A Respite of Sorts in St. Louis

Miles driven today: negligible
Hours of sleep: negligible

IT'S OKAY, YOU GUYS! I'M STILL NOT DEAD. ALSO PROBABLY STILL LITERATE.
These are words, right? Definitely. Cool. Thanks for doing a literacy check with me.

I'm tired. And I've been REAL busy for the last few days. So you get several blog posts, you lucky dogs, you.

When I accepted the interview offer in Chicago for the weekend of December 6-7, my first thought way "Yay! A job!" immediately followed by "But..but..but....I'm going to miss the fast food workers' action in Seattle on December 5." (Cue Charlie Brown music) Fortunately, I have friends in a city which was both a convenient stopping place on my drive and where fast food workers have been making things really awkward for errrybody for a really long time because they oddly enough believe that they have a right to be able to survive on the wages they earn. Cray, amirite?

Would you like a living wage with that? Supersize my salary now!

The St. Louis fast food workers involved in the campaign were off. the. hook. They were turnt up. There was singing. There was dancing. There was a game of go-into-the-restaurant-and-freeze-and-make-things-real-awkward-for-everyone-and-then-throw-a-dance-party. There was fried chicken and mashed potatoes. It was AWESOME.

The marauding of fast food restaurants all over the city and the bonus hospital workers' action in East St. Louis afterwards gave me a chance to get to know some of the neighborhoods in STL and I learned from activists about the history and geography of The Rome of the West.

As someone who spent approximately 30 hours in the city, I feel qualified to write a comprehensive guide to St. Louis:

Hoodies:

But what about eyepatches?

Hooded sweatshirts, colloquially referred to as hoodies, are one of the biggest threats to safety in this country and are a scourge upon the crime-ridden city of St. Louis. Wearers of hoodies are typically warmer than wearers of non-hooded sweatshirts since they cover the wearer's head. The wearer can also put his/her hands into the pockets attached to the sweatshirt. Since the hood covers the head of the wearer, the identity of the wearer is automatically concealed and one can no longer see the face of the wearer or ask the wearer any identifying questions like "Oh hai! What's your name?" or "Nice sweatshirt! Who are you?" In fact, the wearer becomes completely invisible and can move through society without being seen. Notable exceptions to this example include when the wearer carries Skittles and Arizona Watermelon Fruit Juice Cocktail. The candy and juice react with the hoodie in such a manner that the wearer appears to be a gun-wielding, dangerous criminal capable of any sort of horror known to woman or man. In order to prevent the completely-unavoidable-and-in-no-way-a-reflection-of-enduring-systemic-racism-in-America violence that should occur from the misuse of the hoodie/candy/juice combo, law-abiding citizens are asked to refrain from wearing hoodies anywhere in the vicinity of money, guns, and/or white women because George Zimmermans are everywhere. 

The Gateway Arch:

It's okay that this picture was obviously taken while in motion because a passenger helped a bro out and was all like "Yeah, I can totally take a picture of the Arch and not drop your camer....whoops."

At 630 feet, the Gateway Arch is the tallest man-made monument in the United States. It is composed of approximately 82,953,217,193 Lego blocks and weighs 42 lbs. The Gateway Arch was dedicated on May 25, 1968 by Vice President Hubert Humphrey, who has a totally legitimate name and does not remind one at all of the pedophile protagonist of Vladimir Nabokov's seminal work Lolita declared that the majestic arch inspired "a new sense of urgency to wipe out every slum....Whatever is shoddy, whatever is ugly, whatever is waste, whatever is false, will be measured and condemned [in comparison to the Gateway Arch]." He then proceeded to march Godzilla-like through the streets of St. Louis, crushing everything in his path that did not meet his aesthetic sensibilities, leaving behind rows of charming brick townhouses untouched. 

Food and drank:

To the left of the Fortune Teller Bar and to most liberals, anarchists can find the Black Bear Bakery, a co-operative which features a worker-owner handsome enough to be confused for an Edward Cullen lookalike contest winner. They also have delicious and completely normal baked goods and coffee. They only accept dollars stamped with "Not to be used for bribing politicians." Fortunately, they provide the stamp for you next to the cash register. 

As previously noted, food that is not 100% pretentious but is at least 96% delicious can be found in the city of St. Louis. While in the city, I experienced culinary delights such as fried chicken, mashed potatoes, biscuits, cole slaw and sweet tea because St. Louis is a city where citizens can eat food because it is good; not because it will impress their foodie friends. This experience was obviously overwhelming for me and inspired panic attacks of "But where is the cardamom-jalepeno-creme fraiche sauce bottles? How am I supposed to eat taro root fries without it? What is wrong with you people?!?" I managed to find a hipster mecca called The Fortune Teller in the Cherokee neighborhood, which soothed my anxieties and helped me to breathe a little easier. To my delight, the decor and theme were adequately ironic, featuring a large print of Rasputin and a table where you could get your palm read by a big beardy dude. The method of retrieving your food after ordering it was unnecessarily complicated with at least 32 steps, including following a map to an abandoned wearhouse and battling orcs in an alleyway. The food was (disappointingly) wholesome, uncomplicated and reasonably priced. The tattooed bartenders with ultrahip hair styles were warm and engaging and the patrons were so overwhelmingly and genuinely friendly that I fled from the establishment into the snow-covered streets begging with silent lips, "Give me your ironic, your bored, your detached masses yearning to breathe clove cigarillos, the wretched refuse of your dodgeball-teaming shore."

In conclusion:

St. Louis was wayyyyyyyyy charming. In spite of the fact that my host almost got arrested for civil disobedience while I was trying to leave before the giant snow storm and I was like "But how am I supposed to get inside your house if you're in jail and have access to my computer and backpack?" I was very glad that I stayed an extra night and kind-of-but-not-really got to rest after my 14 hour day of driving through Kansas and 12 hours of protesting for higher wages and union recognition. I can now check a visit to East St. Louis off my bucket list. I ate tasty food. I met unbelievably nice people. It was great. St. Louis, you are a delight and I would love to hang out with you again sometime.