Hey gang! Long time no see. Okay, the first part of this is going to be quite heartfelt and serious…. while the second have will start going back towards the nonsensical commentary most folk have come to expect.

 Basically, I came back from the Middle Kingdom permanently on Christmas Eve, and I’m home to stay for the foreseeable future.

Why did I leave? Plenty of reasons really. Simply put, I wasn’t happy in Beijing. Living with Fiona was about the only plus point about being there. I had great friends, and great experiences, but it just wasn’t enough for me. There was no real room for personal growth – I had no chance to travel, career opportunities were extremely limited, and as a person I had fallen into a rut I just couldn’t seem to get out of.

I had to get out.

So I did. The last few weeks in China were great – Fio and I grew super-close, I managed to offload a lot of unwanted possessions, hang out with my friends and did a whole bunch of cool stuff. And then I had to come home, which was the hardest thing I’ve had to do in a long time. Fiona saw me off at the airport, and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to run back out of the gate and go back.

Basically, despite that last month, Fio and I had to go our seperate ways. Believe me, it’s the last thing I wanted, but our relationship would never have survived me being in the UK and her in Beijing. This way, by ending on a high, we leave things open for us to get back together down the road. Dunno where, dunno when, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t the end of our story. Whatever else happens, we’re still best of friends, and she’s closer to me than anyone else I know. I still love her, and I always will. But there’s experiences we both need to have, and things we both need to do, before we’re ready to commit to each other the way we both want. So we’re gonna take a break, grow some more, and see where life takes us.

Anyway, enough with the pseudo-emo already. I’m back in the UK now, and I’m knuckling down for my Navy AIB which, if all goes well, will be at the end of January. The past few months, I’ve become more convinced than ever before that the Navy is where I’m destined to be – at least for the next decade or so of my life. So now my life is a mess of long-distance runs, walks, healthy eating and studying – everything from photos of warships and lists of current deployments to the Shipping News. It’s crazy, hard…. and I’m loving it.

Had a great Christmas with the family – the first time I’ve been back in Bristol for Christmas in five years, Kinda like the Prodigal Son, but with turkey and tinsel. We spent the whole of Christmas Day at Mike and Donna’s with the kids. And believe you me, having to deal with children who have just received a karaoke machine for Christmas while jetlagged out of your mind is not an experience I care to repeat any time soon. I love my neices and nephew, but I just did not have the energy or mental fortitude to cope with that kind of cacophony

Boxing Day was a repeat of the same, except this time it was at our place and we had no less than eight kids come over – all equipped with Nintendo DS’s. The silence was…. heavenly

I’m up in Edinburgh for Hogmanay, and thankfully thus far Lewis’s Five Immutable Laws of Edinburgh Visitation have been somewhat…er…muted. Unfortunately my erstwhile host has fallen sick (possibly thanks to the machinations of some rogue element within the egg fried rice I cooked last night) so I’ve had to clean his flat for tonight’s mini-party. It was supposed to be a full-fledged knees-up, but thanks to colds, sickness, trains and other badness there’s only going to be four of us getting ridiculously drunk, playing Wii and like-as-not having to go to A&E because one of us gets a tad over-zealous with a Wii-mote.

Come tomorrow, I’ll let you all know. I may even write a full illustrated retrospective on 2008…. but that’s likely to have to wait until AFTER Edinburgh. Until then have a fantastic evening/day/night, a wonderful New Year, and an awesome start to 2009.