Gary

What a shame. Ryan was on his game and gave them a big lead the first half. Then the Atlanta coach then decided to sit on the lead and forgot who they were playing. Atlanta simply got out coached.

I was rooting for Atlanta but thought they would get beat. It now looks like Atlanta is kicking the shit out of the Pats. 28 to 3.

What makes you think that Pattaya is a great city? I personally think Pattaya has gone seriously downhill.

That's exactly why she sells it standing and the guy who buys it does the cutting. There are a few cane harvesters around but the small fields around here are far too small to use a harvester. AND, no, I have never cut sugar cane but my wife did up until a couple years ago. I watched. At 49 years old, there is now too much pain involved. She has a small patch of her own to cut and she has been putting it off.

Some years ago and before she started working for the electric company, she farmed about 20 rai herself. She and other Thai women worked each other's farms. I always thought it was odd that it was only the women who worked in the fields. It finally got to be too much for her and now most of the land is sharecropped. They do that two different ways. If they share the planting expenses and fertilizer, it is a half and half deal. If the share cropper pays for everything, it is two thirds with one third going to the land owner. That is for rice. Sugar cane works a little different. Normally my wife takes care of the planting, herbicide and fertilizer and then sells it standing for a set negotiated price. The buyer does the harvesting. The second way is that the sharecropper rents the land by the rai. Rent per rai is not very popular and involves several years. They get between three and four yearly cuttings before replanting. The wife has dozed most of the rice paddy dikes and converted to sugar cane. More money and less work. Well over half is now sugar cane.

My Thai wife has no idea of what my finances are. On the other hand, I don't know anything about her finances either. She farms about 65 rai and works part time for the electric company. I have no idea how much she makes and I don't care. I do know that she has a mortgage at the bank and as soon as one mortgage is paid off, she buys more land.

The coach had put together the perfect team for the Chicago Bears. The only thing that was missing was a good quarterback. He had scouted all the colleges and even the Canadian and European leagues, but he couldn't find a super athlete who could ensure a Super Bowl win. Then one night while watching CNN he saw a war-zone scene in the West Bank . In one corner of the background, he spotted a young Israeli soldier with a truly incredible arm. He threw a hand grenade straight into a 15th story window 100 yards away. KABOOM! He threw another hand grenade 75 yards away, right into a chimney. KA-BLOOEY! Then he threw another at a passing car going 90 mph. BULLS-EYE! "I've got to get this guy!” the coach said to himself. "He has the perfect arm!" So, he brings him to the States and teaches him the great game of football. And the Bears go on to win the Super Bowl. The young man is hailed as the great hero of football, and when the coach asks him what he wants, all the young man wants is to call his mother. "Mom," he says into the phone, "I just won the Super Bowl !" "I don't want to talk to you", the old woman says."You are not my son!" "I don't think you understand, Mother," the young man pleads. "I've won the greatest sporting event in the world. I'm here among thousands of my adoring fans." "No! Let me tell you!" his mother retorts. "At this very moment, there are gunshots all around us. The neighborhood is a pile of rubble. Your two brothers were beaten within an inch of their lives last week, and I have to keep your sister in the house so she doesn't get raped!" The old lady pauses, and then tearfully says,.......... "I will never forgive you for making us move to Chicago !!!!"

I'm very surprised that the group of notorious real estate scammers are still alive, I would have thought that at least some of the people who were scammed out of their life savings would have a need for revenge.

I have tried a number of different Linux releases, including Ubuntu, Slackware and even the very small compact Puppy. I am no techie for sure and have found Linux Mint the best for me. Simple things for simple guys. I use Chrome for my browser, Open Office or whatever it is called now and Gmail or Hotmail (both) for my email. Once in a while Mint tells you updates are available and a couple of clicks gets that done. I can easily connect to the Internet with either my phone or an air card. I don't get into the nuts and bolts of Linux. It just simply works and works well. ADDED - A friend of mine bought a new desktop with a counterfeit WIndows OS on it. He was too stubborn to add an antivirus program because of the frequent updates and Windows itself always wanting to update. He was constantly infected with malware and viruses. I put Mint 17.3 on it for him. He is using the already installed Firefox and he is a happy camper. Before having Mint, he was alway calling me to help him out. Both my laptop and netbook are running on version 17.3. There is a newer version but 17.3 works fine.

I really can't give a knowledgeable answer but maybe one reason is because every time you want to change something in Linux, you have to put in your password. I think it's just not worth a hackers time and effort to try to get by just that protection. I'm sure Linux is not virus proof but the assholes don't seem to want to bother.

I have Linux Mint on a laptop and a netbook. I use Windows 10 at home on my desktop. At home I use too many Windows programs to use Linux but when traveling, Mint works fine. If you want to surf the web or want to use programs like word processing or a spread sheet Linux is fine. With Linux I don't have to worry about viruses or updates. It all depends on what you want to do.

I doubt that liberals would appreciate it but it is, after all, just a joke.

Isaan Lawyers charge 5,000 baht for a single will and 8,000 baht for husband and wife wills. I was going to have it done but my wife is tighter than the bark on a tree. She says the local amphur will make your will for free. She goes to the amphur and they tell her not to worry about it because she will get everything anyways. Since then I have not worried about it. My bank account in the US goes to my son so that is taken care of. My wife has no idea how much I have in my US bank.

Keep in mind that BigD really doesn't care what the costs are. The government is paying his medical bills either directly or with a reimbursement.

Beer and the Wheel The two most important events in all of history were the invention of beer and the invention of the wheel. Beer required grain and that was the beginning of agriculture. Neither the glass bottle nor aluminum can were invented yet, so while our early humans were sitting around waiting for them to be invented, they just stayed close to the brewery. That's how villages were formed. The wheel was invented to get man to the beer and vice versa. These two were the foundation of modern civilization and together were the catalyst for the splitting of humanity into two distinct subgroups: 1. Liberals. 2. Conservatives. Some men spent their days tracking and killing animals to BBQ at night while they were drinking beer. This was the beginning of what is known as the Conservative movement. Other men who were less skilled at hunting (called 'vegetarians' which was an early human word meaning 'bad hunter') learned to live off the Conservatives by showing up for the nightly BBQ's and doing the sewing, fetching, and hairdressing. This was the beginning of the liberal movement. Some of these liberal men evolved into women. Others became known as girlie-men. Some noteworthy liberal achievements include the domestication of cats, the invention of group therapy, group hugs, and the concept of democratic voting to decide how to divide the meat and beer that Conservatives provided. Over the years Conservatives came to be symbolized by the largest, most powerful land animal on earth, the elephant. Liberals are symbolized by the jackass for obvious reasons. Modern Liberals like lite beer (with lime added), but most prefer white wine or imported bottled water. They eat raw fish but like their beef well done. Sushi, tofu, and French food are standard liberal fare. Another interesting evolutionary side note: many liberal women have higher testosterone levels than their men. Most college professors, social workers, personal injury attorneys, journalists, film makers in Hollywood, group therapists and community organizers are liberals. Liberals meddled in our national pastime and invented the designated hitter rule because it wasn't fair to make the pitcher also bat. Conservatives drink real beer. They eat red meat and still provide for their women. Conservatives are members of the military, big game hunters, rodeo cowboys, lumberjacks, construction workers, firemen, medical doctors, police officers, engineers, corporate executives, athletes, airline pilots, and generally anyone who works productively. Conservatives who own companies hire other Conservatives who want to work for a living. Liberals produce little or nothing. They like to govern the producers and decide what to do with the production. Liberals believe Europeans are more enlightened than Americans. That is why most of the liberals remained in Europe when Conservatives were coming to America. They crept in after the Wild West was tamed and created a business of trying to get more for nothing. Here ends today's lesson in world history. It should be noted that a liberal may have a momentary urge to angrily respond to this post. A Conservative will simply laugh and be so convinced of the absolute truth of this history that it will be shared immediately to other true believers and to just piss-off more liberals. And there you have it. Let your next action reveal your true self, I'm going to grab a few beers and grill some ribs!

Jacko, don't feel bad. Many people made a lot of money in the stock market. On the other hand some people lost a lot of money. Put me in that group. Was it my fault or was it the fault of the greedy assholes that managed my retirement account? In any case, I was ultimately responsible and I was the one who lost money. As it stands today, I have NO money in the stock market. My money is in an insured money market and is earning basically nothing. That suits me just fine because I always know exactly how much I have. If I were a young man, I would be concerned with that because a young man can afford to lose money and then make it back. My working days are far behind me. I am happy to say that I did plan my retirement carefully. No way am I wealthy but my pensions bring in more than I spend and since I no longer have health insurance, (priced out), my nest egg is enough to pay for any serious health problems I may have. I'm content. What more can I ask for?

Well, the plates are big.

For what it's worth, I didn't trust Bitcoin either and still don't.

Just put me down as an old Luddite. I don't trust my phone and am skeptical of my home computer. I'm even nervous about using a credit card here in Thailand.

My wife uses all that social crap, if not every day at least several times a week. She was using a Galaxy S5 and was happy with it. Unfortunately the mainboard died. I had a cheap Samsung J1 That I had for a spare. I set that up for her. It simply wasn't up to the task. I was using an IQ Slim 2. I set that one up for her. It was better but still too slow for how she used it. After having mainboard failures on two Galaxy S4's and the S5, I wasn't going to buy anymore high end Samsung phones. After a lot of research, I ordered a Xiaomi Mi 5. I was setting that phone up and was quite impressed with it. She loves that phone and especially the camera. She says it is faster and better than the S5. After sending the S5 to Dr. Smartphone in Bangkok and getting it back, it again died. The repair shop said they were sorry and to send it back to them. They had tried to repair the mainboard but did warm me that it wasn't a sure thing. That repair cost me 3,000 baht. They then replaced the mainboard, supposedly using genuine Samsung parts. They credited me the 3,000 baht and charged another 1,500 baht for the new mainboard. They had told me that a new mainboard would cost 5,000 baht. Samsung service wanted 7,000 baht and this cost 4,500 baht total. They even included a new battery so the shop isn't a ripoff. The bottom line is that I told my wife that her S5 was like new again. She told me to use it myself because the Xiaomi Mi5 is a better phone, faster and a better camera. The Chinese phone has no Chinese apps on it and has Playstore installed. She didn't like the stock Xiaomi launcher so I downloaded the Google launcher. It now looks and acts just like the S5 she was used to. It remains to be seen how the phone will hold up. The S5 lasted about a year and a half before it died. The Xiaomi is guaranteed by the manufacturer for a year the same as the Samsung warranty. The new phone was about half the price of a new Samsung, about 10,000 baht. ADDED - The new phone has no memory card but has 32GB of ROM. The S5 has 16GB of ROM and I had an 8GB memory card in it. I had a number of apps on the memory card and when the memory card died many other things died also. I decided that the built in ROM was better.

The first thing a thief does is remove the battery and if the battery isn't removable, there is an app on Playstore and even instructions on the Internet that will quickly run the battery totally dead. Anyways if it gives you some peace of mind, go for it, it costs nothing. As for myself, I don't put any sensitive information on my phone.

The big day is over for another year. I had the turkey dinner at Eddies. The US turkey was excellent. The price was 675 baht. I was a little surprised because he had several other options on the menu. I thought everyone liked turkey. The only problem I had was that I didn't have room for a beer after I finished eating. I went back to the condo to take a nap. I was almost asleep when my wife called me to say Merry Christmas.

The problem is you won't know if it worked or not. I have a thing about putting anything confidential on my phone. Phones are too easily stolen to take a chance. I don't even bother to use the fingerprint unlock.

Phone thieves are getting a lot smarter. The first thing they do is a factory reset if possible and then remove the battery until they think the former owner is no longer looking for it. The iPhones password protection is pretty solid but what good does that do the former owner? There's very little satisfaction knowing the thief cannot use the phone. If there is no way the thief can hack the phone, they sell it for parts. Here in Thailand the police have no interest in trying to find a stolen phone.

I was working in Thailand until the economy crashed. I was paid in baht which meant that I was making about half of what I had been making. I accepted an offer in Kalifornia for very good money. I was there for about a week finding that I hated SoCal. I spent the next five years trying to figure out how to get back to Thailand. It turned out quite well for me. Since I was making a lot of money in Kalifornia I topped up my Social Security account and even got a small pension from the company. My savings account was healthy and I was able to retire and get back to Thailand. I well remember sitting in the big bird at Don Muang thinking that I would likely never see Thailand again. I had no idea that I would miss Thailand as much as I did. My boss at the Kalifornia factory was very good to me. He realized how much I missed Thailand. I made two trips a year, two weeks over the fourth of July and three weeks over Christmas and New Years. If not for those holidays, I don't know if I could have stuck it out for those LONG five years. So yes, a long visit back to the US will convince you that Thailand is a pretty good place to live. The women I met in Kalifornia had all been married to bastards, had kids and enough baggage that it was easy to understand why they were divorced.