Home Sweet Home

As Ben mentioned, we are finally home. Our journey home was long! We left our home in Warlingham at 8am (3am Texas time). We didn't step foot in our home until the following day at 7:30pm Texas time which is 12:30am 2 days later on England time! In any case, we were exhausted and once we went to bed, we were out!

So here we are, a couple of days later, trying to unpack and get adjusted to Texas time and the real world. On Friday morning I woke up at 7am (not bad). Today I woke up at 5am (not so good). Plus we gain an hour tonight so hopefully I don't wake up at 4am tomorrow!

When we arrived in Las Vegas (our first layover coming home), we had to get our baggage and go through customs. Then the customs person told us to go throught the doors to the recheck desk and recheck our luggage to get to our next stop. So we waited at the recheck desk for about 15 minutes before a worker finally showed up. He said he tends to lose luggage and to take our luggage to the American Airlines ticketing to recheck our bags. Seriously? That is his job. So we run out, take the inter-terminal shuttle. There were several other people on the shuttle, many of whom were asking the driver questions which slowed our progress. Finally we were off the shuttle with a ton of luggage. Unfortunately the driver dropped us on the opposite side of the terminal so we still had to run for what felt like miles in the terminal to get to the ticketing desk. Keep in mind, we have 2 medium size suitcases, 1 small suitcase, 1 carry on bag, 1 backpack and my purse. We arrived at the ticketing desk 30 minutes before our flight was scheduled to take off. The employee told us that we were too late to check in our bags and probably couldn't even get to the gate in time to catch our flight. But we still tried. We ran as hard and as fast as we could to get to the gate. We ended up behind the slowest person in the world at security. We tried to pass him after security. As we were running, he came to an abrupt stop, extended his briefcase for some unknown reason, and slammed me in the knee. Yes, I am bruised. Still, we ran. We huffed. Ben struggled to keep his pants up as he didn't feel like wearing his belt that morning. I can only imagine what we looked like. By the time we were nearing the gate, our names were being paged for immediate departure. But we made it. I had a minor asthma attack, but we made it. And I had my rescue inhaler so all was good.

Here is my summary of the trip:
AWESOME!

It was nice to have 2 solid weeks to enjoy not only our time together but to see other cultures and such. I learned a lot about archaeology that backs up the Bible. In that case, the trip was faith strengthening. I got to see the relaxed side of Liz which made me like her even more. Aubrey was fun too! The history of England is every where you go. While interesting, it shows how much people there essentially worship their human rulers. It made me appreciate the enlightenment (Tim - that is for you) that we have as witnesses of Jehovah. Our everyday lives are so busy and hectic. It was nice to take a more leisurly approach to each day. Also, having met and stayed with Nadia, I felt the brotherhood even more. She was so welcoming as if we were her family. Truly amazing!

I don't know how many stairs we climbed or how many miles we walked, it was all worth it. Somehow I didn't lose any weight after all that activity. I blame Liz and her constant supply of chocolate. :) Again, all worth it!

Pictures taken during the trip: 2623 (Jenny - you beat me with pictures taken on your adventure!)
I'm debating posting more picture from the trip. Any thoughts?