I'm back!

I got in late last night, after a too-long day of airplanes and customs and security lines and no sleep, and I finally turned out the light around 11:30pm. I vaguely recall waking up once during the night, but didn't really start waking up in earnest until almost 8:00am today, so that's good. I'm starting to feel sleepy now, and am hoping to go to bed early, but all in all I'm pleased at how well I slept. We'll see if I can really avoid jetlag, or if I'm deluding myself.

It was extremely hard to leave Italy yesterday; the whole process of packing and taking the train to the airport was just plain depressing. Now, it is nice to be in my own home surrounded by my stuff and to have my cats around (that last part is especially nice), but I could have my own stuff and my cats moved to Italy. So that isn't enough of a lure to stay here. No, moving to Italy is still very much something I want to do, so we'll see how it all works out.

On a lighter note, when I got home last night the garage light was on. I thought that was odd. Then I saw there was a note from our house-sitter extraordinaire on the door, saying one of the cats was in the garage. (They're indoor cats, and not supposed to get into the garage, even.) She said he'd gotten in there just that evening as she was taking out the garbage, and he was too quick for her. He hadn't responded to her attempts to get him back inside, so I spent the first 20 minutes of being home lying on the floor of my garage trying to convince my cat to come out from under Chris' car. He finally did, and when I scooped him I up I realized his paws were kind of oily. Lovely. So then I spent the next 15 minutes washing off my cat's paws (he really didn't love me very much at that point) in a locked bathroom so he couldn't get away and get oily cat footprints all over our cream-colored carpets. Then, and only then, did I actually bring any of my bags upstairs.

Yeah, it was kind of an odd re-entry. But comical. At least for me (not for the cat).

Oh, and this morning before I ran to the grocery store for some milk, I stopped by the cafe that's around the corner from our house (and run by some friends who love Italy and Italian coffee), and I taught the gals working there how to make my new favorite coffee drink. I'll have to teach our friends, the owners, so they can add it to the menu. Seriously. I'm not sure I can live without at least the occasional marocchino for too long! Hey, if I can't be in Italy, I'll bring as much of Italy home with me as possible...

I'm going to spend tomorrow morning doing a few household chores and unpacking, my mom's going to come up for a visit in the afternoon, and I'm going to relax in my PJs and maybe not leave my house all day. Then on Sunday I have to drive to SeaTac airport to pick up Chris. That's as far as he could get on Sunday (they were going to have him stay overnight up there and fly him to Portland on Monday - no thanks). I'm not looking forward to the road trip by myself on the way up, especially if I'm still jetlaggy. Anyone wanna come with??