Thursday, June 25, 2009 - JUST TO RAMBLE A BIT

The rains are more frequent now.  Seems it starts about 4:30PM daily and lasts for 30 minutes or so. It rained so hard two days ago I thought I was in a hurricane.  Very high winds that were causing small trees to sway to one side.  It was so bad that water was coming into the house from under the front door.  Not flood type water but enough to get out some towels down on the floor in front of the door.  That helped a bit.  I hate to think what will happen when the rainy season really does hit up here.  Of course everything is nice and green now :)

Day business at the shop has been slow and Choa hasn't been opening up much. (Wonder why it is slow)  Since one of the rains in the first part of the month when a small glass display case was broken he decided that he couldn't sell noodles.  Since the case was not on the counter for people to see how would they know he had noodles.  That really does not make sense but  I know that arguing the point is useless so I decided we would take the case to town and get the glass replaced. No, he didn't want to do that, business was slow anyway since people were working the fields. So now it sits empty.  After a hard day of work the people in the fields do come by at night for some beer and Thai whiskey.

Wonder what tomorrow will bring

john

Friday, June 19, 2009 - JUST NOT MY DAY

Yesterday started off  just fine and all was going well.  That is till I decided to have a cup of coffee.  I picked up the coffee carafe from the drip coffee pot and just as I started to pour the handle came off. Coffee all over me and the floor.  Not a happy camper mainly because I only got about half a cup poured before it broke.

I finished what coffee I had and decided to head to Pangsilatong which is about 30Km or so away so I could pay my UBC bill which was due the next day.  So far so good.  I get about 20km or so down the main road and I blow a tire on the motorbike..   As some good luck would have it two guys from where I live drove by in their pickup truck.  They stopped and loaded the bike in the back and off we went to town to get it fixed.  I thanked them kindly and sprang for lunch.   While heading back home the bottom decides to fall out of  shy so after getting drenched I pulled over and waited for it to stop.

After getting home I spent the rest of the day doing nothing but watching TV and messing around on the internet.  Choa brought me dinner and a beer about 7:00PM from the shop.  All is good.

Decided to go ahead and take a shower during one the 15 minute breaks between TV shows.  Just as I get out and start to dry off....   PITCH BLACK   The power went out     AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN. This is starting to become real annoying since it happens about once every two weeks..  All the lines here on the street poles aren't worth a damn and they don't seem to have any concerns about repairing them properly.  So I am stuck with it.   Power was off about one hour this time.  Not good because its gets a bit warm without the fan going.  Choa came from the shop to the  house carrying some candles he bought.. We had some light but not much.  We ended up sitting on the patio watching the fireflies flit around and then the geckos pouncing on them for a bit of a snack.

Oh the country life

john

Thursday, June 18, 2009 - MAE SOT - AGAIN

Yesterday it was off to Mae Sot again for my 90 day report.  This is an exhausting trip since it is 220Km from where I live so with a round trip it makes it an all day affair for the most part.  I must admit though that I do like the trip somewhat because of all the beautiful scenery.  The landscape up in that part of the country is just wonderful.

This will probably be my last trip to that area for sometime.  When I was in Pattaya the first of June I rented a small condo, well more like a large doublewide closet, to save some expense. It seems that I can now have an address in Pattaya which is great for Immigration , cheaper than a hotel room for the number of days that I usually stay and I wont have to haul a suitcase or two with me each trip.  Seemed like a win win for me.

john