Hello and happy December. It's kind of strange and surreal being in Asia during this commercial Christmas month. There are certain atmospheric tips that you get about what phase of the year you're in. I remember in high school it was baseball, as soon as the softball and baseball teams started practicing for their season out on the ball field that's when I got the signal school is almost over for the year. That always made me happy when I saw them because I then knew summer was just a couple months away. This December I know cognitively what time of year it is but the amount of signals just aren't there. When I tell my students what a crazy, stressful and chaotic month December is in America they just can't imagine why. Then I say, "Well, everybody's shopping and the malls are packed. People are stressed preparing for parties and worried about their budgets." But you just can't convey the feeling of Christmas to them, they need to walk into a mall and see the strained, tired people racing around for gifts to the background music of overplayed Christmas songs for themselves. Last night I went to the theater with "the girls" and laughed loudly about Love Actually. After watching that movie I thought, "Ah, there's the Christmas I remember..."