Sibylle and I leave on our return flight to America in just a few hours.  I’m suffering from a bout of insomnia, brought on by some poorly timed calls to my cell phone number, so the fact that I’m awake less than 3 hours before starting a marathon day of travel and writing about that day’s impending jet lag, is ironic.

Our flight leaves Germany at 11:00 am local time.  Needing an hour (52 minutes) to travel via S-Bahn from Winnenden to the Stuttgart airport, and another two hours for flight check in and security, plus time for showers, breakfast, travel to the train station, and some cousion time, we are getting up at 5:15 am local time.

The trans-Atlantic flight is just over 10 hours to Atlanta, then we’ve got 3 or so hours on the ground to clear customs, and find our Kansas City departure gate.  The last flight is about 2.5 hours.  Throw in some time for getting our checked bag, and catching a bus to long-term parking, and we’re at our car about hour 22 of travel.  45 minutes to drive home, and we will be at just under 23 total hours duration.

It’ll be 9:00 pm in Kansas City, but 4:00 am for our bodies.  This is better than last year, where our travel duration was closer to 30 hours than to 20.  Still it is going to be a long day.