We are in the midst of the worst part of travel . . . . the dreaded Holiday Hangover.

We arrived back in Kuwait, from Dubai, on Saturday evening. We were back to work and in our typically routine on Sunday morning when our alarm clock went off at 4:30 a.m.  Boo, hiss, yuck!  We had lots of fun on our vacation that lead to late nights and sleeping in until “normal people” sleeping times, like the sun was already up when we woke up.  It was glorious, but it lead to an even rougher Holiday Hangover once we made it back home.

After I struggled through the work day yesterday, I foolishly agreed to go and tutor (dumb mistake #1) when I really just wanted to go home, crawl into my bed, and watch trashy reality t.v. I waited at school for the driver to come pick me up and bring me to tutor, but because of a random police check-point (to check on people’s drivers licenses) he was an hour late to pick me up.   I tutored for about an hour and a half, but then found out that the driver was once again stuck at the police check-point.  He was going to be a while before he made it back to bring me home, so I called my trusty taxi driver Abdul.  Dumb mistake #2, clearly Abdul was going to get stuck at the same police check-point.  Abdul finally made it to me about an hour later. Unfortunately though, by the time he arrived, a shift change had occurred at the guard station outside of the home I was tutoring at, and the new guard wouldn’t allow him onto the grounds to pick me up.  So . . . . I packed up my bag and walked across the grounds towards the gate, which you are probably thinking is not that a big of a deal, unless you knew how unbelievably huge these grounds were!

Throughout this event, which will forever be known as “the longest tutor session ever,” Mitch was in the midst of another terrible part of the Holiday Hangover . . . the trip to the grocery store!  The following is the text messages that we exchanged throughout this entire process…

As I walked towards the taxi, a bird literally took a deuce on my arm!  It was just enough to snap me out of my Holiday Hangover, as I burst into uncontrollable giggles over the series of unfortunate events. I was then reminded how grateful I was to live a life where I have the ability to travel, even if it causes the Holiday Hangover.

On the car ride home, I chatted the entire way with the taxi driver Abdul.  I feel fortunate that I have had the chance to meet people who come from completely different walks of life and are willing to share stories of their countries, their families, and their religions.  I walked into my apartment grateful to have a husband who does the grocery shopping and even more grateful for the box of cereal and milk that he came home with, so I could eat dinner without having to cook.  I poured myself a huge bowl of cereal, took a big bite of the most sour milk I have ever tasted!