Meet me in St. Looey?

[jenP_97]

I've only been to St. Louis once... and since I was there as a
quasi-tourist (I was helping a friend out at a gift-shop 
convention), I have a couple of ideas for you, Tabouli.  Now, 
I was only there for 3 days... and I had a convention to go to 
for 2 of them, so I didn't have very much sight-seeing time.  
Here's what we saw:

* The Arch.  Very interesting, although kind of uncomfortable 
if you suffer from a mild case of claustrophobia.  Interesting 
in the fact that you take *round* elevators that rotate as you 
go up.  The view is pretty nice, but I'd say go up the arch 
*just* for the squeezing into the elevators part. :)

* Scott Joplin's House.  This was pretty good, too... they have 
an old pump-style player piano with old old reels of Joplin's 
most famous rags that they play during tours.  It's an interesting
place, but it isn't very exciting. :)

* The Arboretum (sp?).  We had a convention dinner there, and 
it was very pleasant.  However, if you've been to other gardens 
in the past, it'll be very similar.  There is a science
"exploratorium"-type center nearby, and it is very fun, but also, 
if you're not into that kind of thing, probably not very exciting.

* Some random Irish Pub in a small downtown neighborhood.  This 
was fairly close to Washington University, and they have ragtime 
nights there once or twice a week.  I can't remember the name...
but if you know how to play the piano (and can play Scott Joplin's
music), you can get up and play during their open-piano nights.  
That was fun... but they also have an AMAZING mushroom-barley soup 
that we stumbled onto as a special, so if you have even a 25% 
chance of getting it, go there.  Food is very good (and very
English/Irish), and the beer is very yummy. :)

That's about all we saw.  I also saw an ex-boyfriend while we were
there (went to W.U. and was getting his Math and Physics Masters
degrees - very much an overachiever...), and he took me to a coffee
shop down close to the college that was showing a free screening 
of _I Shot Andy Warhol_ on a big ol' tv... and the morning we 
left, my friend and I went to a greek restaurant that served calf
brains and scrambled eggs as a breakfast special.... but other 
than that, there wasn't very much that we had time to do.  Maybe 
we saw it all?!

Hope you find some interesting things to do there!!  

Jen, who had a pretty good time in St. Looey.