A Bologna Break

I just returned to the United States for the Christmas season, in order to celebrate the holiday with my family and then visit my friend and new homeowner, Ron, for New Year's Eve. Today marks my second day back in the United States. So far, so good....

Yesterday, I went to Wegman's with my mother to buy groceries for a family dinner last night. I didn't realize how many food items I missed while in Italy. I bought (or convinced my mother to buy) sushi, diet wild cherry Pepsi, dill pickles, hummus, etc. Don't worry--I didn't eat all of this food together!
Last night we had our annual family dinner with the Maguire clan. I decided to use this occasion to introduce a group of people to the Italian way of dining. I served them panettone and, at the end of the meal, I broke out the grappa. I am not sure if everyone (myself included) appreciated the wonderment that is grappa, but oh well....

Anyway, back to my first day home. I think it is important to include what I learned over the course of my 36-hour journey from Bologna to Trumansburg, NY; a journey that included a night train to Roma, 2 plane flights to get me to the US, a much-delayed flight from Chicago to Rochester that got me into Rochester at 2:30 AM EST, and a 1.5 hour car ride with my father who had to wait at the airport for the arrival of the 2:30 AM flight. We got home at 4 AM. He had to go to work at 7 AM. However, I don't think this was as inconvenient as the time 3 years ago when he had to drive me to Rochester on Christmas Day in the middle of a Nor'easter, so I could make my flight to Hong Kong. What a trooper...What I learned, though, is that I am never doing this again. It should NOT take 36 hours to travel from Italy to the east coast of the US. I am going to become a more civilized traveler....THAT is my New Year's resolution...