Home again!
It’s kind of pants being back in NI – my trip to America was such a great one, but hey I’ll get used to it. It took ages for my house to get heated up but at least it’s not -15° C outside! The rest of my trip was pretty relaxed – I got a lot of opportunities to simply hang out with John & Abbey’s friends & family, read books etc which was really great. Explored a nearby town called Holland – a quaint wee place with some nice shops (I know, I’ve really been excelling myself by crossing the threshold of a number of retail establishments!). Went to one particular coffee shop where when John & I asked for tea, the girl pointed at about 30 containers of various loose leaf teas and asked, ‘which one?’ I was rather proud that on all 3 occasions when I got the chance to drive, I didn’t get lost and didn’t get stuck in the snow – major improvement from this time last year. Oh and I got a look round Zondervan, the Christian book publisher (it’s based in Grand Rapids), as we called in on the off-chance to get a look around which was really interesting.

My trip home was a bit of a long one – took me a full 24 hours to get door-to-door! There was a major snowfall the night before I left, so my train from Holland-Chicago was delayed by 40 minutes and took 4 hours to cover the distance (usually it’s just over 3 hours). Actually I was really impressed with the Amtrak staff – they were really patient, polite and helpful despite the unbelievably stupid questions from other passengers (the ticket guy’s mother was born in Co Leitrim, so hey we bonded immediately!!) My flight from Chicago was supposed to leave at 6pm but we didn’t get up in the air until 9pm. There was a really random Hispanic guy on the flight whom I happened to get talking to in the departure lounge. He had a very strange obsession with German tanks and has nicknamed his 2 cars Little Car and German Heavy Tank. Mmmm…Anyway I was desperately hoping I’d get a row to myself on the plane so I could stretch out, but it wasn’t to be. The guy I was sitting next to on the plane was from Chicago and was flying to Ireland to buy a home to retire to! I’m not the kind of person that can sleep upright so I didn’t get any until I got on the bus from Dublin to Belfast (it’s disconcerting but I seem to recall that my sleep was so disoriented on the bus that I kind of did those kind of involuntary grunts you have when you’re having bizarre dreams…random). Anyway, a great trip, when’s the next one?!

Rave Review
Read a great book whilst at John & Abbey's called Blue Like Jazz - go get it, it is an excellent read. It is very accurately subtitled ‘Non-religious thoughts on Christian spirituality’ in which the author, Donald Miller, takes a really fresh and radical approach to matters of faith. Not everyone may necessarily agree with him but I think he’s got a lot sussed and his frank conversational style – you could almost be sitting across a table chatting over a coffee with him – makes it really accessible especially for those not interested in glib statements of faith, but at the same time it’s challenging and hits the spot.