2/1/2002

T. LOUIS - So imagine my delight when my editor handed me a plane ticket a couple of days back and asked, ''Ready to roll?''

Oh, yeah. The Big Easy. All aboard the bayou express. Another order of jambalaya, please, and why do I always have to wear pants? I had visions of walking arm-in-arm down Bourbon Street with Emeril, cutting the lunch line at Galatoire's, sidling up to Pete Rozelle at another obscenely exclusive NFL bash.

Actually, my editor said, you're heading to St. Louis, and seeing that this is the year in which a wounded nation comes together to celebrate unity rather than foster petty rivalry, put aside your elitist Eastern cynicism and be nice.

By the way, he added, Pete Rozelle is dead.

I knew that.

All of which explains why I'm standing at the front desk of the International Bowling Museum and Hall of Fame in downtown St. Louis with a smile forced across my rain-streaked face and the words ''Be nice'' slipping through my gritted teeth.

I know what I want to write. I want to question what kind of city has half a giant McDonald's arch as its civic symbol. I want to point out that most of the locals look like Huckleberry Finn's backwater cousins. I want to let it be known that this entire metropolis, if that's what a collection of freeway intersections and rail yards can be called, is like Hartford without the charm or Worcester without the nice architecture.

And the Rams? Please, there's nothing so tall as a molehill within a thousand miles, never mind a ram to climb it. Better the St. Louis Swine, and let's see if they'd be 14-point favorites.

Instead, I find myself standing before a lifesize photograph of the immortal Paeng Nepomuceno, his fist thrust high in the air as he captured the 1992 Bowling World Cup. Moments later, I gaze at glass cases holding the cigarette lighters of some of the century's greatest 10-pin champions. I can't help but wonder, if there's a hard-luck hall of fame somewhere in this godforsaken world, will a portrait of me in St. Louis hang prominently on the wall?

But stop that. National unity - good. Petty rivalry - bad. Time to forge onward in this city where, as the local motto goes, ''There's more than meets the Arch.''

There certainly is. For starters, there's the Museum of the Dog, featuring fine arts exhibits on our four-legged friends. Then there's the Dental Health Theatre, which bills itself as ''the only attraction of its kind in the world, with 16 three-foot-high fiberglass teeth.'' Time permitting, there's always the Bigfoot 4X4, ''Home of the Original Monster Truck.''

So I board a tram for the ride to the top of the Gateway Arch, wondering how a computer company got the naming rights to a national monument. On this day, the only thing that meets the Arch are clouds. ''Be nice. Be nice.''

I head over to Anheuser-Busch for the brewery tour. Hey, the MFA doesn't serve two free beers. Later, I pick at toasted ravioli at the St. Louis Steakhouse as my server wishes her city ''could be more like Jacksonville.'' No kidding. Five hours on the ground, and I've pretty much done St. Louis. The only other thing would be to take steroids with Mark McGwire, but he surely fled town the day he retired.

So I'm left with the mayor. We're in his office, roughly the size of Copley Square. He's prattling on about some symphony and a science museum, when he turns to the topic of heartburn relief, something I could use right about now. He's saying, ''Every Tums, everywhere in the world, is made right in downtown St. Louis. That's 9 billion Tums, with a b, every year.''

I want to tell him that his city will need a year's supply of those homemade Tums come Sunday, but I don't think I'm allowed. Instead, I hightail it back to the airport. Regardless of what happens in New Orleans, I'd rather feel the agony of defeat in Boston than witness a victory parade in this cow town. Of course, I say that in the nicest possible way.

Brian McGrory can be reached by e-mail at mcgrory@globe.com.