respublica

IMHO

This is just my opinion, but the red stoplight on eastbound Main at 159 is too long. The traffic often backs up a full block while we wait and wait for the green. My best guess is this has something to do with IDOT of whoever, wanting the north and south traffic moving through 159. But, the eastbound red is longer than necessary in my experience.

This kind of drives Dale nuts as well and he is usually fairly non-plussed by most daily life things. We've taken to going down the alley and going out behind the former Herbert's Eye place and getting the Clay street light.

Emissions testing

A few weeks ago I received a postcard notice reminding me that I needed to get a new license plate sticker. This was to be done in conjunction with an emissions test. Ugh. The issue for me was the emissions test. It's a bit of a hassle since there are very few places which are certified by the state to perform this test. Granite City (Pontoon Beach) or Swansea (Fairview Heights). Nothing in Collinsville. You'd think as populated as St. Clair and Madison Counties are, there would be more options.

In any event I head off to Swansea this morning to get this over with. But. I called the Air Team business with a question, all I got was a very long recorded message telling me to go to their website and everything I needed to know or do was there. Except there was no option for talking to someone which I wanted to do because not everything was actually on the site.

While my mailed card said we needed an emissions test, the website told me it was not needed. So before I make the trip, I wanted to know which of the two was correct. In the end, I'm making the trip and am interested in just why the contradiction.

Heading home is hard

We are heading back to Collinsville this morning after 3 days along the Huzzah. But, it seems like every trip we have to pile up more stuff into the car than we came with. Why is this? We bring our trash back with us which is bulkier than when it was in its original form. Dirty clothes take up more room than the clean ones. This stresses me out trying to get it all into the car while Dale is not bothered at all.

He spent some time over the weekend trimming out some trees and today he started early clipping branches from them one small piece after another.

I'll be happy to be home this time.

A long way to go just for a free item

This made me laugh this morning. An article with the headline: How to collect your free, surgical, N95 Mask from Thursday.

We have begun wearing masks more frequently these days and have given up on the cloth ones because suddenly they are said to be not as effective as the disposable N95's. I can get the N 95's at Ace Hardware and Home Depot. We aren't running around to medical stores for these.

Anyway, free sounded good. But. To get the free N95 masks starting Thursday you have to go to Singapore!

Sorry, free isn't always free.

A day for junk falling onto St. Louis highways

This may not have been the best morning for getting to work in St. Louis. Here are some of the things reported to have littered the interstates.

On the Hwy. 94 ramp to westbound 70, a report of lumber in the roadway

Eastbound 64/40 before Jefferson, it looks like several tires have gotten flat tires from some debris in the roadway

Westbound 64/40 near McKnight, a report of metal tubes in the roadway

Wentzville: Peine Road, near Hwy. 61, police are checking a report of a piece of construction equipment in the roadway

This is in addition to many crashes this morning. I've counted  13 crash reports from all over the metro area.

 

Traveling during the Virus days

We spent- the past week at our daughter's home in Rockville Maryland. This visit meant having to travel, something we have not done in almost two years. We prepared ourselves with a mental list of things we would not do or places we would not go in order to avoid contact as many strangers as possible. This due to the Covid virus and knowing half the people in this country have not been vaccinated.

Our first step into the unknown came when we had to go into one of the highway rest areas, this one somewhere in western Ohio. I was more nervous than Dale, but once inside we found the place immaculate and with few people around. We always wore a mask and I was gratified to see that anyone else in this place did the same.

Most of the time and most of the places we went into had people in masks, too often about 50-50. We could live with this since we were masked up and had hand sanitizer in the car. The highway place we used most of the time was a gas station/store combination named Sheetz. They are located in mostly eastern states and all look the same and are all (mostly) extremely clean and friendly. The people who work in Sheetz's all wore masks as did most of the customers. To be honest, for all the years we've gone out to the DC area, we've laughed at this name, but have come to really respect this company.

This pictures are from 3 different Sheetz's. They have a fresh food area which actually produced really good ready made sandwiches and wrap, fruit, etc.

But I have to say, the absolute worst place we stopped as far as feeling safe from other people was our last stop on the way home. It was an Effingham, Illinois, gas/store type place named Petro Travel Center. While Dale pumped gas I walked into the attached store which had many things in food and other things and it was very clean. However, I was immediately appalled and kind of frightened when I noticed no one, I mean no one, was wearing a mask. Not even the people working there. There was even a notice on the door that masks were not needed.  Other shoppers gave me mean looks when they saw my mask. I just wanted to get the heck out of there.

We hear on the news about certain parts of the country where people won't get vaccinated or wear masks. I sure found one of those areas and it's right here in Illinois. And here I thought our governor was again promoting the use of masks. I guess not in Effingham.

 

And we will soon be off

We are heading out to our daughter Katie's today with an overnight stop at Dale's mother's in Paris, Illinois. We have not been to Katie's place since the summer of 2019 and we are nothing if not overdue. The Covid put a complete stop to these family visits and we are interested in how things look in Maryland. Things which include the two grandsons, the yard and the two cuddly Aussiedoodles.

I love dogs, miss having a dog, and so am kind of thrilled to see these two girls. They are actual sisters, but born 18 months apart to the same parents. First came Sidney who we have met and last year came Dottie who we haven't met. They also have a cute rabbit named Snowball.

Thanks MoDOT

Wouldn't you just know the weekend we are heading to the Huzzah, MoDOT would be making botch all of I-44. We debated staying put, but Dale really wants to go down there, it's his happy place.

It will be near 100 degrees which is bearable along the river, but boy, how does MoDOT think it's acceptable for the crews to be working in that heat. Hopefully much will be done at night.

The thing is about highway work, if they publicize the highway will close at 8 tonight, you just know it will be mostly closed all day. If Dale would get his Zoom work done soon, we could get out of hear before afternoon rush hour out on 44 makes things really snarled up.

Reminded of a bad memory

My Facebook Memories section had a post I put up in 2012 which involved our car just stalling on 64/40 as I was driving over to Collinsville. I was in the middle lane when it just died and by some miracle I was able to jerk the car to the left and onto the only grassy area on the whole highway. It was really hot and I had no idea what to do. As I recall Dale was out of town so I called his assistant and she drove out to wait with me for a tow truck and then drive me back to the seminary.

This only got more crazy when the mechanic gave me this advice and I wrote it on Facebook:

"As an update to my car dying on highway 40 Thursday, here is the explanation the mechanic gave me when I picked it up yesterday. He couldn't determine whether it was the fuel pump or the fuel injector valve and not wanting to bill us for 800$ if it wasn't the pump, he said, "drive it til it dies again, then get another person to crawl under the gas tank and pound on it while you turn the ignition key. If it starts up, it's the fuel pump".

Right. Like I'm about to even consider driving it anywhere in hopes it will die on me again."

 

In the end we never drove that car again and found a new one, the truck we still have, Ford Explorer. All too often I pass that spot on high 40 and think about that day. 11 years ago today.

 

 

An overdue highway update

With business back to almost normal, so are the mattresses and ladders falling onto St. Louis area highways. So here is an update long overdue.

For 2021 thus far-Ladders 49 Mattresses 24

Ladders being way ahead surely means work is being done in many places. I actually suddenly came across on in the middle lane of highway 40 near Kingshighway last week. it was a metal ladder already sort of smashed from cars rolling over it and luckily I saw it in time and no one was in the lane next to me so I could avoid it.