The Honeymoon is OVER

In one of the myriad classes I took in preparation for this overseas assignment they talked about how people go through phases in their first overseas experiences.  The first phase is the Honeymoon phase, where everything is new, exciting, fresh, and otherwise amazing.  From a blogging perspective that translated into a lot of posts.  We are waaaaaaaaaaaaaay past that phase.

I'm pretty sure we have also passed through the second phase, the so-called Negotiation phase.  This is where one begins to reconcile the differences of their last place and their new home, and might even miss some things from home.  I must admit that the holidays were a bit like that for us, as I missed some things--mostly NOT sweating my brains out on Christmas--although it was really cool to go swimming outside on Christmas and New Years Days.

We are now fully into the third phase, the Everything is OK phase.  This is where we have accepted life here, the stuff that seemed abnormal is now normal, and we are just living life.  Mali has her regular routines and I'm into a groove at work and our lives are now fairly mundane.  Boring, even.

So does this somehow justify my lethargic blog posting record of late?  Is this a viable excuse for why I'm not putting into pixels the various things going on in our lives?  Probably not, but I did my best to justify it.

I already missed the opportunity to make a New Year's resolution to blog more regularly.  Ditto for Chinese New Year (it wrapped up last week, while I was down in southern Thailand checking on the insurgency).  Lao New Year, however, is in April, so perhaps I'll get a jump on it now and make a resolution to blog more.

And of course, whenever possible, I will take the opportunity to make gratuitous references to squat toilets, because that never gets old.  Ever.