maipenrai

Yeah, I'm sure that all venues will be just jumping to reopen so they can put up with onerous conditions like these....jeez.

Great photos, nice to see such a rustic area of the PI..

Lovely...

This morning it was -2C at 0430 but the day became gorgeous later, the first really nice day here for almost ten days; we(four of us, these things are heavy!) got my buddy's woodstove out of his basement and then drank beer on his patio in the sun for the next three hours or so...at home now and the sun is still shining and will do so until almost 11:00PM tonight - finally feels like summer.

Sitting here having a late breakfast and watching the sun vainly trying to break through the clouds - strong south wind blowing for a couple of days now which brings all of the moist air in from the Alaskan coast, giving us cloudy skies and cool weather...hoping for better weather tomorrow...

I had to use fountain pens for the first few years in elementary school, and I'll always remember one of our classrooms being selected for a trial use of indoor/outdoor carpeting - wasn't more than a day or two before some kid spilled a whole bottle of ink all over it, lol... Please forgive my ignorance, but when you mention "biro" are you referring to what we colonials would call a "ballpoint" pen?

Well, after living and working for a lifetime north of the 60th parallel in Canada, I've seen my share of serious cold and don't much care for it anymore; even now as June begins it can dip slightly below zero at night time although the days are warm when the sun is out; it's usually windy here and let the sun go behind a cloud or have a rain shower come over and it cools off quickly so you always need to dress in layers that you can either remove or add during the course of the day. I swore many years ago after a particularly nasty day of winter work in the Arctic that I would never complain about heat again and I haven't - it doesn't really bother me that much. I love the simplicity of dressing for the Thai climate, just a tropical shirt, decent boxer underwear and a good pair of shorts and I am good for any day or night in Thailand. I love walking around Pattaya and Jomtien in the afternoon and have my favourite pit stops along the way - or rather did until the virus fuss closed them all - somehow it just isn't the same going in a 7-11 for a bottle of water compared to stopping for a cold beer and a little interaction with the girls. I should add that although it sounds extreme where I live, it is a dry cold and provide you are properly dressed for it, is probably generally not as unpleasant as the "cold and miserable British winter" that galenkia refers to...

I was planning to help a friend move a woodstove out of his basement today, but the weather is crap and he messaged me that it is no point doing the job if we can't relax on the patio afterward with cold beer - good thinking, there...lazy day instead.

At the age of 64 I find I still have plenty of energy but seem to have more aches and pains and my body doesn't bend like it used to - didn't stop me from buying a new dirt bike last week, however...

I think that is the car from A Clockwork Orange, called a Probe 16....

Breaking down a parts vehicle the easy way...

Just picked up my first new bike in twelve years - 2020 Kawasaki KLX300R; downsized from a Honda CRF450X which at my age is just a little too much nowadays. I've only got a couple of hours on this one so far but I think it's going to be perfect for me...

A small step but still a step in the right direction - I figure the bars in my Canadian neck of the woods will be the last venues to re-open because the vast majority of the population probably haven't been in one since they were young and/or simply don't care.

They don't make any appliances like they used to - time was a washing machine would last twenty years or so, nowadays you're lucky to get five years out of them and I was even told that straight up by the salesman who sold me my last one; and brand loyalty doesn't mean anything because ultimately most of the North American brands are owned by one umbrella corporation anyway. I replaced my hot water heater about three years ago because I knew it was getting old and I was afraid it would go bang when I was overseas - found out online later that it was 34 years old and working fine, whereas I'll probably be lucky to get ten years out of its replacement. It makes my blood boil when I think of how we are constantly harangued to reduce, re-use, recycle, etc. yet these modern appliances are made so cheaply that we have to throw them away and buy new ones...

Good to hear from you again, and I'm sorry for your loss too - I made it home from Thailand a few years ago just in time to see my own mother off and she was totally incapacitated by dementia by that time after being in care for 6.5 years, poor thing. Hopefully we'll meet again in Pattaya when things return to some semblance of normality - I'll buy you a drink in KitCat, lol...

My poor old eyes are more important than the rest of the furniture, lol....plus I only have 800 sq ft of living space so I have to squeeze things in wherever I can; but it's comfy and cheap to heat in the winter - and I have a nice big yard outside...

I flew premium economy on EVA's 747s from Vancouver to Taipei return from 2007 to a couple of years ago when they changed it to 777s, which they had already been flying from the western American airports for some years; I really liked the 747 and especially enjoyed one trip where i got to sit up top when it was still business class - for some strange reason they re-configured the plane later to have business class in the front, premium economy in the middle, and part of economy upstairs....now they have changed to a 787 for this route and have no premium economy anymore which is why I booked with Cathay Pacific for my last trip over...

For drama, I'd have to go with "Das Boot" and "Saving Private Ryan" which of course have the benefit of many special effects that the older films didn't and that is my main reason for choosing them because there are just so many great war movies out there; for humour, I will always remember "What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?" - this 1966 film featured Caroll O'Connor in a supporting role and it was partly on the basis of his performance in this movie that Norman Lear later chose him to play Archie Bunker in "All in the Family"...

In my modest little home I really don't have enough wall room to mount a TV so I have mine on a stand; I seldom watch any actual programming but use my laptop through the big screen with remote keyboard and mouse:

Beautiful morning out and sunshine forecast for all week - the remaining patches of snow are disappearing quickly. Just finished a leisurely (isn't everything leisurely these days?) breakfast and will start getting ready to go out in the driveway and start tearing apart the front end of my 2001 Ford F250 4x4 - been putting it off too long but gotta get at it.

My current favourite spiced rum:

Left home just before 0900 to make a quick run downtown (8km, mostly highway) to our local gov't run liquor store for a couple of bottles - they open for seniors every weekday from 0900 to 1000, bless them, and then it is normal hours for everybody else. After that a couple of other stops for groceries and back home; gotta say it is nice living in a relatively remote area with lots of natural space and comparatively little population, we really don't have a "lockdown" here although social distancing is practised in all of the big stores and most small businesses are closed or doing business online or whatever. I'm still glad that I bailed out of Thailand a month ago, after leaving my departure as long as I dared - lots more freedom and things to do here at home...

This man is a wonderful author - not only does he make the history come alive in his books, but he also has a great tongue-in-cheek sense of humour; check out "Josiah The Great, the true story of the man who would be king" if you haven't already read it...