Jay and Carl flew in from the coast, on Wednesday evening. We picked them up at the airport and then whisked them off to The Loop and Blueberry Hill. Chuck Berry had a concert there that night, but it was sold-out already. I went to work early the next morning and put in a half day. It was vacation time, wisely saved, because when I returned home about noon, the two West Coasters were still in breakfast mode. In the afternoon, we headed downtown to the City Museum.

It was already hot and crowded when we got there. Per our guide’s instruction, we headed straight to the roof, before it got any hotter. We explored the school bus hanging precariously, the Ferris wheel and a modest two-story slide. I found that my new sandals act as a way too effective a breaking system, I didn’t hold my feet up, and got stopped before the bottom and had to crawl the rest of the way out. Then we took the ten story spiral slide back down to the rest of the museum. I still had problems with my shoes sticking, and probably should have taken up the guide’s offer of a spray of fabric slickener, because it was too hard to hold my feet up for ten stories. What I liked best about this giant slide was that as I descended, it got darker and colder. I was descending into the museum’s catacomb maze. On the eve of Gastly Hallows, it felt Potter-ish.

The City Museum resides within an old shoe factory. At one time Saint Louis was first in shoes, first in booze and last in the American League. That team is gone, the beer crown is gone too, but the old shoe factories still remain. Most of these factories have been converted into luxury condominium lofts. The City Museum’s building got converted into something completely different. We wound our way through the maze, checked out the first, and parts of the second and third floors, before patience waned and hunger prevailed. We decamped to the Fountain on Locust, Anne, Carl and Jay all had a sensible lunch, while I had dessert instead, after all, life is uncertain and often too short.

We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping with Jay and Carl. The evening was consumed at the Bottleworks, along with plenty of beer. Our bike buddy, Sandi, threw a birthday party for herself there. Sandi and the rest of our bike buddies got to meet Jay and Carl and they got to meet them too. This was followed by Imo’s pizza delivery, to cap off the perfect Saint Louis summer day.