Next Stop State Capitol?

Taken from inside the Governor's Garden, here is a shot of Missouri's beautiful state capitol.


But our plan to see the capitol early Saturday morning before Jessica's wedding was foiled by car trouble.


When we got in the car to head from our hotel over to the capitol, we discovered the key would not turn in the ignition. We've had this problem before with our trusty Grand Voyager, and it's usually remedied by a little jerking of the steering wheel and some good ol' fashioned fist banging and cursing. After an hour of unsuccessful attempts to start her up, we went back up to the hotel room to explore our options. We called the father of the bride and he hooked us up with a mechanic in town. While we waited for him to arrive, Jeff Googled (yep, that's a verb) the problem we were having and stumbled upon a post from an automotive bulletin board describing the adventures of a young man with the same problem. We read how he had had the steering column replaced twice before a Chicago tow truck driver finally told him how to fix it on the spot. Lucky for us we read of his misfortune, and it saved us a bundle.

Turns out, a $12 rubber mallet was all we needed. By this time, it was too late to visit the capitol so we opted for swimming at the hotel instead.


Silly as it sounds, whacking the key with a rubber mallet will start the van lickity split. No more jerking, banging, or cursing (okay, 2 out of 3 ain't bad).