Nian and I are back from New York City -- actually back for a week now and as you can see I’ve not been doing a good job of keeping my blog up to date. Nian’s time in the US is growing short which is another reason that I will probably be blogging less frequently as most of my time should be devoted to her and us and less about chronicling what we do.

Two weeks for our relationship in its current form and then a lot of unknowns. Marriage is still the plan, but where and how to live continue to be the big questions. Nian promises to be by my side whether in the US or China, but would (much) prefer China. I feel a certain mild relief that job prospects in China are probably not very good for a non-Chinese speaking software engineer specializing in test automation -- leaving the USA the default choice for us Not that China would be a bad place to live, but I would definitely be a stranger in a strange land. While Nian promises me plenty of good English speaking companions to while away my non-Nian time I doubt I would feel truly at home. Unfair as this is to Nian, she does speak English very well, and here in Champaign, Illinois she even has access to a large Chinese population of U of I goers to speak her native tongue with, not to mention most of her friends back home have good internet connections for live web-cam interchanges. The world is definitely a much smaller place these days.

Assuming Nian takes care of duties in China and returns in 6 to 12 months, I have a lot of work to do in the meantime; highest priority would be making progress on obtaining a Masters degree, given which I would feel less sheepish about leaving a reasonable job behind for other challenges, whether in the US or China.

I promise details about our New York trip sometime soon, but for right now my mind is filled with other concerns.

I did add a new Top Ten to Larry’s Top Tens -- Top Ten Stupidest Things To Do With A Time Machine so feel free to enjoy this small diversion until I get back to a more daily practice of updating Bare Naked Larry.