nkped

Looked at my shot record and the last small pox inoculation with the air force was 1984, the year before I got out. Think the first one was as a baby. The Thai ex had a visible scar consistent with a smallpox inoculation and she was an Isaan farm girl so I suspect the vaccination was pretty universal in Thailand as far back as the 50s. No clue as to when it would have been discontinued.

My Wells Fargo ATM, which works just fine all over the U.S., works equally as well in Thailand.

Can't say that our Pommie friends seem to miss too many meals. English breakfast makes McDonalds look like health food.

Print out the page on the RG site with the address in Thai. It serves to get you in the vicinity. I have had drivers who needed it.

Not the best person to ask about smoking/non-smoking but no signs posted and I seem to remember moving an ash tray on the coffee table. In house laundry is by the piece and I would say you pay at least double what you would pay across the street. There is (was?) also a laundry a couple of doors down on the same side of the street. The one across the street is a few doors down from the Food Mart so you will probably be going over there anyway.

Attorney from the big city goes to do a jury trial in a small town where there probably had not been a jury trial in 3 or 4 years. Given the opportunity to question the prospective jurors, he asked the first one "Do you know the plaintiff or any or the other parties to this action?" The judge interrupts and says "Counselor, they all know everyone in the room except for you so you can skip that one."

A 01 room is at the south end of the building of each floor up through the 6th floor (North America numbering--ground floor is 1st floor) and has real windows in the bedroom, which is nice. Never tried the WiFi so can't tell you whether it is better on one floor or another. Laundry in the RG itself is pricey. There are a couple of laundries close by which are much more reasonable.

I'm not bothered by the practice. As Packhike says, if we want to be in on those conversations, learn Thai. And, no, I have not made much progress in that regard, in spite of an on and off relationship with one Thai of many years. It's also not unique to Thailand. Listened to a lot of Korean while engaged in a LLT in Korea.

To somebody from the great plains (middle of U.S.) an accent from Ontario and points east, is fairly noticeable. BTW Folks from the upper peninsula of Michigan have a similar accent. My fellow wheat farmers from the Canadian plains are a bit harder to pick up on.

If the reservation included the destination, the OP does have a legitimate complaint. But yes, he should have had for info with him to give to the driver.

Have to put the Doors in there someplace.

It doesn't happen on flights to Cambodia, Korea or Taiwan.

Type II diabetes does not necessarily (or even typically as I understand it) require insulin. But if it does, a trip to Pattaya could pose an additional challenge if you are in the early days of injecting insulin. I'm not in a medical field, but I was around my brother in his first few months of taking insulin. He had at least two or three instances where he did not get enough glucose in the system after the morning insulin shot and almost blacked out standing up. First aid (it worked) was handing him a bottle of orange juice and telling him to drink. Once, he was driving and I was a pass

The U.S. Embassy's website has an extensive discussion of dying in Thailand.

Their site has very helpful pics of the rooms which seem to confirm a number of the positive things folks have said. Enough views to allow one to make an assessment of the rooms, other the strength of the AC and whether or not you can hear Villa swinging from the light fixtures in his room . From the pics of the bar posted elsewhere on the board, it looks to be a very civilized place. Will have to check out the bar, if not the guesthouse, next trip.

In the normal course there would have been Brits living in the U.S., lawful permanent residents (green card holders) primarily, who would have been serving in the U.S. military during Vietnam just as there are non-citizens serving now. They were subject to the draft and were drafted (conscripted). Many would have enlisted just as their U.S. born friends and neighbors did. Without researching the specifics, I have to think some of the guys with their names on the wall held UK passports at the time of their deaths. Could there have been 22 of them? I don't know, but they would have been mem

When I lived in Anchorage and traveled to the east coast for business, I would tell people I could have gotten to Seoul in the same travel time and guess where I would rather have traveled to. Got some really strange looks with that line.

The secret to a long layover in Seoul is the transit hotel inside the airport.

What nick do you use when you are on the clock? No, wait, I know--Villayouth.

The internet can be scary on occasion. A site for number 1 tunes For me, it was apparently "Goodnight Irene" by Gordon Jenkins & the Weavers.

No real idea, but it's possible it could have been Sinatra or something by Benny Goodman's band.

In 1974 the Air Force gave me good news twice over. First, I was going to get to leave South Carolina--believe me, that was good news. Second, I was going to be paid to live in beautiful Nakhon Phanom on the Mekong.

In my first incarnation as a monger, I was in both the Philippines and Korea when they had midnight curfews that were enforced. You can party a lot by midnight, but you had to get an earlier start. Was in Korea in the early 80s when they ended the midnight curfew and it was not particularly good news. If you were trying to set something up with a bar tender or waitress who got paid by the bar, you had to wait a couple of hours longer to get down to business--BTW, they wore red badges. Also, your target selection did not improve as the evening went on.

Flew out of SFO in July and all of the screeners in sight were from a private company rather than TSA. Their uniforms looked a lot like TSA but different badge and shoulder patch. I mention that because of the people in the U.S. who think they will get a less onerous security regime if their airport opts for a private security contractor instead of TSA.

I'm more worried about the workmen's comp claims from the TSA employees who say they got PTSD from having to look at my sorry ass.