joekicker

Heh. The real Mafia tried to horn in on Thai-Hong Kong drug smuggling in the late 1960s. They didn't last three months. Total babes in the woods. They got out while they still could, so at least they were smart if not very ... intelligent. .

Thank you. .

I was trying to think of something that bad, actually. Thanks. Good one. . The banks of the river, especially both sides of the Oriental Hotel, or on the other side, roughly opposite. All riverside hotels will have something, the Montien, away from the MAIN first-class hotels might be good. The traffic will be horrendous, so figure on the Skytrain, and figure it will be super-packed.

You mean Aussie girls in shorts and flip-flops and German women in leather pants and UK women in cardigans??? I'm really big on not-the-pier, frankly. There are lots of possibilities, anywhere with a pond will have something good, often the golf courses have a party, even. And launching the kratongs in the ocean is always a pain compared with pondside or a klong. Even hotels normally have something poolside, not that I recommend anything quite that artificial, but still, it's a party. .

Beat me to it. Superstar in the making if anyone is. Great team effort as midlife says. When the Pads put two men on and Tejada was up, I figured uh-oh. Then The Kid whiffed him on NINE pitches. Who WAS that guy?, Tejada appeared to he asking, shooting daggers at him. All the Gernts this year, I like that fat guy Uribe. He has produced like he never did in Chicago. I don't think San Fran can handle anything from the East, but they have really, truly provided great moments this last couple of months, and this last couple of days. Good luck to them. In the playoffs, Anything Is Possible. .

No truer word was spoken. I'll tell ya, at least since 1871. I expected something from the AL East this year, but this NL West finish is truly riveting. This is ALSO the weekend I dig out Russ Hodges-Bobby Thompson MP3s and YouTubes and bore the kids again about The Shot Heard Round The World. I found out a couple of months ago that "Bobby Thompson's home run" (like he only hit one, heh) was the first baseball story (1951) to appear on the front page of the Bangkok Post (established 1946). Also, I picked Atlanta in May (NOT April for sure, heh) to go to the Series. We shall see about that. They haven't been trending up, but who has ferpetesake? I s'pose the Phillies stroll in and take it, but I do kind of like Cincinnati, and believe I'd put 5 baht, maybe even 10 on them in the final. atlas, I appreciate the kind words. Baseball is different, and part of its charm is that you keep digging and digging into its nuances and statistics and especially its trivia. It is not a goals-and-pub sport (although it certainly has its pub stories of course). Once hooked, you're really hooked. It's not for everyone, baseball, but I'll say this - Mrs Kicker watched her first baseball game in 2007, in the misty rain and at 35 degrees Fahrenheit surrounded by 47,000-odd (definitely odd, eh?) people, and she is now addicted. She's a raw beginner but she quite likes it, especially at the park, in the crowd, which is where the sport really, really shines. .

It's not your nationality, it's the business you're in. You can operate IF and I repeat IF and ONLY IF you do not infringe on operations that already have been established. Don't even think about opening up a new cigarette smuggling route, stay far away if you are thinking about getting into heroin or E or at-sea oil transfers, etc. But if you have a brand new, untried scam, you can run it past the local folks and get a thumbs up. They will probably want a small piece of it but actually will give you lots of protection as you get started if you need. More "industry" is good for everyone, eh? Lots of new jobs and keeps money liquid and all that. That said, Pattaya has seen it all, and a new scam almost certainly would be nationality- or cultural-based, like, say, Russians cheatinig Russians on housing sales (just picked out of the air, not meant to be a real-life example). .

Haven't heard anyone say that for a while. In fact, I said that to someone a few weeks ago, and he looked at me kind of puzzled - what do I mean, NL style? Too bad about your Jernts. Good ending on the game, though, exciting to the end. I don't care how that series comes out, but the Padres have been super-weird over the past month, much weirder than the Rocks. .

VicVegas is REALLY going to hate this, but I just watched the best baseball game of the year - 11 innings with one run at the very end. With nothing to do before the Giants-Padres game, I picked Rockies-Cardinals out of the MLB.com basket, because the Rockies have REALLY let down Ubaldo ever since he won 15 before the All-Star break. Today he was going for 20 in his last start, second last game of the year. Nothing much else was at stake, both teams were eliminated recently. But the Cardinals called it Stand up for Stan Day, and I'd pay $3 to see that old man in front of his fans any time. Well, it was a gahdum barn burner of a pitchers' duel. Sorry, Vic. No score, no score, almost no hits. Ubaldo gave up three hits in eight innings, and got zero runs in return. He was throwing 96 in the 8th inning but he couldn't go longer. It didn't matter anyhow. 8th inning, 9th, 10th, 11th... Rockies got zip. Neither did the Cardinals until the 11th. They put a guy on, and when Holliday hit a single to left, the fielder fumbled it for half a second, and Feliz slides home with the winning, walk-off run. The Padres-Giants game Friday and against Saturday (as I write) are good, exciting, September baseball, with everything at stake for both teams. Same in the east, although the Yankees and Rays aren't playing each other. But Rockies at St Louis, with nothing at stake, Stan Musial in a full-circuit tour of the field, and not a single run until half a second before the end of the game - THAT is great baseball. Matt Holliday mobbed after his walk-off single. Ubaldo Jimenez, 19-game winner. Stan the Man. Unique, remembered and honoured. .

The monks go naked in your wat then, do they? It's pretty easy to check out how far 500 baht will go in the Buddhist section of any general store or market. It goes about as far as it would go for you, or for the Buddhists who shop in that section.

Part, but also to the store/restaurant/caterer. By supply food and drinks the dead guy also gains merit. .

Nobody made this point until you, that (like gold) Thailand has EXCELLENT and super-cheap jewellery designers and makers, finishers and more. Once you get a dealer you're comfortable with, and some stones you like, it's a terrific place to get custom jewellery made -- not just a price bargain but a truly excellent design centre. Regyai, you are absolutely right AND Chanthaburi is the first and arguably best place in the whole world to get rudely, spectacularly over-charged beyond your worst nightmares on gems unless you know gems or the dealer or both. "Wholesale market" sounds so great, and it's so dangerous -- worse than "duty free" on your pocketbook. But interesting it definitely is, and the world's best Isan gai-yang barbecued chicken is right there in the Chanthaburi main market to boot. .

I'm sorry, I missed the post with your point, and you hadn't posted it in this thread. Can you say again what your point is? Exactly. Virtually any HD-capable TV makes an excellent monitor. .

I believe they generally call really big computer monitors, mid-sized TV sets. .

packhike with all due respect (quite a bit) this means that YOU know your jeweller. And good for you, just as I said before. But again with respect, recommending a dealer because YOU have had good treatment could be dangerous. They may see so-and-so the next customer coming, and fleece him. Not CHEAT him, but fleece him. I understand your post, but be very careful praising jewellery shops to others. Yes, all diamonds are imported into Thailand, as they are imported into pretty well all countries in the world -- and like pretty well all gems in Thailand, since Thailand has almost no gems in the wild and has to, ahem, "import" (read smuggle) even jade, sapphires and rubies, never mind emeralds (!) which come from a long way away. But when I mentioned small diamonds, I meant really small ones, usually used as inlay. They are a bit of a bargain here because they are imported in the raw and worked and faceted and polished here and (mostly) sent back out. A 1-carat (say) diamond is never a bargain in Thailand, you are right about that. If you want to get, say, a wedding band with a bunch of tiny diamonds, or if you are buying a ruby and want it to be surrounded with 15 little diamonds -- it is not a bad buy IF your jeweller is helpful. .

I don't believe he asked that, but if he actually asked that, the wat would (almost certainly) tell him to shove off -- or more likely but way worse, make up some story about sick kids in the school or somesuch. No one asks that any more than Christians ask where the collection plate moolah goes. Any impertinent questioner wouldn't be taken or treated seriously. .

Probably Machete. Not Thai, though. .

That is a very funny story, atlas2, damned well told. You should write a book. Oh, wait, you already are one. .

jacko has it, except I'd add jade as a third one, and also small diamonds, which almost all the world's supply is finished in Thailand. I'll add a bit extra here because of what I read into your post, SidJames. Do NOT buy gems on speculation or investment or whatever unless either you know gems superbly or you know your jeweller very well -- and preferably both. Even a one-off purchase, be REALLY careful. The MAIN thing that Thais do for gems is recolour and rebrand them. They taught the world, I am not kidding. .

Very basic answer: The money itself doesn't get the merit. The activities made possible by the money generate the merit. The money buys time at the wat, along with monks to chant, a good word to the Man Upstairs, so to speak - in Buddhist terms of course. In addition it buys food and drinks for those who come along, i.e. generosity. .

Very concise. Just look at some guy waving at a chin-high fast ball or a slider that went 57 feet and bounced - and you know he's right. .

No he most certainly won't be a great. And he won't be short relief, there's no way he can go beyond three batters at a time. The best that a one-pitch fireballer can do is one season as final closer, and he'd better get three in a row because the fourth guy will kill him. Did you notice how well K-Rod is doing these days? Okay, that's unfair, but guys who ONLY throw heat last two years if they are somehow different. Like the Dodgers had that left-handed Korean flamethrower a couple of years ago, he lasted two years throwing heat in the ninth inning because he was a leftie. Now, I can't remember his name, heh. But if you have one pitch in the bigs, and if that one pitch is straight and hard, you most definitely are not destined for greatness even in short relief. .

Exactly. The thing you are saying without actually saying is that this Chapman, who I have watched twice, is NOT a pitcher, he is a thrower. A guy who rares back and tosses it will get hit and will not be throwing off big league mounds for long. An old coach put it very well one time -- up and down in relation to the ground, in and out in relation to the plate/batter, back and forth (speed) or what some would call precision AND the speed of the pitch -- except that there really three parts to it. If you have three of these, chances are you'll be a good pitcher. If you have two of these you've only got a chance if you are really good (NOT FAST, good) and smart in using that "good". If you have one, you'll never have a chance. Speed of pitch isn't very important, really. Here's one thing that's really important: DIFFERENCE in speed between the fast ball and change. A guy who can throw 92 and 75 and make the pitches look the same is a lot better than a guy who can throw 102 over and over and OVER and over again. A guy who can throw four kinds of fast ball at 94 is better. You can have your 105mph Chapman, and I'll have fun watching him. Meanwhile I'll take that old man Rivera at a measly 95 or that ugly old 92mph Lidge. .

Really. The kid's an asterisk. 105mph is an asterisk EVEN if the kid turns into an actual pitcher over time. Also, Vic doesn't include Siddhartha "Sidd" Finch. He threw at 168 mph in 1985, according to Sports Illustrated. .

Nongprue is on the darkside, roughly opposite Pattaya Klang. I have no idea where the store is, though. .