Leaderboard

Well I am back in Nha Trang. I got here during TET and it has been very crowded. Hard to cross the road due to traffic. People wheeling there luggage around looking for accommodation. However the weather is fantastic.

Part 2 Last night I met the new "owner", who I've known for a couple of years She owns/ed 3 other restaurants. These two on soi buckhou, southern end She is closing the first one (next to blow on the bend, as the lease is expiring and guess what...?!!) She also used to run the kitchen at my local coffee shop until the shop owner fell out with her, and has just sold a place on 3rd road opposite soi excite. Big plans, sort of inside/outside food garden, not a bar but beer available, coffee garden... hopes to be open in 2 weeks...

Very Berry smoothie bowl

Fish comes already crumbed and cooked so just needs a few minutes in the pan to freshen it up. 40 baht from Big C Extra and I threw away the lettuce and sauce that came with it. Chips probably another 10 baht and 15 minutes in the air fryer.

Diavola

Aye, don't know what happened with those 2 posts. No text, then quoting myself instead of edit, spelling mistakes all over the shop. I was multitasking, drinking a large latte, eating a falafel wrap, me being a soy boy poof like @galenkia, and posting. I'll do better next time Boss! Menu of where I'm staying, reindeer reindeer and reindeer!

Home with a mixed kebab and potatoes.

I knocked up an omelette with ham, cheese and onions. Looks crap, but tasted great.

Pork burrito from Monsoon on Soi 8 in Bangkok,think I read some positive reviews on here about this place so tried it. Very good!

Fish and chips in my local. At £7.50, I thought a decent feed.

Have to say I'm impressed with FinnAir and Helsinki Airport. Flight was under 3 hours, had loads of just out movies in an individual screen back of the seat. I mind the days when I first started coming to Thailand, the big screen front of the airport, thst was it lol. No queues at all at passport control, I expected it bust as first day of Finnish school holidays, people flying back to go skiing. Loads of Asian restaurants in the Airport. Seen a few Chinese planes and the obligatory fag waver lol. And what about the free blueberry juice, was proper lush. It's the little things 😂

Watering my plants. Really got into them after Jan went into the hospice, would bring them to her a couple of times a week so her room felt like her home. Jan loved plants so much, her flat is like a jungle lol. I buy them from the lady who has a stall below my gym. I think it’s also a part of my bipolar, the obsession and fixation on things. But at least it’s a healthy obsession.

Outside corner of soi boomerang. That ones a bar, the pool table is already installed...

I saw a YouTube video in Thai of how they make these some time ago, I'll try and find it again when I have time; what they basically do is get a quantity of fresh eggs, and knock a small hole in the end of them and drain the contents. They then mix them all up with Maggi sauce amongst others, I believe, and grey pepper and then they use a big syringe or similar apparatus to put the mixture back into the eggs. Then they are placed in a large pot with a jig in the bottom to keep them upright, and are steamed. They are easy to peel and have an interesting taste and texture. Sometimes they'll sell them from street stalls, usually placed three on a stick but I prefer to buy them from the wandering vendors with the pole over the shoulder - they'll usually sell peanuts and snacks from one basket and these eggs, along with normal hard-boiled eggs and quail eggs, from the other. Try them, you might like them...

Part 1 of 2, as pics are too big On yesterday's early morning walk, @Yesitisdakid and I were only commenting on how sad it was that this place had been closed for the past 6 months. The previous chap left shortly before I arrived in October. Well, what do you know? Later that day machinery was heard, and the site had workers on it. The motorbike taxi guys said "lesteront, thai fud, bergur"....

The first one has a name now and you were right, another Mookata. And progress on the next one from a couple of days ago.

Saigon 2018

Navalny was a great man with incredible courage. I am saddened by his passing. 😞 I am also saddened by the imprisonment of Maria Ressa in the Philippines. She is another journalist who has spoken out about an authoritarian self-appointed demagogue (Duterte). Duterte is no longer president of the PI due to length of service laws, but he has had his lackeys and family members elected to those posts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Ressa

I take it the price for a Gabor head toy is currently 1000 baht, and anyone who pays more is going to push up costs for everyone else?.

Had breakfast at my mates house, then watched the snooker all afternoon whilst drinking his tea and coffee. I did pay for the bacon and made the sarnies though! Now in the pub for a quick pint of Old Original before taking a kebab home to enjoy the other semi final and make a dint into a nece bottle of red.

Dinner on shanghai Airlines.

Just passing....! it was early, nothing was open 😞

Any reason you happened to be in that area ... ? 😜😜😜

Wondering where is everybody in shanghai airport, crap selection of eaterys,settled for a Starbucks caramel coffee with cheese and ham croissants. Glad this site works as Facebook and line don't.

On the new Elizabeth Line to Heathrow. It's very nice, very smooth, but also plagued with delays, so shitting myself a but every time it takes a bit longer to move on from a station. Only 2 stations let now, phew!

Inflation strikes again - one of my favourite Thai snacks, "kai pung", which I have been enjoying for years; when I first started buying them years ago it was four for 20b, then a year or two before Covid they cut that back to three for 20b and now the price is 25b:

Yes, you do what you have to so the job gets done. We were set up pretty well from the beginning when fibre started being used in the north, we had a cube van (freight van with 16' box) set up just for splicing and we could do almost everything with this rig - the only time we had to put up temporary shelters was when we couldn't get the van into the location or if we were working at both ends of a section. The only disadvantage of the van was that for bigger jobs lasting more than a day, we'd have to leave the rig in situ and get a ride back and forth from it, so eventually they replaced it with a tandem axle enclosed trailer that could be detached and left in place. Here's me in the van back in 2003:

I dunno, but I think you like packing best.

After spending all winter at home, mostly recovering from a blood clot in my right leg, which is now behind me thank goodness, I'll be taking off for the Caribbean...Dominican Republic...next week for 3 weeks. As a younger guy, I was just willing to deal with whatever rude and obnoxious behavior that some people brought forth in airports and in the boarding process, while just concentrating on getting to my destination to help get me through the hassle. But no more. I took the liberty to separate myself from the unwashed masses by buying a 1st/business class ticket and removing as much as possible, the potential for rude, idiotic behavior that others here have described in their own travel experiences. Now, instead of having to wait in long lines I'll check in separately in the shorter, quicker first/business class line for my boarding pass, I'll be among the first to board (Group 1 baby!!!) and depart upon arrival, sit comfortably in my wider and infinitely more leg room seat, while the unwashed masses shuffle on past me down the aisle to their seats in cattle class. Once retired, one of the small allowances I was going to reward myself with was never having to book economy again, especially on a foreign trip, so I can experience just a bit more creature comforts and service while on my way to my destination and on the way back home. It's worth paying the extra freight.

The spliced cores hadn't been put into the cassettes yet and some got damaged by the gazebo frame as it collapsed. They had to resplice a few cores. The gazebo was beyond repair. We were working within a fenced of construction site and in the end we were able to remove a section of fencing to bring in a work vehicle that had a side awning attached. This allowed the jointers to keep splicing while it was still raining.

This one in the Austrian alps,Vorderer Brochkogel…3,565 m,I'm looking over to wildespitze which is the highest.

Boeng Mealea Temple -- Cambodia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beng_Mealea

Our first time here since before Covid.The rooms are the same good standard & the staff excellent.Wifi is good. The coffee shop has gone from out front but I don't think I ever went in there anyway & the reception is much smaller. Biggest difference is the gym,it's in the same room with what looks like the same decent equipment but from what I remember it used to be air conditioned & now has all the windows open and 3 ceiling fans whirring around.Not so bad when you're acclimatised but being not long from the UK I sweated bucketfuls today. But that won't stop us staying here again. Also Chequers is just down Soi Nana & they're showing the cricket.Something I found out last night the cook there used to cook in Jools,where the food was very good,happy to report that the grub in Chequers is also very good.

Well said and yes the actual splicing is the easy part of the job. Yes we do have redundant circuits and that is why I came in was to transfer some circuits onto an alternate fibre while the main cable was being relocated. That said there is always the chances of mistakes or issues occurring so we did it in the middle of the night so if things did go pear shaped we wouldn't delay trains as we had a 3 hour trains free window. I reckon it would be at 30 years since I have worked in weather like that and with only 3 years left to go hopeffully no more.

And out came the bean bags.

This place. The Blue Sea is where I drink in the afternoon. At night they replace the tables and chairs with bean bags for the chill crowd.

Nice pics Matt...few from over the years from me.

The fridge in my room is always full of wifeys crap so doesn't make any difference😂 to me

Zebra Spitting Cobra, Windhoek, Namibia https://www.facebook.com/groups/2351763591/

Big bad truck, small nuts...

i just use fb messenger for any call i need to make back to uk wwhich is just a sunday night.do a video call through to my mum so shes knows im ok through my sisters fb account as mum does not use internet at all.

TQ is my only GGB exception. They used to serve draft beer (chang) in ice cold steins years ago, which was a welcome drop on a hot afternoon. Decent sized glasses as well. Actually, TQ is one of the few bars in town apart from Hops (which is technically a restaurant) and Beer Hub where I'll order and drink the draft, purely because I can see it being poured.