xylophone

I hope this is true, especially for a recently ousted US President!!

I think you've confused the difference between being a Patriot and a Dumbo who believes the myriad of lies which have been propagated by trump.

"the allure of owning your own business sometimes cloud the cool heads and judgments". If indeed there was ever a "cool head and judgement" in the first place and I can give you a couple of prime examples.......... An ex-girlfriend of mine, who was university educated with a minor degree in accounting, was working at a small hotel here, until it was demolished for redevelopment by the landowner. We split up and as part of the deal I bought her a small laundry business which was going well but she couldn't manage, especially in the art of delegation, so she was doing all of the work and looked quite unwell through overwork. As far as management goes, she had no management or delegation skills and sold the place. She later told me that she was going to open up a little restaurant/food shop near the "tourist elephant camp" even though very few farangs actually came through the place, but that didn't deter her and after paying good money to set up the equipment etc, it made no money at all, so she walked away from it, going to France to work for three years to save some money. She is now back in Bang Rakam and told me she was going to open a little shop, so I asked her what the foot traffic was like (or indeed any traffic) and she didn't have a clue. However she opened it up with the money she had saved and now it is doing absolutely nothing. It is lucky for her that I have vowed to take care of her daughter from the time we split up until now when she is a 22 year old completing her last year of a teaching qualification at university. So in summary there is an intelligent (supposedly) and fairly well-educated Thai woman who hasn't got a clue about business but who was adamant she wanted to own her own business and failed at it three times. I have two other stories like this, but this one has already gone on too long, however it is not only the Thais who get taken in by the "want to be a business owner/boss" as it happened to 2 farang friends of mine who opened a bar which became very popular, and they were offered 12 million baht for it some 10 years ago but said it was worth a lot more – – that is until business started falling off and then the landlord decided to close it and make something different out of it, so they walked away with basically nothing. The dream was gone.

Good to hear from you again, Merijn.????

Where on earth would they let such a nut job as MTG hold such a position in government. BUT, having said that it really goes to show that the GOP is a party of MAGA loonies and are desperately searching for something to cling onto in order to besmirch the Democrats and Biden – – sad for a country which was once held in high esteem.

I bought some Tart Cherry capsules when I thought I had gout, but not really sure if it was or not, as have had quite a few inflammatory episodes after decades of playing football and tennis. HOWEVER whatever is in the Tart Cherry capsules, they worked.

Has he been playing in the Reserves these last few years?

As mad as a meat axe and about as popular as a rattlenake in a lucky dip. US politics for you.

It happens a lot here in Patong and I could name quite a few café's and bars that have opened up in place of others that have closed down, and are now in the process of doing the same. Owning a business here as bignok has said is a "dream of theirs" (Thai girls esp) and unfortunately the majority of people who do open small businesses/cafés etc really don't have a clue. For example in my street there are three Italian restaurants which have opened and closed in fairly quick succession, four bars which have done the same, likewise a couple of cafés and I could probably name another three bars which will be on the market very shortly. Suffice it to say that all of these "small businesses" had one thing in common – – a Thai woman who wanted to own her own business, and a farang who was willing to back her. Having said all that, there are some profitable bars and restaurants here, but the small ones in the out of the way places are the ones which turnover quite frequently, and is not hard to see why.

I have to agree with that comment above, although I have been a United supporter since the mid-1950s, and just to add that, although I am a supporter of a particular team, I am also a supporter of good football, no matter who plays it and that is paramount for me. City have been playing the best football I have ever seen in the UK, and I am truly worried about the FA Cup final between City and United, because I'm not sure that United can live with the excellent style of football that City are playing at the moment.......time will tell.

I'm with 3BB and it seems strange that IvorBiggun2 has been able to download it on TBP?? Will try a few more avenues, and thanks for your help.

Thanks Will, but tried to download the movie, "Millers Crossing" on both TPB and RGBG and it said I needed a VPN to do so and gave me 3 VPN options....will try Lime tomorrow. Ta.

A question please for all of you movie buffs who are au fait (and then some) with the downloading process....... I usually download my movies from 1337x.to but occasionally they don't have what I want, even in the archives, so I have to go to some others, and in a huge percentage of cases, they need you to download a VPN in order to access the movie. I have found ways around it before, but it looks like they've been "closed", so here's the question: – "I have already got the Nord VPN installed on my other laptop and can transfer it to the one I use for the downloads, and I did do that, but how do I get it be recognised by the download site?" Any tips or info would be most welcome.

There has been some good information posted on this thread, and your decision to go to the doctor at his clinic to get it signed is very wise indeed. I say this because he will also have a stamp, which whether it is needed or not, is always good to have. I say this from experience because I have two POL forms sent from different countries, one from the UK and one from New Zealand. Also, I send mine back to the countries concerned using Thai registered post, and it costs me about 120 baht. Good luck and no need to worry.

I don't have a problem with that as it stands, however there are procedures for taking blood pressure and I've never seen them followed in any of my visits to the hospital. In fact on one occasion I suggested to the nurse that the machine needed recalibrating, if indeed it had ever been calibrated in it's life, because it gave an abnormally high blood pressure for me? She didn't know what I was talking about of course, so I went to the ENT room next door (just a few metres away) and got my blood pressure taken then by another machine and it was fairly normal, far lower than the previous reading, and I showed it to her and there was a blank look on her face!

I agree with you, and I always wonder why they bother to take my blood pressure, this especially when I have just walked a few hundred metres across the car park and up the stairs and have only been seated for a couple of minutes, when the nurse comes over and proceeds to take my blood pressure whilst she is talking to me?? It's a nonsense and is added to the bill, even if I wave them away and say I don't want it. Furthermore I remember for some strange reason that my blood pressure was very high, much higher than normal and nothing was said about that. So what's the point in taking it?

I have to say the same about the Bangkok Hospital Phuket dental department, which is an integral part of the hospital, and the dentist I saw there, Dr Supachai was very good indeed, although the whole procedure was expensive, and painful at times (as I hate deep injections) but he did a good job, so far anyway! As others have said, there are good, average and indifferent doctors and practitioners throughout Thailand, and as far as dentists go, I've been fairly lucky, whereas urologists, not so much.

"He wrongly claimed that U.S. gasoline prices reached $9 under Biden. The highest weekly average price under Biden was about $5 in June 2022." Q.E.D.

They seem like nice boys (as one English comedian used to say).

Yes, and that's my point about licenses here and I loved your "barefaced cheek" quip. Actually something similar happened here when I first arrived and I brought with me from NZ an International Driving Permit (I think that's what they were called) and put it under the seat of my motorbike and forgot all about it! About three years later I was stopped at a police checkpoint at the end of Nanai Road and asked to present my license, and there was another farang guy in front of me being dealt with by a second BIB who was asked the same thing. I got my Driving Permit out and realised that it had expired a couple of years earlier and I was a little worried about this until the policeman took it from me and walked over to the other guy and in fairly good English said, "this is what you should have". He didn't look at the date or anything, or perhaps he didn't understand it, however he gave it back to me and sent me on my way! For the record I did eventually get a Thai driving licence for both motorbike and car. PS. Forgot to add that I thought giving the Border Official your gas bill was "genious".

Pure unadulterated nonsense. The time it takes for a coffee to cool down from hot to drinkable is minutes, mainly because the cup absorbs some of the heat. Secondly whoever made the comment that staff shouldn't have to smile at customers obviously has not run a business which depends on customers and repeat business, and just about every service organisation deems this to be part of "excellent customer service". Having said all that, I agree with @steven100and on that note, I have visited both the recently reopened Starbucks in Patong (Jungceylon) and the Coffee Club and not only is the service abysmal, the food is mostly grim, and the amount of times I have received the, "no hab" from staff when I have asked for pepper or indeed "equal" (sweetener) is unbelievable and when I ask them if they can order some from Bangkok for the next time I visit, I get a blank stare and they walk away – – and the result is: – I don't go there anymore!

I posted this on a similar topic here.............. A poster said; "Easy, if you want to rent a motorcycle you have to provide a valid motorcycle licence? No licence, no rent". That's how it should be, but in a country where the baht rules and one can buy one's way out of just about any situation with a handful of currency, then that won't work, sadly. In addition, many of the BIB can't read English or other languages and wouldn't really know what they were looking at; i.e. the licence could have expired years ago, but they wouldn't be able to read it anyway! There has to be a better/more enforceable way.

That's how it should be, but in a country where the baht rules and one can buy one's way out of just about any situation with a handful of currency, then that won't work, sadly. In addition, many of the BIB can't read English or other languages and wouldn't really know what they were looking at; i.e. the licence could have expired years ago, but they wouldn't be able to read it anyway! There has to be a better/more enforceable way.

Now that is a load of hogwash, and you know it, because the actual purpose of a "Fact Check" is just that, what trump says is compared to the facts, and the majority of the time they don't match at all, mainly because he is a compulsive liar. However with a view such as that which you stated, it becomes clear why the MAGA tribe don't know the truth from lies, because they don't want to, so settling for trumps lies suits their agenda. Such a sad group of cultists.

OOPS......sorry about that!! The poster has (I think) a similar name to you......my bad, and I hope the Xatral XL is working for you. All the best.