8 months to go... (???)

Boom! Just like that, we've gotten to the point that phrases like 'last stretch' start to sound viable.

We have no real idea what's going to happen past September this year (which is when my contract and visa term ends), which is kinda freaky, but it gives us time to figure things out a bit more. Including whether our current "this isn't too bad actually" state of mind might continue.

At this point in the Taiwan experience I had reached very low levels of awesomeness optimisation, but thought I had enough reserves to get through another year. Really not a good way to think about things, and good that we're not in that place now. I think this version of working overseas is much closer to least non-awesomeness, something I might not have been able to say 6 months ago, but am extremely confident in writing now.

I think having friends visit (thanks J,J, G & W and M!) helped enormously, which seems really counter-intuitive, and I'm still figuring out how that might work! Travel is generally awesome, N's family being here is (mostly) great, a really good BJJ club (for me!) actually has me pretty worried about what my NZ options might be on return. N's new job, although it's quite stressful at the best of times, is still a lot better than the soul destroying stuff of previously.  It's also good that we both have  potential friends and one or two more actual friends... something which takes a fair bit of time for both of us.

It hasn't all been roses, but we have had much more good than bad over here... and I'm incredibly grateful for that.

To help continue what has been a great start to 2014, we're off to Dublin, Iceland (again!), Italy
/France (Cinque Terre and the southern coast of France). I'm still plodding along with my French study, which should make it slightly easier than previously (or maybe not...)

I've entered a BJJ comp (!!!! first since my bicep tear) and due to low numbers in the 35+ crowd have been bunged in with the young 'uns. Should make for fun and games! Competing at 94.3kg and below (a 2kg gi needs to be included in the weight), which is the lightest I've ever competed, and something I'm able to do without much effort... I even vaguely considered 88.6, but that would mean getting down to at least 86kg out of the gi, just after Christmas etc. which would entail much effort. Maybe next time. If there is a next time.

In other news, I wear an L shirt now, and almost fit into an M dress shirt this week. Down from my tent like XXL of mid 2012...

Turning 40 this year and I'm really happy with the lead in so far... so much potential!