The Room 12-22

Private Home  Town and Country  Missouri

The Room 12-22

Private Home  Webster Groves  Missouri

The Room 12-23

Mungenast Lexus of St. Louis   Manchester  Missouri

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Kirkwood United Church of Christ  Kirkwood Missouri

Missouri Botanical Garden 12-17

Jan and I enjoyed walking around the Garden 

with its wonderful Christmas decorations. 

Frozen ponds in front of the Climatron.

The family that plays together stays together.

Selfie under the mistletoe.

O'Connells Pub 12-17

Jan and I had a great lunch at O'Connells Pub which is at Kingshighway and Shaw. I had their famous Rueben sandwich and Jan had chicken breast.It is always crowded and the food is great.  Above is a print of Irish boxing Champion Jack Langan. Notice the Christmas lights.

O'Connells Pub has photos and quotes of Irish authors.

This is Molly Blooms ending quote from Ulysses. 

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Gringo Jones Imports  St Louis Missouri

 And finally ...

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House of Denmark  St Louis Missouri

I 

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Brody's Lamps  Brentwood  Missouri

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The Alpine Shop   Kirkwood Missouri

Camera Obscura Room

This afternoon we were knocking around The Hill  and Jan wanted to go into Herbarium, a store and factory that makes and sells natural soap products. Ken Gilberg , the owner, invited us upstairs to his camera obscura room. The darkened room has black curtains over the window in which there is a circular aperture through which at the right time of day the sun shines. The aperture has  lenses of 1 or 2 diopters. When we were there the sun was in perfect position to shine through.

The sun that comes through the aperture the light is focused on a large fabric screen hanging from ceiling to floor forming a long horizontal distinct image of the building line to the south of the room. The images show up as inverted. Notice the upside down telephone pole above Jan's right shoulder at 11:00.

This is the tower of the nearby Catholic Church.

The Room 12-3

Charlie Gitto's Restaurant, The Hill, 
St Louis Missouri.
After a superb dinner of tender loin

lamb chops I discovered this painting

in the necessary room.

The Room 12-3

SKIF Warehouse, The Hill, St Louis Missouri

SKIF 12-3

Down the street from Herbarium on The Hill is a large warehouse with one door

and no frontal windows. It is a garment factory with sewing machines rimming the 

upstairs balconies. 
SKIF means 'rough' in the native tongue of the owner and 

describes the chic clothing made there with the seams on the outside. 
This is a wall painting of  the "Skiffettes".

Paintings abound on the main floor.

This wall hanging on the side door is made of intertwining tubes

of fabric spaghetti.

On the wall in the dressing room is a most unexpected map of the Brussels 

International Worlds Fair which I attended in the summer of 1958 after college 

graduation.

The Room 12-3

Herbarium, The Hill, St. Louis Missouri

Fireworks Point 12-1

Jan and I drove to Fireworks Point which is directly across Lake Aspen from our 

house. That is the green water tower in the distance to the right of Jan. Strolling along the shore and through the tall grass in the warm December sun was magical.

Who ever heard of outgassing or, what to do in your retirement?

This summer we purchased some inexpensive bedroom furniture for the Lake House.

It was manufactured by Ashley and was bought from the Warehouse of Dinettes in 

St. Charles. It was made of particle board and had a nice brown wood finish on the 

outside. When the drawers were opened there was a pungent woody odor which we 

thought was because it was new. We assumed that the smell would disappear. It hasn't 

disappeared and seems to be getting worse. It has not caused me problems with my 

breathing but Jan is certain that it was causing headache, dizzyness, weakness and 

nausea which symptoms improved and then disappeared when she stayed out of the 

bedroom. 

Jan googled 'web complaints about Ashley furniture' and found that there are multiple 

people with the same odor issue. It is apparently caused by the smells arising from the 

materials in the particle board and glues used in the manufacturing process. This process 

is described as outgassing. It is of interest since the materials used in manufacturing particleboard contain formaldehyde which is not only irritating but toxic. The level of formaldehyde outgassing from this source is regulated by our federal government. So the fumes arising from our new furniture is supposedly safe even if irritating. In various reports the smell was said to disappear in time periods of 2 months to 5 to 10 years. Heat and humidity are reported to cause the smell to reappear at times. 

I called the Warehouse of Dinettes and Ron said he had never heard of this issue but 

would call his Ashley sales rep. I Called Ashley Consumer Affairs and the representative

and her supervisor both said that the formaldehyde levels in Ashley furniture were within federal guidelines and that they had been told to say that the smell would dissipate 'in time'.

What to do? Suggestions from friends have run the gamut from putting it up for sale on e-Bay to giving it away to throwing it in the lake or burning it. I have ordered a product called SafeCoat TopSeal which is made specifically for this issue of outgassing. I am to brush it on the particle board surface (2 coats)to solve this dilemma. More later.
Addendum: After three coats of sealer the furniture was odor free enough to bring back into the bedroom from the garage. It only took me about a month to seal the four pieces.