Lacessit

I'm lazy, I buy Pringles.

Strawberries and avocados are in season in Chiang Rai as I write, in the local market and on the street stalls. 80 baht a punnet, 50 baht a kilo respectively. Very tasty. I buy fruit and vegetables in season, when the prices come down. I can't remember the last time I bought them in a supermarket, way more expensive and no better in quality.

LOL, a checkout operator at ALDI has a target of 3000 items an hour. Thai checkout chicks would have to crank up to warp speed.

COVID means more precautions must be taken in all postal offices, that pushes costs up. Fewer flights between countries does the same, less competition for air freight.

I buy all my fruit and vegetables at local markets. Big C and Tops are for luxuries such as ice-cream and good quality yoghurt, I can't say I've seen any change in them. I don't eat much Western food. At my age, pesticides don't worry me. I've lived with them for more than seven decades. They are stored in body fat, it's obese people who need to worry about them. If I think something is too expensive, I don't buy it. I make an exception for gasoline, up 25%. The average Thai must really be doing it hard.

Not in Europe

From that, it's not just a land grab. It's also a food grab. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem Putin is true to form, he's always been a thief.

Perhaps it has escaped your notice Russia has an ample supply of nukes itself, and most certainly would use them if attacked with nuclear weapons. Do you really want World War III?

IMO the effects of sanctions are already biting Russia seriously. If Russia is not supplying fossil fuels, there are quite a few others happy to fill the gap. Australian gas and coal prices have increased substantially in the week since the war began. The Saudis are probably enjoying the situation too. Russian GDP should be a hell of a lot higher than it is, given its natural assets. A combination of Communist central planning, corruption, and despotism has put paid to that. I was told about how central planning works by a Russian Jew who emigrated to Australia. As a student, he was sent to help harvest the wheat crop in the black soil region (chernozem) of Russia. The wheat was bagged awaiting transport. The thread to sew the bags up failed to arrive for about a week. After that, a convoy of trucks was delayed due to a shortage of diesel for a couple of days. A nearby military depot refused to release fuel to assist, even though it had plenty to spare. As a result, he estimated about 40% of the crop was lost to birds and vermin.

I'd be chasing Swiss francs.

Part of the problem is the Holomodor emptied several eastern regions of Ukraine such as the Donbas, and Russians were transplanted there to fill the void. That's Putin's excuse, he is protecting those Russians from the Nazis in Kyiv, which is propaganda that's been used erroneously since World War II. The Ukrainians very quickly learned the Nazis they embraced as liberators were no better than the Russians. The sensible solution would be to have a UN-regulated plebiscite in each region of the Ukraine to find what each population wants, then let them do it free of Russian interference. While that is rewarding Stalin's genocide, it's preferable to the alternatives. Unfortunately, Putin and sense seem to be poles apart.

You did forget the humpy-rumpy, I would be astonished if you embraced celibacy.

Excuse me? I am certainly not jaded with life, every day is a new adventure for me. Moving on is preferable to being bitter about something in the past that I can do nothing about. Cynical, yes. I've learned money brings out the worst in people, so the only person who knows what I have is me. The other risk is STD's, the ignorance of them in young people is astounding. Was that a general comment, or a shot at me? If so, you missed by miles.

"And according to him and the other interview the best of that time was a couple of months together with a (paid) schoolgirl. Will he now, with 64 and without money be able to repeat that experience? NO!" I admit to being baffled by guys that want the youngest around. I've always preferred older women, perhaps because one initiated me in the joys of sex. There's a rhyme that used to go around which sums up why older women are better: They don't tell. They don't yell. They don't swell. They are as grateful as hell. Of course, now they are all younger than me anyway.

Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result. I researched Thailand for 6 months, as well as the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia. I knew all the pitfalls before I even landed here. Property "ownership", bar girls, STD's, alcoholism, medical/dental costs etc. Thai road toll. Thai marriage laws. I realized staying solvent here was simply a matter of leaving the majority of my assets in Australia, and not getting married. I am happy here. I certainly would not be if it was the only option left. If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.

Conducting transactions in bitcoin would be another option, although Russia would have to liquidate its foreign exchange and precious metals in order to do so. The ruble would not buy many. It could be a longer term solution. If I was a gambler ( I'm not ) a punt on bitcoin could reap huge dividends. The irony of bitcoin is a system created to free currency from government interference, may end up sustaining one of the most autocratic and interfering governments of them all.

I doubt it. As Sir Lauren van der Post said, Russians are only one step above being a collection of tribes. Because they were kept on the run for centuries by Tartar and Mongol invasions, they have never developed democracy as Western civilizations have. Due to those invasions, the Russian psyche is far more wary of the East than the West, where they have always given as good as they got. Until now, perhaps. IMO a quick victory and impotent West was the expectation. Sorry, off topic.

I'd say that is getting close to defaulting. Sometimes, other countries step in to prevent default. Mexico and Greece are examples. The only country I can see who would do that for Russia is China, and they would want more than a pound of flesh in return. Defaults trash individual investors, pension funds, and bondholders. That makes for a lot of angry people.

I can get the information in up until the point it asks for my cell number, then it says it is wrong. I thought all SIM's in Thailand were tied to a national database?

Poetic justice.

I'll take a bet they won't be exchanging the baht they get for rubles.

You may be right, but that does not explain why the Russian official interest rate is now 20%. The central bank has been blocked from using forex to prop up the ruble, so perhaps the other payment systems you mention are also under sanction.

The neo-nazi slur is used by the Russians because they remember what happened in World War II. Kyiv surrendered without firing a shot, most of Ukraine greeted the advancing Germans as liberators. That was because the Ukrainian memory went even further back, to the Holomodor, which was effectively genocide by mass starvation, ordered by Stalin. It didn't take long for the Ukrainians to realize they had swapped the left jackboot for a right jackboot, but it's still a handy brush for the Russians to tar Ukrainians with. History might have been very different if the Germans had recognized the value of treating a country who welcomes you well.

I have been told by two urologists, one in Australia, one here, that I have an obstructive prostate. Thus far, it does not seem to have affected me. Sometimes there is a bit of hesitation before flow starts. I am taking 5 mg of finasteride daily. I've found consuming alcohol gets me up more often in the night, it's a diuretic. I can recommend Dr. Wittawat Rawiyotai at Bangkok Hospital in Chiang Mai as a urologist. Speaks good English, professional, answers my questions about any procedures. He does my routine cystoscopies. IIRC, it was Sheryl who initially recommended him. Thanks Sheryl.

I am wondering when the authorities will start appreciating the money that is getting fed into the Thai economy by people who decided to retire here after starting off as tourists. I won't hold my breath, though.