Visit with Jim's Friend - Saying Our Goodbye's

(Scott AFB, IL) Hi 71 Lo 50 -- We had a lot planned today so we didn't linger long this morning.

Traffic on the way to St. Louis is crazy. DOT is working on repairing two sections of I-64, one on the Illinois side of the river and the other just over the bridge in downtown St. Louis. Traffic usually gets backed up for miles, so we left in plenty of time to get to The Atomic Cowboy, a Tex-Mex eatery in West St. Louis. It's in a "questionable" looking part of town, but it looked like the city is trying to improve the area. It was a mixture of old buildings and new. As you can see, the Atomic Cowboy is in one of the older buildings.  (Click on pictures to make larger).

We probably wouldn't have chosen this place except we had previously bought a half-price coupon through "Amazon Deals." We invited Jim's good friend Steve to join us. Jim and Steve worked together in St. Louis at the Defense Mapping Agency (now the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency) back in the '80's. We always try to meet up with Steve when we're in town. He's such a lot of fun to talk with, he knows something about almost everything. Jim says he reminds him of "The Most Interesting Man In the World" in those beer commercials. :














Jim and Steve had burritos. I've heard of fish tacos but never tried one, so that's what I ordered. It was really good.


It was a very nice couple of hours. Thanks Steve... see you again next year!

If you've been keeping up with our blog you know that Jim was treated for atrial fibrillation this past winter. He was recently cleared to go off the Coumadin and start taking one aspirin per day. His "home" doctor at the Tampa Veterans Hospital wanted him to get a final EKG just to make sure everything's ok. He made arrangements for  him to get it done here in St. Louis. So after lunch we headed to the St. Louis Veterans Hospital, which is on North Grand Ave. On the way we saw this beautiful church, which I just had to photograph.

North Grand Ave. is one of the more famous streets in St. Louis. Powell Hall, home of the St. Louis Symphony, is on North Grand, and so is the famous Fox Theater. We went to many plays at the Fox when we lived in this area.

When we got to the Vets hospital we drove up to the entrance and an attendant met us to valet park our car. It's a free service they provide to patients (and as much as we wanted to, they wouldn't take a tip). We found the Cardiology Dept. after a little searching the halls, and walked right in and got the EKG done, no waiting. We were in and out in about 15 minutes. What a great place! (The EKG was perfectly normal by the way.)

We're leaving tomorrow so we went to Frank's to say goodbye to the family. The kids got home from school and, after visiting with us for a few minutes we got our goodbye hugs and they went off to play with friends. We visited with Frank and Angie awhile longer, then sadly left for home to start preparing for tomorrow's trip. Thank you Angie and Frank for a great couple weeks, and for letting us "borrow" the boys. :)  They are a true delight!

When we got home Jim checked the tire pressures and tightened some trim screws on the rig. And we both re-mounted our ham radio antennas on our vehicles. We're now settled in for the evening. We'll get up early in the morning; it'll be a long trip for us, about six hours.  It's been great being back in the St. Louis area.  See you from Indy tomorrow.