impulse

And your rats moved next door.

200 years from today, people are going to walk past the collection of Royal portraits and wonder "what kind of drugs were they on?" And wonder what the butterfly may have been saying to him. There's a time for originality and spunk. Royal portraits? Nope. They should convey stability. Plus, gotta consider what it's going to look like in the context of all the rest.

They need to tune into the YouTubes of the British guys that use night vision and pellet guns to take out rats for local farmers. Also Aussies. Not many Americans. We get to use real guns and take out feral hogs that are wreaking havoc on farms. May become a whole new tourist thing... Lord knows there's enough Brits and Aussies in Pattaya with special forces training.

If I showed up like he did before, after, and at the SOTU, my company's HR department would have compared that to the countless videos of me stumbling over my words and battling the teleprompter, and I'd have been selected for "random drug testing" the next day. Anyone who believes that wasn't a fortified performance also doubts that the laptop's real and also believes the Biden family never took in money from influence peddling.

Let's compare records... Under Trump, 1.4% inflation, no invasion at the border, no wars in Ukraine or Israel, cost of gas around $2 a gallon, cost of a buying/financing a new house around 30% lower than today... And not a single cannibal story... But there were mean tweets. Which are so much worse than the specter of WW3 and nuclear annihilation.

The OP may get clearer answers by specifying which anti-depressant(s) he's looking for.

Biden may be able to hold his own in a debate about ice cream, but he's well and truly screwed if they ask him about inflation, the border, the cost of housing and health care for "newcomers", multiple wars on his watch, Israel (or Palestine- he loses on both), Afghanistan, the Biden family business, mortgage rates and home affordability, the cost of gas, credit card debt (or national debt), or cannibals.

I wonder if Hemingway would have sold as many copies if it was called "The Old Man and the Olympic Size Pool"?

Yeah. There's no finer experience than plopping down on a comfy chair with a cold beverage and watching the sun go down over the olympic sized pool. And paying 50 baht for the experience...

"The science" says everyone over 6 months old should get a booster. 77.5% of adults over 18 have said, "no thank you". Last time I checked, 77.5% was more than 22.5%. Kinda agrees with the part of my post that you clipped out: About 70% of U.S. adults have not received the most recent monovalent vaccine nor the bivalent vaccine that preceded it. Most folks seem to be rejecting "the science". By almost a 3:1 margin. Dang conspiracy theorists... https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/stay-up-to-date.html#When_Are_You_Up_to_Date?

How's the beach up in Chiang Rai?

The booster uptake numbers would seem to indicate that the "conspiracy theorists" far outnumber the "follow the science" crowd. About 70% of U.S. adults have not received the most recent monovalent vaccine nor the bivalent vaccine that preceded it. Only 4% of adults have gotten a dose of the most recent vaccine formulation. Vaccine uptake was lower in rural areas and among Native Americans and Alaska Natives. https://www.verywellhealth.com/covid-booster-spring-2024-8603072

I'd spray the whole thing down with WD40 before I'd condemn an AC unit for making noise or for stiff louvers. Ideally, clean out the inevitable collection of dust bunnies and mung, then spray down the moving parts and give it another try. BTW, mung is a technical term for dust and stuff. Chogies is the scientific term for when the mung clumps up into big wads. The wads of congealed mung are called chogies.

If they wanted to make it fair, they'd let CNN moderate, but allow Fox to write the questions.

Biden may, if they require a pre-game drug test. No way he stays lucid for 90 minutes...

Too low or too high? I can see where there would be limited demand at $140 per R/T if you exclude tourists, especially foreign tourists. Most locals would take the train or a bus and lose the day. But a 180 seat aircraft 80% full of $70 per leg passengers is barely $10K USD. And from that, they have to pay fuel, pilots and flight cutie salaries, airport fees, depreciation, maintenance, ground crew, and on and on. I can't even imagine putting a $30 million (Guessing...) asset into the air for $10K a throw. But I know it's done all over. I suspect the route is one of those that's going to be hard to operate profitably unless tourism comes back screaming, which means cutting the bad (h)air days in CR.

The Israeli guy's braver than me. I think long and hard before I hop on a scooter taxi past one or 2 km, especially if it involves the open road and any speed at all.

By my calculation, the guy's still 3,500 baht ahead, and I'd bet dollars to donuts he's back out plying the streets in his tuk-tuk by tomorrow. At worst, maybe across town where they don't recognize him. At the very least, they should have made him return the 6,000 baht.

The neon green relish is made by the Chicago Pickle Company. Chipico.

Not meaning to be morbid, but when does that 7 day clock start? Is it upon declaration of death, after the funeral, or exactly what triggers the clock?

It would be interesting to see an honest study of the entire effect of legalizing weed. How much did that affect alcohol consumption, how much did it affect yaba consumption, etc. And does weed cause the mental problems, or does it attract people seeking relief from pre-existing mental health issues? In addition to how much it affected revenues of the powerful Thai families in the beer and booze businesses. Which, I suspect, is the real reason for the 180 on legal weed. If it's a choice between weed and nothing, I suspect "nothing" is healthier. But that's not the real world choice.

While it is legal by treaty (and I used my Thai license when I became a Covid refugee in Texas), be aware that a lot of cops don't know the rules. I'd suggest downloading and printing an authoritative looking summary from a US gub'ment or other website to show any cop that may pull you over. In fairness to the cops, they may wonder why a US citizen would have a foreign license (too many DUI's back home? Is it real?, etc.) On the flipside, there are cops that are just itching to give people tickets for technical fouls, like an old address on your US license. (Been there, done that) Best to be as ready as you can be, especially as easy as it is to make a printout. In my case (speaking of not knowing the laws), the Texas DMV lady made me surrender my Thai license when she issued my Texas DL. She said I wasn't allowed to have 2 valid licenses at the same time. I would have fought it, but my Thai DL had just a few months left on it and I didn't expect to ever use it again.

3 non-stops a day from Moscow. Wouldn't that be a kick in the nuts?

From NPR: Crime is a huge topic in elections this November, and the FBI has now entered the chat. It has just released the Crime in the Nation report for 2021. But the bureau switched the way it collects crime data this year, and many police departments did not get on board. Los Angeles and New York City did not report to the FBI. In fact, only 63% of the country's police departments submitted anything, and some of the data that was submitted was incomplete. https://www.npr.org/2022/10/05/1127047811/the-fbis-new-crime-report-is-in-but-its-incomplete So you can believe the FBI, who changed the way they collect data... And is now "estimating" crime statistics because over 1/3 of the cities aren't reporting (and in an election year, it's going down. Yeah, right). Or you can believe your lying eyes.

I'm a little confused... The OP states he fell off (sp) a motorcycle taxi, dropped his goodies and that caused a crash. Was it the motorcycle taxi that ran over his stuff and crashed? Or another scooter?