In which I almost made like the pope

The husband and I had a very nice time in St. Louis this weekend, although all I saw of the place was the Westin and the convention center. (Had a VERY yummy lunch at Kitchen K, so if you're in the vicinity, I recommend the fried chicken.) Anyway, the weather was uncooperative at best, but we always have fun together and the work event we were attending for him was forty kinds of bizarre which means we had LOTS to talk about. But the longer we were in St. Louis, the stranger it seemed there. Now, don't get me wrong, it's a very nice city. Perhaps TOO nice...in fact, by Sunday morning I had developed a theory. I don't think there are any human folks in St. Louis at all. I think it's some sort of extraterrestrial experiment where entities from another galaxy are emulating humans and testing the waters before they invade Manhattan. You think I'm kidding? I give you the following exhibits:

*the cabdriver who drove us across downtown and waved off the fare when my husband wanted to pay with his corporate card saying, "Oh, that's alright, just catch me another time. It's too much trouble to run the machine."

*the waitress who wouldn't charge me for my tea because she only had plain black tea and no Earl Grey and "couldn't possibly charge for something that wasn't first choice".

*the other cabdriver who gave my husband back part of his tip because it was too much money.

*the waitress who wouldn't let me order off the breakfast menu but insisted I use the buffet at the Westin because a la carte oatmeal was too expensive and then worried that I didn't get enough Greek yogurt.

*the TSA agent at the airport who helped take all of my things out of the four assorted gray plastic bins after they had been scanned and smiled while he was doing it as his colleague was helping my husband unpack his electronics

There is a pattern there of a distinctly Stepfordian bent. Added to that is the fact that the entire time we were there, we saw NOT ONE SINGLE pedestrian downtown. Granted, the weather wasn't great, but there were some patches of clear and still not a single living soul ventured onto the city sidewalks. Say what you like, that is just not normal. I was getting extremely nervous until we had lunch in the airport and the waitress helped herself to the coins from my lunch change. (Clearly the advance efforts for alien colonization missed one. Either that, or they are getting MUCH better at emulating human behavior.)

Now lest you think I am being critical of St. Louis, let me say that the people are extremely friendly, and I don't think I have ever seen a major sports facility as nicely done as Busch Stadium. I mean, honestly, it's all red brick and black iron and it just looks like someone actually THOUGHT about what it would look like when they were finished instead of pouring a mess of concrete and calling it a day. It reminds me of an old-fashioned ballpark, and I am genuinely sorry to have visited out of season and missed my chance to see the Cardinals play there.

But my pope reference has nothing to do with St. Louis itself. It was the flight home that had me mentally reviewing my Last Will and Testament, updated just last year--by a very nice man who informed me that I apparently now have a "literary estate" and who seemed rather tickled at having to dispose of it for me. Anyway, my husband and I amused ourselves at the Philadelphia airport by watching what looked like the cast of "Saved by the Bell" service our teeny-tiny twin-prop plane, but it did not seem at ALL funny an hour later when we hit a hailstorm and got bounced around like whiffle balls. We dropped so far and so hard I came up out of my seat more than once, and only avoided concussion because I had my seatbelt strapped so tightly I could feel it in my liver. I sincerely hoped that Screech had done everything he needed to in order to make sure that little plane didn't shake itself apart, and bless him, he apparently did because it all held together. (I was not at all comforted by the fact that we had changed seats at the last minute to get exit row leg room since the exit door was rattling like a set of maracas and seemed entirely capable of just popping off entirely.)

But there was an off-duty pilot in the row behind us, and I kept telling myself that if he wasn't nervous, neither was I, but let's be honest here, I was about five minutes away from the mother of all conniption fits, and I was EXTREMELY grateful when we emerged on the other side of that storm intact. I wasn't sure whether to kiss the pilot or kick him, but when he popped out of the cockpit, GRINNING, and said, "Little bumpy back there?" I gave serious consideration to pitchforks and baling wire, but I just didn't have the energy left in my poor white knuckles to hold the torch. And when did they start letting twelve-year olds fly commercial airliners? I KNOW he wasn't old enough to shave yet, and I strongly suspect he stole his daddy's pilot's license. Someone ought to look into it...