The Lou

Really, I'm writing this entry for therapeutic purposes. This post isn't about sports and it also isn't a short work of fiction. I'm basically just recounting some of the more major events from last weekend. I thought I would never be the guy who just blogs about his boring life, but here I am, and here you are, so I'm guessing you're just as bored. In case you didn't know, I was in St. Louis from Thursday the 25th until this morning (Sunday). While I did have a great time and was able to catch up with one of my all-time best buds' (Zoid), there were a few things that did not go my way during my stay in the gateway to the west. I need to get these things off my chest because it was a little ridiculous.

My mini-vacation (well, I guess I've been on vacation for a while now) in St. Louis began on Thursday. I departed from a chilly, overcast Minster around 10:45. Shortly into my trip it began to rain, which would have made the remaining 6 hour drive miserable for most mortals, however I enjoy a challenge and I met that challenge with an unprecedented ferocity. I listened to "Eye of the Tiger" for the last 5 hours and 45 minutes of the drive and conquered the sheets of water spraying from semi's that rendered me legally blind. Hammertime-1, Mother Nature-0. To Mother Nature's credit, I am currently winning the vast majority of my contests by much more than 1. If I weren't so busy trying not to slam head-on to medians while I was visually impaired, I may have taken the 6 hour downpour as an ominous sign that my trip would steer me into many potholes, so to speak, along the way.

Bummer #1

I arrived at Zoid's apartment on Thursday night and we basically just hung out and went to bed (probably could word this sentence differently to minimize how gay it sounds). I awoke Friday to find that Zoid had gone to work and Cathy (Zoid's girlfriend) and I quickly became bored. We decided to make the 1/2 hour drive to downtown St. Louis (Zoid lives in the 'burbs) so I could see some stuff. I wanted to see the new Busch Stadium, so after parking and feeding the meter for two hours, we walked to Busch. While we were walking around their new stadium we saw an open gate being guarded by a guard (fitting, huh), so I asked him if I could quickly get in to take a sneak peak at the field and maybe snap off a picture. The guard did not oblige, I guess he thought I was a terrorist or something, also I was wearing my Reds hat, so that probably didn't help my cause.

Bummer #2

Cathy and I then took a 15 minute walk over to the Arch. Cathy said when you're at the top of the arch you can see down into the stadium, and basically, the rest of the city, so that sounded pretty awesome. I was excited for this, how many people can say they have been to the top of the arch, without lying? I was about to become one of those peoples. We walked up to the counter to sign up for the tour where I saw a sign which read, "tours start every ten minutes." There was also a sign hanging right next to the previous sign which read, "next tour begins at 11:50." At the time I read the second sign, it was only 10:40, so I guess someone setting the tour times is not competent in mathematics. The trouble was, since there was a 2:00 max on parking meter's, and we were all out of silver, we didn't have enough meter time to wait for an hour and then take an hour tour. So, I still can't morally say that I've been to the top of the St. Louis arch.

Bummers #3, 4 and 5.

I love Zoid, but I have to be honest, if the Buckeyes weren't playing their sweet 16 and (possible) elite 8 games in St. Louis, I probably wouldn't have made the trek to Missouri. Zoid informed me that it was his girlfriends' and one of his other buddies girlfriends' birthday and they had made dinner reservations for Friday night. I was left to fend for myself in a foreign town, for one of my biggest sports games of the year (3). Luckily, the official Ohio State bar in St. Louis is located less than a mile from Zoid's apartment, so I just decided to eat and watch the game there. Basically, I ended up driving to St. Louis to watch a game at a bar, by myself. Zoid felt pretty bad about leaving me hanging but I told him it wasn't a big deal and that I really wanted to watch the elite 8 game, so we decided to cross our fingers and actually go to the elite 8 game on Sunday. The Buckeyes lost on Friday (4), however, and I was a "Grumpy Gus" for the rest of the night. So obviously, we couldn't watch the Buckeyes on Sunday (5).

Bummer #6, averted

If you've experienced the absolute thrill of meeting me, you'll know that I do enjoy the occasional alcoholic beverage. Most of my life, the beverage of choice was the wallet-friendly, smooth-tasting, Natural Light. A fine (wish I could still say American) product indeed. If my Dad was buying or if it was a special occasion, I would dabble into the Bud Light arena. Being that I've always had a love for Budweiser products, we decided to tour the Budweiser factory in St. Louis. This bummer almost occurred immediately. We arrived only to see a sign posted out front which read, "All Tours are full." Reluctantly, Zoid and I still decided to enter, just to walk around the lobby area and look at some of the knick-knacks they had sprinkled about. We then noticed an open door, and inside of that open door were people who just finished their tour and were drinking their complementary beers. Zoid and I snuck into this room (it was really easy) and began to drink a couple free beers, while we decided what we wanted to do for the rest of the day. We each drank two beers (you're only SUPPOSED to have 2 free beers) and thought we would leave. As we were walking out, we noticed that a tour was beginning, so we sort of shimmied to the middle of the pack and joined the group without ever showing the tour guide our passes, which we didn't have. It was a small victory but it felt good given the string of bad luck I had encountered on my trip. At the conclusion of our tour, we were lead back to the "free beer room" as I call it, and received two more free beers apiece, a major victory for myself and America.

Overall, St. Louis was a pretty good time and although a few things didn't really go my way, I did get to see one of my best friends' and spend some quality time with him, for which I am truly thankful. That's the stuff that really matters, not getting to see the inside of Busch Stadium or riding to the top of the Arch. I'm just sorry it took me over a year and a half to go see Zoid.