For the past couple days I've been tearing my garage apart looking for some photography props I need for an upcoming project. Which is no easy task considering how much senseless crap I've accumulated over the years. Boxes and boxes and boxes of stuff I should have never saved, but kept anyway. Like I've got some kind of hoarding disorder.

Take for instance my travel souvenir collection.

When I first started traveling, I had no idea how many places I would end up going, so I saved absolutely everything. Every ticket stub, every matchbook, every brochure, every pamphlet, everything. My thinking was that this was the best way to remember where and when I've been. And that would have been fine if I only went to a handful of places... but I've been hundreds of places around the globe, and I've accumulated a metric shit-ton of crap because of it.

Five years ago I stopped buying souvenirs and saving crap because I've already got more than I'll ever look at. I just take pictures instead, and that's all I really need. Thank heavens. Because just look at some of this stuff...

   
• SAND
At some point I decided it would be a good idea to collect baggies of sand from beaches around the world...

Eventually I switched to small Tupperware plastic boxes...

I just counted... I have sand collected from 38 beaches. Everywhere from Bali and Phuket to Key West and Maui. It's kind of wasteful to throw all of this sand in the trash, so I'm thinking of making one of those jars where you layer sand in them. Usually, it's colored sand... but I think it would be pretty with natural sand, because there really is a huge variety in color and texture when you stop and really look at the stuff.

   
• MAPS
Now-a-days this makes absolutely no sense, because I've got an iPhone that can pull up a map (with directions!) anywhere in the world. But back in the day? You had to get a paper map, and I saved up hundreds of them. Partly because I didn't want to have to buy a new map if I ever ended up going back to a place like Montreal...

But mostly because I love maps. Always have. I especially like custom maps, which is why I probably won't be tossing out cool ones I've found... like these from the various Hard Rock Cafes in Japan...

But all the others? Recycle bin.

   
• BOARDING PASSES
Remember boarding passes? PAPER boarding passes before you could just have your boarding pass on your phone? I do. It's not like I can forget when I've got hundreds of them piled up. Apparently at one time I thought it important that I remembered I flew to Detroit on September 30, 2003... but why?

LOL... to show just how old I am, you used to get your tickets sent to you in the mail!...

I remember how upset I was when so many airlines gave up on the nice, heavy cardstock passes and switched to those flimsy paper ones. A travesty! But of course I kept them all anyway...

If I had only flown ten times in my life, perhaps it would be fun to look back on all my trips so I could remember when I went on that trip to Phoenix... but during my prime travel days I was flying up to 40 times a year. Wanting to look back on that mess is just insanity. Besides, most of my travels are recorded with a date stamp on the photos I take... or an entry on this blog... so it's not like I need them even if I did care.

   
• HOTEL KEYCARDS
Honestly, I rarely kept these things on purpose. A handful of times I'd keep them if it was a particularly memorable or famous hotel... but I've got keycards from frickin' Holiday Inns?!?

Whenever I found them hidden away in a pair of dirty jeans when I got home, I'd just add them to the pile. Eventually I had a pretty big pile. Because I'm crazy like that.

   
• BROCHURES
Okay, these actually make a little bit of sense to hang onto. First of all, they're almost always free. Second of all, they usually contain interesting information of stuff you've seen and done. I have a big box filled with nothing bu brochures from Disneyland, Disney World, and Universal Studios. It's kind of cool to go back through old ones and see attractions and rides that don't exist anymore... or watch how the parks progressed over the decades...

Brochures also make for an interesting snapshot of the times. This ad ran inside a Disney World brochure during their 25th Anniversary, where they changed Cinderella Castle into a massive birthday cake...

It was hideously ugly... and I remember how pissed off people were when they went to get their picture taken in front of the castle and had to settle for this freak show instead. Fun times. Fun times. Anyway... I've got enough brochures to build a retaining wall in my back yard. And yet... I don't want to get rid of all of them... just most of them, so I'll have to set them aside and find time to sort through.

   
• HOTEL SUMMARIES
Why? Why? Why would I save these? I mean, I guess it's cool that I can look back and see that I stayed at the Park Lane Sheraton in London, but WHY?!?...

Also interesting? A room at the Park Lane Sheraton was just 150£ sixteen years ago. Now it's probably more like 350£. I've accumulated hundreds upon hundreds of these things... and now they're all lining my recycle bin.

   
• RECEIPTS
Saving receipts for business trips became so second-nature to me that I automatically saved all my receipts... even for personal travel. Like this massive stack of Hard Rock receipts...

I shudder to think how many thousands of dollars are represented in these alone. What was I thinking? And it wasn't just Hard Rock... I saved everything! I found a receipt for a soda I bought in Tokyo, for heaven's sake. That I took it home with my is crazy... that I held onto it for twenty years is madness.

   
• CALLING CARDS
For whatever reason, I had a box that was filled just with calling cards. I must have had 50 of them. Some of them were freebies... others were a part of some bundle I had bought... and about 20 of them were in an "Inconvenience Packet" that you'd get when an airline screwed up and stranded you. Presumably so you could contact loved ones back home and let them know you would be missing dinner...

Now-a-days, of course, you just pull out your mobile phone, but it was a simpler time back then.

   
• UPGRADE CERTIFICATES
Because I flew a lot, I was forever getting perks that I could redeem... like upgrade certificates. Except any time there was room for an upgrade, I'd get the upgrade automatically, so they were kind of redundant. I tried using them a few times to guarantee my upgrade to First Class, but that never really worked because there were so many restrictions. But never mind all that, because I kept stacks of them anyway...

You'd think that since the above example expired in 2001 I would have tossed it in 2002... but nope.

   
• AIRLINE FREQUENT FLYER KITS
Now-a-days I don't even think you get a kit... unless you're a really top-tier flyer. But twenty years ago? They came like clockwork for me...

I have my Northwest Airlines kits from when I first became a premium frequent flier in 1994 (where I was a Silver Level) until they ceased operations in 2009 (where I was a Platinum Level). Why? You got me. What's really insane is that many years I got multiple kits. One when I turned Silver. Another when I turned Gold. Then another when I turned Platinum...

Insanely wasteful, but frequent fliers are an airline's bread and butter, so I guess it was worth it?

   
• AIRLINE NEWSLETTERS
If there's anything more insane than saving expired upgrade certificates, it would have to be saving airline newsletters...

I guess they're kinda cool because the ones from Northwest always had a summary of the places you've flown but, again, I don't know that having this information is all that useful unless you're psychotic about knowing the date and time of every flight you took.

   
And this is just the tip of the iceberg, I assure you. I've got enough postcards to plaster every wall in my house. I've got enough knickknacks, tchotchkes, keychains, pins, cards, and other crap to fill... well, to fill an entire garage. Which is what I've done.

And that's why I can't find the photo props I'm looking for.

Perhaps after another month of going through all this junk I will no longer be eligible to appear on an episode of Hoarders.

And, if I'm very lucky, I might also find what I've been looking for all this time.

Before heading to the airport to turn in our rental car in St. Louis, we stopped for gas so we wouldn't have to pay the insane refueling fee that the rental car places charge.

As I was standing there waiting for the tank to fill, I saw this...

Here's hoping it wasn't the driver, but I'm guessing it was.

Given the non-stop trainwreck of horrors that has been drinking-and-driving, you'd think that people would learn something. How many more lives have to be destroyed before people learn something?

So there we are, waiting for our ghost hunt to begin when Coal Miner's Granddaughter turns to me and says "Hey, did you see that Kilauea erupted in Hawaii?"

I hadn't.

In March of 2008 a new fissure opened on Kilauea, causing a "vog" (volcanic smog) alert to be issued. Not just for The Big Island, but for neighboring islands as well. I ended up traveling to Hawaii later that year, excited at the prospect of finally seeing a lava flow. But, alas, Pele (Hawaiian goddess of fire) had other plans and there was no lava to be found. There was still vog happening though...

   
Now Pele has unleashed the Real Deal on The Big Island, and unfortunately there are people in the path of her wrath...

Bruce Omori from Paradise Helicopters via Shutterstock and Time Magazine

Bruce Omori from Paradise Helicopters via Shutterstock and Time Magazine

   
The footage is pretty dramatic...

   
Though this is the story that's probably most disturbing!

   
Holy Watchmen, Batman!

   
Such beautiful destruction.

I'm in Hawaii later this year. If the lava thing is still happening, perhaps this will finally be my chance to see it.

Assuming the world hasn't ended by then, of course.

Yesterday was a whirlwind of travel getting from Jefferson City back home. Or maybe it wasn't and it just felt that way because we returned from our ghost hunt at 3:30am.

Whatever the case, Coal Miner's Granddaughter and I decided to start things off right with ICE CREAM FOR BREAKFAST! Yay! Let's set aside the fact that an ice cream parlor opens their doors at 8am each morning and instead focus on the creamy dream that they are peddling...

That massive ice cream cone there? $3.00 at the Central Dairy. Yes, you read that right... THREE DOLLARS! That same cone would be at least $6.00 anywhere else. And it probably wouldn't taste nearly as good. Because, I gotta tell you... this ice cream was amazing. It's so creamy as to border on being described as "fluffy" and the flavor makes you stand up and say "Dayamn!"

If you're ever in Jefferson City, MO... this is a must-stop.

After ice cream it was a two-hour drive back to St. Louis Lambert International Airport, followed by a two-hour wait, followed by a four-hour flight to Portland, followed by an hour wait, followed by a half-hour flight to Seattle, followed by a half-hour on the tarmac, followed by an overnight, followed by a two-and-a-half-hour drive home.

Where I was very, very happy to see my cats.

And give them a present I brought back from Jeff City... a stuffed Missouri mule! His name is Moose. Jenny was not impressed. Jake, on the other hand, looked like he might like it at first...

...but then started tossing it around. No idea if the cats will warm up to it, but I had to try!

   
And... back to Real Life.

And so... I spent the night with Coal Miner's Granddaughter and The Tennessee Wraith Chasers in the old Missouri State Penitentiary! For those who don't watch "ghost hunt" television, the Wraith Chasers are a paranormal investigation group who have appeared in such shows as Ghost Asylum and Haunted Towns. Turns out they're also an incredibly nice group of guys.

Heather and I purchased "VIP Passes" which allowed us early entry into the event. With the sun going down, the prison takes on an entirely different personality...

The team behind the event, "Ghost Hunt Weekends," lit up our "home base" in one of the buildings with atmosphere lighting, which was also very different from what we saw on our tour earlier...

Eventually the Wraith Chasers themselves kicked things off with a Q&A session which was pretty entertaining...

Everybody had a chance to get their photo taken with Doogie, Brannon, Chris, and Mike, which was pretty nice of them...

Interesting to note that Heather and I have like TEN LAYERS of clothing on because it was freezing in there... but the Wraith Chasers are all in short-sleeves.

Our group started off with the gas chamber, then rotated through four other sites...

Not a lot of paranormal activity last night, but still a lot of fun!

And now... sleep!

And so here I am in Jefferson City with Coal Miner's Granddaughter!

Our event doesn't start until tonight, so we decided to head downtown to soak in all the big fun that Jeff-City has to offer.

Our first stop was the Missouri State Capitol Building. From the outside it looks pretty typical for a capitol building...

But on the inside? Absolutely stunning. Gorgeous art nouveau paintings depicting the life and history of Missouri cover the inside dome...

   
Inside this gorgeous building are busts of "famous Missourians" scattered around. Or, as in the case of Rush "Total Piece of Shit" Limbaugh, infamous...

There are also awesome people like Betty Grable (whose bust is creepy as hell) and Josephine Baker as well...

   
To the South of the Capitol Building is a monument for the Lewis and Clark trailhead. Since I've seen the end of the trail (about a half hour south of Astoria, Oregon), I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see the start...

   
Unbeknownst to us, downtown Jefferson City had been closed off for Shelbyfest... the celebration of all things related to the Shelby Mustang...

   
The "Ghost Hunt Weekend" event is at the old Missouri State Penitentiary. We decided to go early so we could take a tour and know the history behind everything...

The grounds are massive. The buildings are massive. Everything is massive. This is just one of the buildings...

What's not massive? The cells. They're tiny. And, depending on the era, there were times that they held more inmates than you'd think were possible... four... even six per cell...

There are several buildings. We saw just two of them. The newer one seemed much more like what you'd think a prison looks like...

The last stop on the tour was the gas chamber. A place where 40 convicted criminals met their end...

Our tour was a particularly good one because our guide was a former prison guard. Even better? One of the first women guards was taking the tour with us. Even better? Two former inmates were also on our tour... one of whom was wrongfully convicted of a life sentence and served 23 years before he was released.

   
There are some happy residents of the prison complex... groundhogs! They're everywhere!

   
And that was the end of our day. The real adventure happens tonight...

The Gateway Arch in St. Louis is a stunning piece of architecture. Not just because of what you see on the outside (though the stainless steel exterior is beautiful) but also because of the incredible structural design on the inside. And underneath it (the foundation extends 60 feet beneath the ground). It's massive and impressive on many levels, and if you're ever in the area I highly recommend paying a visit.

It would be hard to me to top the beautiful blue skies from my previous visit, but I decided to go anyway because I just can't help myself. I could just look at the thing all day long...

   
My favorite part of visiting The Arch is the tram/elevator system that takes people to the top...

   
The cars are pretty tiny, which means you get to get real close to the people riding up with you...

   
But it's all worth it once you get to the top...

   
By the time I made it back down again the weather started clearing up (of course)...

   
The Old Courthouse across the street is too pretty to pass up, so I dropped in for a quick visit...

   
While they are remodeling the Gateway Arch Visitor Center, the Old Courthouse is the temporary ticket office. While you're there, you can get a close look at how the tram cars are constructed...

The system that transports the cars is pretty ingenious. The track starts out above the cars at the bottom... then transition to below the cars as you head up the legs. Eight cars are all chained together so that they can increase the number of people transported each go. The actual cars are suspended in an outer shell that allows the cars to rotate around as it travels, keeping the passengers upright.

And, just like that, my trip to St. Louis had come to an end. Time to head back to the airport to meet up with long-time blogging friend Coal Miner's Granddaughter for a road-trip to Jefferson City. But before we go? Time for T-Rav (which is "Toasted Ravioli," a St. Louis specialty, for those not in the know)...

See you in Jef-City...

An interesting aside here... did you know that China built their own "Gateway Arch," but made it into a full loop? They call it the "Ring of Life" and it is pretty obvious where the original inspiration came from...

Photo by В ЭТОЙ ЖИЗНИ

Pretty. But I'll take the original any day!

Planning for a trip over the mountains to the airport is pretty simple. Pull out the Waze app so I can calculate travel time... add a half hour because Waze is always wrong by at least that... then add two hours to that, which should cover any delays and get me to the terminal with at least 90 minutes to spare.

Except...

Sometimes things get out of control before you even step out the door. This morning I decided to empty the trash can before I left, only to have Fake Jake come running in while I was navigating the door.

Needless to say, bedlam ensued. Much running around and hissing were to be had. Real Jake was enraged. Jenny, bless her heart, did not run and hide as I expected, but instead stood her ground. From a distance, of course.

Ten minutes later, I managed to corral Fake Jake with the promise of treats...

I then spent 20 minutes trying to calm my cats down so that I wouldn't be leaving them in a traumatized state. By the time I left... for the second time... they were back to normal as if nothing happened.

Lucky for me Seattle traffic was only horrendous instead of overwhelmingly fucking heinous, so I still managed to arrive with plenty of time to spare.

Annnnnnd...

Now I'm in St. Louis. A city I haven't visited in quite a while. Nearly ten years, in fact (boy, having a blog is handy for figuring out things like this!).

First order of business? Falafel...

Before turning in for the night, I decided to walk across the street and marvel at The Gateway Arch...

Across the street from that is the Old St. Louis Courthouse, where the Dred Scott case was first presented 172 years ago... which is not so long ago, when you really think about it...

I didn't think that any rooms in my hotel had a view of The Arch. Turns out the rooms on the very corner do. And I'm in the penthouse suite, which means I've got the best view possible...

And that's all she wrote for my exciting day of travel. Good night y'all.

It's World Penguin Day! A holiday I never even knew existed until they started appearing everywhere I went on the internet.

I'm rather fond of penguins, and am thrilled that I have been able to get up-close-and-personal with them on my recent trip to Antarctica. Certainly interesting enough creatures to deserve a day of their own...

   
Until next year...

There's always a special thrill reserved for those times I happen upon my favorite city on earth being featured somewhere.

Especially when it's in a way that's as cool and unique as this...

   
=sigh= And now I want to be back in Scotland.