Short and Sweet

We're back home! After three glorious weeks in the US we are back and settled into our place in Tel Aviv. The kitty missed us dearly--she hasn't left our sides since we got back. I can't say that either one of us was exactly ready for vacation to end and reality to return, but none-the-less we are home and have returned to our normal routine. I have since recovered from the most wicked case of jet-lag I have ever endured and am glad to not be keeping the same hours as the nocturnal hood cats that live below our apartment anymore.

We had a fabulous time in the US with the time split between The Land of Enchantment and the Sunshine State and many visits and laughs with family and friends. I was going to go into all the details of the trip but in the interest of saving time and getting this blog out in a timely manner (okay, a somewhat more timely manner), I decided to just give the abridged version. Synopsis. Cliff's Notes if you will. I figure of the few people who still read this anyway, we probably either saw them while we were in the US, or they got the rundown from somebody who did. And yes, I realize it has been over a month since I last blogged (and yes, I am ashamed). I swear that I really did have every intention of blogging while away but things were just too darn busy. Busy meaning Fun. So "Yay!", at least we were having a good time! I think that's a pretty good excuse if you ask me.

So the US was most fabulous indeed! The air was clean and clear. The car horns were silent. And people were nice. Ridiculously nice. So much so that we started to wonder if people were being intentionally nice to us. It's like they somehow knew we were visiting from Israel and wanted to be super nice to us just to make us feel welcome. We went to all our favorite restaurants in Albuquerque (like the infamous El Pinto!) and ate as much bacon, ham, and pulled pork as we could possibly muster. Kosher Smosher. We did our best to help out the failing economy by indulging in a shopping spree (that pretty much spanned the entire 3 weeks) and treated ourselves to new clothes, shoes, fancy facial products (okay, that was just me) and various other sundries that we either cannot find in Israel or that we refuse to lay down insane quantities of Shekels for. We visited with family and friends, had light saber battles with the coolest Kindergartner ever, drank tea and ate fancy little finger foods (okay, that was just me and my Mom....sometimes we like to pretend that we are refined and classy), frequented several golf courses (okay that was just Phil, I was too busy being a good consumer), had a wonderful welcome home party thrown for us in our honor (thanks Bri and Matt!!), hung out with the most precocious almost-three year we know, spent quality time with our folks and aunts and uncles, actually enjoyed driving again (I swear I haven't felt that free since we moved here) and generally just enjoyed the familiar English speaking world we had almost forgot existed. Ahhhhhhh....it was nice.

And then in an unexpected twist of good luck we got upgraded to business class seats on our way back home. Okay, so it wasn't so much as an upgrade as our flight got cancelled, so we were forced to spend an extra night in Florida and the only available seats on the next days flight to Tel Aviv were business class. But hey, I'm not complaining. It was worth the extra night in a hotel and the pathetic grilled cheese I had to eat for dinner that night. (Come to think of it....it was probably better than the craptastic food you get served in coach.) And now I don't know how we shall ever fly coach again. Business class is indeed a different world and it's quite maddening to think that there are people who actually fly like this all the time. I even drank some wine (which I never do because of my predisposition to horrible throbbing migraines....but hey,....it was free so I took my chances). And I actually slept, which is indeed something I am very very bad at on airplanes. In general, it just never happens.

So we are back in and settled and all of our wonderful loot is unpacked and put away. The heat has subsided and I am starting to think it must have been the crazy oppressive sticky heat that was making me so cranky before. Either that or I'm still just on a high from our awesome vacation. Phil is back at work and I am back doing what it is I do....cooking, cleaning, knitting, working out (much to my dismay), hanging out with girlfriends, etc. I even had an interesting proposition from one (no, get your mind out of the gutter!). I was asked if I wanted to participate in a Marathon. Can you hear me? That's me still laughing hysterically! Clearly she doesn't know me as well as some. We're also making plans for celebrating Thanksgiving in Israel which I of course will tell you all about in due time. We've also had a lovely visitor (that's you Aunt Rose!) and we even went on our first excursion to Jerusalem (I know, finally!) But more about our day in the Holy City soon. I'll save that for another blog hopefully out in the not so far off future (definitely less than 4, 5 weeks max). And if that wasn't enough we are off tomorrow to the Dead Sea for a little weekend excursion. So with that I must get to the packing that I was supposed to be doing all day (instead I chose to spend the afternoon holding a cute baby.....but shhhhhh, don't tell Phil I wasn't doing my job!).