Blogs are completely self serving and self indulgent. I know that, you know that. I have, you see, substituted my blog indulgence for a variety of delicious exotic indulgences during my time away. I ate lots of baklava, had lots of coffee and frilly caffeinated drinks at cafes with plushy couchey seating outdoors, I drowned myself in, yes, debt-laden Aegean sunlight, I was endlessly occupied with delightful conversation and smoke-friendly establishments, I was awoken in the morning by little Greek angel-children whispering “Irene… are you sleeping? Wake up!!” in little gilded child-voices which is similar to waking up to cupcakes and fairy dust.

I have come back to the land of workaholics and to you, my devoted FANS (friends).

On the way to the airport as I was leaving Greece, my cousin’s husband (driver) missed the exit and I figured he would keep going and just get off at the nearest exit. Judging by the amount of time he continued driving for, I assumed he would resort to the same, when suddenly he stops and says “maybe I should just reverse”. I laughed, naturally, because that’s ridiculous and what else are you supposed to do when you’re sure someone just made a joke?

He did. He reversed all the way back to the exit. For a solid three minutes, I counted. THREE minutes of reverse time is like three hours of normal life time!! Right? What? And then I thought, obviously, this would never happen in the US. Regardless of the hawk-like stalking nature of the “establishment”, Big Brother and the ubiquity of Government know all … it doesn’t even matter if no one was there to see you reverse down a broad highway.

God would be watching. And we all know how intimate a relationship God and the United States government have.

So there you have it, an anecdote from my most recent trip and now a picture collage of the intimate relationship between Greece and her very own divine: