Colds, Lost Luggage, and General Malaise

I went to Europe for Christmas and spent almost a whole week in bed with the nastiest cold I've ever had. When I finally did get well enough to go out, I alternated between fever and chills so badly that I would soak my clothes with sweat and then literally have them frozen to me when I went outside. I did get to enjoy myself however, good restaurants, good bread, lots of beauty of the type I NEVER see around here in this dismal part of Arkansas. When I finally got ready to leave the airport to go home, one of my huge checked bags was missing. Lovely, huh. Luckily it wasn't the one with my Christmas presents in it, but it still had quite a few valuables. I had to pick it up at the airport in Newark to go through Customs, so I knew it had made it to the U.S. at least. Why you have to pick up your checked bags for about 5 minutes to go through customs is beyond me. Nobody even asked us if we had anything to declare, and since we weren't coming from Brazil or another country with agricultural "cooties" that could have been brought in, it seems to me that we could have skipped the entire ordeal. We caught our connecting flight with barely enough time to spare (although the time before last, I missed it, making the gate just after they had shut the gate door. Talk about awful! Spend the night at the Howard Johnson's Airport hotel in Newark, New Jersey.
So I'm back home and the house if filthy; the cats (or one of them) has thrown up a couple of places. I swear that they do it deliberately (well, if she thinks she can go to Europe and just leave me here, I'll show her!). Anyway, at least they were very glad to see us although our catsitter takes very good care of them and stays around to watch movies on the satellite so the cats can climb on him and he can pet them (I think he does like the movies, too).
We have to get new carpet for most of the downstairs; this stuff is shameful. No matter how much I vacuum or anyone else does, the carpet still looks dirty. But my husband hates to spend money (hey, the carpet is 24 years old!) and he hates the hassle of doing it (although I'm the one who's going to have to do most of the moving and cleaning; he will do none of it). Life's Enigmas Donnachloe