Fulton Christmas windows, Washu and pecan pie.

The big event in Fulton last week was the revealing of the Christmas windows. All week, the shops, all 8 of them, have had their windows papered up so that on friday evening there could be a grand unveiling ceremony and window competition. This is serious stuff. It's not just the shop windows being decorated. All the lamp posts in Fulton have been wrapped in artificial greenery and had a big red ribbon tied on top. It is only November19th!
The shops are all serving food and drink- again. Not just nibbles, hot dishes and cake. There are 4 judges, who take their duties very seriously and ponder over the various merits of each display. Actually, some were pretty good.

There are also mule rides. Missouri is famed for it's mules. They are the state animal. There used to be a big mule fair in Fulton not so long ago, held in front of the Court House.

It's all good fun. They are trying so hard to keep the centre of town alive, but Taylors, the jewellers, are closing down and selling all their stock. They are an old Fulton business, and it is not good news. There is a glimmer of hope though. It has been announced that a second nuclear reactor is going to be built. Now in England this would bring howls of protest. Here, the majority see it as an influx of new people to revitalise the town. It takes a long time to build a reactor.

The weather has been going up and down, but remains incredibly dry. We haven't had any real rainfall for a month and a half. It has made walking a pleasure and I have enjoyed looking at the piles of autumn leaves. Sad person, you might think, but they are such beautiful shapes and colours, and different varieties of trees to England.

I have been picking them up by the bag full, I feel you ought to be able to do something artistic with them.

Some of the seed pods are also interesting and I've been collecting those too. I think I'll turn them all into a large, but tasteful, Christmas wreath. I'll photograph it if it turns out ok.

We had another visit to St. Louis as Roland was giving a paper at Washington university or Washu, as it is known. In college league tables, this place comes high, about 10th. The university is big by Fulton standards, about 15,000, but not by american ones.
It is a very attractive campus, with a lot of trees and green spaces and you would think you had suddenly been whisked back to Oxford or Cambridge, except the scale is wrong. It's bigger!

They even have the look alike chapel!

They are adding a huge new science department on one corner of the site and it is in the same mock, Oxford/Cambridge style. We asked why they didn't build in a more modern style and basically their benefactors and parents like this style and insist on it. If you are forking out $50,000 a year for your child to go to Washu, you expect to be listened to. I can hear architect friends howling in agony at such pastiche, but I rather like it!

The university has a rather good but small art collection.

We revisit the art gallery in the middle of Forrest Park and do the basement. It has some lovely stuff.

This is one of Missouri's Caleb Bingham's paintings.

I can't remember the name of the artist, but I think this is great.  I know it won't be to everyone's taste.

We explore a bit more of the park. There is a rather unusual Art Deco greenhouse which I love

Just to the west of the park is the relatively modern- 1907 cathedral Basilica of St Louis. It is Romanesque on the outside and Byzantine inside. It is quite amazing. You would think you had stepped into St Marks. This is the largest mosaic collection in the world! 

Sorry, a rather dark photo.

From dark to blurry! 

Most of it is beautiful, some of the later stuff is a bit tacky, but luckily is high up!

We go to the loop for dinner, and end up at Blueberry Hill, famed for The Duck Room, where Chuck Berry still performs. The loop is slightly alternative. It has it's Hall of Fame in the pavement. Rock and Roll stars, not actors. It is full of bars and trendy clothes shops. All the publicity for it stresses it's ethnic 'diversity', in other words you get black and white together!!

The place is packed and buzzing and the hamburgers aren't bad. Chuck is performing in december, but it is sold out before it's advertised.

It is Thanksgiving tomorrow and we are heading down to Jeff City, with three international students, to spend Thanksgiving with a lady who works in the Churchill Institute. She and her husband already have two international school students living with them, but it seems people here do take the message of Thanksgiving seriously, and nobody is left on their own. 

I have made a chocolate pecan pie to contribute to the feast, so I hope it tastes alright. The ingredients here are that little bit different. It looks good!

Unfortunately you can't seem to buy cream here, except sour cream. We'll just have to have to eat it straight.