Back again!

Wow - the last post was Salzburg.  Amazing how much has happened since then and how much I have to be thankful.

First a recap of the last few months and then back to the trips blog that everyone knows and loves.  I kid, I'm sure my mom is the only one who loves it.

So in September, the family found out my dad was quite ill with a very rare heart condition for which the prognosis was not good.  We kept it very hush hush until the day I flew back home for the surgery. Long story short, I stopped booking trips and only did them last minute if I thought it was ok and mostly to London.  So you still had some blog posts pre-Christmas, but they were all fairly short and easy to get back to Houston should I need to. 

I went home for Christmas, which was tough because there was still a lot of uncertainty.  I wasn't sure if I was going back, what the right thing to do was and most importantly, how I was going to emotionally deal with being an ocean away whilst we didn't know what was going to happen.  When we finally had some clarity, I headed back with a date on the calendar to come home in February for the surgery.  Honestly, busy season was a curse and a blessing this year.  On one hand, I was able to completely immerse myself in work and friends here.  There are several people I honestly couldn't live without....particularly as the days got closer and my mental capacity dropped, I've never felt more supported or cared for, both with emails from Houston friends and dinners with absolutely the best colleagues.  The curse was I missed 2 weeks of busy season and one does not recover from that.  I worked my tail off before and when I got back to get ahead and catch up.  

So I flew home on the last day of January.  I was off the clock for 2 full weeks and everyone in the NL and the UK made sure it stayed that way.  Everything went so well for my dad that ptl, he's home and recovering and can fully expect me to bug him about visiting sooner rather than later.  

I also got the chance to catch up with the my previous team in Houston, which was great (glad they were willing to come to rice village for my car-less self!)!  And I had quality time with S and T (sorry for falling asleep at 8!)

So....on to more travels and adventures!

So far this year, I've taken a work trip to London (nothing exciting), London and Newcastle (very exciting), and I'm writing this waiting on a plane back to amsterdam from Kuala Lumpur.  Not jinxing it by giving away the airline, but suffice it to say, it was once a very safe airline and now that is definitely in question.  Next post on Newcastle!