Cards Game with Senator Ted Cruz

My friend Chris posted on Facebook really last minute that he had extra Cardinals luxury suite tickets. I'd never been in a luxury suite that I can recall so I couldn't resist.

I think part of the luxury is that the box is much closer to the game than some of the other boxes I've been inside.

On my drive from the Brewery to Busch Stadium I forgot that Budweiser was the king of beers so it was lucky for me that I got several reminders during the game.

Speaking of which there's an upcoming beer festival at the Brewery. Yes please!

One fun aspect of the suites was being able to peek at the other suites in our vicinity. Some were decorated pretty nicely. To our immediate left must have been the Anheuser-Busch suite because there was a lot of fancy wood paneling and the amount of eagles that you would expect.

I scanned the people sitting over there for coworkers but I didn't see any. One guy looked vaguely familiar but I let it go and continued watching the game. Well I saw Chris looking over there a little too. We both agreed that there was a guy sitting over there that looked just like... Texas Senator Rafael Edward "Ted" Cruz. It was! I waived and asked if we could take a picture with him. We chatted briefly and he said that he was in town fundraising. He seemed nice. Lydia made fun of me for being too civil with him. Sad.

Let's Talk Justice

Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Sonia Sotomayor spoke at the Touhill today. I was impressed with how nice she was. She spent the majority of the talk wandering around in the aisles and taking pictures with people.

She was looking pretty frail. The US marshals with her seemed present as much to help her get up and down staircases as for her protection.

Biking the Missouri Weinstrasse

Today we brought back an event we've done once or twice before: a round trip bike ride from Defiance, MO to Augusta's wine country.

Augusta is situated in the Missouri Rhineland region. The land near the Missouri river is apparently similar to Germany's Rhineland, so when German immigrants started arriving in the area they already knew what to do: grow grapes and make wine! According to trusty Wikipedia they wined so hard that around the time of the Civil War Missouri was the largest wine producing state in the nation.

Wikipedia: "The area along Route 94 between Defiance and Marthasville has so many wineries that the highway has been nicknamed the Missouri Weinstrasse (wine route)."

"We drank wine, senator."

Some of the wineries were pretty specific about their rules.

One the way home we stopped at a Mexican restaurant. Lainey tried to order enchiladas with beans only, no meat. Apparently that order got lost in translation because she got this watery refried bean mess instead. ¡Ay, caramba!

Back in St. Louis we did some more Lime scooter corralling.  It's fun to ride them around in the hallways.

$$$!

Life Changing Cards Game

This was my first Cardinals game since an AB coworker of mine told me he worked the Busch Stadium grounds crew.

Is that him? Nahhhh.

Could that...? 

Maybe?

Ehhh.

Baseball was happening too.

After the game I began an amazing career as a Lime scooter charger. In lime-punny parlance they are called Lime Juicers. All you gotta do is find one that's low on power, take it home and plug it in, then put it outside in the morning. The sucky part is the morning part. You are supposed to have them out on street by 7am. Bleh.

These are all the places you can set them in the morning. Luckily downtown is a hotspot so I don't have to go far.

Folding them into my normal sized, not a truck or van type car can get weird.

Hurray capitalism!

Floatin' Down Ugly River

A big pack of us drove out to Garrisons River Resort near Steelville, Missouri to do a little campin' and a little floatin'. I'm not going to lie, things got pretty trashy out there.

The night of our arrival they had a little karaoke session under a pavillion in the dark.

Some of the yokels were really good at singing. Suspiciously good.

Something you'll learn about me out in real America is that I really like to burn things.

Playing bags by the campfire has a certain romance to it.

The harsh light of day reminded us that we were in real America. It was time to hit the river, pound some beers, and let our buttcracks hang out.

I was a bit confused because in years past the river was so full of rafts that it was hard to navigate. This year there were like 7 total rafts on the whole river. I guess we went kind of late in the season or something.

Stuart brought a box of aviators that completed my nautical camo/state fair lottery hat ensemble.

Everyone was in high spirits. Like the opening scene of a horror movie.

The free beer flowed like milk.

Half of the fun of float trips is arguing when to stop the raft, someone being left behind, them yelling/crying, and criticizing each-other's rowing techniques. You just can't have this brand of fun on land.

Things got sexier and sexier. People were jumping into the river not because of the sun but because their minds had gotten overheated.

There was a rope swing. There's always a rope swing.

I did not jump from a tree branch into whatever pokey dangers were lurking in the muddy water. I instead jumped on the opportunity to take more pictures of myself.

This seems like a picture of us leaving several people to die. Fun fact: Wikipedia says that the Meramec River's name likely means 'the river of ugly fishes' or 'ugly water' in Algonquian. That feels right.

I seem to have been legally deceased for an hour or two.

You never know when you might wake up from your nap real thirsty. Best to keep a beer handy.

I guess at some point there were more people dead than alive. We were essentially shipwreck victims waiting for rescue by the time we got to the end.

A highlight of going on float trips in rural Missouri is the opportunity to ride on a school bus that dates back to prohibition.