Shilo

OK, for those interested.... I've set up the ESPN NFL Gridiron Challenge for the 2012 season. It's totally free and I think this is the seventh year that we have been doing this across the different Pattaya boards. All are welcome including my English friends who are looking to get back at some of us Yanks that beat them from time to time in their beloved EPL games. Here is a paste and copy of an email that would be sent out from ESPN if I was inviting friends one at a time. The link should work but let me know if there is a problem. This message is from Shilo's Prowler who is challenging you to play Gridiron Challenge on ESPN.com. This game challenges you to build a roster of pro football players consisting of 2 QBs, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE, 1 Kicker, and 1 Team Defense, while staying under your team's $50m salary cap. Best of all, it's FREE to play. Get in the action now: http://games.espn.go.com/nfl-gridiron-challenge/en/group?groupID=811 http://games.espn.go.com/nfl-gridiron-challenge/en/m/group?groupID=811 Group: Pattaya Wannabes Password: Pattaya A couple of quick side notes for returning players and the new guys. The game may seem easy at first. The opening prices for players pretty much allows you to start with whoever you want. Seriously, I was able to pick the number one and two player at every position (except the Kicker) and still stay within the original budget cap. So the good news is that you can start the year with pretty much whoever you want on your team. But going forward the players values will go up and down based on performance. This makes it REALLY hard once little injuries kick in or we start dealing with the BYE weeks. Buy a player at say 6 mill and he does well for several weeks, his price will move up to say 6.7 mill and then comes the BYE week.... do you hold him and take 0 points for that week or do you trade him for a lesser player to get points that week but know that you can't afford to get the original player back... Good luck to all, Shilo (the guys who has the avatar that reflects his two favorite passions in life)

Just to fill in a few gaps... the Sapphire Lodge is new have having some growing pains. Most of the girls are freelancers and it seems that many don't show up till around 9pm. It's the same old problem... sometimes they have girls but no customers, other times they have customers but no girls. In the end both groups move on to greener pastures. So to fix the problem the owner is working on the demand side. The normal ST barfine for the room is 350 baht and the girls are encouraged to ask for 1000. Some are willing but the hotter girls feel like they have a better chance of getting 1500 on Walking St. Anyway, the owner decided that for the month of March he would drop the room charge. He still gives the girl her cut of the barfine, pays the maid service, room upkeep, and laundry. So in many ways he is loosing money on the deal. And to keep away guys who would just pop in and grab a girl and the use of the room he added the 1 LD charge. The hope is that the promotion will drawl in more guys and the word will filter to the girls so that hopefully both groups will grow and business will improve. It may work or it may not... but at least give the guy credit for trying and thinking out of the box.

Just a quick closing note: Thanks to everyone that played this year. The Post Season Gridiron came down to the wire. After a poor opening week where OC Mikey scored in the middle of the pack, he came back strong in weeks 2 and 3 to lead the league and take a commanding lead into the Superbowl. But he put to much faith the the 49ers so entered the last week with half his roster sitting at home watching the Superbowl like himself. It opened the door just a smidge to allow jringh's team ANY GIVEN SUNDAY to snatch the victory by 2 points 492-490. Thanks again for all who played.... let's do it again this coming fall

My current 2 year lease is coming to an end and I'm looking for a double unit in the Viewtalay 2A building. I've been coming to Pattaya for the past 11 years and living here as a retired expat for the past 3. Can offer references if needed but financially secure and looking for a long term lease. I'm willing to consider a studio at the right price but would prefer a double unit. Can move in on May 1st when I get back from AC where I hide out each year to avoid Songkran. To contact me just send me a PM over the board or use my email address berwood72@hotmail.com

Well, with the Giants win over the Cowboys, we come to the end of another regular season of NFL football. And we end another GREAT season of the Pattaya Wannabe's Gridiron season. Like pass years, this was a VERY competitive league. I'm proud to announce that this year's winner was your's truly My Shilo's Prowlers set new records with 2279 points, a ranking of 94th out of about 220K players across the ESPN site with a 100%. It was really close for 2nd with Belem edging out Mikey's Packer's Repeat 2140 to 2139 with 98.4% rankings. A a dead heat for 4th between Kumphawapi and Barfine Corba's with 2124 points each and beating 97.4% of the site. Honorable mention also has to go out to djfranke (96.9%) and cashpix (95.2%) The simple math says that this league had a third of it's players (7 out of 22) that beat 95% of the 220,000 plays on the site.... now that is competitive. Thanks to one and all for another GREAT fantasy season. And for those who missed out but might still want to try their hand we're going to have our first post season Gridiron game. It's open to anyone and it's totally free: http://www.pattayatalk.com/forums/topic/57363-nfl-gridiron-2011-playoff-version/

You pick your roster from the players who play each week... So in week one you would only take players in the Wildcard games. And like the regular season game you are limited to a $50 million budget and the players are valued based on performance. You'll still have the same issues with injuries, prices going up and down as the postseason moves along... but you'll also lose players each week as we narrow down to the final two teams in the Superbowl.

Well the regular season is coming to a close so it means an end to another season of the Pattaya Wannabes Gridiron game. Once again we had about 20 players and several of us took turns leading the pack. But in the end it looks like yours truly will take the bragging rights for this season. And that's saying something when you consider that we had at least 6 guys who were beating something like 95% of all the players on the ESPN site. But because it has been another great season and frankly a ton of fun... I decided to give the ESPN Gridiron Playoff version a go this year. Same rules as the regular game but a clean sheet for all of us who have been butting heads all season. And it's open to ANYONE who wants to join us. OH... and it's FREE. So here are the details you need if you decide to play: This message is from Shilo's Prowler who is challenging you to play Gridiron Playoff Challenge on ESPN.com. This game challenges you to build a playoff roster of pro football players consisting of 2 QBs, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE, 1 Kicker, and 1 Team Defense, while staying under your team's $50m salary cap. Best of all, it's FREE to play. Get in the action now: http://games.espn.go.com/gridiron-playoff-challenge/en/group?groupID=3027 Group: Pattaya Wannabes Password: danger

Well, we're into the 9th week (the half way point) and the Barfine Cobras are in 1st place...1069 points 98.5% My Shilo Prowlers are hot on his heels (2 points back) in 2nd...1067 points 98.4% cashpix who has lead the league for most of the season has "dropped" to 3rd...1055 points 97.6% and Packer's Repeat is still in the hunt at 4th...1048 points 97.0% Like past seasons we have 22 players and to win this league you have got to be one of the best on the site. Those percentages mentioned above means that to be in the top 4 of our league you need to be beating 97% (or better) of all the players across the ESPN site. Now is when it'll get interesting.... we're in the BYE weeks when players need to decide if they are willing to keep a stud player that they bought early in the season and take a ZERO at that position for the week. Or sell him for a lesser player and hope they can juggle their lineups based on weekly matchups. Bottom line: to win this league you need to be one of the best of the best. Good Luck on the second half of the season. NOTE: if anyone is interested in still joining the league then the info at the top of the thread is still active. You won't have a chance in hell of winning this year but you'll be able to play, see how the game works, and be ready for next season

We're up to 8 players The season starts on Sept 8th so we have a little more then a week for anyone else to sign up.... in the past we have averaged about 15-20 guys. Good luck

OK, for those interested.... I've set up the ESPN NFL Gridiron Challenge for the upcoming season. It's totally free and I think this is about the fifth of sixth year that we have been doing this across the different Pattaya boards. All are welcome including my English friends who are looking to get back at some of us Yanks that beat them from time to time in their beloved EPL games. Here is a paste and copy of an email that would be sent out from ESPN if I was inviting friends one at a time. The link should work but let me know if there is a problem. This message is from Shilo's Prowler who is challenging you to play Gridiron Challenge on ESPN.com. This game challenges you to build a roster of pro football players consisting of 2 QBs, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE, 1 Kicker, and 1 Team Defense, while staying under your team's $50m salary cap. Best of all, it's FREE to play. Get in the action now: http://games.espn.go.com/gridiron-challenge/en/group?groupID=3114 Group: Pattaya Wannabes Password: Pattaya A couple of quick side notes for returning players and the new guys. The game may seem easy at first. The opening prices for players pretty much allows you to start with whoever you want. Seriously, I was able to pick the number one and two player at every position (except the Kicker) and still stay within the original budget cap. So the good news is that you can start the year with pretty much whoever you want on your team. But going forward the players values will go up and down based on performance. This makes it REALLY hard once little injuries kick in or we start dealing with the BYE weeks. Buy a player at say 6 mill and he does well for several weeks, his price will move up to say 6.7 mill and then comes the BYE week.... do you hold him and take 0 points for that week or do you trade him for a lesser player to get points that week but know that you can't afford to get the original player back... Good luck to all, Shilo (the guys who has the avatar that reflects his two favorite passions in life)

Well, you have to realize that I have only got a little over 1000 posts over the past 9-10 years or so that I have been on this board. Collectively, Tom and Joe have over 25,000 posts which I guess is a level of activity required to qualify as a true Know-it-All But a better test is to click on their names and take a quick look at the threads that they have started... in all of last year alone Joe started about 6-7 threads and most were in the Sports and Funnies sections. Like a true snakes in the grass, guys like these just like to pounce on other people threads to attack the poster without adding anything meaningful to the original topic. At it's core, this thread isn't about language.... it's about rudeness. Both on the part of the Thais who are willing to allow a "guest" or in most cases the "host" being as he will be expected to pick up the tap for the evening to sit hour after hour as they enjoy an evening of conversation without showing even the most basic attempt to include him in the interaction. And secondly the rudeness of a few BM's who have nothing better to do then attack another BM after he takes the time to share a thought with a well reasoned and sensible post by suggesting that he is silly or a troll.

This right here is a prime example of why I (and I believe a lot of other guys) seldom post on the FLB board anymore... The OP takes the time to present what I believe is a realistic complaint about Thai social rudeness, and then the resident Know-it-alls (Tom and Joe) come along and suggest that he's a troll. Same thing happened to me a while back when I was "silly" enough in their eyes to suggest that it was ignorant for the Thais to have a website promoting a city wide sale over low season in a tourist town yet not offer a hint of English on the site that would give a clue to the average tourist of what was being offered, for how much, or where. To the OP, I agree with everything that you said and will even go further to suggest that it was just these types of interactions that partly underminded my last live-in relationship. And to Joe and Tom.... though I am not a great fan of trolls, I have even less respect for thread fuckers like yourselves.

+1 But in answer to your question.... There are actually several tourist "seasons" here in Pattaya beyond the "High and Low" periods. There are also what are called the "shoulder and peak" seasons. Forgetting the actual numbers of tourist on the ground and thinking just in terms of relative numbers, think of a bell curve. At least in my mind: Low Season really starts to kick in just after Songkran around the end of April. Low Season will extend through the end of Sept. Fall Shoulder Season begins to pick up stream at the beginning of Oct. Peak Season begins at the beginning of Dec. (peaks at the holidays) and extends through Jan. Winter Shoulder Season see business taper off at the beginning of Feb. Then a sudden spike (think: mini peak) for the week of Songkran. Wash and Repeat. Oh and just because I think that this is a question that is worth asking and answering, plus I'm getting really sick of seeing so much micro-managing bullshit of the threads on this board. EDIT: I went ahead and cut out of the post the "racy content" from my post to stay in compliance with the most PC Pattaya board on the net....

Maybe we should start a second thread for the Zombie Bars.... The ones that are still open but a shadow of their former selves. My guess is that the list might be just as long or longer. But on topic, I miss Catz. And many might disagree but I also miss Hammers old Cherry Bar 2, worthless when looking for a barfine but the best place in Pattaya to watch football

Just looking for a little info on the Pattaya Water Park (in Jontiem). I tried the search tool but it's hard to narrow it down when you're using words like Pattaya-Park-Water My girl wants me to take her and her co-worker girlfriend for a visit tomorrow (Saturday)... with no info and just a hunch, I'm going to guess it'll be expensive, poor value for the money, stock full of Russians and weekend Thais.... and otherwise a complete waste of money and time. On the other hand, my girl doesn't ask for much or very often and I figure it can't be that much worst then some of the tourist traps I suffered through back in the states. So anyways... would appreciate any info on costs and or suggestions of what to take along with us to improve the day or to avoid. Thanks

This may not help you but might be of value to someone else.... When I was last living back in the states (about 3 yrs ago) I used Time Warner bundled services for my cable/internet/phone.... they had a service that allowed "unlimited" calling overseas for a flat rate of $20 per month. Might be worth a call to their customer service line if you use them for your cable service.

Almost forgot to mention.... For whatever reason the game seems to be starting out easy as hell... I was able to pretty much pick the cream of the crop at just about every position and still stay within the 50 mill player budget. So at least at the start of this years game you'll be able to either pick the best players and run with them or chose players based on match-ups and keep some money in the bank to make changes along the way. But as some of you guys who have played before know... once the season starts the player prices will go up and down based on performance which will cause headaches when one of your stars gets a minor injury or has to sit out his bye week. It's a pisser when you buy an Drew Brees at the beginning of the year at the budget price of 6.5 mill, he does well and goes up to 7.0 mill and then you get hit with the bye week and have to decide if it's better to lose the points while keeping him or trade for a lesser player knowing you'll never be able to afford to get him back on your roster. Enjoy, Shilo

OK Guys, The 2010 Gridiron Challenge is up and open to all interested. I'll be posting this thread on most of the Pattaya boards. It's played on the ESPN site and free to play. For those who haven't played in the past, it's pretty simple. You register with the site, pick a name for yourself and your team, and use a 50 million dollar budget to buy what you think will be a winning team. You can make changes as often as you like till the first weekend of kickoffs. After that you can still make changes but the players values will go up and down based on performance. Here is the info that would be sent if I was inviting you by email. It gives you the links and code that you'll need to join the Pattaya Expats and Wannabes League Message: This message is from Shilo's Prowler who is challenging you to play Gridiron Challenge on ESPN.com. This game challenges you to build a roster of pro football players consisting of 2 QBs, 2 RBs, 2 WRs, 1 TE, 1 Kicker, and 1 Team Defense, while staying under your team's $50m salary cap. Best of all, it's FREE to play. Get in the action now: http://games.espn.go.com/gridiron/group?groupID=3718 Game Front: http://games.espn.go.com/gridiron/frontpage Group: Pattaya Expats & Wannab Password: Pattaya Good luck Shilo

You might be right.... but I've never had this problem till after I made the "upgrade" from the 4mb to the 10mb service level. And none of my friends who use the 4mb level are having any problems. I'm currently stuck between a rock and a hard place. I want to keep the 10mb speed which is great when I'm watching streaming video over the web. But during the day I am lucky to get 40-90kbs on downloads till after about 7-8pm when it'll often pop up to between 750kbs to 1.1mb downloads. Not a serious problem now but come this fall when all of my favorite TV shows come back and the NFL season starts I'll have to choose between streaming speed vs download consistancy

OK, almost by magic.... my speed problem has been resolved. For no apparent reason, I am now getting the 9.5-10MB speed that I was paying for. And most of the general stuff that I use the net for is working just fine. BUT this is Thailand, so nothing is ever as simple as it would seem. My new problem is that my U-torrent speed has gone to crap. Once is a blue moon it is great (1mb download rate), very once in a while it is decent (500-750 kb), but most of the time it is total crap ("lucky" to get 10-70 kb). My best guess is that the 10MB Pro level is a 20 customer shared line and 3BB "squeezes" the torrent downloads to insure that all the customers get a decent level of speed for the normal net surfing stuff. Anyone else run into this problem and or have any suggestions? Other then calling the damned 1530 call center line. I haven't tried that yet just because I doubt it would do any good and because I'm not sure what their policy would be about torrent usage.

I've talked to several other guys here in View Talay 2, a couple who own and rent out multi units, and some have TOT while others have 3BB. It is hit and miss where some have lost the internet completely, some are seeing power spikes up and down, and still others have had no problems at all. There is only one common theme that I hear over and over... those with problems say it all started about two weeks ago. But then there is the rub. In my case it was about two weeks ago that I made the switch. Another theory is that a couple of weeks ago the city was doing road work outside in front of the complex. Or the last theory, that again it was about two weeks ago when the building moved several UBC dishes from one side of the roof top to the other side for better reception. So many guys are thinking that some where... some how... some wires were clipped or some type of central box took some damage. For myself, I know that it's not my computer, the modem is brand new, and I'm showing that the feed coming from 3BB to my line on my modem status page is showing a very strong signal. I'm stamped my foot for the past two weeks and tried everything I could think of, so now I've just going to ask around for any new ideas and let others in the building with problems take the lead. Does anyone have any idea what is involved with the equipment that is used to pass the internet feeds from the box outside by the parking lot into the building? Is there some sort of transformer unit or could there be a way that the phones lines could squeeze the signal? again Errr.....

OK, I need some help guys... I've run out of ideas. I went ahead and made the upgrade with 3BB from the 3MB to the 10MB "speed". That was about 2 1/2 weeks ago. As soon as I made the switch my speed dropped from 3MB to around 1.5 to 2MB. I called 3BB's hotline 1530 and was told that they would contact a tech and he would call me. No one ever called. For the next two weeks I called about 15-20 times, spoke with supervisors, had them do some stuff over the phone and some times the speed would increase to 7.5-8MB only to dropped down again after a few hours, or it would stay around 2.5-3.75MB for a day or two and then it would rain and dropped down to 1MB. Again, after many calls and promises there was NEVER any callbacks. I did finally catch one of the 3BB trucks while they were at my building with a work order for a different client and got them to check the line. They checked it and then left without any explaination. And of course it didn't fix the problem. Then a couple of days later after a few more calls 3BB showed up again with a work order with my name. They checked the line again and showed me on my modem status page where the signal was coming in at 11.772MB. The tech guy seemed pissed that he had to keep coming out when as far as he was concerned there wasn't any problem to fix.... note: at this point my "speed" was and still is a constant .30MB My Thai girlfriend was trying to explain that nothing had been "fixed" and he response was something along the lines of "we have done what we had to do, we won't be coming back again, fuxk you." So here is where I stand: I believe that 3BB is pumping 10+MB into my line... though their customer "service" is total crap. I have used my computer on a friends wireless modem and it worked fine... so no problem with my computer. I went out and bought a new modem because my old one was a hand-me-down and several years old. No change with the new modem. And the View Talay 2 building guys have checked the phone lines and can't find a problem. The best advice I have gotten from other expats is to drop 3BB and move over to TOT. While other expat friends have said NO... they just moved from TOT to 3BB because they got lousy service from TOT. Personally, I just want this problem to go away So here is the question: it's not my computer, the modem, and for kicks let's assume that the feed is actually 10+MB... any ideas out there as to why I get a constant .30MB speed? has anyone else had the same problem and found a fix? Errr......

Well, I just got back from 3BB where I upgraded to the 10mb Pro level... and naturally, my speed then dropped But I spoke with a friend here in my complex who did the same a while back and he said after a bit of time it'll sort it's self out. For what it's worth, the girl at the office said that the Premier level allows for 10:1 clients to band lines while the Pro level allows for 20:1... so the math suggests that at 3mb w/10 clients to the line I should get about 300K while at the 10mb w/20 clients to the line I might get 500K. Where I'm hoping to see the most benefit is late at night or early mornings when I'm downloading stuff and there is far less traffic... we'll see.

On the surface this will seem like a really stupid question.... but then again, this is Thailand I use 3BB for my internet service. They have three levels called Indy, Pro, and Premiere. I understand that the Indy level is the cheapest because they have upwards of 50 customers using one line. Premiere is what I use and is supposed to only have 5-10 customers on a shared line. The Pro level is a mystery.... I currently pay 1090 baht per month for 3mb of speed. The Pro level has a 10mb service for 1490 baht per month. But I have heard that the Pro level only works best within Thailand and is much slower when accessing sites outside of the country. And I have no idea how many customers are on a single line. So my really stupid question: is the 10mb Pro service worth the extra 400 baht over the 3mb Premiere service?

Well, I think that I'm making some progress.... I've got it narrowed down to a choice between two units. Samsung 40", LCD, 1080p, 120Hz, Series 6, at a price of around 25,000 baht or LG 42", LCD, 1080p, 120Hz, also priced around 25,000 baht. They both seem to be comparable on just about every level, decent reviews, middle of the line so seem to offer decent value, and at least in the central Festival there is a Power Buy, Samsung, and LG stores right next to each other... so easy to scoop out for sales or bargains. I still have a few weeks before I move into my new condo so I'll use the time to save up some money and watch for a bargain.