maipenrai

Three of my favourite authors there - hard to go wrong with anything from them...

Well, I knew it's an Aussie model but those attachments on the front bumper had me thinking that it may have been an old embassy car - several years ago a friend of mine in Jomtien had a nice old Volvo with some unique features that had been sold by the Swedish embassy...

I remember seeing this car many times myself - kind of wonder what story is behind it?

Count me in too - I still regret the night I missed Code's message to meet up with him while we were both in BKK...

I was originally advised to take four of the six tablets at once and that has worked for me - can't imagine taking 18 at once and I sure hope it does the trick for Code without causing any other unpleasant side effects, lol....

Congratulations and good luck to you - I retired similarly ten years ago and never regretted it; it's just a pity that you'll have to wait a while to travel to your favourite places like the rest of us but I hope to have a drink or several with you in Pattaya again when we are able to.

That's quite a story, Code - and having met you in person and read so many of your posts, I don't doubt your veracity - but I'd sure like to know how a guy with a background like this ends up going to the Sorbonne and making such a success of himself later - I'm sure the continuance of this story would be very interesting...

Enjoying a leisurely Saturday morning breakfast before heading out to the snow piles again - coldest morning so far this winter at -22C but calm and clear so not bad; more snow coming tomorrow but not like our last record-breaking dump, thankfully....too bad I couldn't have some of our frustrated gym rats over here to help me out, could show them what productive exercise feels like, lol...

Read this author's book "1776" recently and liked his style so now into this fascinating story:

I'd like to be sitting in a beer bar on Soi 7 or 8 or Beach Rd in the middle of the afternoon in 2003, the year of my first planned long visit to Pattaya, surrounded by other happy tourists getting good exchange to their currencies and having fun flirting with happy and eager bargirls who didn't have access to smartphones yet...those first few trips were a revelation.

I've done my share of barebacking over the years and have caught chlamydia three times - ironically, the first time I am almost positive that I caught it from the only "good girl" I ever wasted my time on over there; luckily, Zithromax had it quickly sorted every time. One trip I came home with crabs - I can still remember the horror I felt some time after my return when I picked this little lump off of my itching scrotum with tweezers and saw its tiny legs moving...jeezus...but even that wasn't as bad as catching scabies on another trip - not pleasant at all and it takes some time to get rid of, you have to buy expensive ointment and apply it to your entire body from the neck down and then leave it for 24 hrs, it was a hot summer and I was working outside and couldn't even take a shower after applying this gunk, and you have to do it several times for it to be effective. Also, with scabies the symptoms endure for up to two months after the creatures themselves are killed off because it is not their movements under your skin that cause the itching, it is an enzyme produced by them that does and this substance lingers for that long after the critters are kaput. I suspect I may have caught this from one of my African or middle Eastern girls - my doc at the time was Iranian and he told me he used to see lots of it in his home country practice. I used to visit our gov't Communicable Diseases Clinic after every trip and get tested, which is free in our system and easy to arrange, but in the past couple of years they have gone statistic-crazy and bombard you with half an hour of invasive questioning about sexual habits first which pissed me off so much the last time that I swore I wouldn't go back unless I was showing symptoms and thankfully I haven't been....

Lazarus, I love your bird photos and please keep them coming - I don't mean to nitpick but these are properly referred to as Canada geese, not "Canadian geese"...

Yeah, I should have bought a Bobcat or similar machine years ago - not to mention building a garage to keep it in - but I chose to blow all of my money on trips to Thailand instead, lol....

Had a hard time opening my door this morning because of so much snow overnight - check these stats: The snow records for this day: Greatest snowfall (1942-2012) - 11.8 cm in 2009 Most snow on the ground (1955-2012) - 18.0 cm in 1971 Currently 45 cm in the past 24 hours, 50+ on the ground. And it's still coming down - I had our last snowfall cleared yesterday in a couple of hours, when this dump finishes it's going to take me a couple of days...winter, bah....

Cleared my whole yard of snow (and my lot is half an acre with a small house) yesterday and the day before, did it again this morning and now here is our latest weather forecast: Today Light snow ending near noon then cloudy. Drifting snow. Wind north 20 km/h. Temperature steady near minus 14. Wind chill near minus 25. Tonigh Cloudy. Snow at times heavy beginning early this evening. Drifting snow. Amount 10 to 20 cm. Wind north 30 km/h. Low minus 15. Wind chill near minus 26. Mon, 2 Nov Snow at times heavy changing to light snow in the morning. Amount 5 cm. Wind northwest 20 km/h becoming light near noon. High minus 12. Wind chill minus 24 in the morning and minus 19 in the afternoon. Night Cloudy with 60 percent chance of snow. Low minus 22. What a crazy year all around, I don't think I've ever seen this much snow by November 1... but hey, it's good exercise and our snow is so light and fluffy in this climate that it is quite easy to move...

I remember that event too and saw the photos - pretty grim and should serve as a reminder to anybody that bikes - particularly big and powerful bikes - and booze don't mix well...

It snowed on and off all day yesterday and early in the evening I went out for my mail and ended up clearing about 2/3 of my yard - woke up this morning and it had snowed another 4cm or so overnight and is still going so other than my steps and sidewalk I'm going to leave it for today - cheap beer night at my local anyway...snow forecast on and off for the next week or so but getting colder so maybe I'll be able to do a proper job of things then...

I'm re-visiting some old favourites, the "Flashman" series by George MacDonald Fraser:

I fired up my thermostatically-controlled woodstove on the 16th when the temperature went down to below -!0C and ran it for a week until warmer weather returned; now I am back on oil heat for now but it's supposed to get cooler again on Friday night so I will probably start it again - it'll go for over 12 hours on one load of wood at -10 or so, easy to live with. Here's the stove besides my old forced-air oil furnace - I also have a high-tech oil stove that I am running right now so actually have three sources of heat:

I think you're spot on with this assessment - I've been sceptical of the Thai Covid-free claims from day one of this whole thing...

Good story - I've done that trick with starters before too but certainly not on anything as exotic as that, lol...

Here in my part of Canada, we always followed our neighbour British Columbia's practices regarding time changes, so we were always on the same time as Vancouver, no matter what time of year; however, this year our gov't consulted with BC's gov't and our own constituents and the general consensus was that the populace didn't want to change the time so we didn't. Then, the BC gov't went back on their own word and decided to change their time after all - but we were already committed to NOT changing our time so now, for the first time in my living memory, we will be on the same time as Edmonton, Alberta and Vancouver will be an hour behind us - which is bound to cause some adjustments for a lot of people and businesses going forward....

-17C here this morning and forecast for -20 tonight - pretty cool for mid-October; usually the snow doesn't stay here until Halloween but I don't think the light skiff on the ground now will melt before then...