The Tired Pastry Chef Who Went to St Louis

Not too long ago, there was a girl who made cream puffs for a 4th of July bbq. The last time she had made cream puffs was 4 years prior -- and they turned out horribly. But this batch was perfect, and the curse, it seemed, had been lifted at long last.

That same night after the bbq, the girl went to the top of Mount Tabor to see the fireworks displays around the city. The view from the top was spectular -- the city skyline, the distant hills, the bright and colorful displays of fireworks from downtown and surrounding suberbs... Also nice was the lack of crowd, grassy knolls and the tranquil lake. The girl enjoyed long moments of reflection about independence, the founding of her country, the values of the founding fathers, and the cost of freedom.

Roughly 28 hours later at 3:30 am Sunday morning, the girl was waking up to her cell phone alarm. She had a 5:45 am plane to catch to St Louis. The main cabin of the early flight was overbooked; and because she was traveling with her boss who has premier status on just about every airline, she, her boss, and her other co-worker all got automatically upgraded to 1st class for free.

Arriving in hot, humid St Louis in the early afternoon (after a short layover in Denver), the posse of 3 set out in the rental car armed with GPS for a famous Irish pub her boss had heard about. But, unfortunately, it was closed for annual cleaning. The Irish restaurant was next to the Italian district of St Louis, The Hill, with its dozens of very authentic-looking Italian ristoranti, shops, Catholic cathedrals, and quaint houses. But, naturally, being Sunday, all the good Italians were at mass and all the restaurants were closed. Sigh. So much for mangiano bene...

At the hotel, with hours to kill, the girl decided to make use of the hotel's outdoor pool area. The hotel itself has a number of interconnected buildings - new and old - making quite the labyrith of unintuitively marked corridors, stairways leading nowhere (that guests should be, in any case), and numerous sets of elevators (some of which close their doors but then do not move - and then one has to manually pry oneself out with one's hands since all the buttons are unresponsive). She eventually found the pool. Needing to finish a book for her work meetings the next day, she read while reclining on a chaise lounge in the shade (to avoid sunburning).

That night, hoping to get enough sleep to offset the early morning that day, the 2-hour time change, and the early alarm for the following day, the girl decided to go to bed early. Unfortnately, the hotel's weight/fitness room was directly next to her room. And one guest decided to do a long late-night workout... banging weights together (using bad form, by the way) and clomping loudly on the treadmill. Then the workout stopped -- thanks to an even noisier interruption... the fire alarm. Naturally.

Sometime after 11pm, the hotel's emergency alarm system sounded. The girl, groggy (from taking melatonin) and perhaps grouchy from the unsuccessful attempts at sleep and the unwelcome interruptions, decided not to risk the bet that it probably was just a false alarm. She pulled herself out of bed and wandered out to the corrider to begin the evacutation process. The fire department came. The police department came.

It was a false alarm.

The morning dawned early. Early and hot and humid. The girl had her co-workers had a long solid day of meeting -- which went well, though not a one left before sitting in the hot seat. The 3 amigos made it to the airport for the evening flight back to Portland. It was delayed. Significantly.

The girl and her traveling companions all miraculously got on stand-by for an earlier - though also delayed - flight. They arrived in Denver to find that the connecting flight was ... also delayed, even more so than the previous. They eventually landed in Portland around 1 am ... just 44 hours after they had flown out of that same airport. They all had work the next morning, but the girl's boss said they could sleep in.

This girl, though she brought the camera all the way to St Louis and back again, regretfully didn't take any pictures of her adventures, so you got the 1,000 words instead.

The end. For now. Until the next one...