NIrishGuy

Well it's good to finally read a GOOD news story I guess in these depression times of world cost of living crises ! lol

Thanks guys, Im actually quite relieved to hear the above as the guy I'll be working with is 62 and a drama queen and if he picked up Covid while working with/ for me I'm guessing I'd never have heard the last of it from him !

Like yourselves I too seem to have succumb to it for a second time now just last week too. Im guessing the onset of winter here in the UK will be pushing the numbers up again quite rapidly as people having cases here is all I've heard this last three weeks now. Myself and nine other family members were away for a trip last weekend. We were all staying in three separate log cabins and only meeting up for breakfast and drinks later in the evening ( but all sitting quite separate even then). From our original group of ten five members came home with Covid on the Monday and 3 others picked it up later during the week, so with eight people from the original group of ten picking it up would certainly suggest that it's strength or transmission rates certainly aren't on the wane anyway thats for sure. Thankfully as I'm double jabbed the symptoms were less that the first time I'd picked it up, but I certainly was still aware of it for it, with the whole headache, sore throat and shortness of breath thing stil being there. I've actually just tested 10 minutes ago there and there's a test a full 6 days after returning home from my trip and the test is still showing up an almost as strong reading as it did last week with no visual sign of any weakening, so it certainly doesn't seem to have lost any of it's potency anyway And now the next dilemma as I'm due to travel by boat tomorrow and fly on a short haul flight on Monday for "must do" work stuff and after my already haven taken this week off and worked remotely another week just isn't practical so the decision comes up to mask up and travel anyway or not now ! 😞

Ahh my beloved Tarnatwan - many a multiple happy morning, afternoon and evening spent there :-), brings back some wonderful memories just looking at those pics. Room 510 or there about's per chance ? While you're there would you check under the bed as I'm sure I dropped 1000 baht on my last trip, any chance you could mail it back to me perhaps ?! 🙂

One of my Bf de jour once joked to me that I wasn't so much a butterfly but a helicopter ! I was almost offended until I realised he was totally correct ! lol

GAY DEAR !!!??? - WHO ME DEAR - how VERY DARE you ! 🙂

My Flipino BF tells me that the reason a lot of Malls are so packed is that as it's so overpoweringly hot there people go to Malls for the (free) aircon ! This based on the fact that it's much more pleasant to spend the afternoon sitting there or walking around a Mall than it is to sit at home either sweating it out or having to spend money running an expensive home Ac machine. Likewise re the fancy cars I know even from watching his family and friends that Flipinos ( or actually most Asians it seems!?) having fancy cars definitely does NOT mean they are rich or have a lot of money. In my experience they buy the biggest car they (cant) afford just to be "seen" in it and so that they can LOOK like they have money and a great lifestyle to show off to their friends - whereas in reality they maybe hardly having enough money to put petrol in the bloody thing !! Shallow ( as I've pointed out to him, but he and they see nothing wrong with showing off ( what you dont have !)

Or alternatively - life's short, you're a long time dead, ask him would he like to go back to your room, offer him a nice tip or not as required and fuck the shit out of him and move on.....there's always that 🙂

Actually much to my surprise Thai Lion Air DID send me a refund during Covid when asked. I called at the start and they said "yes it's being processed", needless to say no refund arrived. I called again a few times more over the next few weeks and was told the same and "yes it's being processed". So, needless to say I soon mentally wrote off any chance of it ever arriving and and moved on, quietly cursing them at the same time. BUT sure enough about 6 months later without any further chasing from me it arrived into my bank, totally unannounced and without as much as an accompanying email to say it had been sent ! So it seems that sometimes, if you believe hard enough, that even in Thailand, just sometimes, miracles CAN happen ! As an aside to that though as my flight was only an internal one, costing only about £150 or so, , me in my bloody stupidity rang them while making a round of other calls, from MY MOBILE as I already had it in my hand !! Thus meaning that £150 refund ( which was reduced to about £110 from memory for "admin processing" reasons) actually ended up being less than the cost of the cost of the calls on next mobile phone bill as each call involved in for several long, putting me on hold sessions - direct to Thailand from the UK ! So my success in getting my refund was somewhat bitter sweet in the end it seems ! 🙂

"Bangkok—a portmanteau of ban or bang (village) and makok (plum), the settlement’s former name" Well you learn something new every day ( or at least I did) - I don't know how after all these years I DIDN"T know that Bangkok actually meant Plum Village ( or some variation of that). Interesting post, thanks for posting Reader.

For anyone who might know about such things ( I don't) are the Govt Bonds mentioned above any good in terms of safety and rate of return ( versus other standard methods of low risk investment) and are they worth the paper they're printed on in terms of long term safety ( knowing that the Thai Govt can and do move the goalposts regularly in many areas just as and when it suits then and to hell with the consequences ( to investors in this case perhaps ?) * Ps I'm not actually running out to buy $250k's worth of bonds tomorrow or anything, just wondering what a sensible / crazy thing that might be for those who might ??

I visited Cebu a few years back now (2017) and had a blast. Back then Mango Square was the place to go with lots of str8 and ladyboy bars - and so where the ladyboys went the gays followed both in the bars and hanging around on the streets outside the bars. BUT I believe a lot of the Mango Square area has since been gentrified and they're trying to clean up it's image a bit, a quick google shows me that some bars are still there but I'm guessing it's not the bustling night life place it once was - but I'm also guessing there's fun to be had in Cebu in general, if not there then in other areas. I know my grindr just never stopped the entire time I was there and if I'd wanted I wouldn't have needed to go to ANY bars for the duration of the trip thats for sure ! Should it help you I stayed at the St Mark hotel https://www.stmarkhotel.ph which a quick goggle shows me is still there. It was spot on hotel wise and just around the corner from the bars. One thing back just to give a word of caution, when there I was warned by several people ( not all guys and it wasn't chat up lines) not to walk home alone 'in general" at night and certainly not to and from the bars, as being the white guy I stood out like a sore thumb of course as a robbery target ( which seemed quite prevalent there at the time I heard. I did follow that advice the first few nights ( ro got someone to walk home with me "for safety" lol, but after a while I relaxed and did walk about quite freely - as to whether or not that was actually wise idea late at night or not I'm not so sure. But do check the PH's message boards etc as it seems info is always quite hard to pin down there ( and in the PH's in general) as everyone likes to put up that "holier than thou" front - and yet the bars once you get into them are busy - funny that eh ! Oh and I would concur with what a few others said, I went to a few so called go go bars in Manila ( the old location, not where the new O bar is at now - link here - https://www.travelgay.com/venue/o-bar-manila/#comment-13023 and the guys ( in the old gay bar area area of Malate - where they may actually still be a few gays bars I believe?) but they were nothing to write home about in the slightest, and I'm guessing mainly straight. There were however plently of friendly guys OUTSIDE the bars, who I'm guessing weren't allowed in as they were freelancing - they I found were VERY friendly and in fact I spent a few days with one of the guys I met there and we had a great time seeing the sights "and stuff" 🙂 The Ph's can feel like hard work sometimes when trying to plan a trip online as nothing is easy or laid out on a plate for you and the info online can tend to be years out of date sometimes ( although bars facebook pages seem a better option sometimes), BUT the guys there I found always to be plentiful on arrival the minute you walked out the door and ( and also many of them were hot) and a lot of them always very keen to be "friendly" either for money or not actually half times and many were just keen for a good night out ( and in) with you - the only downside of course being that every Flipino seems to think they're you're bf after 10 minutes, but I'm sure you're well experienced in correcting that misapprehension FAST ! Hope that helped in some way.

And dont be fooled by the overtly religious (crap) some of the guys come out with re "blessings from God" and "praying for this or that" - all for show to suit their surroundings as just like in Thailand once you get behind closed doors that can change PRETTY fast - in a good way !

🙂 My suggestion was fairly tongue in cheek, I realise it wouldn't be the best option for several reasons - just doesn't mean the buggers still dont deserve it though eh 🙂

Just on the the whole door code thing......so do the flight attendants even KNOW the code ( is there even a code pad ?) as I thought the whole idea was that once the door was locked that it could ONLY be opened by the pilots from the INSIDE of the cockpit after looking through the spy hole ( and CCTV camera) to unlock the electronic lock ?? No ?? If so that always left the conundrum about what if a hijacker was standing outside the door holding a crew member ( or member of the public for that matter) hostage and threatening to kill them if the door wasn't opened, to which it's been made fair clear knowledge now I thought that pilots had now said and been trained that "the door doesn't get opened under ANY circumstances" and should they need to land the plane with all crew and passengers killed in the meantime then so be it as "that" was better than the alternative of another 9/11 type attack etc. That was my understanding of things anyway? *Edit - a quick google re the above states that there is a code, but the cockpit setting for the door lock has three settings, one being "open" i.e not locked at all, the other being "locked by code, meaning the code the crew may have works, but only opens the door after a 30 second delay ( giving the pilots time to check the screen and see who's there and override the open command if necessary) and finally LOCKED - where no code works and the door remains locked no matter what. Curiously that lock only activates for intervals of five minutes and then has to be reset to locked again it seems which seems strange as you'd of thought if they HAD to press LOCK they'd of wanted to keep that way until they changed their minds again perhaps ! Oh and just to stay on topic re air rage etc - TASERS !!! the second one of the buggers started up with how they were refusing to do "whatever" crew should just be allowed to taser them either until they leave the flight, comply or die ! ( ok so the last one is perhaps a LITTLE harsh, but when you listen to some of those Karens ( usually from the US it has to be said) sometimes it feels like a fitting way to deal with them !! 🙂

Dead as in opened but not busy or dead as in Closed and gone forever ?

Can I suggest you put the "will try my best" mode out of your mind as something that you "should" try to make happen and change your mindset and set it in stone before you go that you will NOT be having sex without a condom when in Thailand FULL STOP just (or period if you're from the US 🙂 ) as any possible deviation from that "I will NOT" can of course quickly lead to "well maybe just this one time" and BINGO, you end up going home with more than you arrived with, which as you said maybe wont be able to be cured with one / ANY tablet. If you honestly believe / know in your heart that you're quite actually to throw caution to the wind some night and just decide to "risk it" in going bareback then perhaps consider starting a course of PREP well BEFORE your depart and then stay on it for the duration of your trip ( if not longer if you feel that's going to be a regular ( intentional) "slip up" perhaps.

When at home and if I'm missing Thailand I just buy nice clothes that are 4 sizes too small for me, tie a tiny piece of wool to them and then take them out of the back, realise they'll never fit me ever again and just pretend I've just got them back from my Thailand laundry service ! lol 🙂

"Time for something new… South America maybe.” He says he’s left Thailand for good...." Ok so who's going to open the betting then as to how long before he returns 🙂 .

You're joking right ? This is a very common thing ( here in the UK at least). Many people either clean their own bins ( Im in the why would you camp there), or as is more usual pay a company who's van follows the bin lorry and once it empties your bin they collect it in their specialist van, power wash ( and fix the wheels etc if needed) and return it to your driveway. I guess aside from aesthetics it's as people want to keep smells, insects and even possible maggot infestations etc out of their bins and off their property just as much as they can.

I know you were asking more there as to should it be a large or small amount etc however my solicitor offered me a great piece of advice when he and I were discussing that same topic. I was fumbling about over "how much money to leave" someone / everyone and found I couldn't come to an agreed number very easily. His advice was to stop thinking about how much MONEY I would be leaving them but to think instead of how much of a percentage of my final "pot" from me assets I would like to leave them. That he said usually made it feel less of a personal slant if it ended up (perhaps unintentionally) more or less that someone else may have received ( thinking family members there perhaps) but was also a big plus point ( for HIM and me) in that I wouldn't need to keep reviewing my will as my assets changed over my lifetime as my beneficiaries would always be getting the same 5% / 10% or whatever of just WHATEVER the final pot was. Plus he pointed out that in doing so it kept things nice and easy for me but ALSO for HIM to administer my estate and that would then reduce his workload and so his fees too - we all know of course that last part will NEVER happen after I'm gone and his calculating his final invoice !). I'm leaning towards doing my damnedest to spend the lot before I go without much being left anyway but of course as others have said it's hard without knowing when we're going to pop our clogs to find that happy balance. At least one of the benefits of being gay ( usually) is a lot of us don't have to worry about leaving the bulk of our estate on to wives and children. I actually had to change my financial advisor recently as my old (school) advisor guy just couldn't get his head around my requirement NOT to have to keep my estate intact for passing on to children etc and every pension plan he came up with ended up in his proposing "I" took less now as that would keep my pot well funded after my death". I had to explain to him that NO, I intend and indeed was instructing him to do the exact opposite but it seems his years of "training in safe investing" just couldn't get him into my "spend the lot and be damned mode" - hence my need to change advisors - much to my beneficiaries disgust once I'm gone perhaps ! ( and in some cases I certainly HOPE so anyway ! 🙂 )

https://sawatdeenetwork.com/v4/forum.php

You really should be on facebook with comments like that, with all the other people who can't work out why its not quite just as simple and how small multiple changes across many spheres are hoped to make a positive effect but without crucifying any one industry any more than is necessary etc. Such jibes are an easy win for the facebook brigade to make in order to get likes from their fellow "woke" brigade ( I'm not saying YOU are, I'm saying THEY THINK they are there btw) but they really dont benefit anyone much, well aside from the poster and their likes count I guess.

You DO know that several Apps on your phone do and have already been tracking your every move from the very first day you bought it don't you ?? Just have a look back at your google locations someday when you're bored just to see just now much, quite scary if you weren't aware of it !

Well you weren't meant to TELL him we'd gossip as COME ON a room full of gay men I mean who could possibly even consider that we wouldn't ! lol But Shushh, say nothing and he might tell us yet...... 🙂 OK, back to JFK........see all the mafia had to do was tell a gay man who the culprit was and the whole world would know the full story AND MORE by now ! 🙂