Clownvis Still Has Talent

I took the opportunity being in St. Louis to hit my favorite restaurants. Sugarfire is pretty darn good barbecue.

The sauces... the sauces.

I checked out the Missouri History Museum in Forest Park.

I love an opportunity to immerse myself in the 1904 World's Fair.

This was a weird thing that I don't remember learning about before. They have some jars of preserved fruit from an agricultural exhibit. If I was a supervillain I think I might break in the museum in the dead of night and feast upon 120 year old pears.

Our annual pumpkin beer tasting was coming up so I was excited to stock up on delicious St. Louis beer.

I got a little carried away though... I couldn't make it all fit in my suitcase. Sacrifices were made.

I was super excited about this event. Silver Ballroom is maybe my favorite bar in town, and Clownvis is a very fun and unique local act... plus free pinball? I'm there.

I suited up for the occasion.

It turns out that the event was promoting a new Clownvis beer from 4 Hands Brewing Co.

Seago and Nora joined in the fun. It was fun talking to Clownvis a bit about the olden days. He recognized my shirt as being a relic from an earlier time. I discovered Clownvis very early in my St. Louis life so there was a fair bit of nostalgia involved as well. Good times.

Andre was there too.

Clownvis even gave me some swag. What a good night.

Johns Do St. Louis

We returned to St. Louis, MO after a thoroughly celebrated first birthday party in Springfield, IL.

We met up with the gang at the Saint Louis Zoo.

Granddad took a turn carrying Ern.

Lydia had also planned me a nice little surprise birthday party of some sort. We headed to Schnucks to look for beers. I thought it would be cool to get some 40 oz beers since it was my 40th birthday party. We hit maybe 2-3 stores and it turns out that 40s aren't that prevalent, even in St. Louis beer metropolis.

Seattle has a great beer scene but seeing the plethora of macro brewery products did give me some nostalgia, I will admit.

This absolutely atrocious 42 ounce Olde English malt liquor was the closest thing I could find. It tasted like it, too, was celebrating its 40th birthday. If I was capable of planning more than 15 minutes into the future I would have made use of my Anheuser-Busch contacts to procure said gigantic brewskies.

My surprise party was awesome. They rented a party bus that drove us around to all my favorite spots. We had a really good turn out and everyone dressed up as different "Johns". John Lennon, John Stockton, etc.

Ernie John even made an appearance. It was probably a little late for him but I requested the cameo so that my friends could meet him.

This stop was my favorite brewery in town: Earthbound. They make lots of weird cool flavors. And it's not just "let's put frosted flakes in this one" kind of cool, though I think they do some weird ingredients. They also make gruit, for example, which is a type of beer made before hops was a widespread ingredient. Sadly this brewery would close later this year so that makes this visit even more special. It may be the last time I set foot here.

Lyly was Olivia Newton-John.

Lainey "John Lennon" showing Ernie her guitar.

Brandon and Natalie came down from Chicago which was very surprising as well. I did my best to drink that horrid malt liquor but warming up did not help its flavor profile one bit.

Jay was John Belushi.

Zoe was John Deere. I remember how much I used to complain to my friends about always going to the same few bars in Soulard over and over and rarely succeeding them at getting them to try anything new. Well now I rarely see those friends anymore and a stop at McGurk's was major flashback inducing. Getting old is weird.

Silver Ballroom

Emily was Jimmy John's and Cassie was Elton John. People's costumes were pretty great.

Our last stop was River City Casino. Best birthday ever.