Coming Home

So I made it back to merry old England in one piece, after what felt like the longest journey ever. I left America at 4pm, and made it back to England at 7:40am the next morning - obviously I lost hours due to the time zones, but it felt like I'd been travelling for about thirty years when I finally touched down at Heathrow. It was made easier by the fact that I had Smiley in the row behind me on the flight from JFK to Frankfurt - what also made it easier was that I watched The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and The Devil Wears Prada.

Luckily, I also had Smiley with me to scuttle across Frankfurt airport in order to get our connecting flights. My feet were killing me and it didn't help that Frankfurt airport is basically the size of England; after half an hour of walking and a trip on the air train, we finally found security and our gates. This is where I said goodbye to Smiley, as she was flying to Manchester and I was going back to Heathrow. I hobbled along to my gate, and sat there like a lemon until boarding was supposedly happening, but no one was there. I then found out that the gate had been changed (cheers for letting me know, right?) so I kind of hobble-galloped over to the new gate, which was mercifully not too far away. After berating a dickhead business man for being rude to one of the airport staff just for doing her job, I limped onto the plane and sat down, resting my awfully aching feet.

Border control at Heathrow was a breeze, even though I was now re-equipped with the heaviest suitcase and holdall in the world. What also annoyed me was the 'nothing to declare' section, when I went through the one coming from the EU instead of coming from the USA. There was literally no difference in these two places, but I was told off and made to walk out of the EU one and through the USA one, something my feet were not happy about. I finally got out to where Mutti and Ryan were waiting, and it was so great to see them! I was dead on my feet and in so much pain, but just getting to see some family was a huge boost. I also got a Greggs sausage roll on the drive home - you have no idea how much I've missed those.

I was pretty out of it with jetlag for the next couple of days, but I got to see my family at home, including my fat furry pal, Jackson:

I also saw Caz for the first time in like four months, so that was a bloody blast. And I got to see Liam, who is currently on break from his tour in Afghanistan; him and Ashleigh came over for a chinwag and it was so good to see all of them ♥

I am now over my jetlag and ridiculously excited because the Kate Bush gig is in 2 days, and Arron & Kim's wedding is in 6 days!