The Holtonian

Visiting the Folks and St. Louis

The wife and I traveled up to St. Louis to see my folks for the weekend. It was a good trip, but that drive is getting old fast.

We got up around 8Pm on friday and pretty much just sat around and talked then went strait to bed. We did the typical holton thing which is sit around in the morning on the weekend and drink about 18 cups of coffee each. We took up some good stuff (greyfriars) as well as some homemade biscotti made by the wifey, and some new mugs for their brand new redesigned kitchen. Sadly enough I don't have any pictures of this fabulous kitchen. The four of us went out to the wife's favorite chain restaurant: Cheesecake Factory and we all managed to eat too much. I got the four cheese pasta, pretty much my standard there, wifey got the chicken club which is pretty dang good, mom got some sort of asian chicken appetizer, and dad got the soup and sandwich. Very good. Then mom and wifey walked around the Gag-a-ria (St. Louis term for the Gallaria the obscenely large mall in Richmond Heights).

Then I just sort of hung out at home with Copper and mom and wifey toured some of the st. louis boutiques in search of deals of sorts. I ended up watching Jason X on tv, which I had sadly enough seen the ending of at some earlier point in history. What a sad movie, sad as in horrendously terrible, possibly the most contrived movie in history.

Then we went to a restaraunt where my mom's friend's son is the chef. It was a St. Johnsesque quality type restaurant but more casual in atmosphere. Wife and I ordered the lamb which was amazing and we topped it off with some cheesecake that was dang dang good.

Then the wife and I went to see Jason Harrod play in Clayton at the Hanley Baptist Church's Vox coffee shop. I get Jason Harrod's emails regarding tour dates and what not and we had sort of planned to go see him play at the Vox if we had time while in St. louis. We had the time so we snuck into the show. We were mostrously late but still managed to catch an hour of the show, luckily for us he had an opening band and also he played for a dang long time. It was a great set and seeing him in action was pretty stinking cool.

I kind of became a fan of his in the past year after just hearing his cd in the background while playing cards with the Crabbs. Wifey liked the music of him and Funk right away and I picked up on the hint and bought her their live Album from Calvin College. Though, I had heard Harrod and Funk prior to the Crabbs encounter though I didn't know who they were. I actually have a bootleg from one of Jason's shows that I inherited from Roe. Problem is its on a minidisc and I can't seem to get the darn thing off the mini disc. So anyway in the past few months I've sort of become a pretty big fan of his enjoying his music imensley. We introduced ourselves after the set and tried to coax Jason into coming down to Chatty for a concert. We bought his new CD, which we listened to a few times on the drive back. I'll probably give a review of it later this week after I have some time to digest it. We also bought Living In Skin as we didn't have that CD either.

Also for those interested I saw Matt Novenson and his new baby at the concert, though I don't really know him, just know of him and recognize him from Covenant so I didn't say "Hi" as I thought I would look like a dork, though I look like a dork regardless of who I say "hi" to. But for those wondering he is alive and in St. Louis.

Then today we went to Shnucks and picked up some St. Louis Necessities: Mama Lucias Pizzas,
a King of the Hill Sandwich, sourdough bread, and Gooey Butter Coffee Cake.
I love Shnucks, those are some dang good little Shnuckers. For those who don't know, Shnucks is about the best grocery store in the world, its amazing and so St. Louisey. A lot of the stuff they sell is only St. Louis stuff, such as Gooey Butter Coffee Cake, Mama Lucias, Shafley Beer, and Fitzs Root Beer (which can be purchased at Greyfriars and is dang good Root).
Oh the source of so many of my many pounds... the gooiest, butteriest, coffeest cake there is....

So it was a great weekend. My folks house looks pretty good....

this is grass...

we never had this growing up. Between driving a go cart throughout the back yard and two pooping dogs we had a terrible lawn. But I guess all that dog fertilizer paid off because now their lawn is lush and green as all get out.

Also Concerned/Hunt: Your car is good, here it is....

Here is mom loving and taking care of it...

Fun time with the folks...

FYI, the pics that are blurry are because I edited them and Microsoft just loves to mess with the quality when I mess with the demensions.

Posted by holtonian at May 1, 2005 10:19 PM | TrackBack