I'm Jeff from the US. I've been mining for a few months (first with Ars, now with Eclipse). I'm generally not one to post much, so newbiedom will likely be an eternal purgatory for me. 
Jeff, I'm curious. What made you choose Eclipse over the others?
I've only tried a handful of pools, but I liked the following about Eclipse:
- Low stale rate and low rate of cgminer waiting on work
- Nice UI
- No mandatory fee
- Hopping-proof payout method (though most pools seem to have that nowadays)
- Active and enthusiastic administrator