireworks... and beer. Oh, watching the movie is cool too. The bathrooms aren't there to wow you, just to keep people from pissing in the bushes. Its fine by me. Keep this awesome tradition alive and go see a movie at one of the two drive in's we have left in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. They're worth it just for one movie but you always get two movies and sometimes three for your ticket.

- Justin Teerlinck

RESTROOM RATING: 3
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