Ethiopia blocks Dungeons & Dragons - Blogs!

I'm back in the states from Africa.  I was out of touch with the D&D blogosphere for a few weeks.  It turns out that Ethiopia blocks a number of internet sites that could be used for political discussion, including blogspot.com, so I wasn't able to post or read anything while over there.  I found Ethiopian society to be fairly free and progressive in the capital, so it was strange to encounter that kind of government control over the internet.  There were like 1,000 unread posts in google reader - that A-Z challenge you all were doing was a killer.

We spent the first week at the orphanage and doing the court stuff for the adoption - we're approved for the adoption, and once the embassy gets back to us in a few weeks, Mrs Beedo will be heading back to the capital to pick up our new son.  He's healthy, and with a translator we were able to share some thoughts - he's a good kid.  Thanks to church, family, and friends, we were able to bring a few extra suitcases of donations for the orphanage, including a hundred pounds of infant formula, soccer balls, and toothbrushes.

We had time in the second week for doing cultural stuff and tourism - we spent a few days deep in the rift valley spotting wildlife (many hoofed bovids were seen, and I saw at least a dozen crocodiles while out there).  We toured some spectacular orthodox churches and a monastery, went to the national museum (it has an awesome paleontology section on early hominds and "Lucy"), and had a ton of Ethiopian food.

Regular blogging will return shortly - I had plenty of time on the plane while Mrs Beedo was sleeping to fill my game journal with notes for the Black City.  (The plane ride from Washington to Addis Ababa was 13 hours there, 17 hours coming back).