STL Free For All

Collinsville Great Train Expo (Mar. 17)
A great photo in the newspaper caught my eye yesterday: a 6-year-old model train enthusiast watching a tornado “destroy” a town as a train chugged through the debris.  Pretty great idea for a model!  Check out the story at the Post’s Web site.

Polar Bear Water Ski Show (Jan. 1)
WHY do I forget about this event every year? The only reason I can think of is this: Perhaps I have a subconscious fear that my water-ski-crazed husband will want to jump into the 33-degree Mississippi River with 26 of the craziest people and one of the craziest dogs in the metro area. To read about it, check out the article in the Post.

Tubachristmas at the Galleria (Dec. 8 )

The sound of 127 tuba, eupohnium and baritone players was something else, if the audio slideshow at the Post’s Web site is any indication (click here and scroll down to the news heading). It’s apparently a worldwide, annual event — I’ll be watching for it next year!

Incidentally, this particular audio slideshow is exceptionally well done. Papers are trending en masse toward this sort of coverage, but often they send out reporters who’re not particularly great with photos or with audio to get the material, so the multimedia efforts are not that memorable. This one, though, has fabulous photography and well-done interview audio.

Santa and his ho-ho-hos (Nov. 30)

I had seen notices about Soulard’s first tree-lighting ceremony last Friday (Nov. 30), but we didn’t get around to going. Too bad — I heard it was a nice event, with free cocoa for the kids plus blood-warming libations for adults. I also heard, from more than one mom, about the scantily clad “elves” provided by a local establishment that’s favored by a mostly male clientele. What delighted me was that the moms weren’t upset — in keeping with this live-and-let-live part of town, they laughed it off as something for the parents to gossip about while the kids were caught up, as they all apparently were, with ogling Santa and his sleigh. No word on what the dads were looking at.