These places have one big downside, however. You could get arrested. But in Jefferson County, prosecutors can't quite figure out what to do with folks caught doing the nasty where anyone with a hankering is free to watch.
Take the case of Award Video, where six men caught allegedly having sexual contact with each other in a porn store were charged with sexual misconduct. However, a woman who police said had sex with four of those same guys walked free. Prosecutors say they couldn't charge her with anything because the law says you must be in a position to offend someone before you've committed a crime -- hardly the case in a porno shop. However, the law, prosecutors say, doesn't apply the same standard to people who have sex with members of their own gender, even in the privacy of their own bedrooms. No matter where it happens, gay sex is a misdemeanor in Missouri.
The head spins with possibilities.
Why not open a full-blown sex theater in downtown Hillsboro? So long as the gay element can be kept out, exhibitionists from across the nation would presumably be free to do each other right under the noses of the police. Or how about opening a Hooters Plus, for the discriminating diner who demands extra commitment from the serving staff? The only problem are those nasty gay people. They'd just come in and ruin it for everybody.
It's near the end of the year, and no one has yet figured him out. Baseball takes great comfort in statistics, but to compare numbers between one era and another is tricky. It's hard to gauge which player had the best first two years in the majors. But whenever that debate is pursued, Albert Pujols' name is going to be mentioned. Poo-holes: Get used to saying it. He's going to be the talk of this town for a long time. All he needs is a nickname.
The Katy Trail -- its name taken from the now-defunct Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad, one of whose routes it traces -- starts in St. Charles and spans more than half the state. Country towns are spaced nicely apart, and wildlife encounters are not uncommon. We've got a number of good trails around here, though. The North Riverfront Trail is very doable. From the Arch north to the Chain of Rocks Bridge, the twelve-mile trek wends through urban, industrial and natural settings. Ride past scrapyards, fields of restored prairie grass, men fishing from the banks of the river. The Great River Road Trail, starting in Alton, heads northward with the shining Mississippi on the left and towering bluffs on the right. Barges, laden with coal or grain or salt, ply the river; egrets, gulls and, in winter, bald eagles soar overhead. The spirit of the mythical Piasa bird is strong here. None of the trails should be missed -- you like living, right? -- but it's the Katy we ride when we're searching for natural beauty.