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And I’ve never felt more exhausted after more than 24 hours travelling back to Bangkok being either in the taxi, on the plane or waiting in transit. I could hardly keep my eyes open since I landed even though I managed a continuous 6-7 hours of sleep on the plane.

I’ve been a complete wreck since I came home. For 2 days, I blended in with the furniture, dozing off on the couch in deep sleep the moment I lay my head down to rest.I don’t think I even hear the kids screaming.

I feel like a zombie; nodding off while waiting for Spud to finish her swimming lesson and her taekwondo class. I have been napping almost throughout the day over the weekend and I STILL sleep at night. It’s a miracle that I could drag my ass off to work on Monday morning, eyes all puffy and feeling sleepy like hell.  I didn’t even hear the raging thunderstorm that night.

I blame it on the terrible flight times I have had going to and coming back from Lisbon in a span of 4+ short days. Coming back was worse: My flight from Lisbon was at 5 a.m. which meant that I had to leave the hotel early. Early enough that the butler at the hotel was asking me where did I think I was going at an ungodly hour of 2.30 a.m! I wish I could tell him I was going to some fabulous party.

Add that to 9 hours of transit time in Amsterdam and a delay of half an hour prior to my flight back to Bangkok, a terrible jet-lag ensued. But this jet-lag feels a little different – it’s not that I can’t sleep; I just can’t seem to get enough of it!

I wish I had more time to explore Lisbon, though. We went to the city center *really* briefly. Apart from its steep, cobbled-stoned sidewalks and quaint architecture, it was hard to get any impression of the city at all with only 2 days of being there.

Food-wise, I have been a little disappointed as I thought that they were a little too ordinary; so really nothing to share there. Maybe we had not gone to the right places. Taxi-wise, I had been a little terrified at how they drive those machines in Lisbon! They drove crazy fast and I was so very glad to get out the cabs when we got to our destination.

My long lay-over in Amsterdam gave me the chance to get out of the airport and I didn’t think I’d  back in the area so soon! I guess there could be worse places to be in.

Guess what I did with so much waiting time on my hands?

I arranged a meet-up with my Mom-in-Law, of course! She was game enough to make the trip to Amsterdam to spend the day with me and it had been a fun meet-up. Funnily enough, when I told my new-found friends at the conference during one of our casual chat sessions about meeting my MIL whilst in Amsterdam, I was being laughed at.

And that was right after they laughed at me for my crazy impending 2.30 a.m departure from the hotel. They must have thought that it was a crazy thing to want to subject myself to. MIL of all people? Must be madness! But really, MIL and me get along just fine. Really!

The day was glorious. In fact, I thought it was a little hot at 30 degrees celsius! At least it wasn’t humid and this is when you’ll see the Dutch sitting in a row at cafes, facing the sun. It’s a national hobby!

It was a day of catching up, chatting, drinking coffee, having lunch, a little bit of window shopping and some walking. By the time Mom-In-Law saw me off to my train bound for Schipol Airport, my feet was already throbbing. It got worse when I did a lot more walking at the airport going from end to end, and back and forth,  just to find the directions to the lounge before my flight. (The airport was under renovation and a mess…getting lost was too easy!)

All in all,  I don’t remember much of Lisbon. It was literally zoom-in, zoom-out type of travel.  I did, however,  discover that amongst all the work conferences I have gone to, this was one of the most well-run and well-planned conferences I have ever attended.

It was impressive, inspiring and I made a few new friends along the way. And that is always good!

My turn to come up with a theme for this month’s Mystery Munchies with Gen! If you have read my previous post, you’d know that we have decided to team up with Appetizers in Dough as the central theme.

Gen has,once again earned herself as the Awesome Experimenteur in my books. She has, effortlessly came up with not just one, but three simple appetizers that left me salivating just by looking at them when I was about to get on the plane last evening:

She made them using phyllo pastry and, in her words, they didn’t last long!  The first one is fried mixed mushrooms and garlic with mozzarella. She had used white button mushrooms but added portabellini mushrooms to add some extra flavour. She used fresh garlic cloves and fried up the lot, added mozzarella and baked for 15 minutes.

The second one is blue cheese and honey at her Husband’s suggestion, and the is salami and cream cheese foldovers with Italian parsley. Headover to her blog here on her take of these appetizers and get step-by-step instructions on how to do them from the Goddess of Experimenteur herself.

Like Gen, I’m not a fan of blue cheese and I find blue cheeses a little too funky for my taste. But that fold-over really looks so damn good, and maybe, just maybe, I may change my mind. Tough, but maybe. Silver Bullet, I suspect , might just like it. He has a thing for cheeses with the most awful smell. In his words: The smellier, the better. (yuck!)

Thank you, Gen for taking up the challenge and sharing your wonderful creation. They all look so fuss-free and easy enough to attempt! One theme, across 2 continents and 4 different types of eats. How fabulous is that!

I seriously can’t bloody wait for next month’s theme. Over to you, Gen! 😀