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Well it's taken me awhile to actually get around to writing it.

But here it is.

My 300th post. Which is nice because I love even numbers - I would have actually written an extra one just to get to 300 because 299 just doesn't sit right with me.

Also my last post for this blog.

Anyway I've been back just over two weeks (how the heck that happened, I have no idea) and so far my thought pattern goes something like this.

"GET ME THE F@*# OUT OF HERE!"

Alright that's probably a bit harsh, although at times fairly accurate. Sometimes the truth can be ugly. And yes, sometimes I feel it in capitals. It's like I'm living some weird ass double life. One here in suburbia with my family and friends, not to mention work (shitty but essential), driving a car and remnants of my past floating by me (much of which will be remedied by good old ebay or the trading post). And then my other life in Manhattan with new and old friends along with de-cluttering, the Y, the subway and current episodes of 'Bones'.

They're so completely removed from each other that I can't seem to find a way to connect them.

I realise that my year away had lots of different elements but as the last place I stayed (apart from a quick stop off in San Diego) was Manhattan and the fact that collectively I spent about four months there, it's the part that has had left the greatest impression on me. And the part that has ultimately given me some direction and changed my plans for the next year or so.

Alright it didn't really change them. Because I had no plan past the end of this trip. So it actually provided me with a plan (fingers crossed) that started from Fiona and Sybil both separately asking me "Do you wish you could stay here longer?"

Well Fiona actually asked "Don't you wish you could stay here longer?"

Tiny difference. Huge difference.

So I turned that around in my brain for awhile to see what it would feel like and they eventually dragged an answer out of me.

Yes.

I'm sure I was a lot more vague about it than that. I know I was. But the long and the short of it is - it's true. Hence, future plans are evolving.

So here are some things I miss about the U.S.

1. Friends (have to put that at the top or I'd be in trouble).

2. Manhattan.

3. Starbucks on every corner.

4. French vanilla latte mix (I did bring three containers home but they won't last long as I'm already onto my second).

5. Being able to turn right on a red light.

Things that are great about being back home.

1. Family and friends.

2. The metric system.

3. The smallest coin being 5 cents.

4. Being able to buy fresh pumpkin (ie - not out of a tin - who even knew you could get it in a tin?) at any time of year.

5. Plain AND self-raising flour.

There's more for both list but this is just a little taste.

So, was there a lucky hour at the world's end?

Well of course there was.

I'm just not going to tell you what it was. But if you read my blog then you already know!

CALIFORNIA - SAN DIEGO

I actually think I had a bit of jetlag yesterday. Pretty sad considering there is only a three hour time difference between the east and west coast. I hope that's not an indication of what I will be like for the big trip home.

Anyway today I feel much better and Kristen and I wandered around the farmer's market that is just over the road from their apartment. It was another gorgeous day although a leetle bit more overcast than yesterday. We both bought a wrap around skirt.

I really have no idea what's wrong with me. I thought my shopping "thing" had ended.

Apparently not.

I need to stop or I won't have any money left for my trip to DFO when I get home that I have promised Nicole. You'd think she'd won tatts she was that excited when I said I would go! I would quote her here but the kids might read this and the language wasn't really appropriate for minors.

For lunch we headed down to a town called Ocean Beach and met a few of Kristen's friends at a place called "Hodads." It's a burger place that is so popular there is a queue down the street. I have decided that this is my last one for awhile. I am going to do a detox when I get home - no red or white meat for me. So I'll be eating like a vegetarian (scary prospect I know) although I will still be eating fish. I can hear you all groaning as you read this. But you'll just have to get over it.

After lunch we walked around looking at the shops.

Ummmm .......................... I did buy a t-shirt but it was under $3 so DFO is still a goer.

Oh yeah, we also stopped off at some other shops before we came home and I bought a mini hair straightener (very inexpensive too).

What am I doing with a straightener with such short hair, I hear you ask? Well it's a teeny tiny one and I'm going to use it to flick up the ends of my hair. I'm not so good with high maintenance hair as you all know, so we'll see how long this lasts.

CALIFORNIA - SAN DIEGO

The shuttle bus to the airport got to the apartment early so there was no time for tearful farewells even though I told them I wanted lots of heart wrenching sobs when I left.

Fiona did text me a "Sniff, sniff" later which kind of made up for it.

Anyway I ended up being at the airport three hours early and then had a three hour stop over in Dallas.

I have become addicted to solitaire on my Ipod. I must have played it for about 10 house yesterday which is actually pretty sad.

Thank goodness for the charging stations at the airport.

But I made it safely to San Diego where I am staying with Kristen (little sis of my person Joyce) and her husband Adam for the weekend. At 10pm I was ready for bed mostly because I was still on New York time and it was 1am to me.

I was looking forward to a great sleep in until Fiona texted me at about 6.30am. She has a habit of doing this - the other week it was 1.30am. That time it was because she was still awake and maybe thought that if she couldn't sleep then I shouldn't either. This time was because the fact that I was in a different time zone had escaped her.

Anyway the weather is lovely in San Diego and Kristen and I went for a long walk and ended up at Balboa Park which is a lovely place full of gardens, the zoo, places to eat, museums, street performers and more. It was a gorgeous day and just perfect for walking, strolling and talking.

Which we did plenty of.

NEW YORK - GREENWICH VILLAGE

My last day in New York (apart from being sad) was busy. It involved a bunch of washing, cleaning, packing, moving back to Fiona and Bob's, not to mention fitting in baking some Anzacs. We didn't have time to go to the gym (although we had good intentions) but did have time to go to Tea and Sympathy to have afternoon tea in an English teahouse. Which ended up being lunch with cucumber finger sandwiches, cake, scones and tea.

Well, obviously tea.

Oh yeah, I also managed my last cooking session with Kiki which was brownies.

And I'm very excited to report that I rate number three on Kiki's list of heroes. After Bob and Fiona of course. Now, she could have just being nice to make me feel good. But then this is a girl who had no qualms telling me one day that my teeth looked yellow (don't you love how kids don't seem to be able to filter?), so I'm going to take her on her word.

NEW YORK - GREENWICH VILLAGE

Fiona, Bob, Kiki and I went out for dinner on my second last night here. We went to Japonica all the way over the other side of the street from their apartment. It's Kiki's favorite. When I asked her where she wanted to go to eat the answer was Japonica! No big surprise.

I can't believe that I have to leave New York and will be home in less than a week!

NEW YORK - EAST VILLAGE

This was my last weekend in New York :(.
This trip :).
So Friday arvo it was time to line up at the half price ticket booth one more time and I bagged us some tickets to see "A Little Night Music" which neither Jaime or I have seen before. Even though they were 40% off they were the dearest ones yet. The show had Angela Lansbury (who was fantastic) and Katherine Zeta-Jones (who was great but not really a singer) and was so much funnier than I thought it was going to be.
Jaime only just made it in time (she literally walked into the foyer right at 8pm) and at interval ate the cold cheeseburger I had picked up for her a few hours earlier when we thought she would have time before the show to eat it.
I think it's put her off hamburgers for awhile.
After the show we headed off to Slattery's pub and I met her Irish man Paul and some off his friends (see the photo to check him out).
Saturday morning I was helping Lili out with more de-cluttering and Jaime headed back to Rye for the day. I don't know if it was lack of sleep or what (getting to bed somewhere between 2am and 3am, the other girl in my apartment having a shower at about 3.30am - my bedhead and the shower share a wall - someone texting Jaime at 5.45am from England plus a teeny bit of snoring from Jaime, I'm a light sleeper so you can imagine that all this drove me crazy) but Saturday morning was the start of a few weird days for me. Everything seemed to go wrong and I did stupid stuff I rarely do.
Firstly I left a little bit late (well alright that IS something I do do) but then I got off the bus one stop early which meant I had to walk a block which then meant I had to wait for the next train and consequently got to Lili's 15 minutes late. The day before I had got there early enough that I had time to get a coffee beforehand.
Then my computer got a virus or spyware or something. We had booked tickets to go to the movies Saturday night with Fiona to see "Alice In Wonderland" but there were storms here that day and a tree fell on Jaime's house and she was running late getting back to the city and I was worried about someone hacking into my computer and getting my passwords and taking my money or my identity......................
So I met Fiona at the cinema, we changed our tickets for a later show, texted Jaime to meet at Fiona's and then I spent ages checking my accounts and changing all my passwords. Do you know what a pain that is? Firstly you have to remember everything you have a password for, then figure out how to change it and then come up with new passwords. Well it's not really that hard but it's a pain and then you have this change over period where every time you log into something you end up putting in the old password because you've used it for so long and it's like "Shit!!!!!!" Until you remember the new one. Which can be tricky because every bank or user group etc has different criteria for their passwords. Must have one capital, must have three digits, can only be six characters long, blah, blah, blah. Not to mention those websites that rate the strength of your password which for me usually starts off as weak so I keep adding letters and symbols and numbers until it gets to strong and then I have this impossibly complicated password to try and remember!
I am sure there were a few other things on Saturday (like being really clumsy) but they were the main ones.
So I figured that on Sunday I would wake up with a clean slate and be back to my normal organised, unforgetful (generally) self.
Uh. No.
I had asked Jaime to text me if she wasn't coming back to my place so that I knew she was okay. About 6.30am she texted to say she was fine but not coming back and to remind me to put my clock forward an hour for daylight savings time. Which I did straight away. I had my alarm set for 11am, got up and called Fiona to wake her up so she wouldn't miss yoga and she said "why are you calling so early it's only 9 o'clock."
I told her it was 11.......daylight savings and all that. l got ready, headed on out to yoga and it was only once I got out of the lift that I realised that I had gone to the wrong place. The one we use as a fallback position if the teacher we like at out favorite place isn't working. What an idiot.
So I walked down to the right one still with plenty of time for the 12.30 class and when I got there their clock said 11.20, it was kind of quiet and there was no sign of Fiona. Not that that means anything - 'on time' is definitely not her middle name. I felt like a bit of a fool but I asked the guy at the desk if the clock on the wall was right. He tells me yes. So I leave and call Fiona on both her phones but there was no answer. I went back in and asked the guy if he'd seen her. Nope. So I walked to her apartment and there she was sitting on the couch. I had completely stuffed up my time not to mention going to the wrong place. For the first time ever I think my phone changed to daylight savings itself and then I moved it forward another hour - it's the only explanation I can think of.
I have spent way too much time with Fiona - I'm turning into her.
She of course thinks it's hilarious.
She also thinks Mercury must be in retrograde. I have no idea what that is but when it happens lots of stuff can go wrong. She looked up a website called "Is Mercury in retrograde?"
In bold it says - NO.
There goes that theory down the toilet.
Fine, I thought. It's just a blip.
Or maybe I could blame it on hormones?
Monday is going to be perfect.
Monday. I tripped over my phone cord twice while it was charging and dropped it on the floor and some weird messages came up.
Turned it off. Turned it on. Looked fine. Phew.
Not a great start but the day was looking good until I was trying to get back from Brooklyn in time to babysit for Bob and Fiona that night. I jumped on the wrong train. Well it was actually the right train, it was just going in the wrong direction. I looked at my watch thinking I was never going to make it. Got off at the next stop, changed platforms, looked at my watch and the time was the same.
My watch had stopped.
WHAT IS GOING ON???????
Seriously this was the weirdest three days of being all over the place and all out of sorts that I can remember. I told Fiona that if this is what she feels like all the time then I would go crazy being her. She just shrugged her shoulders and said "Ah well," with a big grin on her face.
She embraces it. Which is probably the wisest thing to do.
I would tear my hair out.
But I am happy to report that by Tuesday I was back on track - thank goodness.
It wasn't Mercury and it could have been hormones.
Maybe it's just time for me to go home for awhile.

NEW YORK - BROOKLYN

I have been helping out a client of Bob's who is preparing to move into a new house in Brooklyn. After I got off the subway on my way there, I saw this walking to their apartment.

How cute is that?

Very, is the correct answer.