Grove Fest is a neighborhood festival benefitting the Forest Park Southeast Development Corporation. Saturday we stopped by The Grove for some sight-seeing, which was an drastic change of scenery after taking a trip for some house-related errands in The County — The City hosts a bit more diversity.

Food, drink, and music were plentiful in the neighborhood’s streets and at open restaurants and bars. We came too late to see the street performers and artist village, but the main event that evening was the Crashn’ Fashion Bash by TheTime Boutique (for the 21 and up) and the Arch Rival Rollergirls exhibition: certainly some things you don’t see every day.

St. Louis was hit with a freak storm sustaining winds above 80 mph, Wednesday, July 19th. It unexpectedly changed the sky from blue to black and green in minutes, and despite no reported tornado touchdowns, the wind damage was significant around the area. I’ve heard Ameren Power Outage numbers as high as 560,000, and as of Friday morning, more than 400K customers were still without power. This during the highest temperatures of the year, with Thursday at 101 degrees, high 90s the rest of the week, heat index 110+, stupid humidity, etc… I hope enough people find air conditioning. Heard on the radio this morning the National Guard was deployed to assist relief efforts.

For the record, we’re all fine. Our only live encounter with the storm was a short walk through a sandstorm just off Washington Avenue, and addressing some leaking water near some windows (it was blowing horizontally after-all). All the downtown places we know of kept power as the lines are adequately protected underground and fed from multiple points. Our house near the airport lost power that night, but it was restored the next day. It didn’t look like there was any major damage (trees stayed put, no holes or leaks visible in the house), though the insurance company will still be getting a call about the roof.

My parent’s house was still without power last night, and a friend is staying home since his office doesn’t have power. Our office downtown has power, but the AC is not able to keep up and the heat and mugginess from outside has penetrated the building. Occupying the top floor doesn’t help; perhaps we should temporarily relocate to the open first floor. Or Starbucks.

Or maybe the basement. I’m watching the St. Louis Radar and it appears in two hours we’re gonna see some more storms. Whee!

Update:
Robert Siegel talks with St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay on NPR’s Talk of the Nation.

Crazy night at Busch Stadium caught on video.

Today we were supposed to pick up keys for our Terrace Lofts apartment so we could begin the lease we contracted to begin July 1st.  Unfortunately, they failed to warn us earlier this week as they had the other “residents” that due to failing the electric inspection, they were not ready for anyone to move in.  Looking around, that wasn’t the only aspect lacking, but it was easily the one they could quickly point to.  We were then told they hoped to be ready July 15th, but I’m not holding my breath. 

We got a brief re-introduction to the building as we passed dangling cables and equipment.  The elevators didn’t appear to be installed, but it doesn’t matter much with no power.  The underground garage didn’t look like it was getting any attention yet, so who knows how long that will take.  Our unit was mostly in-tact, but it was still a bit dirty, the bathroom was not complete, and one of the window latches was just missing.  The entire building still had a very unfinished feel, and I expect it will be more than two weeks before it’s ready to support residents.

The concession provides paid occupancy for room and tax charges at the Residence Inn by Marriott at Jefferson and 40, starting July 1.  It’s a shame they didn’t get something closer to the business district or at least a Metrolink stop so we could walk to work, but we’ll certainly take advantage of their pool, complimentary breakfast, and definitely the housekeeping.  In the meantime, we can continue to prepare our house to sell in the evenings and weekends.  This timing actually works out well, as we’re not exactly ready to move out anyway, and this way we don’t overlap the additional rent longer than we have to. 

While construction completes, residents are able to up their keys (though they couldn’t find ours) so they can access their unit and move things in, though ours was not ready for that (aside from the missing key).  We’re also not comfortable filling the apartment with our toys while construction goes on and people still have pretty open access to the building.  Maybe after they have power for security.

We’ve been watching the progress for a few months, so none of this came as a surprise; it’s rather amusing for us.  I hope others in the same situation are not too put out.  A “happy” hour is being hosted Saturday evening (July 1st) for the residents, so we may find out then.

…The McGowan Brothers should probably take down the 2-story banner declaring a May 1 move-in.

MODOT construction right now involves resurfacing the Poplar Street Bridge and causing a nightmare of traffic for many; not only is traffic across the Mississippi river an issue, but it’s also significantly increasing traffic for the highway interchanges and backing up downtown as people try to find alternate routes. I enjoy knowing in a month we’re replacing our current commute downtown from the airport with a 7 block walk. Neither this traffic nor the pending I-64/40 construction will be a commuting issue for us as soon as we move.

An amusing side-effect of the backup is now all these commuters idling on downtown roads after work find themselves surrounded by the rehabbing and construction of new residential locations. I wonder how many ponder moving downtown during rush-hour frustration. This weekend is the St. Louis Downtown Living Tour, which is a good showcase for the types of living spaces available, and many developers have done a bit of outside preparation to advertise.

Kelly and I already have plans to be in Terrace Lofts this year and have a contract for 305 in Ely Walker for move in next year, but we’ll still be touring the neighborhood to see the new developments. Lots of activity continues downtown!

I’m always anxious to see how progress is going with our condo in the Ely Walker building downtown, so today I walked by during lunch after hearing new windows were being installed.

The old windows show the chipped paint, old glass, and some are cracked or taped over.

Recently updated windows have new glass that appears to be double-pane insulated. We were told they hoped to preserve the casings if everything was in good condition, and it looks like it was.

I forgot to check the back of the building, but if there’s no change there, the only progress so far is this single column on the (shorter) west side. Many more windows to go!