I can't believe how long it's been since I last wrote in this diary. No excuses, but it's been a combination of intense work and awful Internet connections that have kept me away.

Rather than try to summarize what's been going on for the past couple of months, I'll tell you what happened on October 3rd: I gave 30 days' notice at work, I asked my girlfriend to marry me and I moved into a new house. In that order.

At work there has been enough corporate intrigue to last me a lifetime. I still don't know exactly how it's going to play out, but it looks at this point like I will be looking for work elsewhere.

Asking Kat to marry me will of course have a much bigger impact on my life. We are thinking April for a wedding date, but there is still a lot to discuss. The general idea is to stay in Vietnam for the next year or so and for us to move to Australia or the U.S. for a couple of years so she can complete her studies.

My new house is pretty cute. Kitchen and dining room downstairs, a bedroom upstairs, and a living room at the top. Luckily there is a bathroom and a phone on every floor, but I still do a lot of running up and down to get this, that or the other.

It's a friendly neighbourhood (which I like), but it's also really noisy. I am having a hard time adjusting. It's basically only quiet from about 11PM to 5AM. There are all kinds of street noise the rest of the time, but I particularly hate the sound of loud TVs.

Thanks to the people who have signed the guestbook lately and also to the two people who added themselves to the update mailing list- sorry there has been so little activity lately!