A Magical Kingdom, A Painful Delay & The Jet Lag From Hell. Welcome Home!

Last Thursday was our last full day in Florida and we were attempting something quite challenging.

3 Disney Theme parks in one day.

We started at Disney Hollywood Studios. It has a 50’s style theme which I LOVED. I do love a bit of the old style of things if one.

We went on the star wars rides as the husband and boys are big fans, they were good but one had a little drop which put me off going on the Tower of Terror and its 130ft drop. No Thank You.

At 2:30 pm the queues were quite long and we wanted to get to the next park, Epcot. We boarded the cable cars which took us over some of the Disney resort hotels.

I had no idea about any of these parks. Epcot has lots of little areas for places all around the world, Japan, Morocco, Italy, India, China, France, Germany and of course the UK, where the husband and I popped into the very authentic rose & crown pub for a pint and a Pimms.

There weren’t so many rides there but we did go on a mission to Mars which was pretty impressive. We sat in a makeshift rocket which had some pretty strong g-force.

That made me feel a bit queasy so I have the Test track a miss when they went on. They have just opened a new Guardians of the Galaxy ride but according to the app, you had to be there at 7 am to join the virtual queue.

The husband went up to ask one of the guys that were working on the ride if there was any way we could get on and he very kindly let us on. What a guy! The ride was pretty good. Sadly he was gone when we left the ride so we couldn’t thank him properly!

We left Epcot by Monorail to go to the Magical Kingdom in time for the Disney Enchantment Spectacular, which was exactly that. I admit, I rolled my eyes at other people beforehand about videoing and not watching it in real life, but I did in fact video it for my little niece but I watched it in real life, not through my phone.

All too exhausted to go on any more rides and our feet throbbing, we got the ferry back to the transportation centre to get an uber.

Friday morning I woke up to the husband saying “oh no” my heart went in my mouth.

“What?” Fearing our flight had been cancelled and my poor Toby would be without me for even longer. The husband didn’t reply so I asked again more forcefully.

“The flights are delayed”

My heart still where it shouldn’t be I ask

“How long?”

"2 hours"

Oh, the relief. That’s nothing.

I get up and shower and finish packing the rest of my stuff, leaving the husband to deal with packing his and the rest of the boy's stuff and went to sit downstairs in the lobby. The husband always leaves stuff until the last minute and I get stressed knowing we are supposed to be out of the room so I have learned over the years it’s easier to remove myself from these situations.

The coach arrives on time, we are the last pick up and go straight to the airport with no issues. The board at the airport says all is in time. Hurrah.

No. No hurrah. No hurrah at all.

My time at Melbourne airport will go down as some of my worst for many reasons, but the flight is delayed by not 2 but almost 5 is the one I will share here.

We got chatting to a woman and her husband sitting next to us at the bar and quite frankly they saved my sanity. Leanne, Eamon (I think) and especially Amelia who was the loveliest sassiest 9-year-old ever, from New Cross I hope you all got home ok, you made my airport delay 1000% better!

I would also like to give a massive shout out to the lady at Melbourne airport who worked later on the bar, she worked this bar, along with a few hundred delayed British passengers and in my mind that deserves a special mention.

We finally boarded the plane at about 10 pm, we were supposed to take off at 5:20 pm. I got to my seat and of course, someone was sitting in it.

The woman who was sitting with her 2 children called out to her husband sat alone 2 rows in front asking what their seats were, apologised saying she assumed they would seat families together.

Her husband and one child were seated together across the aisle just like I was seated with my family across the other aisle. Now correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the seat numbers on the boarding pass? And aren’t we all asked as we step on the plane what our seat numbers are so we can be directed to our correct seats?

The husband had gone online and chosen the seats specifically so we could all sit together as well. To be honest, had she been a lone parent I would have sat elsewhere but there didn’t appear to be any spare seats as it was. I sat down to find that my water, blanket and pillow had been taken too.

Just get me home to my Toby. That’s all I want right now.

I tried to sleep with my sleep mask on but I couldn’t, as exhausted as I was. The stress of the entire afternoon ran through my veins like poison. Why am I the way I am? Why can’t I just let certain things wash over me and wash away? How do people do this? Can you train yourself to be laid back?

I remembered that I had downloaded the latest 2 episodes of real housewives of Beverly Hills. Only Lisa, Kyle, Erika & Dorit could save me now! And they did indeed help but of course my luck being as it is, only one bloody episode downloaded.

We finally land at Gatwick 6 hours later than planned, I wanted to kiss the ground. Little did I know, that the journey from hell was not quite over.

Our bags came out quickly and our taxi was waiting for us in the car park. We hopped in, the heat was blazing, and the constant air con we had in the US was a distant memory. We got on the M23. Traffic. FFS!! We sat in the back of the car in the sweltering heat, the back seat didn’t have windows either.

We get to the turn-off for the M25 and the junction was closed so we had to go the wrong way around the M25 to get off at the first junction to turn ourselves around. We were supposed to land at 6:20 am, I imagined we would be home by 8:30 am.

No.

By the time we picked Toby up, we finally got home at 3 pm. I was so relieved at this point I could have cried I cuddled Toby as much as he would allow me to and the husband and I ordered an Indian takeaway and put a film on.

We lasted until about 8:30 we both kept nodding off so we took ourselves to bed where we slept until just after midnight. We put the film back on and are back and we were snoozing again two hours later.

Toby was in and out of the bed all night for cuddles and eventually at 9:30 am, I get out of bed and empty my suitcase of dirty laundry and start catching up on some of the TV programs I recorded whilst I was away.

I manage to have a productive day, unpacking the shopping delivery, washing and planning my week.

I don’t cook a roast dinner as planned as it’s far too hot to have the oven on for 2 hours, so we settle for pizzas that I’d ordered with the shopping. I take myself off to bed at 10:30 happy that I have managed to get myself back into my routine.

It was not to be.

Although I managed to happily dose off at 11 pm, the husband woke me when he decides to unpack some of his things in another room at an ungodly hour. I continue to toss and turn before eventually giving up at 4 am and coming downstairs.

I was so frustrated and angry, probably because I was so bloody tired!! I try meditating, watching TV, drinking water, and drinking tea but I am just too annoyed to sleep. Eventually at around 9:30 am, I give up the dream of getting back into a routine today, looking after my body is more important than getting to my laptop at 10 am. So I take myself back to bed for a few hours, hoping for a more productive day tomorrow.

On Tuesday I wake up refreshed after a restful 7 hours of sleep, I do a 25-minute yoga session, clean the kitchen, shower, meditate, read set my goals for the day and make a healthy smoothie.

At 10 am when I am supposed to be going upstairs to write, I feel like I have used up all the energy I had for the day. It’s just not there. I tell myself I’ll allow myself a couple of hours rest but that ends up extending through most of the day, I only stop to write a blog post on my iPad and cook dinner.

When I wake up on Wednesday, I’m not feeling great and despite not having done much the last few days. I know I'm not quite ready to go full throttle back into normal life. Whilst I’ve done nothing physical, my mind is exhausted. I’m going to remove a lot from the to-do list today.

Rather than throw myself into writing, I make some notes in Evernote of some ideas. I am going to have another day off today, my mind judging me on the word “another”

On holiday I added a lot of things to my reading list on chrome which I have been trying and failing to get through so I take some time to go through this. I stop halfway to take myself into the garden with Toby, deciding that a bit of fresh air will help.

Whilst out there, I get a message from my mum asking me a question about where someone used to live. Fantastic a distraction, rather than say I can’t remember, I use this opportunity to take myself off onto Google Earth, and within 15 minutes I’ve found it.

Then I am down a rabbit hole finding out a few other things about the previous owners, things my mum did not ask for. I tell myself it's just me keeping on top of my research skills. There isn’t much I can’t find on the internet y’know.

After the unrequested research, I get back my reading list and I am suddenly met with some things that make me want to kiss the me that saved them a week ago - more inspiration!

I also signed up for a webinar with Writers Launch a few days ago on how to get your first paid publication. It was on at 6 pm this evening and I was debating whether to join. I didn’t want to go on zoom with a bunch of strangers! Then I got a reminder email from them that included a YouTube link, so I had no more excuses. I gave it a go and it was so so helpful! and I have now signed up for a free month with them.

I go to bed positive & hopeful ❤️