The Missouri Compromise.

My day started out innocently enough, I was going to take a picture of the river since it’s got lots of water in it right now. I get down to Riverfront Park and sadly the Riverwalk is closed due to the very waters I seek. Thwarting my attempts to capture Alonzo Westons “old men under the river” when the high waters drive them out of their lair beneath the Freemason Overlook.

Oh it's true........it's very very true....

So I head down to the old riverboat docking area where that abandoned snack store sits upon the shoreline like a cracked open roach motel.

Above is the aforementioned snack mart, that is however not an aforementioned roach,
but rather, as the graffiti implies, a "Crazy White Boy."

And there, what do my eyes behold but yet another sign that spring is in the air and summer is fast approaching. Now I’m not talking about the river, though it is encroaching on the lower level of concrete.

On the plus side Vagrants now have a wave pool.

Rather, if you look close enough, amongst other things, you’ll see that the Triforce may in fact be buried beneath the city amongst those tunnels that run from the old Sisters Hospital to Benton High School. And its entrance is the roach motel that now serves as the public sounding board of creativity since MoDot took out that awesome boulder that once rested by the highway 36 entrance ramp on the Southside.

The only riddle left is which side James Montee will take in the battle for Saint Joseph, MO.

Flight of remembrance and urban myth fantasy aside I have to say that I was thinking this year’s crop of Riverfront Graffiti may be some of the tastiest yet. And this is judging it against such times as the year I found out there was a rare and endangered species living along the river.

His mournful cry echoed across the plains in much the way of a lonesome whippoorwill.

…but then the pureness and joy of public vandalism was shattered by the cuddly face of racism….There on the wall, amongst the rapping panda bear, the various phone numbers offering various services and a brilliantly inspired rendition of a gang name was something sinister….something screaming huggable yet skin-tone based hatred….and it was the Stay Puft Marshmallow man proclaiming his allegiance to the KKK and its presence in my beloved hometown!

There’s not much you can do about Mr. Stay Puft here in the Midwest because the only time we “cross the streams” is when guys get drunk while camping and try to pee on each other for a laugh…..all right I lied, it’s not Mr. Stay Puft, but I’d been dying to make that joke.

It does appear that they have a celebrity spokesman though. I knew the only chance we as a community could have to understand this new influx of Camel Cigarette style advertising was to nut up and get an exclusive interview with the spokesman himself….but I didn’t, I sent the Joesy Broesy instead, here’s what he came back with.