Bourne's BIG Trip: Mark Twain Museum and Art Gallery

Yesterday was a pretty nice day, with a mild temperature and a pretty sunny sky, but by 11:00 o clock or so it was cloudy, and I do not mean just a few spots of grey here and there. The whole sky was gray, black, or white, and no blue spot was shown to my pupil. Even though so, rain was idle and unbecoming. We did cleaning and laundry and such, and chose to just hang around for the day. Mom did some laundry, and Dad sent some things home by way of post office, and also got a little trim of his hair. While we took Mom's laundry sheets and blankets and all that, I took in a book and asked Denise if they had a book exchange, and she said she didn't but just a week ago a lady had come in and gave her like 5o books and she showed all of them to me in big crates. I gave her the book and looked for other good ones, and did find one about cowboys and one that just looked intriguing. Other ones were either romance novels or scary books, and none at all interesting to me. I then thanked her and left, and then helped Mom with the laundry. It wasn't too bad. Later in the day as he were walking back after walking the dogs a man by a truck by a fifth wheel asked us if we wanted any pumpkins. He said he picked them and was going to do target practice against 'em, so we could take a few. Thanking him, we got about three and a few other really cool gourds, with awesome designs of yellow and orange and having bumpy spots. It was really nice of the man.

We cleaned some more after that.

Then Dad said we were going to go to Mark Twain Museum and Art Gallery, which we didn't do the day before, doing the cave first. But now we were doing the museum. Rebecca and Mom didn't want to go, saying that they were too busy and thought it was not gonna be that cool. But it definitely was.

We had a good ride together, talking about this and that and having a good time. We went through Quincy and into Hannibal, and we took in the familiar sights we had seen the day before. We parked across the street from the museum, and we saw it's brick big presence looming over us, like it was about to strike. Dad poorly parallel parked, and we walked in.

It was fairly big, with a little desk with a lady on the left, and a large gift shop on that side too. Restrooms were on the right, and after paying, we walked through big doors by the desk and went into the museum. It was a really well thought out museum, and was really cool too. To our left was an area with museum dials telling about things and such, but from the distance I couldn't read it. I went over and saw that there was openings with fake stone and stuff looking like a mini castle, and when I came into the area I saw it was an exhibit about one of Mark Twain's book, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. I read some of the dials, some of them talking about how the character in the book tried to revolutionize old Europe as he was made king as they thought him a wizard(but it was really science, and how he made baseball and telephone lines and such into the middle ages. I had read it, and it was really cool to see a display about it.

In the middle of the room was a glass container containing the desk and writing papers of Mark Twain, and then behind was a lot of bookshelves and such containing his best books. On the other side of this was a sculpture of Twain sitting down on this chair, with Tom on his lap and Huck in the other chair, and he was reading. It was a really cool piece.

To the left of that were dials talking about Tom Sawyer's adventures, like when he asks Becky to engage him or when he gets everybody to paint the fence. There was actually an activity where you could really paint the fence. It was really cool. Another part was where you could listen to Injun Joe kill Dr. Robinson, and where you could see the figures in the graveyard. Then we went in a fake cave, and as we passed an area that was motion censored lit up and made a bat's noise, displaying a bat. Dad got a little freaked out. Then, for the next part, we came into Huckleberry Finn, and we stepped onto an area designed to look like a raft with benches in a swamp, all the walls and such being in a swampy design. On a projector we watched a little bit of Huckleberry Finn the Movie. After that we left and went over to the left side again, and then we saw an exhibit about Roughing It, a book I read like a year ago about Twain's adventures out west. It was really cool to see it to come to life, as we looked at the dials and did hands- on things, like sitting in a carriage as he did or trying to mine for gold. It was really cool to see all that, it really was.

By now we had come to the very back of the large room, and over us was another floor that went up on blue and white stairs and another staircase by that. Then I saw a little exhibit about Twain's time in the middle east and such, called Innocents Abroad. I got to see all the places Twain went, and I saw his progress on a map. So that was kind of interesting.

Then we went up the wooden stairs and came to a little area with a few models of steamboats and an actual steamboat wheel and bell. I actually got to move it around and such, and it was pretty hard to move back and forth after a while. I also pulled down on a bell, and that was really cool and made a loud sound as loud as the Occupy Wall street protesters.

We learned about Twain's life as a river boater, and that his brother died in an accident. We then went up the stairs again, this time in a fairly big room, with a lot of displays and paintings. We actually saw wonderful paintings of Norman Rockwell's when he painted the Tom and Huck stories. It was really cute.

We also saw 1st edition books of Mark Twain, like the very first copies that came out of all of them. It was really cool to see those old, old, old books.

There were other interesting parts, like seeing a bust of M.T. and his stories in all different languages. We even saw his famous white suit. It was a lot of fun. We went into another room, and we saw the museum office. A lady named Cindy. On top floor. Museum Office. These were the words that Valarie had told me about the lady named Cindy.She said she likes Mark Twain, and she would love to talk to someone about him. We walked in, and there were two other offices, one right in front of us, one to the right, and another big one to the left. That had a painting and sculpture of Mark Twain, and many of his books on a book shelf. I just KNEW that that was her office. They said she wasn't here today, but she did have an email. I probably will email her sometime today or so.

We went downstairs by way of the elevator, and left the museum, but not before getting three Mark Twain books(I was on low supply of books in the R.V.) Life on the Mississippi, Innocents Abroad, Best Short Stories by Mark Twain. I hope to enjoy them.

We rejoined with the girls, and then ate a wonderful dinner at T.G.I.F. It was very good.

Then I had my bed out and slept an interrupted great sleep.

"A person who won't read has no advantage over one who can't read." - Mark Twain. ,

Andrew.