Almost a foreign correspondent

The paperwork is reportedly moving along to make me an official foreign correspondent in China, and the business cards are on their way.

It's time to get started, laying the groundwork for my new career. Unfortunately, I've been too busy these last two weeks setting up my computers, moving my files, getting the Internet access, and finishing up projects from back home that I haven't had time to go out and get to know the people and institutions I'll be writing about in a very short time.

Meanwhile, my editor has agreed to spring for some travel expenses, and I hope to be visiting some neighboring countries in the next few weeks (while I'm waiting for that accreditation I keep talking about). I'm thinking of visiting Mongolia, which has a stock market, and Vladivostok in the Russian far east. I'm interested in those places because they aren't usually written about, and because I speak Russian (which is common not ony in Vladivostok, of course, but in Mongolia as well).

Meanwhile, on the home front -- spring has ended. We had one week of 60-degree weather (Farenheit) and now we're into the summer temperatures and are down to our T-shirts. Strangely, the locals are still wearing windbreakers. We're worried about how hot it's going to get, but the kids, at least, are going to spend their summers back in the states, and the apartment and Richard's workplace are both air conditioned.