Chowing Down, and Somewhat Off Line

A week ago Thursday night (16 January), I joined with about 12 others at Bailey's Range, a restaurant in downtown St. Louis, for a St. Louis Food Lovers Meetup. Bailey's Range features beef, chicken, pork, bison, and vegetable burgers, along with locally-sourced foods and natural ice cream. I had a great meal there, enjoying a smoked beef burger. This was my first Meetup with this group, and they really made me feel right at home.

Worked hard at the car rental branch that Friday and that Saturday morning, and relaxed at home that weekend. After work on Monday (20 January), I went to join the Monday Indie Movie Club Meetup in Frontenac. Meeting with our party at Panera Bread Co. in Plaza Frontenac, our group of about 20 then walked to the nearby Plaza Frontenac Cinema to catch the Italian film "La Grande Bellezza" (The Great Beauty), which recently won a Golden Globe Award (Best Foreign Film) and is an Oscar Nominee in that category. It's a comedy-drama about a journalist in Rome who's been enjoying the night life there until his 65th birthday and a shock from his past makes him take stock of his life. A rather interesting film, beautifully photographed. Our group generally liked this film. It was my first Meetup with this group, too.

The cold, snowy and icy weather of early this past week (including considerable winds) caused IPMS/Gateway to postpone its meeting by one night, to this past Wednesday (22 January). We had our annual Swap & Sell, where members could sell or trade their model kits and supplies, plus our annual Kit Auction, which raised money for the club's picnic this September. We had a good turnout for our meeting, including three first-time attendees (all of whom joined our club that night), and a reporter from the South County Times, who's doing a story about our club. That should run in this week's issue.

Thursday morning, on my day off work, my computer acted up, so I took it to the Geek Squad at Best Buy. The technician said it looked like it had a lot of viruses and would have to take it in to correct that. He thought I would be without my computer until early this week; however, they called yesterday afternoon and it was ready. I have it back now and it's running fine. In the meantime, I used my smartphone and my parent's computer to access messages and websites.

Later this afternoon, I'm off to yet another Meetup, this time in Richmond Heights. I'll fill you in on that in my next post.

Later.