Welcome back!
You don't mention budget, and that certainly is a factor.
Personally, if looking to spend more than the price of the AA's, I'd consider the Philharmonitors the next sweet spot. I think Dennis Murphy has a monopoly on quality sound at reasonable prices! These use the legendary Raal tweeter (generally considered among the very best production tweeters)
The AA'S are a great price on a very good speaker.
Some of this may have started before you left, but as far as what is new...
Instead of throwing together a bunch of pieces to make another entry level speaker, Pioneer tasked their lead speaker designer (generally worked on Pioneer's TAD speakers at up to $60,000!) to design a budget speaker.
http://www.audioholics.com/tower-speaker-reviews/pioneer-sp-pk52fs
These speakers are noteworthy because
their MSRP is so low that I don't believe even DIY can touch them! A true example of volume discounts - Pioneer can get a custom designed curved cabinet for cheap when selling so many and the same is true of the custom drivers. Furthermore, Pioneer based their price on a set profit margin instead of finding out what competitors are charging for comparable sounding speakers.
Enter Dennis Murphy, who designs crossovers for many of Jim Salk's speakers, has been on the DIY scene for awhile, and who started Philharmonic Audio. Dennis realized that while the Pioneers were great speakers for their price, he could swap out the tweeters and fine-tune the crossover to produce a decidedly better speaker at roughly a 50% price increase, resulting in a speaker that is better than anything else near the price. These are the speakers being recommended to you.
One reason I am posting this is because the Pioneers are at BestBuy and you may want to check them out for appearance (decent, but not a "for show" speaker) and sound, knowing the AA's will sound better.
Sony has also entered the fray with their response to the Pioneers, their Core Series speaker which is also sold at BestBuy. These are purported to sound better than the Pioneers, but do not compete with the AA's despite costing more.
It may be a character flaw on my part, but I would be tempted to call Dennis, get a pair of bookshelves on the way, and depending on the lead time, buy a pair of Pioneers or Sonys from BB (while carefully verifying their returns policy). This way you can be up and running (as soon as you get an AVR) and see what things look and sound like in your new room. And someone will have the opportunity to buy a pair of decent speaker at a little discount because you returned them.
