Eneukman

Thanks, Owen. I've saved the page and will print it off and read it later at my leisure. Alan

I was crossing South Pattaya Road yesterday at the junction with 2nd Road. Even though I was more than half way across some stupid fucking cunts (farang at that) were still trying to pass in front of me, Then some fucking blind Thai bitch tries to run me down. Fortunately she stopped or I would have pushed her over. Personally, I'd ban anyone from driving unless they have an IQ of at least 120 and can demonstrate consistent safe driving over a 5 hour period in all sorts of road conditions. Alan

I'm another convertee to Firefox - though I still have Internet Explorer as I need for when I use AOL. When internet problems arose following the recent Taipei earthquake, AOL opened all the sites that I couldn't access through Firefox. AOl are still a load of shite though. Alan

I'm not sure that Levis or Wranglers will agree with you though I do share your sentiments. I have never bought a shirt or whatever because of the label - in fact, I tend to avoid those overpriced rip off brands. I'm happy with shirts costing 150 baht or so and I don't pay any attention whatsoever to any label that may be on it. Alan

I like to get down to the pool for around 10.00/10.30 so around 10.00 am is fine with me - or a bit earlier so long as we've had the morning shag. Alan

Will they have low cost business and 1st Class as well? I really can't see me making use of this service on my visits back home as I first have to get to KL and then I have to get to Edinburgh from Manchester. A flight arriving at Manchester at 19.30 would almost certainly be too late for me to get a flight up to Edinburgh so I would have to stay overnight in Manchester. It sounds like a good deal for those living in the Manchester area so long as they don't mind flying via KL. Alan

I use www.investorschronicle.com for my information. It's a subscription site though you do get some titbits free of charge. There are plenty other sites out there though I think you can look at too many sites and end up gettting conflicting opinions on individual shares. The downside with Investors Chronicle is that they only give their opinion on a particular company once it's issued its half yearly or annual reuslts. They do, however, give a guide to what brokers are recommending on each company though this can be confusing unless you know how each broker reached their opinion. One broker may say buy whilst another will say sell. Scorpions' point that you need to invest in different industries is absolutely correct. Vodafone is a buy according to Investors Chronicle magazine but I am reluctant to do so at present purely because I already own BT shares. (one of my best performers over the last 12 months or so). Alan

I know absolutely nothing about markets other than the UK so I'm going to stick with it. Alan

I spent 25 years dealing with the administration of estates of people who have just died. As Owen points out, there are many elderly widows who have no idea about how to manage their money, not because they're stupid or anything but simply because it was something their husband's always did. On many occasions, we've helped them get direct debits set up to pay their electric, gas, telephone bills etc. As for "thieving" sons, we had a case where the widow received the income from her husband's estate during her liftime and on her death it passed to her their son. The bank for whom I worked held a power of attorney for the widow but the son persuaded her to revoke it and sign one in her favour. On her death, the value of her estate had to be added to the value of her husband's trusy for Inheritance Tax purposes and my colleagues dealing with the trust wer somewhat surprised by the low value put on her estate when they knew that it should have been maybe £200,000 or so higher. I've no idea what happened in the end but I suspect the son may have either have had to come clean or would have ended up in Court on charges of fraud. One thing I always did when I got my bank statement was to reconcile it against what I had entered in to Microsoft Money. As my bank statements go to my brother now, I do this on-line instead. However, it always surprised me the amount of people in my own office who didn't seem to have a clue as to whether or not their bank statement was correct or not. When I retired, I elected to invest most of my funds in the Stock Exchange and to manage them myself with the help of Investors Chronicle magazine. This year has been a very good year for the Stock Markets and 3 of my investments are showing gains of between 37% and 42%. One of these has also only been held since the end of June this year. I don't expect anything near the same kind of return next year and I would not be too concerned if the market was to fall back over the coming months. When I buy and sell shares, I try to ensure that the net outcome will be an increase in the dividends produced by the new holdings. During the course of this year, my dividend income has increased by about 4 1/2%. That is a figure I'm comfortable with even though inflation in Thailand is slightly higher. Also, when I sell shares, I'm quite happy to take a loss (at the moment only one share is showing a loss with one other showing a very small gain) though before doing so, I ensure that it is not about to go "xd". If a share is sold "xd", it means that the seller gets to keep the dividend even though it may the payment date may still be a few weeks away. The other thing I try to do when investing on the stock market is not to get overweight in any one sector. At the moment, I am seriously overweight in the banking sector (mainly due to shares received as profit sharing and through stock options). This will be reduced gradually over the next year or two. The shares have preformed extremely well and I am therefore a little reluctant to sell a large percentage of them in the short term. Investing in the stock market should, in any event, be for the long term. It is not the place to put money you're going to need in 3 months time. Alan

The problem is that the items that have to be packed in clear plastic containers have, I think, to go into ONE container. Typical over reaction as always! Alan

My landlord installed a TOT phone line and a 512/256 modem for me. It was up and running within a few days. TOT's service is crap though just now I'm getting 487/234, which is pretty close to the advertised speed. It costs 100 baht for the line and 700 baht for the broadband (total 856 baht incl VAT). THe speed is very variable though and at times it can be well below 100 kbs!!!! Alan

You won't have any problems as both visits are for less than 30 days. Where problems MAY arise is when people have been in the country on 30 days stamps for 90 days in the last 180 days (or perhaps even 3 successive 30 day stamps). Exactly how Immigration interpret the ruling in practice should become clearer next month. Alan

Adam, I'm out on the prowl tonight and tomorrow night but no plans for the next 3 or 4 days after that. Send me a PM and we can maybe meet up in the FLB or Lennies some time. Alan

What's the certificate for? When I renewed my retirement visa in August my health certificate cost me 80 baht but this requirement has since been done away with. A health certificate is still required the first time you apply for a Thai driving licence. Alan

Pity it's next month. I'd be interested if it was during April as Langkawi is a possible destination for me for the duration of Songkran Alan

This is a list I prepared for my laptop. The top 4 lines are lower case, the bottom 4 lines are upper case (hold down the shift key) _ๅ / - ภ ถ ุ ึ ค ต จ ข ช ๆ ไ ำ พ ะ ั ี ร น ย บ ล ฟ ห ก ด เ ้ ่ า ส ว ง ฃ ผ ป แ อ ิ ื ท ม ใ ฝ % + ๑ ๒ ๓ ๔ ู ฿ ๕ ๖ ๗ ๘ ๙ ๐ “ ฎ ฑ ธ ํ ๊ ณ ฯ ญ ฐ , ฤ ฆ ฏ โ ฌ ็ ๋ ษ ศ ซ . ฅ ( ) ฉ ฮ ฺ ์ ? ฒ ฬ ฦ You may need to double check this yourself before trying to type anything. Where there are tone marks, you should type the consonant first, the vowel (if it appears above or below the consonant) next and then the tone mark. Goof luck. โชกดี Alan

I'll try and mnake it tomorrow night. Alan

Whenever I've transferred funds from my Nationwide Isle of Man account, they've arrived within 2 or 3 days at most. Nationwide charges me £20 a time, which as I transfer enough funds to last me about a year, works at less than 0.2%. Alan

I, too, would recommend learning to write the script by hand before attempting to type it. I now now where most of the more common characters are on the keyboard but I do sometimes have to refer to a sheet I created to remind me some of the less common ones are. I don't know any school that teaches written Thai by computer rather than by hand. I would also recommend that you learn to read to a very basic level before attempting to write. I can read Thai, albeit very slowly but I wouldn't attempt writing it yet - apart from some very basic words - until I can get the correct spelling into my head. Alan

The price is per day. If you stay for a month, you will get a reduced rate. I can't remember the exact details now, but it came to something around 1,000 baht per day - though it may be slightly higher now. Alan

This is a Firefox thing - I'm using Firefox 1.5 and can't see anyone's reputation score. I'm not really into this so it doesn't bother me in the slightest. Alan

Are you not being an optimist thinking she's going to wait that long? I'm sure the e-mails or tests will be on the go before then. Alan

I prefer my pizzas to have a decent size base. I go to the Italian restaurant in the Jomtien Plaza a couple of times a month for a pizza. I like it there. Alan

I've just signed up to Pandora and I'm quite impressed with the selection of music they're coming up with, especially the artists I haven't come across before. So far, I've only given them Pink Floyd, ABBA and Beautiful South. Alan

I use a Packard Bell laptop, which is now 2 years old. It came with 256 mg of RAM. I took it back to PC World and got them to put in another 256 mg of RAM because it was so slow. It's still slow at times but when I upgrade, I'm going for a MINIMUM of Igb of RAM. Alan