Winding Down

It has been a couple of weeks since I last posted. I didn't have much response from our Top 10 Lists, plus we have become super busy at work here.

The last few weeks have been quite up and down. My grandfather passed away the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, but I was unable to go home for the funeral due to costs and my length of stay being so short. Fortunately, my family was very understanding. The funeral was held on Thanksgiving Day and the local church provided my family with a nice Thanksgiving meal. Thanks CUMC. When Jamie and I first began discussing moving to China, we knew that the death of a family member would be tough. We knew that this could potentially happen and we have both lost grandfathers since coming to China. This is certainly the hardest part about being away from home, and we only have each other to comfort us in these times.

Onto other news... I finally have Chapters 1 - 3 sent to the school for approval. I will then just need to apply to the IRB and then I can begin my research coming in January. If all goes well, I should research and write Chapters 4 and 5 next January and February, and hopefully finish up by June. Jamie is on a similar course, but it will depend on the speed of her committee and school as to how long it might take her. We predict no longer than next August.

We have been working hard on our dissertations as well as at work. Jamie is in the swing of things now with her IE classes, and we both are busy planning middle school lock-ins, running the school store, and preparing for the Southern region middle school Model United Nations conference. We are hosting it and preparing it has been quite the busy task. It isn't until April, but we have had to prepare for teams way ahead of time.

We had initially wanted to go home for winter break this year, but the costs of airline tickets are just too much. We are instead, as of now, going to take a tour of southern China (Kunming, Dali, Lijiang) and then head down through Laos (Luang Prabang, Viang Vang, and Vientiane). We'll finally end up in Bangkok on January 4, 2010 and prepare for our Job Fair. We are hoping to land a job at a school that we both like. We have a list of schools that we are willing to interview for positions.

Griffey is doing well. No change there and he still sleeps 22 hours per day it seems. We just bought a new travel laptop that we are excited about. It only has an 8.9" screen and we think it'll be perfect for traveling. Certainly weighs less than what we've been using.

I am finally recovered from my kidney issues, although I did bruise a rib pretty badly playing basketball 2 weeks ago. It is healing nicely though.

We are just hanging on for another couple of weeks until winter break. This first half of the year has flown by, and the 2nd half I'm sure will too. We are looking forward to Jamie's parents coming over for Chinese New Year and we'll be going to Vietnam to tour the southern and central parts (Ho Chi Minh City, Danang, Hoi An, and Hue). Should be a blast for all.

Hope all is well everyone else's way. Feel free to drop a comment on Facebook or our our Blog if you see this. Also be sure to check out our Top 10 lists. As I said, not many people commented on it.

Take care everyone...