Tropical Heat Wave

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Photo by V Srinivasan on Unsplash¹

We’re having a Heat Wave,A tropical Heat Wave.The temperature’s rising,It isn’t surprising.—Ethel Waters

Well, it is only in the sixties today. It is raining too, but we are ready for summer now. We have a new air conditioner. Starting at 7 AM this morning, installation commenced. It took six hours, longer than expected because the squirrels had chewed into the outdoor lines, necessitating their replacement and additional labor. I was wondering what those demon rodents were up to, since they have not attacked the car again recently. The new unit has an app. It also has Wi-Fi and can be remotely controlled. It also displays the humidity, which in St. Louis is usually half the summer air conditioning problem. It comes with a trial service agreement, where the vendor comes out to inspect the unit. This is how we got this new air conditioner to begin with, but I want some peace of mind knowing that it will run all summer long, even while we are away.

Your Wife Is Hot!

The other thing that occurred today, was that we were visited by a drive by notary, Pamela. We are closing on the Monterey house next week and things have progressed to the point where the title company is stepping in. So, you know that things are getting serious. The long and short of this experience is that I signed a lot of paperwork. Pamela had a rather laissez faire attitude. Whenever I had questions, she advised that I only fill out the minimum and let the title company complete the rest. Hopefully, I’ll get paid. When we do, Anne wants to flush a bunch of this money down the toilet, in the form of a new bathroom and I would like to have our current one-and-only bathroom updated with a walk-in shower, because we are getting older.

  1. Infrared photograph of a tropical jungle scene at 720 nm wavelength, where green is turned to white.

Highway Farty

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St. Louis Sportsman’s Park Banner

Highway Farty refers to the local St. Louis pronunciation of old US 40 (now I-64), where the “o” vowel is shifted to an “ar” sound. It is a characteristic feature of a native St. Louis accent, which also turns neighboring I-44 into farty-far. In this instance though Highway Farty alludes to a YouTube channel on local St. Louis history. I watched this series’ first five episodes that explains why Babe Ruth liked coming to St. Louis to play baseball more than anywhere else in the country. Here is a heads-up, it wasn’t the baseball that attracted him.

The first episode acts as an introduction to this series and centers on Sportsman’s Park and its role in the 1926 World Series. At the time St. Louis had two MLB teams, the Cardinals and the Browns. Located on the northside, both teams shared Sportsmen’s, with one team on the road, while the other team at home. The American League Browns regularly brought the Yankees to town. In 1926 Ruth hit three homeruns in the fourth game of that world series. Most famously one for 11-year-old Johnny Sylvester who was sick in the hospital at the time.

Baseball may have first brought Babe Ruth to town, but it was his favorite whorehouse in the whole country that made him actually want to come here. Episodes 2-5 detail the search for this once famous, but now elusive house of ill repute. Host Don M. Kaiser travels around town, following his clues. False starts and dead ends include the House of the Good Sheperd, Magdalene Laundry and Busch’s Grove. Sifting evidence, he finally hits paydirt.

In St. Louis, on August 29, 1925, Ruth was fined $5,000 ($100,000 in today’s dollars) and suspended from the Yankees for violations of team rules. Given a train ticket, he was ordered back to New York. Instead, he headed back downtown and straight to his favorite bordello, whose site is currently occupied by a Salvation Army parking lot, near the midtown IKEA. On September 3, 1925, the Post Dispatch reported a police raid at this location where the moral squad arrested two young women and a maid. Ruth apologized to management and patch things up with his team and was in St. Louis again next year.

Life and Trust

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Life and Trust Still by Stephanie Crousillat

Life and Trust is a spin on the Faust story by Emursive, the immersive theater company that reworked Macbeth in the style of Hitchcock for Sleep No More. The German legend of Faust tells the tale of a dissatisfied alchemist who makes a pact with the devil for success, riches, and love. But when your soul is for the taking, the deal is bound to go sour. In Life and Trust, Faust is Mr. Conwell, a banking magnate. On the evening of a big celebration at Conwell Tower, a bank built upon the fortunes of a magic syrup that cured his ailing sister, the wearied executive learns the stock market has plummeted. His entire fortune disappears in a blink, delivered to the audience members in his office with a mix of casual venomous disdain. Before he tries to take his own life, one of Satan’s minions offers him the chance to return to his original sin. From there, audience members follow various characters in their pursuit of pleasure, power, and legacy.