"Onion rings in the car cushions do not improve with age." - Erma Bombeck

I'm writing this Thursday evening, which is Thursday morning at home where my body is. My sleep and eat cycles are a total mess.

Talk about sensory overload! So much new, and often strange input that my travel-addled brain can't hardly handle it. In no order whatsoever (I'm incapable of it now anyway):

• International flights are much nicer than domestic flights. They take better care of you and offer more amenities. Every seat back has a screen, and in some cases it's a cool touch screen. The food is free and pretty decent. The booze is free (I didn't have any). I think there's even an inch or two more between rows. 
• Just because the flight is nicer doesn't mean the passengers are. In my case that meant a guy in front of me who put his seat back as far into the recline position as it would go as soon as he was allowed to do that. It stayed that way for all 10.5 hours of the flight, whether he was awake or asleep.
• Delta's in-flight programming includes episodes of the British version of Top Gear. Score!
• The Amsterdam airport is pretty nice. Maybe someday I'll do more than walk from Terminal A to Terminal D as fast as I can so as not to miss my connection. 
• Swahili has no word for integrity. My host Cory told me that by way of explaining the values and mores of the culture here. 
• You know how if two lines - people or cars - are merging people automatically take turns? Let the person from the right go ahead and the person behind them will then let you go. OK, every once in awhile you get a jerk who dives in, but mostly people alternate. Not here. Let that mom struggling with three heavy suitcases go first and the people behind her take that as a sign of weakness on your part and will push up so tightly behind her that you're left elbowed out. This leaves you in the dilemma of either being an insensitive boor or angering all the people in line behind you now angry at the stupid and weak wazungu who has doomed them to no forward movement.
• Tanzania  is one of those countries where they drive on the other side of the street and the steering wheel is on the other side of the car. So you feel pretty silly when you get in the front seat as a passenger and find yourself behind the wheel.
• And after you're seated on the other side of the car and going down the road you have to remind yourself there's no need to panic. That car up ahead is not coming directly at you, and left turns aren't going to kill you. 
• I think I saw the Big Dipper tonight. Did I? Should that be visible in the southern hemisphere? 
• It's going to take more than 24 hours to recover from the travel, the jet lag, and the disruption to my eating schedule. I could feel that tonight as I led a group of missionaries in a Bible study (the mental part) and on the way home (the eating part). 
• Tomorrow I lead the first three sessions on spiritual growth, with the other three to follow on Saturday. We'll leave the house at 8:45 a.m. and get home about 5 p.m. So my recovery needs to start now. G'night.