After I left Morgan Street, it was time to hit the Cardinal's new park for the game.

It was fun. I always like going to games. Of course the Cards lost, but I guess technically I'm supposed to be more of a Reds fan anyway. I didn't tell anyone that though. I even bought a Cardinals cap.

Anyway, I took some pictures.

The new park is a pretty confusing place. Parts of it are like a maze. I think it might be my least favorite of the new parks I've been to as far as getting around goes, but it's got a lot more character than the new parks in Cincinnati or Chicago, so I like it.

Both Friday and Saturday were quite busy, so I'll be breaking this trip report up into several entries. Otherwise it's just seems like too daunting a task and I'd probably never get to it.

So, Friday afternoon. I checked into my hotel. It seemed like a cool place at first.

But I quickly discovered that the "free Internet access in every room" was simply a myth to lure in customers. I had no signal in my room, and when I called them to complain they basically told me that I was SOL, and why not just take my laptop down to the lobby? There's a strong signal there.

So that sucked, but I wasn't supposed to be sitting at my computer all weekend anyway.

Once I'd checked in, I took off down the hill to see the arch. Should that be capitalized?

The Arch?

I dunno. Or care.

I took a shitload of arch pictures. I'm only going to post a few though. You'll thank me later.

This next one is semi-interesting. This was the first time I'd touched the arch in twenty years or so. I didn't cry though.

As I'd expected, the ride to the top was completely sold out, so I bought a ticket for 12:40 on Saturday. Then I walked over to Laclede's Landing to check out this Morgan Street Brewpub place. Behold my photographic prowess.

While I was at Morgan Street I figured what the heck, I'll have some beer.

Morgan Street Honey Wheat (4)

The bartender didn't know if it was a German-style or and American-style wheat, so I just had a sampler glass. It's American-style, so I didn't like it. The honey was not apparent except that the usual hop bitterness I find in this style was not there. Bland and boring.

I also had a sample of this Winter Lager stuff (4) which I'll get to in a minute.

Morgan Street Irish Stout (16)

Fucking yummy and chocolately and yummy. Whoever says that there's no good beer at Laclede's Landing is an idiot. This beer was worth the trip all by itself.

Quite boring and generic. No hint at all of the strangeness that I usually associate with this style. I see no point to even making this beer.

Despite the name, this is an oatmeal stout aged in used Jack Daniel's barrels. The bartender says that every beer in the place is "lager-style" which to me means yeast. Whatever they call it, this beer is yummy.

(Written Friday morning)

I guess the drive wasn't too bad. It was long, and it was boring, and after the first hour or so, it was hot, but it felt kind of good to be actually doing something.

I used to, over twenty years ago, make the drive between Western Illinois and Southern Indiana at least once a month. Even after I got married we still enjoyed going to my parents' house as often as we could.

One place that we always stopped at was this Hardee's in the middle of Illinois. I stopped there yesterday, and it was still there. Not much has changed in that part of Illinois.

I keep having to remind myself that it's really been more like 15 years since I've spent any time in the St. Louis area - not 20. During the period between 1989 and 1991 my ex-wife and I were back together, living in Nebraska, and we'd go visit her parents in Illinois or my Dad in Indiana. I really don't remember much about those trips though.

It still takes a tank of gas to get from the Georgetown Indiana exit to the Scott AFB Illinois exit, so I found myself taking that old exit and looking for a gas station. It would have been cool if I could have gone onto the base to check it out, but of course I couldn't do that. So I just drove around a bit and ended up at a gas station in Belleville.

This time my journey didn't end at the Scott AFB exit like it used to. This time I got back on I-64 and drove those extra 20 miles to St. Louis. Those extra 20 miles took about an hour and a half due to road construction. I'd been having this internal debate with myself about whether I wanted to go back to the Scott/Belleville/Mascoutah area on Saturday to explore. I think the road construction has made my mind up for me. There's just not really anything there that I need to see. It was all too long ago. It was another life, and not a particularly good one.

So I'll just dick around St. Louis, and I'll let those things that are in the past stay in the past.

I'm writing this Saturday morning. This will test my memory.

I guess a lot of people must get Good Friday off work, because Rich O's was looking more like a Friday than a Thursday. The place was packed with strangers. I ended up sitting on the loveseat drinking a couple BBC Jefferson's Reserve Bourbon Barrel Stouts (144) for the first hour or so. There were some idiots sitting on the sofa and the throne. I didn't talk to them because they were idiots and I didn't want to be associated with them.

I was quite bored. I tried, for about the millionth time, to call SassyGirl. It went straight to voicemail. Again.

After a long time, some strangers all got up from the island and left, So I bolted over there. For about .0003 seconds I had the island to myself. CoffeeDude ruined that by sitting across from me and attempting to start a conversation. A conversation which I quickly squelched by grunting a lot. For about 2 minutes CoffeeDude and I had the island to ourselves. But then about 8000 PBDs came in. They'd been having a brew club meeting out front and as soon as that was over they stampeded into Rich O's proper because people don't like to sit out front - it's cold and impersonal out there.

So for a while I was pretty irritated, mostly because this one PDB lady kept fanning herself with a menu and the menu kept smacking me in the ear. Right at about the time I was trying to decide between (a) moving elsewhere and (b) murdering the PBD lady, two cool things happened.

First, the PBD lady left and went to go assault somebody else.

Second, DooRagGirl came in and sat beside me.

A bonus cool thing was that I recognized her right away - first time that's happened since she got her hair cut.

So the rest of the night was pretty good. The crowd there at the island dwindled to a reasonable number, and we all sat around bullshitting.

I had myself a Weihenstephaner (850).

I think that just about the only other thing of note was that HotEuchreGirl was there and one of the PBDs that I was sitting with decided that he was going to help me pick HotEuchreGirl up. There were several things wrong with this plan, not the least of which was that her boyfriend was already standing right there talking to us.

Not cool, dude.

Now I've got a lot of catching up to do with my email and other messages. Then I've got a lot of shit to type. Then I've got to catch up on all the journals I've missed.

Man, after all this I'm going to need a vacation.

My hotel supposedly has Internet access in all the rooms, but it's wireless access and I've got no signal in my room.

I'm sitting down in the lobby typing this so my readers don't think I'm dead or anything.

I probably won't do any more updates until I get home tomorrow.

Bye!

Right now, I'm supposed to be writing my Thursday beer report. But instead I'm going to go to St. Louis.

I might write my Thursday beer report later today, or sometime this weekend. I might write an entry or two sometime between now and Sunday when I get back home.

But I'm not making any promises.

I'm taking my laptop with me. This is the first time I've bothered to take it on one of my Easter trips. But that doesn't guarantee that I'll be writing anything.

I may have fun instead.

At least three different women will read the title of this entry and assume that I'm writing about them.

Only one of them is right, though.

Just to ease some concerns and lessen some confusion: If I know your last name, then this is not about you.

Now that I've cleared that up, I thought that I'd say that there's this chick that I want to lick from head to toe, but she's got a boyfriend...

...and he seems to be kind of a dick...

...and he's taking her for granted...

...she could definitely do better...

...and I would love the opportunity to make her scream in ecstasy...

...but she's got a boyfriend, so I will do nothing.

This morning on the way to work I passed a car on the side of the road. The hood was up, and the elderly black lady standing beside was it doing the phone signal to the cars passing her. You know, with her thumb and her pinkie extended?

Genius that I am, I figured that she was wanting to know if anyone had a phone to she could call for help with her car.

Nice guy that I am, I pulled over at the first opportunity.

I walked back to the lady.

"Ma'am," I asked. "Would you like to use my phone?"

The lady looked at me, sneered a little, and said, "I'll get my own phone, Whitey."

As I walked back to my truck, I directed some thoughts at the lady. The most relevant was probably this one:

Please die, you racist bitch. The world will be better off when you, and people like you, are no longer a part of it.

I know this one chick, she's the maestro of the metaphor and the sultan of the simile.

Me, I'm neither. The best I can come up with is that tired old cliché phantom pubic hairs equal feelings.

Confused? It probably won't become any clearer.

Sometimes, I sit at Rich O's after work, and everything is almost perfect. The place is empty enough that I feel like I'm the only one there. My mood is decent but not good, subdued but not sad, alert but not anxious. The music is at a comfortable level, and it's not fucking Johnny Cash. The beer is yummy.

Almost perfect.

After work today I sat in the throne, drinking a pint of Spezial Rauchbier (1190), and it was as close to perfect as it's been in a very long time.

Too fucking close.

I found myself getting irritated because I'm not supposed to be content in that place. There are reasons that I go there, and those reasons do not include beer or conversation or music or any of that crap. That crap I can get anywhere, and that crap is not why I go to Rich O's.

I go to Rich O's because that's where it all happened. Because that was the scene of my crime. Because that's where the ghost is. Because I know without a doubt that Rich O's is the place where, if I have any chance at all of resurrecting anything even remotely resembling actual human emotion - it will be there.

So I go.

I sit in the throne or at the bar or at the island and I grasp at gossamer wisps of emotion, but they evaporate when I touch them.

I tug, ever so gently, on threads tied to memories of that place from so long ago, but those threads break with the slightest tension.

I pull phantom hairs out of my mouth, but I can never quite get a grip, and my fingers emerge from my lips with nothing on them but moisture.

A tickle in my throat, a quiet voice in my head, a tiny and brief rush of adrenaline when someone walks in the door. These are the new highlights of my life.

I am not heartbroken, though I should be. I am not happy, though I long to be. I am not sad, though I deserve to be. I'm finding, more and more lately, that I'm simply content.

Fucking content. What a load of crap that is.

A wise man once wrote:

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this - it just doesn't seem right to let things fade away. Some things deserve a grand exit. Some things deserve closure. Some things do not deserve to be pushed aside so they can fade over time and eventually be forgotten completely.

That is my fear. That the time for love is behind me forever. That I've missed my exit, and that I'll never pass this way again.