impulse

Those were yesterday's Dems, who bear little resemblance to what that party has become. How's that deficit reduction coming along under Mr. "Let's throw $$$ trillions at our pet projects and forecast great results to get re-elected"?

Tons of Costa Ricans have moved to the USA and gained citizenship. Nothing nefarious about that. Regarding room service, I hang out the Do Not Disturb sign as soon as I check in, and only pull it down once a week or so for fresh towels. I prefer privacy. Not hard to believe he did the same.

I don't know about the UK, but vitamins in the USA generally cost a small fraction of what they cost in Thailand. Same with aspirin, Tylenol and ibuprofen. (That's if you can even find 325mg or 500mg aspirin in Thailand) Compare prices between Lazada.co.th and your home country's Amazon if you want to figure out whether it's worthwhile to carry them in your luggage.

Not saying I'd have moved up next week's BKK arrival for this one, but it sure would be nice to hear about these events before they happen. We always seem to read about them when it's too late to participate, or even attend. BIRA racing, longtail boat races, bikini beach runs, jetski races, fun runs, WW2 memorials, and hundreds of other events happen each year in LOS. Some of them may even get us grumps away from the keyboard. Seems like there should be a forum section like "Upcoming Events"...

Perhaps because that's what's on offer in the job market? Even the most progressive dotcoms seem to be snapping to the fact that they're just not getting the productivity out of their remote workers and are increasing the hours they actually have to bathe, dress and show up at the office. Of course, if their looks are good enough for OnlyFans, that's an option. But that come with its own price.

My job drove me to live in the Asoke area, and I loved it. I didn't think I would, but now I'm a convert. With no commute I'd probably move a little further out to reduce rent costs, but I'd stay near the BTS or MRT. Between Sukhumvit, Silom, Chinatown and the BTS and MRT, everything I needed without even firing up the old Mitsubishi pickup truck. Except when I wanted to get away for weekends. Even then, if I wasn't hauling a kayak or 2 and a couple of bicycles, I'd take public transport for weekend trips as well. When I moved back to the USA (Covid refugee), I sorely missed the walking community and even the feel of "community" I got in the middle of Bangkok. Now debating where I want to retire to, and BKK would be hands down my choice if it wasn't for the 60 hour round trip to visit family who are starting to have normal age related health thingies. And health care expenses. Hard to walk away from Medicare with my pre-existing conditions.

+1 I love Seat61.com https://www.seat61.com/Thailand.htm

One of my pet peeves about Thailand... We always read about these things after the fact.

Is that generally an economic thing, or something else? How much does HIV treatment cost on a monthly basis for a Thai citizen?

Boiling isn't as useful in removing lead from water that's been sent through very old pipes that are either made of lead (not so common) or soldered with lead (very common). I trusted the quality of the water as it left the treatment plant, but not the quality of the water as it entered my apartment many miles away. Not to mention the lack of back flow (anti-siphon) valves along the way... No telling what's been hoovered into the line by someone's Rube Goldberg water system.

My 75 year old diabetic next door neighbor was diagnosed with Covid long before the vaccines were available. At a time when it took 10+ days to get the Covid test results. He and I met every day in the yard when he walked his dogs and he never missed a day of taking the dogs out. Both of us were rather gobsmacked when his results came back positive. His wife didn't get it. He died about a year later, hit head on by a drunk driver who crossed the center line.

I don't have an SCB account...

Someone catch me up here... Does anyone in Thailand have something akin to a Walmart pre-paid debit card or similar, available to tourists? (Walmart's is a visa card, I think) Or even a digital wallet as we're discussing, but specifically for short stay tourists that can be loaded up... I'd like to buy some stuff on Lazada to be sent to my hotel in anticipation of my next arrival (which for me is a visa run from China). But I don't want to expose my US credit cards to the Lazada system, especially ordering from here in China (if Lazada even accepts foreign cards- I bought tons of stuff from them when I had a K-Bank card, but never using a US card). Edit: Opening up the possibilities a little, does anyone have experience using a foreign Visa card on Lazada?

I was an absolute cutie. Until I hit puberty.

My life was wrecked 2 days after I got my 2nd Pfizer. One side of my face went numb, my sense of balance went to crap, and my energy level went into the toilet, where it remains to this day. I didn't get Covid until over 2 years later and by that time, it was milder than the flu. I wonder how many people think they have long Covid, but it's not really long Covid.

That works for 60 days at a time, but not for 61. Plus, it can be a PITA to get down to the immigration office to get the extension. I'd go with the 60 day tourist visa out of the blocks. It's also possible to do up to 2 land border crossings in a year, so the OP could do an old timey visa run to extend past that 60 days, whether it's by tourist visa or extended visa exempt. But, thinking outside the OP's box, I'd plan for a cheap excursion by air to another SEA country like Vietnam or Malaysia just to (as DrJack suggests) spice up the experience. Especially if there's nothing tying the OP to Thailand, like a squeezy thing. Cheap as the flights and hotels are, a few days (weeks...) of bopping around a strange country are more fun than slogging down to immigration and waiting in a queue.

Contrast that with pre-Covid, when the queue would occasionally snake all the way down that incline, almost before you even turned into the immigration sections. I've been loving this year's shorter queues, but can't say it bodes well for those in the tourism business. Edit: I'd add that, coming from China, the flights are always pretty full but there are far fewer flights than before, and no non-stops (where there used to be 3-4 each day from my small town of 15 million people). And a lot of cancelled flights when they didn't fill up, adding half a day to the slog. Until that gets squared away, I don't see much benefit in the visa exempt to attract Chinese weekenders. It takes too long on each end of the journey to make it worthwhile for a discretionary trip.

I think that's why smartphone sales are down. Phones from 5+ years ago do everything you need, albeit maybe a little slower. So why pop for a new one when money's tight like it's been since Covid? Plus, Thailand's repair market is so much cheaper than "back home" where a battery replacement (including labor) can exceed the cost of a new phone. I just bought a Samsung A05s in BKK for 5500 baht because my Moto X4 from back home (4+ years old) runs down the battery in less than a day and only holds one SIM. I'd like to keep my USA SIM active for emergency calls from home and install a Thai tourist SIM for data while I'm in LOS, replacing it with a China SIM for data when I'm there. Dual SIM, it seems to be an amazing phone for the $$$. My challenge now is that Google Play is blocked here in China so I have to limp along until my next visa run to Thailand in a few weeks. I'm a little concerned about how much convenience attaches to Google access. I don't realize until I didn't have it...

Gotta love that about Thailand.... $100+/- of G&C (graft and corruption) and problem solved. I guess the 2 questions are 1) What agency(s) comes recommended (I doubt that can be answered within forum rules) and 2) What, if any, liability does the visa seeker accrue if things go tits up and someone discovers the bank account was dodgily opened? (Coming from nanny land, my mind always goes there- what if I get caught out...)

On 4 of my last 6 arrivals this year, I walked right up to the officer without even a queue. The other 2, there may have been a 5 minute queue. Visa exempt on US passport. Which is great, except then I had to wait up to 45 minutes at the luggage carousel. It's nothing like it used to be. Almost sad, really, knowing how many Thai people depend on tourist money.

I had a similar problem with a set of earbuds, and it turned out that they were latching onto (via Bluetooth) a tablet when I wanted them to latch onto my cell phone. Almost binned them, but finally figured it out and turned off the Bluetooth on the tablet before I pulled them out of the battery case. I don't recall even syncing them with the tablet, but apparently I did. Maybe accidentally, maybe just to try them out. I also have the same issue when I want to use the Bluetooth earbuds with my laptop to avoid disturbing others. In those cases, I have to turn off the Bluetooth on all my nearby devices in the room and then they'll latch onto the laptop. Years ago, I got so frustrated with a cheap set of earbuds that I did bin them. Now, I'm sure they were fine- just latching onto the wrong device. Fortunately, I usually buy the 300 baht Bluetooth earbuds so it didn't hurt too bad to figure out I was the idiot.

Gosh, I sure hope this isn't another one of those prescient articles like "The middle east is quieter than ever under Biden".

You mean like those individual American citizens that don't recall donating thousands of times? The first person O’Keefe interviewed was a man named Michael Jamieson, who, according to FEC data, was listed as the source of $32,000 in donations across more than 3,000 different contributions. When asked if he was aware of the donations, Jamieson said, “No, I’m not.” The second person the team interviewed was a woman named Cindy Nowe, who supposedly donated to ActBlue more than 1,000 times during 2022. The total contributions ascribed to her name totaled $18,849.77, meaning that Nowe would have had to donate three times per day, every single day, all year, O’Keefe said. Nowe told the crew that she donated to ActBlue “once in a while,” but said she did not donate nearly $18,850. “I wish I could have donated $18,000 to Biden’s presidency,” she said, before adding that her actual contributions are just a few donations around $5. https://timcast.com/news/james-okeefe-exposes-potential-money-laundering-scheme-by-democrat-fundraising-group-actblue/

All in good time. I don't know of anybody that wants to see Biden impeached while Kackling Kamala is waiting in the wings. Perhaps just before the 2024 elections would be a good time to have all the evidence ducks in a row... With occasional teasers in the meantime.

Bought mine from Zenni online and paid about 1/8 the price at a local optometrist in the USA. Had zero problems with them. I hear they deliver to Thailand as well. I recall the previous pair I bought from Top Charon and they were even more expensive than a pair at a local optometrist from the USA. Never again, though the eye candy did momentarily take my mind off the screwing I was taking.