With launch pad and pyramids, the little village of River Bend, Mo., really has it going on. All it needs is the Queen Elizabeth and Ripley's Believe It or Not to rival Las Vegas for glitz and glamor

River Bend, Mo., is a small, fiercely independent community south of Liberty. Judging from the sand-dredging operations going on on both sides of Missouri 291, it must have some of the finest sand in Northwest Missouri (It is river bottom, less than a mile from the Missouri River). That's a sand or gravel mound above, not a pyramid as imagined by yours truly, the Magic Commuter with the over-developed visual imagination. (Nor is the tower below to be confused with the Kennedy Space Center, although it does look like Cape Canaveral preparing for a sunrise launch.) The sand biz apparently is the hottest commercial gig in town, aside from a convenience store that I drop in on periodically and the Back Door Lounge, a bar in the same building that's connected by a door not far from the pop dispenser. Like most good rural, blue-collar convenience stores, this one will cook you breakfast and make sandwiches for lunch. I once considered offering my musical services to the Back Door Lounge, but thought twice about it. It was a good decision, apparently, considering Scott M. of Kansas City's review on Yelp.com (see below). That's it for now, my treybooshays, from River Bend and the long and circuitous route taken by the Magic Commute. 

"This is a tiny dive bar on the back side of a gas station at 291 & 210 Hwys. Access is from a small unlighted intersection about 500 feet east of the interchange. The bar is eclectically decorated -- several types of stringed musical instruments, a wooden Indian, bee hives, cattle horns, etc.  There's a jukebox, a dart board, and a pool table.  The clientele is skews a little older, but a few younger people pop in from time to time.   Draft beer is served in mugs -- some with high school logos on them. We were greeted by an extremely intoxicated mechanic who couldn't even say his own name when introducing himself and found setting a book of matches on the bar to be a rather challenging task. River Bend -- a village incporporated several years ago by residents who wanted to stay free of the encroaching restrictions of (ironically)  Liberty and Independence -- has no smoking ordinance. Therefore smoking is allowed in this bar."