The current plan is to return to Toronto around September 20th. My possessions should be arriving (and going into storage) around the same time - a mover is taking care of that. I'll stay in the city about three weeks making arrangements, and then board a plane. Where I go is still being disputed. Here's my current thoughts:

Toronto -> Vancouver -> Honolulu -> Hong Kong -> Beijing (Great Wall) -> Shanghai -> Xian (Terracotta Warriors) -> Guilin (stone forest) -> Yangshuo (karsts) -> Kunming -> Hong Kong -> Bangkok -> Chang Mai -> through Laos -> Hanoi -> across Vietnam -> Ho Chi Minh City -> Phnom Penh -> Bangkok -> Thai penninsula -> Kuala Lumpur -> Singapore -> Indonesia? -> Myanamar? -> Kathmandu -> Kolkata -> Varanasi -> Chennai -> Kerala -> fly right over the Middle East -> Ankara -> Istanbul -> Thessaloniki -> Athens? -> Skopje -> Sofia -> Bucharest -> Belgrade -> Budapest -> Prague -> Warsaw? -> Toronto.

Egypt and Morocco are under consideration. New Zealand was axed because if I went there first and stayed a couple months, it would be dead cold in Beijing by the time I arrived as NZ would probably have to be right at the beginning of the itinerary. Australia, Japan, and Korea are off the list because of relatively high costs of living. I want cheap places to stay away as long as possible.

U.S. travel advisories warn heavily against Nepal (they do have Maoist insurgents running all over the country) but no one else does and I really want to go there.

I'm toying with the idea of flying straight to Thailand because I think I'm going to like it and deal with it best, and I hope to stay there a long time (a couple/three months). But I have no way of knowing that. I've heard a lot of good things about it, it's a predominantly Buddhist country, and the people have a reputation for being easy-going.