Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Mold-A-Rama Is on the Move
End of an era! Como Park Zoo & Conservatory's Mold-A-Ramas—the little machines that lets you make plastic gorillas, lions, sea lions, and polar bears—are moving south, "to a region with a longer peak season," the zoo explains in a Facebook post. The post clarifies that this was not a decision the zoo made; a different company owns the Mold-A-Rama machines.
Como's post has amassed hundreds of comments and thousands of likes and shares. "The memory of the smell of the burning plastic when walking into the Como Zoo buildings will always stay with me," one commenter remarks. "Ooh Ooh tha smell!!" adds another, evoking Lynyrd Skynyrd. "The thought of my hands burning from holding the hot plastic brings back memories," yet another nostalgic commenter chimes in.
The machines move the week of November 3, so hurry on over there to get your colorful, smelly, hot plastic creations before then.
Remembering MST3K's MN Origins
"This is Menard's drainage tubing," Jim Mallon explains at the outset of this Wednesday MPR segment. "This is a baby carrier, the old style." He's describing the makings of Gypsy, the panicky purple puppet he controlled for years as one of the co-creators of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
What, you didn't know the show was from here? [Pause for Racket's Gen X readers to affirm that they absolutely did know and to shout other MST3K fun facts.] The show launched on Twin Cities television channel 23 (KTMA-TV, now WUCW) in 1988, and it was produced here in town for the length of its first 10 seasons and 197 episodes. A child of Rochester, Minnesota, Mallon tells MPR's Clay Masters and Gretchen Brown that he had a “Spielberg-esque” upbringing, with lots of time for creativity and exploration.
Right, back to Mallon: He's retiring this week after over a decade as a mental health counselor, a career change he made after the tragic death of his daughter in 1997. And he's retiring in part because he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2017.
Hm, not a lot to laugh about there. Let's bring the vibe back up with this six-hour cut of MST3K's most quotable episodes:
Snow's Here, and Cold Is Coming
More like... snope:
Ope, it must be winter! Our International Falls observer reported the first snowflakes of the season with the 1 PM observation. A trace of very wet snow, sticking slightly to clothing. ❄️ #mnwx
— NWS Duluth (@NWSduluth) October 22, 2025
Yes, it's no Halloween blizzard, but snow has arrived in Minnesota, and it sounds like this will be a cold and snowy year overall. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration just released its 2025-26 winter predictions, which call for colder-than-average temps in Minnesota along with more snow than usual. Get ready: As KSTP notes, the average first snowfall in the Twin Cities occurs during the first week of November.
Annunciation's Sophia Forchas Leaves Hospital
Two months after the Annunciation shooting, 12-year-old Sophia Forchas has been discharged from the hospital to a "boisterous welcome," reports Paul Walsh at the Star Tribune. Doctors had worried she might not survive her extensive injuries; she had been shot in the head, Dr. Walt Galicich stated during an early September news conference, "There is a chance that maybe she is the third fatality in this event."
On Thursday, she took a stretch limo from Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare in St. Paul to HCMC in Minneapolis, where a crowd greeted her with banners, gifts, and cupcakes.
Forchas turns 13 this Saturday.
