Toy Boy

Conn Iggulden's 'The Abbot's Tale' was a fascinating story, covering 7 kings from Athelstan to the early years of Ethelred the Unready. He recommends also reading Tom Holland's 'Athelstan - The Making of England', so that's what I'm doing.

I was surprised by the reaction this one got on FB, it stimulated quite a heated discussion.

I spent a while trying to figure out where the hotel we'd stayed in had been, and I finally remembered that it was the Delta Hotel in Vlaardingen, not Maassluis. This was a fun time, I was working week on/week off with another engineer and he'd found the hotel but had been told by Personnel (what we call HR these days) that it was too posh for the likes of us. It was a weird area, with the river and harbour to the south, while to the north it was mostly greenhouses kept warm by Groningen gas to grow all those Dutch fruit and vegetables. When you got to the sea you had the Hoek van Holland ferry terminal, and north of were some cheap and cheerful beach resorts like Monster. He'd argued the toss with them and eventually they relented, as nobody could find a suitable cheaper alternative. We were on 24-hour duty for the week so had to be able to get to the rig fast when called, but this hotel was 20 km from the wellsite, way too far in normal circumstances. Just north of it, though, was a very fast dual-carriageway that went to De Lier, so we could get to the rig in under 15 minutes if need be. The best part was that we were paid a generous mileage allowance, and driving to and from the rig 4 or 5 times a day meant a lot of extra Guilders in the bank account when the expenses claim was filed. Lovely jubbly.

I recently had a couple of Thai craft wheat beers. Definitely not cheap at around the 150-odd Baht per half-litre can mark, but both were a lot better than the crap that the two big breweries started foisting on an unprepared and unsuspecting Thai public some years ago. The Thai Myth wheat beer was smooth and not unpleasant, but excessively fruity for my taste. I can well imagine the Thais, especially the women, liking that, though. I'm a bit doubtful and suspicious, to be honest, as to whether this degree of citrus flavour is entirely due to the brewing process, or has it been chemically enhanced, or simply had lemon juice added? The Full Moon brewery version had a better balance, at least for my palate, but early on I detected something a bit excessively yeasty in the background. It disappeared after a few minutes, anyway, and that's not a bad drink at all. Given the price, though, why would I choose either of these two when, for the same (or even less) money, I can drink Belgian or German wheat beers made by breweries with half a millennium of history and a global reputation?

Back in the early 80's, I stayed for the best part of 3 months in a fancy hotel in Maasluis, on the northern bank of the river, while we were doing some recompletion and abandonment work on old oil wells in the De Lier field. Looking at the Google map of the area, it seems to have changed enough in the last 40 years that I can hardly recognise it, no need to go back 500 years, lol.

We've all seen those silly maps the Euro-zealots have on their living room walls after Brexit showing the world without Great Britain. Here's a map showing only the world's islands, Oz omitted, I guess, as it's a continent. I like this one for some reason, it's kind of peaceful, lol...

I saw this one on FB and was interested to see that Thailand is predicted to be as water-stressed as Australia.

We had a decent downpour while I was swimming this morning, around 11:00. About 10 minutes of heavy rain and 20 minutes or so of lighter stuff. I have no hesitation in saying that watering duty is cancelled this afternoon.

For maximum satisfaction, I want to see at least 46,000 THB appear in my bank account if I send £1,000. So I need to wait until the Wise rate is around the 46.25 mark, to cover their fee.

I got this 2022 film from YIFY and watched it last night, not really expecting much, but I was very pleasantly surprised. I easily get bored with time-travel films, but this one isn't actually time travel, it's about staying in the present and altering the future. Set at the start of WW2, it explores some interesting alternative - and disastrous - scenarios and outcomes. It's filmed in monochrome using vintage lenses to give it that genuine 1940's look and feel. It's probably the most original and inventive film I've seen in the past 15 years, with a good story and excellent dialogue. I'd be happy to go back and watch it again, and at just 1 hr 18 m it's a good use of your time. https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/lola_2023

Yeah, I guess there has to be some reason why you're paying almost 100 Baht for a 330 cl bottle of locally brewed beer. Master brewing craftsmanship, the finest ingredients from across the globe, or pure unadulterated greed.

I tried Phuket lager many years ago when it first came out, but didn't see the point of paying over the odds for another bog standard Thai lager. I don't know if this is from the same brewery, or a completely different company, but it's much better. I prefer it to the Carabao Dunkel, which is a decent drop of dark, though as it's around three times as expensive as the Carabao I'd have hoped so.

That reminds me of an old Tommy Copper joke. Wife: this broom handle's broken. Husband: Well why not just use the car instead?

On Wan Lai, it would mean the entire city becoming booze free, lol.

Another Welsh cultural marvel! This Welsh council uses a third-party translation service, so they asked for a translation of the English and got back a message that they then painted on the road sign below it.

I've been living here for 20 years and swimming almost every day, and I'd never bother with a pool heater. For the few weeks of the year when the water might be a bit chilly for our tastes - and this 'Winter' there wasn't a single day in that category as far as I'm concerned - it's much more economical to just buy a wet suit. Or just take the philosophical view and embrace the joys of cold water swimming, it's been proven to have many health benefits... ...including improving your libido, so the missus will be happy, lol.

it seems the mayor has a cunning plan to get tourists to spend more time and money in the city - you simply prevent them from ever leaving! lol