June 22, 2010

My first travel painting is now posted on my "Travel Art" spot! I'm so excited! Please feel free to check it out!

Today was so steaming hot half of my bodily molecules reached "escape velocity," and thus I'm scattered. Two-thirds of those molecules must have been brain matter. The morning was very sweet, though. Cool and breezy. I took Jubie on a swell bike ride through a little village called Elsah, just north of St. Louis about 30 miles. It is spectacularly adorable and quaint, with narrow lanes and old cottages. The entire village is listed on the National Historic Register. I sat on the porch of a lovely inn to chat with the owner for over an hour, while our dogs played cat and mouse. Elsah is situated just off the river, and I was able to squint my eyes and see my son floating on by toward St. Louis!

As it turns out the Mississippi is in dangerous flood stage and considered too hazardous to allow "pleasure craft" to pass into St. Louis. The Coast Guard "evicted" Hans from the river just above town, where I  picked him up and brought him onboard the cooled Motherload. Tomorrow, the entire harbor at St.Louis will be closed to ALL boat traffic, including the barges and all forms of river travel! The river level had clearly risen with all the rain from this month, but neither of us saw the danger. Hans was thrilled that the current sped up to assist his travels. There was never a warning posted anywhere that the river was considered hazardous. Maybe if you live in these parts you understand that flooded levees, partially submerged structures, swamped roadways and fish in your driveway means hazardous river conditions, but with so little brain matter in tact...

I HAVE figured out that the way to deal with the heat is to get up very early and start the day's activities by 6 am, while it's still cool outside. Then do the driving part of the day during the worst heat, with the air conditioning full blast, only leaving the car for short bursts and never turning off the ignition. Then, at the end of the day, pull into an RV park and hook up immediately to continue the cooling. I've never felt heat like this before! The RV camp I found today has a pool! A blessedly clean, sparkling, clear, blue pool!