Katia

3 hours ago, Aussie999 said:

If a kids goes "missing" then their name and appearance MUST be broadcast, how else would the public be able to recognize them, luckily, in this case, all is ok, it could have been much worse. Even mentioning the school is necessary as someone might have seen her leaving. What "law" has the media broken? In some countries, if a kid is reported missing, all details, including photos, are transmitted by media and public broadcast systems, eg at railway stations, electronic bill boards etc.

The article says they were still digging through her trash and stuff *after* she was found:

Quote

She was found unharmed on Thursday, but some media outlets wanted more details. Reporters went to the extreme of sifting through the garbage bin at her place in search of clues.

8 hours ago, djayz said:

And limit it to one per person. 

And keep people from trying to say those big rolling suitcases are a "carry on."

8 hours ago, djayz said:

Who in their right mind takes 14kg of oranges with them on a flight?!?!

You should have seen all of the packages of what looked like mangoes that I saw people packing into their suitcases near the check-in line last time I was at Swampy... I think they were Korean.  I was actually amazed that they fit it all into a couple big suitcases.  (Why they didn't just pack the bag before they left home, I don't know.  I've never understood the people I see at airports packing and re-packing their bags.  Okay, if you turn out to be a pound over and need to transfer a pair of shoes or something, I get it, but why don't they estimate the weight, and figure out what they need to check vs. carry, or whatever else it is they're taking care of, at home?)

8 hours ago, oilinki said:

Trump creates uncertainty among people. Uncertainty creates fear. Fear creates anger. Anger creates division between people, who would normally live happily together. 

 

I wonder if this is what Trump wants.

I think he wants whatever he wants, and doesn't care how he gets it-- whether there's actual deliberate manipulation involved, or if he simply doesn't think, runs his mouth about "but I wanna do this and I think we should do that and hang what anyone else thinks/feels!" and fear/anger/division happens to be the result, I don't know.

On 1/5/2019 at 9:40 PM, Oxx said:

https://www.what-dog.net suggests it's a Staffordshire Bull Terrier type - Active, personable, affectionate

He's undoubtedly some sort of mutt.

This is a Staffordshire Terrier.  Puppies of same.  He hasn't the look; not nearly stocky enough, face too long.

He's completely adorable, though!

On 1/6/2019 at 4:35 AM, poohy said:

Meet Winnie a bundle of love and a pretty good guard, shes learning from our BIG girl!

 

OMG, look at those fuzzy ears.

Moist heat and yoga (it sounds like croc, but every time my back hurts, yoga/stretching help.  A lot).

Sometimes it maybe just happens.  Last year I suddenly woke up one morning with my upper back seized up (like, I literally woke up, sat up in bed, and went "ohhhhhhh <deleted>???").  Muscle soreness, interspersed with sudden random spasms that took my breath away (partly from pain and partly just from sudden tensing of muscles in the thoracic area).  It was like that for a couple weeks.  I hadn't done a thing that could have caused it (nothing I hadn't/haven't done a million times before and since with no issue)-- I don't think I even slept weird.

I know someone who once hurt her back but got over it pretty quickly... she said her doctor told her don't lie around in bed but keep moving.  Apparently it worked for her.  I imagine this depends on exactly what the issue is-- don't do it if it's a condition that'll cause injury with movement, and obviously it doesn't mean hop to the gym and bang out some lat pulldowns and rows-- but in some cases it might help.

3 hours ago, Prairieboy said:

I believe school uniforms are not free.  In my opinion forcing parents to buy uniforms in addition to the child's everyday clothing has much more of a negative impact on the families expenses!

I believe this in the U.S.  But in Thailand, I've seen a lot of kids wearing school uniform outside of school hours (including weekends) and heard someone explain it's because the uniform is the only clothes they own.  This doesn't appear to be the social faux pas in Thailand that it would be in the West?  Or maybe it is and I just don't know.  Either way, if the parents *can* afford only a uniform and so that's all the child wears, then it's still going to be painfully obvious who doesn't have money, isn't it?

I've never believed any of these "arguments" for school uniforms, though. 

Why would students be less disciplined or academically successful because they don't wear uniforms?  Most people's clothing reflects their personality and attitude, doesn't influence it. 

Why would wearing a uniform eliminate economic differences?  As stated above, uniforms just make parents buy two sets of clothing instead of one, everyone will still know the kids in the worn/ill-fitting/hand-me-down uniforms are the poor ones, and there are many ways they'll know besides clothing, like where the kid lives, what they eat for lunch, whether they have parties or something, whether they can afford after-school activities, they might even know what each other's parents do.  (I don't recall ever paying much attention to what my classmates wore-- and let's face it, it was largely jeans and t-shirts anyway, for everyone-- but I still knew who was poor and who was rich.)

And as for the argument often trotted out in the U.S., that it easily shows intruders by who's not in uniform-- as if it's difficult to buy a school uniform (assuming the person isn't a former student who already has the real deal?)?

Mind you, I'll admit uniforms can be easy (times when I've had to wear them for work, it's been easy to get dressed), and I always said in school I wouldn't necessarily be against them IF they made sense (no uncomfortable silly things like ties, or requiring girls to wear skirts {especially in my cold-ass state; no way in hell am I freezing my ass off all winter 'cause somebody thinks the world will end if I wear pants}), and I don't feel my life will end if I can't "express my creativity" through what I wear, but I just don't see why they're needed.

I've... never heard of this before.  Is using hydrogen in balloons a "thing" outside of Thailand?

8 hours ago, nkg said:

As I pointed out before, when you ask a large number of people to look for something small, distant, and difficult to see, you will get a lot of false positives.

 

As I also said before, the initial sightings may well have been drones. Once the airport was closed and the police and army were looking for them 24/7, I don't see how drones could have continued to fly into Gatwick without being photographed or videoed. I expect the army have rather good equipment for detecting and photographing/videoing drones.

 

Could be, but I also don't see how police and army all could have mistakenly thought they saw drones where there were none, to cause continued closure.

10x50 for binoculars is usually the largest recommended for holding in hand.  Larger than that, you'll need a tripod to keep it stead-- not the end of the world if you don't mind a tripod.

I had understood there's an astronomy club in Bangkok, though I don't believe they're English-speaking if that's what you need.

Here's an earlier thread, though it's quite old and maybe some of the shops no longer exist: https://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/20159-telescopes-astronomy/

12 hours ago, Burma Bill said:

"four-room furniture shop" - the seat of the fire!

If you want to couch it in those terms... then maybe we should table this discussion... you know, put it to bed...

The whole thing is straight-up bizarre at this point.  First there are drones, OMG, drones.  Now, maybe no drones.  I find it hard to believe planes were grounded for three days over people's hallucinations.  

I too think it would be difficult to photograph/video them, but I find it very hard to believe no one *tried*, that there aren't photos and videos going around saying "yeah, it's on there somewhere!"  People photo/video *everything* in this day and age, and as someone else said, people stuck at the airport would be specifically watching out for them!  And not just random people who you maybe could accuse of getting into some herd mentality of "oh yeah I see it too!" and would swear the emperor's got clothes on... I assume the police and other authorities were also looking, or did they all hallucinate, too?

And... "some drones may have been police drones"?  They didn't know they were flying them in the area?  When someone said "OMG IT'S  A DRONE!" nobody else said "well duh, PC Brown's got one up"?

And... they found crashed drones but they weren't involved.  Then where did they come from?  Who just leaves an expensive piece of electronics lying around?  (Okay, fine, I know human nature-- some idiot crashed their drone, figured it was totaled and hence had no more use for it, couldn't possibly bother to pick up their own trash.)  Who, then, was apparently illegally flying drones near the airport without them being spotted, at some point in the past?

Maybe the fact that I've not read all of the news stories is what makes it all seem weird to me, but...

So this article says the two men were in one cart and their wives in the second, and the women bumped them into the water.  The other article we have here says each couple shared a cart, both driven by the men, one cart bumped the first and it ended up in the water, and the man in the second cart jumped in to help the first two.

Which was it?  Which journalist was... um... misinformed?

1 hour ago, Puchaiyank said:

I'm thinking of adding visiting Thailand to my list of things that endanger one's life...along with calling police to a domestic dispute and spending the night in a hospital. 

 

Freak accident...yes, But could it have been avoided with a few safety precautions? 

It sounds like "Going golfing with your friend who can't drive" is what belongs on the list of things that endanger one's life...

Hm.  I would've guessed a type of squash or gourd.

Oh, damn.  I guess I held out little hope after a week of wandering through sugarcane fields (this is the first I saw of the reports that someone took him; I thought he was just lost in the fields), but still, it would've been nice for there to have been a happy ending.

There's a difference between a joke that's funny in a dark way, and a comment that's inappropriate/insensitive.  I have a pretty damn dark and dry sense of humor, but even I know when something is obliquely funny as opposed to straight-up cruel or inappropriate; and also when my audience will not in any way see the humor but instead will only be offended or hurt, vs. when they'll laugh uproariously or at least "get" that it's supposed to be humor.

Perhaps "empathy" is to know the difference... "coldheartedness" is to know and not care.

20 hours ago, mogandave said:

I think if people want to kill themselves they should do it themselves. Involving the state and the heirs introduces too many avenues of corruption.

Everyone wants to die young until they get old.

It would be nice if "do it yourself" was easier, then-- like an easy way to do it as politely as possible that doesn't involve too much mess, or trauma for whoever finds you/requiring someone else's unwitting participation (which rules out guns, knives, vehicle accidents, possibly poison depending on what it is, drowning, jumping in front of a train/truck, hanging, jumping off something, self-immolation, asphyxiation, etc.).  That leaves, pretty much, pills (probably a narcotic or barbiturate), which means either having to fool a doctor and stockpile, or figure out how to get them illegally *and* without getting arrested before you can actually use them (and then after death you will be labeled a drug addict for your family and friends to believe and deal with forevermore).  And this method isn't foolproof as you have to make sure you take enough to actually kill you.  Or, something like carbon monoxide.  Then there's the matter of making sure you're found before it gets gross.  And the problem of how to do it if you have to make it look accidental for reasons of insurance or sparing feelings of family/friends, though that then probably rules out any non-messy or non-traumatic method.

52 minutes ago, Been there done that said:

Reading all comments, i conclude that OP must stay away from little children as he is not able to look after them on a proper way.

 

Not the first but certainly not the last. 

I'm still not sure why everyone is painting this as his fault.  He wasn't the child's caretaker, merely a friend of the family who observed the interaction from afar.  What is he supposed to do, go charging up to everyone who speaks to the kid within his line of sight and demand to know who they are, how they know the kid, their intentions, driver's license proof of insurance proof of residence and business card plus mother's maiden name and three references?  I bet you're a blast to be around whenever there's a child within a ten-mile radius.

2 minutes ago, faraday said:

What's the salt content of Pretzels then....?

????

I never said I was worried about any of that.

3 minutes ago, tutsiwarrior said:

 

yer right...there's plenty of salt in the instant noodles and in the miso and I don't drink the instant noodle broth (only to flavor the noodles) but the miso soup can't be beat...I can handle the salt content OK but not the sugar when it comes to breakfast cereal, the BP stays fairly steady with the salt but the BG goes thru the roof with the sugar...

 

the point being that it's good to investigate different things for breakfast, especially when ye don't havta hoard...a local khaao thom muu is quite nice but the jasmine rice plays hell with the BG...

 

try looking at youtube regarding the preparation of a french omelette and you might change yer mind about the eggs...buttery and melt in yer mouth, very nice...don't even need toast to eat it with...

 

 

 

 

If it still tastes even remotely like eggs, I want nothing to do with it!

I agree that people get "stuck" on the idea that only certain things should be eaten for breakfast... never understood it myself, but there you go.  People get stuck on a lot of ideas about food.

5 hours ago, CharlieH said:

No not the same, look at this......

My mom always liked the canned corned-beef hash... I thought it was rubbish.  Then once at a restaurant a friend ordered it made with the "real" corned beef... "Oh!  This stuff's not crap after all!"

56 minutes ago, tutsiwarrior said:

 

I useta like grape nuts until I saw the sugar content...and grape nuts is not a 'sugar coated' cereal like frosted flakes, coco pops and etc...the added sugar is to prevent the cereal from tasting like cardboard...

 

I usually make do with some instant noodles or some miso or a combination of both for breakfast. no need to hoard, plenty available in abundance...in indonesia I was trying to get folks to try the mie ayam (noodles in chicken broth) which is very tasty and popular for brekkie locally and a western colleague indignantly cried 'and what's wrong with corn flakes???!!!' he musta thought that I was insulting his usual morning repast...

 

 

You're worried about the sugar content of Grape Nuts but not the salt content of instant noodles??

(Me, I'd much rather eat "real" food than "breakfast" food for the most part-- I hate eggs and don't eat meat, so there's half of it gone right there.  Don't care all that much about pancakes, and not much less about waffles, though I'll eat both on occasion.  Though I do enjoy a good bagel, and cereal is okay as long as I don't have to have milk on it but not very filling, and toast is all right sometimes.  I'm good with crepes/blintzes and potato pancakes/latkes.  Otherwise I'm happy to pass on "breakfast food."

Also didn't give that much of a crap about farang food.  I didn't go to Thailand to eat Western food... I groaned every time people I was with wanted to go to some Western-food restaurant.  Even in the U.S. I'd rather go to eat Asian, S. Asian, Middle-Eastern, etc. than Western food.

I missed a few things while in Thailand-- for example, I was used to snacking on things like pretzels and crackers, I like spaghetti, love avocados, etc.-- but not enough to pay import prices for them.

16 hours ago, LazySlipper said:

They were fined 500 bht each, made to wai and almost charged with committing a crime under the cover of darkness...

 

Both admitted to the  crime so they were released on a promise of good behavior.

 

They were both seen heading for the nearest falang's house.

But who got to keep the rat??

16 hours ago, Mavideol said:

his name is not in the lease contract, the landlord can throw him out

That's what i was wondering-- if he's not on the lease, is he even allowed to be there?