St. Louis!

I've made it to the city of the giant arch, which I have not seen, but expect it's within 20 miles or so.

I've not mentioned road kill for a while.  I've seen some rare ones if you are a citizen (or is it subject?) of the great state of California, and that would be armadillo!  I also had a cicada hatch out on the tent last night.  It didn't wake me as I had ear plugs in, but I saw the silhouette in the morning.

Speaking of other road side attractions, there are firework stands all over the place - so if anyone wants some smuggled out, let me know.  Just kidding!  I've not bothered to stop and they are probably full of "safe and sane" stuff and who needs that?  I remember the Malcolm in he Middle episode where they got the bomb that turned night into day.  "How long before our sight comes back?"  "I think the guy said 3 days." 

Car issues.  So I make some calls last night looking for tires.  Thought a VW dealer might be the best bet.  He had them, but no appointments open for 10 days to mount them.   I don't think so.

I call Big O and use Google to find them on the route.  "Find big o dealer between here and St. Louis."  this actually works.

I call them.  They have tires.  I'll be there mid morning.

I get there about 10:30 at the 159 mile marker on I-44 from Oklahoma towards St. Louis.  It takes them some time to look at it.  I spent that time getting some breakfast at the midnight cafe across the road.  No checks and no credit cards!  But steak and eggs out the door was $10. 

The guy drives the car and then checks balance.  One tire is off by 1 ounce and the other by 3!  Another test drive.  No more vibration.  Cost?  $0.00.  The VW guy charged me $60 for the four wheel balance, plus a $27 shop charge and a bunch of other stuff.  I may write them a letter.

From the small town where the Big O was to Ann Marie's was about 120 miles.  It all seems pretty good at this point.  So I have the capacity to bitch about audio books...

I started a Dale Brown book.  I've read his stuff before and liked it.  This one has a space component in it.  But the book is like being back at work.  He spends so much time developing acronyms that I find it highly artificial and painful. 

The story has not really gotten going yet, so I'll stick with it a bit more and he gets back to telling a story and not missile name dropping.

I'm dropping in on Ann Marie and we are going to do some photography on Saturday.  She joined the St. Louis photography club a few years back and has done some wonderful work.  So she and her friend and I are going to out and do some clicking.  Great fun!

It rained most of the day coming up.  There were sections where it was quite heavy and I even slowed down.  Of course this was pre tire fix and I was slightly cautious about tires not being on the ground much.  But not too much drama.  The stability control came on a couple of times as I hit puddles.

All the rain was in Missouri, with none in Oklahoma.  I did a nice job on picking where to camp last night.  I think that camping in the rain might be a lot of fun with the right tarps up and such.  But I didn't want to setup or take down and store all the wet gear.  Ok, ok, I'm not really a camper!

That's all that comes to mind at this point.

Rich