home again, home again, jiggity jig

Another trip to St. Louis is done and we are home. Or we went home. Where is home? Anyway, it all went remarkably smoothly. Highlights of the trip:

1. Michael is going to be on TV. I think this is absolutely hysterical. This is the hospital's doing and I think it's marvelous. Michael, not so much.
2. As if the above weren't enough, he is making a presentation to the Jamestown Mall Walkers. Equally funny to me. I have to be nice though, or he isn't going to let me go to the baseball game where the hospital has reserved a box and is inviting a bunch of primary care docs to meet Michael...so I'll leave it at that.
3. I have an interior decorator. I realize this makes me sound a. grown up, and b. rich. I assure you I am neither. I just need a carpet runner on my wood staircase or someone is going to fall and die, and the stairs are wide enough to need an especially wide runner, so enter interior decorator.
4. No real progress made on refrig or washer/dryer. It is, of course, immensely more complicated than it ought to be. After about 10 sets of measurements taken on the existing spaces for said appliances, I quit...if we don't have a w/d when we move in, the world doesn't end. We have lots of socks and undies expressly so I don't have to wash every week.
5. I got to see Michael's office, which was fun...it's pretty much off the beaten path of our routine life in St. Louis, so I don't imagine I'll get up there much, so I'm really glad I saw it. I got to meet all of the nurses and nurse practitioners, staff people and etc...the whole group is almost bizarrely nice. And they seem to have so much fun working together. I'm so, so immensely grateful that his job seems to be such an ideal fit for him people-wise, structure-wise, patient population, the whole deal is a perfect match for Dr. Wood.
6. Ate dinner with all 5 of the docs and their spouses in the Central West End - again, they are amazingly fond of each other and remarkably funny people. I really enjoy each of them...could be stuck in convo with any of them and enjoy myself. I can't wait to get to know them all better.
7. We will be converting to Catholicism after moving in at Westmoreland Drive - I mean, everyone else on the street is...I think I need to brush up on my catholic theology.

That's about it - it was a very busy but very profitable trip. I can't believe that the next time we go there, it will be for good. Monday June 4 will officially be the three week mark. I already have five nights I need a babysitter in St. Louis. And a yard crew who are mowing my yard while we are absent. And I know where we'll get a family fitness membership. And I have shopped at my grocery store. It almost feels like I live there already...except my house and kids and stuff and friends are all here. A very strange, feet in different worlds sort of existence.

Exciting, and sickening, and exhausting, and exhilarating...all at once.