Tag Archives: Tower Grove Park

Primary Election Do-Over

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A Pair of Tower Grove Water Lilies

Earlier this month (8/7), the non-presidential primary election was held. Anne worked it as an Election Official. Everything seemed to go well, until it didn’t. Due to redistricting, incumbant state representatives Stacey Newman and Susan Carlson were smashed together in the 87th District. Newman won by a single vote, 1,823 to 1,822. A recount was automatic and the recount unearthed a huge can of worms. In a Brentwood polling place more than 100 voters were given the incorrect ballot and allowed to vote in this race, when they shouldn’t have been allowed to vote at all. Anne is so glad that it wasn’t at her polling place.

On Monday, a judge ruled an election do-over. All sixteen polling places in the district will be open on Monday, 9/24. This includes that faulty Brentwood poll, hopefully under new management. If not, then even they should be able to handle the process, I hope. There will be only one ballot and the voter rolls will only list eligible voters. Anne has already gotten a voicemail from the County Election Commission.

While, this do-over should eventually resolve this election deadlock, the Saint Louis Post-Dispatch is not quite so sure, “No Republicans filed to run in the district, meaning the Democratic victor will likely represent the area in the state House.” My emphasis added.

Tut, Tut, Looks Like Rain

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Tower Grove Weather Vane

Hurricane Isaac, fresh from disrupting the Republican National Convention today, is barreling north and appears to be taking aim for New Orleans. If it holds to its projected course it will impact New Orleans seven years to the day that Katrina struck there . Further projections have what will be by then Tropical Depression Isaac arriving here in Saint Louis on Saturday.

An informal poll of my coworkers showed overwhelming approval of this weather forecast. Why would they want their Labor Day weekend marred by rain? Well, because we are currently undergoing the worst drought that I’ve ever experienced here in Saint Louis. Isaac will be a major rain event. I’m a little bit more ambivalent about the prospect of giving up part of my holiday weekend to Isaac though.

Part of my reluctance is due to the fact that we got rain on both Saturday and Sunday last weekend. So the need for rain here is not quite as critical as it was. Primarily my reluctance is bicycling based. Labor Day weekend host the Gateway Cup the biggest bicycle racing event of the year. I don’t race, but I do like to come out and watch the races. This Saturday night hosts the Moonlight Ramble. The Ramble is the largest nighttime bicycle ride. This ride normally occurs on the closest Saturday to the full moon in August. This year it actually falls in September. The current forecast shows rain Friday night and during the day on Saturday. This could spoil the first two days of Gateway.

These events are still days away, so there is no reason for me to get my undies all in a bunch about the weather. If the storm does strike it will be the first real test of our new roof and gutters. It will also give me plenty of time to prepare.

Humanity, Humidity & Heat

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Anne and I bicycled over to Tower Grove Park to attend the Festival of Nations. We’ve done this for quite a few years running and this weekend in August always seems a bit more sweltering than most. As we passed through Forest Park, the rumbling bass sounds of the Rock n Roll Loufest, could be heard. It was kicking. Fresh from last night’s screening of “Premium Rush”, it was only with some effort that I was able to restrain my red-light running tendencies as well as I did. Others were not so restrained. 🙄

On the way over to the Festival of Nations, we stopped off at the botanical gardens. This summer’s big Chinese Lantern Festival has closed and the remnants of the lantern sculptures were on sale in the parking lot. There were still a few good pieces looking for a good home, but most of the artwork had already been sold off. Interestingly, the pair of porcelain dragons that were set in front of the Climatron were off-limits. I got two conflicting stories about this. The first had them being packed up and shipped back to China for another show. The second story also had them shipped back to China, but because they were all lead based and they were not allowed to remain in the country.

At the festival, we saw Bobbi, who was working one of the charity booths. She was on lunch break when we saw her in the food aisle and so were we. Today’s repast included Malaysian. We had their sweet sesame ‘meatballs’ for an appetizer. Our main course was from Nigeria. It was a spicy beef stew that was served upon this tortilla thin spongy white ‘bread’. It had a rather elastic consistency, which made it excellent for wiping the plate clean of all the beef sauce. We had Iranian for dessert. It was a sweet frozen cup of something with noodles in it. All of these dishes were good, if a bit foreign. 😉

Brett, a friend from work and also a neighbor alerted us to COBU. COBU is the premiere act at the festival. COBU is a Japanese girl band that is one part Taiko drumming and one part punk. They’ve actually transplanted to NYC, where one of their members also performs in Stomp. Their motto is, “Dance like Drumming, Drum like Dancing”. I got enough video of them that a movie is in the offering. It will do more justice to their art than still photography ever could. While we were saving our seats for COBU, we watched Aalim’s Arabian Silk, what I would call belly dancers. They were actually pretty good. I missed the little Polynesian girls in their grass skirts, but that is probably just as well.