September 16

Headed home! 

On the train as I write this. Driving to the train station was fairly uneventful except the normal trying to find gas, stations that won't take credit cards and David having challenges adapting to a keyless car with a lot of funky glitches. We did get to the train station and returning the car was stressful once again. France does not make the pick up and return of rental cars easy. Trying to find out where to take the car is hard and then when you get there, you find impossible parking and driving in places that don't feel right. But David got the car parked as only he can do and we found the office. The different location was a complete non event which made me sorry I had wasted hours of my life on it. 

Got to the train station and found our train, not without difficulty. The carriage number was hard to figure out and we had to get help. But we are on here now and hoping finding a taxi to get us to Orly airport will not be too difficult. 

The rest of the day:

We found a taxi driver at the Paris train station who was a true Jedi. This woman was afraid of nothing and got us to the airport in crazy traffic without a problem. She was fearless. We had to stand in long lines to get a boarding pass for Georgia since the system didn't give her one. But we made it to the plane on time. Bought some sandwiches and Poke bowls in the airport. The sandwiches were good but the Poke bowls were spoiled. By the time we realized, it was too late to return them. 

The plane ride was pretty uneventful for me. Went quickly and I slept quite a bit. David had a hard time and entered into an altercation with the woman in front of him who insisted on reclining her seat the full way. Terribly uncomfortable for the person sitting behind. I calmed him down finally. 

Got to SFO and then had some challenges finding the place where Uber could pick us up but we did navigate it and found our ride. $87 later, we were finally home and so happy to be there. It took us about 22 hours to get from Aix to Alameda. 

David has continued to fall into a lower energy state with each passing day although he has done remarkably well with difficult situations and long days of driving. He is complaining about everything which isn't normal for him and always indicates a low energy state. I'm pretty worried about him and hoping rest will help avoid a serious depression. This was bound to happen on the tail end of a mania that went on for a couple of months prior to our departure.