voracious

@Lovedog Sometimes the car rental companies run out. I booked with Thai Rentacar and once they ran out. I carry one of those cheap Thai (made in China?) Fox GPS units, but wanted to compare it to whatever the car rental places were using, since the maps on the iFox at the time were not great running me into blocked off alleys and going in circles and such. (quick review Thai rentacar: no gps, car had something wrong and was underpowered but driveable, so the company was ok and cheap) @Severn The last time I was out I rented a Fortuner from Budget (on 3 legs of a long Thai trip) and was quite happy with the GPS they rented me. If you're in Pattaya, check at their branch there and you may be able to rent one. Not sure if they'll rent one without you renting the car from them, but the staff there is pretty helpful so it's worth a shot. If you can't get one and visit Thailand often, perhaps you can consider purchasing one. I recommend spending extra to get a Garmin if you do, as the iFox is wrong far too often to make it worth the while (e.g. arrow indicates right turn, GPS says to take a left in voice) (quick review on Budget. more expensive, but newer cars...near pristine actually. good gps rental. good service. if money is not an issue then I'd go with budget.) hope it helps. edit: in the case of Thai rentacar, yes I had pre-reserved the GPS unit, but if they don't have one when you get there's not much you can do, after asking a couple different ways and being told there are none available. not worth getting upset over

20k for a couple grand in furniture? Is there more that it comes with not listed on the website? edit: "couple grand" is being VERY generous in the estimate. I see a bar a few stools and a couple tables.

+1 to what Gary said. It's still down, at least for me and I can't connect. here's the link to skype where they lay out in more technical terms why. http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/StatusUpdate/

Same for tattoo within the last year or traveling to certain mosquito infested areas. I was red lined on those two alone. Sad, that I cannot help out with the blood, but no worries, life goes on. In Cambodia they had no trouble accepting my blood. They're very short and not very many locals seem to donate.

...and they ain't done f'in it up yet.

I flew on United's Business Class with flat seats/beds and loved it.

Milk or yogurt at the end when you're ready to cool down. let it work a little before you swallow.

Assuming this isn't some kind of wind up. I'll toss this opinion in. If the lady is a good lady, do be aware that some family ties are very strong. It isn't only the Japanese that have a sense of "ON" (obligation to family). If you bring the mother with you so the daughter can take care of her with you in the UK, the family might find that an acceptable alternative. If it's a decent family at all, asking the girl to cut off with the family would be a no-go. edit for clarification: Note: By decent and "good", I'm talking about how a typical Asian family would view another family based on norms and mores which typically stress family over not-family. I'm not making a personal judgment about your girl, who I know nothing about.

I use agoda exclusively (used to use asiarooms but they had very poor service) and have been quite happy. I believe the ability for them to refund you is based on the hotel. I was bumped off a plane and they requested and received a one night credit on my behalf. This was done without me even asking for it, since I knew that the cancellation policy didn't entitle me to anything. For some of the early booking steep discounts, the hotel applies a pretty strict cancellation policy and once the money's gone out to the hotel, if Agoda can't get it back, they're not giving it back to the customer. Not fun, but if you need/want more flexibility than that don't use any prepay service and just book where you can go with no deposit. Pros and cons to that too, but you'll won't have to deal with cancellation policies. Stuff happens. A couple years ago I made a reservation at the vault about many months in advance. Had a death in the immediate family and had to cancel plans. Still several months before the trip. Promptly canceled. I never received a refund of the $50 deposit.

I found this. http://www.eyenetwork.com/search/Thailand/ It came up with a couple, even listing that they're using polycom equipment. Not cheap. Best of luck.

Yep, what they said. I fly Cathay instead if I have a choice. Even United is better. But if you have to do it, an Ambien CR might help get you through the flight nicely (check with your Doc).

If you have trouble watching it on your television (depending on format and your DVD player it can be an involved process making it work), then try this: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ Free download, easy to use video player that is pretty friendly to a variety of codecs and formats. Alternatively http://www.bsplayer.org/ is another good, free player. (just make sure to pick the free version).

have you spilled anything on it? Behavior like that can be a sign of a degrading chip in the keyboard itself. try unplugging it for over 10 minutes, if it doesn't work still, try another keyboard and see if that solves the problem. then for sure you know the keyboard is no good

Although I'm not currently an NRA member, the label doesn't bother me. I know alot of good guys that shoot. It's funny but at the range, people from all walks of life, old or young, tend to be very polite and easy to get along with. Cheers. edit: oh and lest I forget...back to beer, women & some rib eye steak!

I think... he's talking about this: The top one is a spotting scope, the lower one is a rifle scope. It's basically a telescope for day use. There are bigger ones, some with prisms and angled viewfinders, but the one I provided a photo of, is straight through and is used by my spotter when I go target shooting. That said, I've seen some optics sold along the shops on Beach Road on the walk down towards Mike's, and there's the stand on the second floor of Big C near the front courtyard side that sells the green (and red too i guess) lasers and rifle scopes. I'm not sure if they sell the spotting scopes, as I wasn't looking for optics at the time and didn't bother to go through their selection. For the OP, if you leave a flexible day in your schedule and really want to get one, you can always swing through Bangkok as a last resort. If you're looking for Nikon (like the Nikon Prostaff or Fieldscope), because many Nikon products are made in Thailand, I haven't seen any steep discounts for real Nikon products here. From what I understand the prices are more than the USA (was about 10% more last time I looked) and are possibly slightly cheaper prices than the UK. If you're looking for Chinese made, you can get Chinese products fairly cheaply, but then again it'd probably be cheaper still in Zhuhai or Shenzhen... Good luck to you. Hope you find what you're looking for.

Also some excellent background here: http://history1900s.about.com/cs/swastika/...tikahistory.htm It's a bit less technical and an easier read if you're just looking for an overview.

Thanks for the photos! A few nice looking girls there. I wish I was in town to check it out. I'll do so next time I'm out that way :) (sooner than later I hope!)

That's awesome! Love it.

LOL, hope that's photoshop... Glass eyes are a bit creepy stuck in odd places. :)

Don't blame it all on Thailand, lol... If you call Comcast in the states, you need a repair appointment...which is usually about 3 working days out in my area. Then if they come and the problem is not in your house you get charged a $75.00 fee for an unnecessary service call. Horrible, really. Edit: unless you're paying for commercial guaranteed uptime like a T1 or T3 then you have a right to complain. Read the contract and see what they say about uptime. I used to have a T1 to my home and you could call any time and they'd work on it right away, but of course you paid an arm and a leg for it.

Soi6: I've heard that about purple...

Residence Garden will allow you to park without extra charge. I rented a Honda Civic last trip and was happy to drive around and go where I wanted and have easy parking when returning to the hotel.

Happy 50th Birthday, Shane! Best wishes for your birthday :)

hahahaha.... you really had me going there!

Just wait until the baby boomers retire and their demand for social security and medicare kicks in. The cost works out to something like 2 working people will be paying, in it's entirety, the support of 1 retired person. I don't believe we will survive the crushing weight of it. Congress knows, they have known, and as the writer in the paper said today "they just shrugged".