Yujin

Quartz has an interesting article about how Boeing transformed itself from an innovating and safety driven aeronautical engineering company into a "bean counter" company run by non-engineers to maximize profit over everything else . . . including safety. The 1997 merger that paved the way for the Boeing 737 Max crisis https://qz.com/1776080/how-the-mcdonnell-douglas-boeing-merger-led-to-the-737-max-crisis/

I haven't tried it yet, but vegans are being warned that if you go to Burger King or another fast food restaurant, there will be cross-contamination since they are cooked on the same grill as their beef patties.

I finally got around to watching John Wick 3. It's almost non-stop action with l-o-n-g fight scenes and a high body count. I was almost physically fatigued watching all the fighting. Despite all the violence, I enjoyed the subtle and not so subtle humor like when Halle Berry went off on a revenge killing spree because someone killed her dog (similar to what set off John Wick in the first movie). John Wick 3 is better than John Wick 2. From the ending of John Wick 3, there's going to be a John Wick 4 and I hope Halle Berry returns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSXc5z9F7Do&t=152

If popularity is based upon $$$, then the US Women’s Soccer team (USWNT) is more popular than the US Men’s Soccer team. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/19/us-womens-soccer-games-now-generate-more-revenue-than-mens.html Right now the FIFA Women’s World Cup and the Copa America games / matches are on TV. I’ve found myself watching more of the FIFA Women’s World Cup games / matches than the Copa America regardless of the countries playing.

Boeing CEO, Dennis Muilenburg, admits his company at fault (“we own it”) in connection with two plane crashes involving 737 MAX 8. And he said that his company will fix the problem.

The co-pilot only had 200 hours of flying experience or "basically . . . a student pilot." https://www.businessinsider.com/ethiopian-airlines-flight-302-co-pilot-200-flight-hours-2019-3

That’s a very good video about Boeing’s quality control problem. Unfortunately, Boeing continues to have problems with quality control. Last month, the USAF stopped taking delivery of new Boeing KC-46 tankers after finding “trash, tools, nuts and bolts . . . scattered inside the aircraft.” You would think that someone from Boeing would have walked through the KC-46 before delivery with a checklist to make sure the inside was vacuumed, windshields clean, tires filled with air, etc. (like at your local car dealership). This shows the "I don't give a damn" attitude of Boeing. https://

I just finished Mark Bowden’s “Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam”. It’s one of the best non-fiction book that I’ve read about the Vietnam War. I was in high school in 1968 and getting too close for comfort to draft age so I was paying close attention to the news media accounts of the Tet Offensive. I thought I knew a lot about it, but Mark Bowden’s book revealed that I knew very little. I apparently was drinking General William Westmoreland’s Kool-Aid about the inconsequential and ineffective Viet Cong and NVA forces during the Battle of Hue. https://ww

I live in a condo in the US and there are two Russian families (mother, father, grandmother, kids) who live on the same floor. Everytime I would see them outside of their condos, I would smile and greet them "Good Morning" or "Good Evening". At first, they wouldn't acknowledge me and just scowled. After a few weeks, they started to smile and greet me or acknowledge my greeting. I spoke with one of their adult kids and she said that people in Russia never smile or greet strangers so they were suspicious when I started to smile and greet them. They invited me to a holiday party where

From what I’ve read in other articles, this EVA passenger has displayed and made similar conduct on other round-trip flights between Los Angeles and Bangkok. He seems to be a frequent flyer to Thailand. If you fly between those cities, you might have had the misfortune to have flown with him . . . or you might be him. https://viewfromthewing.boardingarea.com/2019/01/21/awful-passenger-meets-eva-air-hospitality-in-the-lavatory-and-it-gets-crazier-from-there/ EVA Airlines “blacklisted” the passenger, but he somehow got around the “blacklist” by making a slight change in the spellin

I saw Peter Jackson’s “They Shall Not Grow Old” at my local theater. It’s an amazing documentary film on World War I about a war that I must admit I did not know much about. At the showing that I attended, after the credits, there was a special 30-minute clip by Peter Jackson explaining how he turned 100+ year old silent B&W film into color with dialogue and sound effect. I don’t know if the impact of this documentary film will be the same on a small TV screen or computer monitor so see it on a big theater screen if possible. The sound effect of the artillery shells explod

Evil Penevil - Thanks for posting your restaurant reviews! You've given me some interesting restaurant choices on my next visit to Pattaya. I also must be getting "old" when I'm more interested in reading restaurant reviews than about massage parlors and the best places to find female companionship.

I saw SEARCHING and it was the best movie that I’ve seen this year; and it’s worthy of its win at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. It’s a real “Whodunnit” movie with lots of unexpected twists and turns similar to an Alfred Hitchcock movie. As in our normal lives, the movie makes heavy use of personal computers, social media, Facetime, “catfishing”, texting, etc. to tell the story but in a coherent way. The movie’s underlying message is that the cover-up of a crime is always worst than the crime being covered up. [video=youtube;T8zaNxmQC9s]

Evil Penevil - Thanks for the review, photos and directions to Akatsuki! The one thing that impresses me is the price and the quality of food at Japanese restaurants in Bangkok and Pattaya. Where I live, the prices at Japanese restaurants are much higher compared to Thailand so I splurge when I go there. I'll have to add this Japanese restaurant to my list when I get back to Pattaya.

I haven’t stayed there “recently,” but I wasn’t impressed when I stayed there several years ago. Unless the Bay Breeze under went a major remodel, I don’t think much has changed. The rooms are small. The balcony is so small that it’s only useful to hang your clothes to dry. The rooms have small safes but they do NOT work. From what I was told, the hotel deactivated all the room safes because too many guests were finding their valuables stolen from the room safe. On their website, a room safe is NOT listed as one of the “room amenities.” Instead you have to use the front desk safety de

I read that there's already a "Baby Driver" sequel in production.

I too agree that “Dunkirk” was over hyped, but that's HOLLYWOOD (or the British version of Hollywood). From what I’ve read, the evacuation was a total cluster f**k and only by sheer luck and Hitler’s refusal to allow his panzer units to attack were the Brits able to evacuate so many men. The movie glossed over the massive undertaking and missed opportunities to evacuate the troops sooner. When rescue was undertaken, ships ran aground. Some ships were sent to the wrong beaches where there were no troops to be rescued so they returned back to England empty. Ship captains were given tourist

In the USA, there are prisons that have the well-earned reputation of being “gladiator schools”, e.g., Angola (Louisiana), Attica (New York), Pelican Bay (California). After watching A Prayer Before Dawn, “gladiator school” is an accurate description of the Thai prison depicted in the movie. A Prayer Before Dawn is based upon the best selling memoir of Billy Moore, a young British meth user sentenced to 3 years in a Thai prison. This movie is hyper-violent and scary. Everything that you fear would happen to you in a prison happens in A Prayer Before Dawn. [video=youtube;Mp88Nuci68c&a

An old video, but a reminder that what you see might not be what you get (especially in Thailand). Have a safe and happy Christmas holiday!!! [video=youtube;2RhhJuRLPrE]

I just finished reading Beneath a Scarlet Sky by Mark Sullivan and I highly recommend it if you’re a history buff (especially about WWII). Beneath a Scarlet Sky is a historical fiction based on the memoir of an Italian teenager Pino Lella during WWII (who I just read is still alive and living in Lesa, Italy). It’s “historical” because all the events, characters, and places are true. It’s “fiction” because the dialogue needed to be created. I’ve read lots of books about WWII, but this novel gave me an insight into something that I knew very little about - the war in Italy, the Italian

I haven’t seen Narcos, but I just finished reading Pablo Escobar: Beyond Narcos. The book gives a very good insight into the rise and fall of Pablo Escobar, the Colombian drug cartels, and US government support for the drug cartels. In the book, the author of Pablo Escobar: Beyond Narcos points out some of the errors and omissions in the Netflix series. Nevertheless, I’ve got Narcos on my winter to-watch binge list. https://www.amazon.com/Pablo-Escobar-Beyond-Shaun-Attwood/dp/1537296302/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

Pattaya hotels seem to have a high number of deaths and injuries from guests falling from their hotel balcony. At first, I thought it was probably suicide or a mixture of too much booze and suicide. After my last trip to Pattaya, I noticed something that now leads me to believe falls from hotel balconies are most likely accidental. What I noticed is the height of the balcony railing is very low. I’m not a tall person (5’6” / 167 cm) and I almost fell over the balcony railing after I stumbled on the threshold between my room and the balcony. After that near death experience, I rarely vent

A few years ago, someone spoofed The Atlanta Hotel "Sex Tourists Not Welcome" site and replaced The Atlanta Hotel with The Nana Hotel. Guys on the the internet went bonkers before realizing that it was a hoax and not the end of the world.

Baby Driver is one of the best movies that I've seen in 2017. Fast car chases, violent criminals, good music . . . the success formula for a guy's movie. [video=youtube;D9YZw_X5UzQ&t=16s]

My thoughts and prayers to the people in Texas. Wind damage is bad, but flood damage is the absolute worst. It’s a good thing that most Americans outside of Texas aren’t as provincial when it comes to helping their neighbors as Senator Ted Cruz who voted against federal disaster aid to New York after superstorm Sandy. http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/peter-king-i-won-t-abandon-texas-the-way-ted-cruz-did-ny-1.14093108