day 11- returning home

we got a shuttle to the aeroporto di roma and waited on our flight. i bought some funky euro food for the kids and stowed it in my pack. i was tempted to buy a few balls of buffalo mozzarella but wasn't sure how it would keep on the plane- i'd just have to eat it for the good of everyone. sadly, i decided not to buy them.
we are waiting on our flight to newark-it's been delayed a few times. it'll be good to see the kids soon.
we have lots of leg room on this flight but that's because we are in a special section of the airplane. right in front of us in the "stewardess nap station". it's sectioned off with curtains to protect them from cabin light. they take turns taking naps in there, swapping with the flight attendants who aren't very forthcoming with the water. chris and i took turns getting up and going to the back to help ourselves to some acua.
even italian plane food is good! can you tell i'm jealous? why can't we do this? have we tamed our taste buds so much and justified all the cheap food by saying it's saving money? but my taste buds aren't fooled. there is no such thing as a free lunch- or a cheaper dinner, just by cutting corners and growing junk crops and shipping food to the ends of the earth. our bodies will pay. look at old italian people- they look ALOT healthier than american people! i think it's safe to say i saw NO fat italians. isn't that incredible? bread, pasta, cheese. no fat. something's wrong with our idea of "food".

the man sitting behind us won't stop talking. he did take a nap but seriously- it's a 10 hour flight! i could tell you ALL about him. he's a geology professor who took his class to italy to tour pompei and other rocky places. he likes john denver, he has two kids- both are in high school....blah blah blah. the poor gal sitting next to him must be a student and in fear for her grade she is forced to sit patiently through all his verbaflood.
italian pilots are like italian drivers- i came VERY close to losing my lunch on the landing. ugh. the gal behind us lost hers completely- a few times actually. chris said "oh, i could tell you about all the times i ever threw up in my ilfe!" mimicking the geology professor to a "t".


it was kind of humiliating to get full body frisked wearing a dirty shirt and no deoderant. chris likes my stink so sitting next to me on the flight wasn't too bad. but i'm sure that lady at newark security has some singed nose hairs. i don't care how bad i smell- i'm NOT going through the full body radiation oven.
after the frisking i went and bought a csi new york shirt. we grabbed a drink at the bar while we waited for our flight. i had a cranberry juice, because by this time i was %95 certain we were expecting, and chris had a beer. we were hoping to get food but our waitress was so slow we gave up. instead we got some food close to our gate. such a let down. some tex-mex burrito- where all the flavors kind of were one, and not from the freshest ingredients- trying to hide this fact was a cheesy sauce. the difference in cuisine was stark.
we got on a later flight to atlanta, our delays in italy made us miss our connection. this flight was much quieter. no geology professors, no italian pilot's threatening us with crash landings.
mom and dad were at the atlanta airport with the boys- waiting for us to return. so glad to be home with them, can't wait to get the girls back tomorrow.