I am a week behind on this post, but not without good reason. Will explain all of that at the end.

We left Paris on Friday, October 24, 2025. We had a 2 PM flight to Philadelphia with an overnight stay there before continuing home the following day.

We stayed at an airport hotel, dropped our bags, and took a Lyft into town. It was about 6 PM at this point so none of the touristy things were open, which was fine. So we just took advantage of photo opportunities with independence Hall above, the Liberty Bell below, and the beautiful City Hall building below that.

We decided that a Philly cheesesteak was in order for dinner, so we took another ride to Geno’a in South Philly, about a mile and a half from where we were. 

Sherry, Mark, and I all got variations of a steak sandwich. We thought it was OK, but it was dryer than we expected. Ash went across the street to another place to get a chicken version and his sandwich was more like what we were anticipating: very cheesy and pretty wet. All still very good.

The next morning, we took a 6:30!shuttle from the hotel to the airport. We got through security easily and stopped at a Chase Sapphire lounge for breakfast. These are springing up all over the country and we have their credit card to get us in. So far our experience with them has been really good. They are on par with airline flagship lounges.

We went from Philly to Phoenix, with lunch at another Chase Sapphire lounge there before taking our final leg to Sacramento.

Those of you who have been following me for awhile know that I always close with some final thoughts about the overall trip so here we go:

1. Ash had spent a total of six weeks in Europe on this trip. He had a total of 17 different people traveling with him throughout his journey. He loves spending significant time in one place when he travels, but he does not care to travel alone. So he arranges for a wide variety of friends to come and go throughout his stay. This was his third full month in Paris over the years. So if you ever want to spend some time in Paris with someone who knows it pretty well, reach out to him. He’s likely going back at some point and will likely have room for you.
2. In May, we have an annual recommitment ritual that we referred to as handfasting. Part of the tradition for us is talking about our favorite parts of the prior year and what we’re looking forward to about the coming year. Each of us had the same answer to what we were looking forward to most: this particular week in Paris with friends that we consider family. In particular, family members who had never been to Paris before. It is a joy to return to a place with someone that’s never been there before because you get to experience it all over again through fresh eyes. And on that front, this trip far exceeded expectations. One teeny example: seeing Mark brought to tears over the beauty and grandeur of the Louvre while standing in that courtyard is a moment I will never forget. There were many, many moments like this with all of them. 
3. Unlike Ash, I do enjoy being alone, including traveling alone, and had a good month of wonderful alone time before I joined him on this trip. So I had some trepidation about going from that to an apartment with 3 other people that we would be with 24/7 for a week. Not to mention others that came in from other parts of the world to join us for some of it, although they did not stay with us.  But the truth is, all of it was a completely incredible experience of family, fun, special places, and special moments with special people. I could not be happier with the way it all came together. Ash and I commented at least once a day how blessed we are to have such wonderful people in our lives who want to spend time with us in these special and meaningful ways. 
4. And then there’s Paris. There is a reason that it is the number one travel destination on the planet. If you have never been, we highly recommend it. And are happy to help you plan your stay. And that’s all I’m going to say about that.

So why did it take me a week to get back to this? I could easily make this a very long story but I’m gonna try not to.

I don’t remember if I mentioned this earlier in the blog, but Ash and I are in the process of moving. Our home has been on the market for a month and has been staged to enhance the look of the house from the perspective of a potential buyer. The staging was completed after Ash and in particular Zeus had already left. The plan was that we were going to move a few days after we got home, so we made arrangements for Zeus to stay with a friend who could not take him until Sunday.

So for Saturday night, we stayed at the Sheraton Grand in downtown Sacramento. It is a Marriott property and they gave us a free upgrade to a lovely suite.

It was about 6:30 Saturday evening when I realized that my laptop was missing. That set off a panicked adrenaline rush that honestly I still haven’t gotten past. I can still feel that in my body a little bit. What we believe happened is I had to take it out of my backpack at security in Paris. Ash needed help with Zeus at that moment and I must’ve been distracted and neglected to put it back in the bag. We had checked with the Airbnb host and it was not there.

On top of that, the new iPhone that I had hoped I would have for the trip because of the improved camera came in while I was gone. For reasons that were shortsighted in hindsight, I chose to get my new phone on Monday, forgetting that I was going to need passwords again for many things which of course were on my laptop.

But by Wednesday night, my phone was up and running perfectly, and my new laptop was up and running perfectly. All of the backup systems worked, and I didn’t lose a thing.

And then on Thursday, we closed on our new house. We have since pushed our move date back a couple of weeks because we decided to do some remodeling before we move in, primarily painting and new floors. So I anticipate there will be a before and after blog at some point in the future.

In the meantime, we brought Zeus home yesterday and we will spend the next couple of weeks finishing up the packing here while getting the new house ready.

All in time for our trip to New York the week of Thanksgiving, although I will likely not blog that trip since it is primarily a theater excursion. And we close out the year with an Amazon river cruise by National Geographic in December. You won’t want to miss that one. It’s gonna be incredible. And I’m very happy that I got my new camera for that trip.