ChrisP24

Well that still technically makes you a millionaire. Unless you spent it.

Riding a rented scooter through a roundabout for the first time (coming from a country that drives on the right-hand side of the road).

I tried software many, many years ago and found it too tedious, it was Andrew Tobias' Manage Your Money back in the 1990s. Excel is much more flexible, you can lay out your own spreadsheets in the way that best aligns with how you mentally view your finances. And then later I migrated to Libre Office, which as Lacessit states is a free office suite that includes a spreadsheet that's functionally equivalent (and cross-compatible with) Excel. It also includes counterparts to the other MS Office software. It works fine with Windows.

I've learned in my travels that with regard to how safe/unsafe an area is, a good indicator is whether the locals are comfortable bringing their own families/children and especially if the parents are letting their children run around having fun with other kids (vs. being clutched tightly by watchful parents just passing through on their way to someplace safer). One of the first things I noticed about the Jomtien night market area was that even around 9:00 p.m., there were many families with kids playing and running around on that little stage with the live music. Also many families and apparent Thai (and Korean) tourists taking selfies at the Angry Birds park over on the beach, and Thai families relaxing all along the beachfront. To me that area seemed family-friendly with many families out enjoying it even after dark.

Are you OK with English subtitles? There are quite a few modern Thai horror and even a few drama movies and mini-series that I've enjoyed.

This is even more confusing than when my Filipina wife tries to explain to me exactly how some of the third and fourth cousins are related to her (some of whom have more than one link).

I quite enjoyed Bangkok Heightz at the top of the Continent Hotel a few years ago. It wasn't loud, the food was excellent, and it had a great view of city lights looking down along Sukhumvit.

Maybe find a young person (niece, nephew etc.) to liquidate the items online for a generous commission? Gets the stuff gone, teaches entrepreneurship, and you get some baht as a bonus.

Good on you for wearing helmet! Best wishes for a full recovery.

It's funny, but I sometimes have the same though about my own countrymen here in my country, that I don't particularly like being around them. I like my own space, but when I do chat with people it's more interesting to me if their life experience has been different from mine. And I wonder how well or poorly I would have done had I been born in their environment. It's also interesting to me how their environment has shaped their view of the world.

Just one. Have never had any interest in trolling or arguing over the internet so one has been enough.

If you tried but instead used Spanish sardines preserved in the stuff together with a sliver of carrot, pickle and chili added to each tin, I think you'd survive longer (and better). I personally could live for a very long time on the Portuguese sardine version of that, mixed with rice, although I imagine the nutritional profile is missing some things, the effects of which would become apparent by a month or two.

One with a good Hoover could be a bonus.

They (we) still do. Back to original topic, ummm.... Thailand Awesome. I've made four scouting trips now, the most recent one staying 2 1/2 weeks in Jomtien. It was surprising in that I had time to actually get bored - - to me it did not feel like a place that I could ever become more than a visitor. I should have broken up the trip into segments instead of staying in just one place. And actually I think that's how I'll travel Thailand going forward, keeping an open itinerary in order to unravel its awesomeness. Best spots thus far have been Chiang Mai and Phuket, with emphasis on Kathu and the areas both north and south of Patong. I can tell that learning the Thai language would be a "must". After trying a two-week course I think I could learn it, but it would take a couple of years of concerted effort.

Yes, they were interesting at the time. But I wouldn't want to go back and do them again now for more than a day or two. Except for the army, that one I'd be OK doing a full deployment if it were for something important.

Too early to tell, the differences in experiences/opportunities don't truly manifest until the child reaches their 20s and early adulthood. It's also very specific to so many factors such as location, culture, family situation, socioeconomic status, etc. etc. etc. I'm in the late stages of raising one boy and one girl, and I've taken great care over the years to give the girl messages to the effect of her being able to do anything and become anything she wants, in an effort to counter any message to the contrary she might be receiving through other channels. Both kids are doing alright. I'm a male so that has been my life experience and inevitable bias, but from observation I'd say that in general, globally, both genders have it better now than at any prior point in human history.

Even the largest dong will only get you so far. (pasted from Quora) What will $20 buy in Vietnam? You can buy one t-shirt or 20 t-shirts on a market. You can go on a day trip and have pizza afterwards. You can eat 8 breakfasts, 9 lunches AND 10 dinners. Or you can spend it on one lunch. You can have a 90 minutes of full body massage and facial treatment. You can fill your tank on your motorbike 17 times. You can take a motorbike taxi and drive around for a few hours. You can rent 4 bikes for a day. You can walk on the main street in HCMC and someone will steal it from you. You can buy 45 killos of Passion Fruit. You can get really drunk on the street with your friends and pay taxi home. Or you can drink one cocktail in super expensive bar. You can buy 40 local sandwiches. You can go on a date. But you can’t put it on your bank account. Because banks in Vietnam won’t allow it.

You could check to see if the realtor is still licensed, and if so complain to whatever board licenses him. Or just find review sites for whatever business he's doing now and post complaints with links to the article.

If it were a viable case then a good attorney would take it on contingency, charging between 25% and 40% of the eventual recovery. But after so much time I doubt there is a case, or an attorney who will take it. A quick google search indicates that the statute of limitations (SOL) in Florida is 4 years. I am not an attorney, however if the SOL can be overcome, my understanding is that a judgment for damages stemming from fraud cannot be discharged in bankruptcy so a judgment against the realtor could be pursued. But scumbags who are no longer worried about their reputations can be so very good at evading these. Your friend can save their stress by not expecting anything to move quickly, not expect and money at all (and if any comes it'll be an unexpected event). But getting the judgment and having the attorney record it will show up in a background check of the perpetrator. And eventually if the perp ever sells or refinances real estate in their name, they may have to deal with the judgment first, although after all this time your friend will be last in line after anyone else who has a judgment. But I think that ship has long ago sailed. The time to act was within the SOL period. Sadly, it might be best for your friend's emotional health to just move on.

Hope is not a plan.

Best to block her, cease responding to anything, and move on. Nothing good can come of maintaining contact with a bad, unstable person who keeps threatening you. Once she figures out that she isn't going to get anything out of you, she will move on too, and has nothing to gain by filing false reports. Odds are good that you are not the only one she is trying this with.

That's true when younger, but once you reach a later age the statistics keep pushing your life expectancy out. When I run it through various calculators (while being honest about lifestyle), now I get a life expectancy of 91 (50/50 chance of making it) and a 75% chance of making it to age 83. And hopefully I have more than 3 years of non-disability left. So in a very real sense, the more one ages, the more one has already beaten the statistics. All the more so if one is in relatively good health. Of course nothing is guaranteed and I don't begrudge any youngsters who took off for a life of adventure. I'm just happy with my own choices and where I've ended up in this chapter thus far, and in fact grateful as many things could have gone differently and in a bad way. So if the youngsters tell me I've done it wrong and that I should instead have followed a course where I would have had to work until I die, well that is water off a duck's back. It occurs to me that people who post on an expat forum have generally also already beaten the odds. Escaping the cradle and associated insular mindset that the West has prepared for them. Britman I very much enjoy your posts by the way.

The young ones are quite possibly too busy struggling to keep their English teaching gigs lined up to post here. I'm 60 and my life plan has long been to finish raising a family here in the U.S., and then slow-travel to see and experience many different places, in Thailand and elsewhere. I've made many scouting trips, and after retiring a few years ago have stayed for up to a month at a time. To me a good life looks like increasing this to three months at a time, probably breaking a year into three or four segments with one of those segments being in the U.S. but the others being abroad. If I had done this in reverse order, then I would not have had the experience of having a career (actually multiple careers), building a close family around me, raising kids and reliving my own childhood through them, etc. nor would I have achieved the financial independence with military healthcare that I now get to enjoy for the rest of my life (unless I do something stupid). Based on family history I expect to live to see age 90, with hopefully at least half of my remaining time in good health. I would much rather be where I am now, than to have bailed on the west in my 30s having to work as a foreigner in a foreign country for the rest of my life, and with only a grim lifeline back to my original home country.

Yes indeed. “Never argue with an idiot. They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.” ― Mark Twain

I have just one, there were just too many negative posts. After one too many where they were clearly just trying to antagonize others, I thought that I'd improve my reading experience by simply placing them on ignore. There are a few others who can be annoying but those are usually hit-and-runs, whereas this one continues to be a prolific poster. And I'm not curious enough to see if anything has changed.