And the evening and the morning were the second day...

We made it! We survived not only our trip back to the land of the free and the home of the brave, but also the world's longest Saturday.

We left the house there in Fuchu, Tokyo at noon on Saturday. We walked, caught a bus, took a train, caught another bus, then boarded a plane at 7pm, on Saturday. So we flew for 10-12 hours to Los Angeles, arriving at noon (get this) on Saturday.
Wait... This was an episode of Scooby Doo! 

Pastor Mike Ashcraft and his wife picked us up and took us to In-N-Out Burger (yes, out of all of the possibilities, that's what we picked. Funny what you miss...). They showed us around Santa Monica, we went by their house a couple of times, had some excellent coffee, we saw their school, they took us to Santa Monica pier (leave to to a missionary to know how to really show missionaries a great time!), ALL this, and it's still Saturday...

So they drop us off at LAX and we make it to our gate with time to spare. Tick tock, time to board, but there's a delay. They're short one airline attendant. One hour later we finally get on the plane. It’s 8pm and it's still Saturday...

To make a long story even longer, we wrest our belongings from the baggage carousel in Albuquerque, call the shuttle bus, check in at the Sheraton (14th floor, very nice. Thanks, Pastor Ray!) order a pizza from Dominos (yes, that's what we really wanted), get the pizza "in 30 minutes or less", and just as we pop the cork on a vintage bottle of Coke Zero, we glance at the clock - it's 11:59, and it's still Saturday...

By my calculations, with Saturday starting at 12am in Tokyo and ending at 11:59:59 in Albuquerque, we lived, out of sync with the rest of the world, a Saturday that lasted, for us... 42 HOURS!!!

On that note, thanks to all of you who kept us in prayer the whole time. Great trip! Looking forward to all God's going to do between now and our returning... (wait for it) .....BACK TO THE FUTURE!

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