tutsiwarrior

it is not a belief in God or religion that one must consider...it is the significance of religious ritual and symbolism in peoples lives.

I once found myself at an early morning mass at a church in Latin America after buying a bottle of vodka from the early opening local bodega. I had a look at the people that were attending and found them transfixed on the performance going on at the altar. It occurred to me that it was not their Christian belief that they were celebrating but the ritual associated with that belief.

I used to derride religion as nonsense but to ignore it's ritual significance is to prohibit a basic understanding of our fellow humans. We must not forget that births, marriages and deaths are usually all commemorated within within a religious ritual context. It was an epiphany...I've looked at religion differently since then...

'sittin' in lah lah waitin' for mah yah yah uh humm' a great song but never knew what it was called...

turn the bottle arse end up and there should be flow, ye get the same with Smirnoff boddils...these plastic caps are for pub use to control the measure...pain in the arse.

If the arrangement continues to annoy get out the pliers and yank the mother right out...

How does a tree in Khao San looks like..? any pictures?

lez go getta chainsaw an' have sum fun...

I would kiss the girl friend for her concern for the maintenance of your personal belongings and then sternly instruct the sister/housekeeper regarding the necessary procedure...what's a couple ob suits and a belt here or there?

It sounds that you are truly loved...savor the unique pleasure...

I would travel to BKK from Suphan if there was a Taco Bell...superb cuisine and splendid memories of the TB parking lot in Laguna Beach and events leading up to a bust for 3 joints in 1968. The cop said 'I hope you enjoyed the tacos pal 'cause yer looking at 1 to 5 for possesion...'

You wern't hanging with Tim Leary down there were you?

nah...just happened to be around after seeing Jimmy Reed at a bluesclub by the Huntington Beach pier...was living in Fullerton at the time. Things turned out for the best...a bunch of the high school teachers thought that it would be a shame if I had to go to the joint for hard time and petitioned the judge. Got the charge reduced and did 8 days in OC County during the easter holiday. They thought that my superior writing skills would be a terrible thing to waste...

good writing skills saved my ass more than once, let me tell ya...too bad I didn't turn out a Nobel laureate rather than the dumbass engineer that I presently am...

oh...me and GG Marques and 'ol Fidel enjoying glasses of Havana Club on the Malecon in Havana...

this is a real crap question and means absolutely nothing.

so how about closing this thread mods as its taking up valuable band width.

cheers.

get otta here...yer just pissed off 'cause I didn't stand by my original put down of the OP and opened up opportunities for people to respond to the original question...

in vino veritas...don't respond unless you've been drinking intoxicating liquor for the past 5 hours...

waydaminit, waydaminit...I can see the potentially serious implications of this thread...xyz, please accept my apologies...tutsi is drunk at 2 in the afternoon...

your doing better than me. I have been drunk for the last 10 days of my holidays..

so...does Thailand mean eternal drunkeness for falangs?...what about sex and alcohol related penile dysfunction?...so, that we could say that sex and liquor are merely symptoms and not particularly related to the meaning of Thailand...

I do like the subject of shelter though...if it wasn't for my shophouse in a small town in Suphan I'd have nowhere to go...

waydaminit, waydaminit...I can see the potentially serious implications of this thread...xyz, please accept my apologies...tutsi is drunk at 2 in the afternoon...

a dumb topic deserves a dumb reply...SHELTER, clear enough?

No. What's your IQ? I have lived in this house for over 20 years. Shelter is definitely not it.

maybe, in your case shelter is better found underneath a rock...

From the Thai Hill Mynah website

Breeding season is January through July. Being monogamous birds , both male and female make nest, incubate and feed their young. Between August and December we find them living in flock about 7-50 birds. They forage, perch, sun bathe and fly together in group.

Eight years of field study (1991-1998) revealed that, on average, out of every 100 eggs there were only 12 independent fledglings which could survive. Most of the rest were caught for caged pets. Thus, breeding in captivity is undoubtedly urgent for the conservation of wild species.

If the bird is black with a yellow wattle then it is a Hill Mynah or Gracula religiosa, there is also a bird called the common mynah which is a different bird but with similar appearance and characteristics. It is not the same thing as an Australian Miner bird however.

Hill Mynah or Gracula Religiosa is a bird banned from import in the US because of their declining numbers due to overtrapping and deforestation:

A common Mynah or Indian Mynah: Acridotheres tristis is a member of the Starling family.

The Australian Noisy Miner: Manorina melanocephala, is a native bird:

Most likely, your culprit is the Common mynah and not the Hill Mynah at all.

the common mynah in the photo hangs around on the roof next door outside my window...never heard them make a peep...they have interesting behavior, never seen any in pairs like most birds...

a dumb topic deserves a dumb reply...SHELTER, clear enough?

OK, so SE Asia is still a far cry from our dirty 5-star USA kitchen.

Ever been to Indonisia?

Check out the kitchens/loos there for a stomach-disturbing experience...

yeah...I'd agree in most places in Jakarta. However, I was inna bog in a lowkey roadside restaurant up by the Puncak Pass and was surprised at the cleanliness...had expected to barf along with other discharges...

where did they get masa mix for corn tortillas? A reliable source for BKK mexican restaurants would improve the offering considerably...

I wish I knew. I do recall them having real problems with getting tortillas. it was the biggest issue pre-opening. I seem to recall that they were importing them already made from someplace, shipped in with dry ice. Shipping in the msa would be better. And the limestone is for the water, is it not? To make it the right pH for tortilla making?

limestone is like a binder...like breadcrumbs and eggs for meatloaf. I tried making tortillas from surplus commodity cornmeal alone once and they fell apart (mind, I was inna filthy crashpad in Eugene, Oregon in 1971 and on acid)...not sure that pH correction would be a requirement for the heat of preparation(?)

I knew an escort agency employee that carried one of those click-clack machines around in her bag...

there was a thread about a year ago in one of the food forums discussing ovens...do a search and have a look

Tournament of Roses Parade - Pasadena, California

yahs, yahs...brings a tear to this old expats eyes...many a New Year's Eve was spent curbside along the parade route on Colorado Blvd when growing up there...biggest New Year's Eve party in the US.

tomorrow sum Arabs are gonna call me about a job in Saudi so gotta be awake to answer the call, then gotta decide if I wanna take the job or not (if offered; good money but ugh )...otherwise uneventful.

best wishes for the New Year to everyone...

Its also possible to create your own compost from kitchen scraps. Worm bins can be kept in the house if properly maintained.

Google Vermiculture or worm bin and learn how to build your own.

I've thought about this as there is plenty organic type scraps around. Trouble is the guy from the pig abbatoir comes around every day to collect them for pig slop. Falang organic farmer vs the thai pig stickers war...only in Thailand...

whaaaaat?...I haven't been in one go go bar that didn't have at least 2-3 ZZ Top numbers on the box...very nice if the ladies like dancing an' struttin' their stuff, an' tryin' to attract customers...

somebody modify the poll to include a preference for LOUD ZZ Top in go go bars...

my concern is that it could get around that a pubescent girl was sleeping in the same bed as her FALANG stepfather...some adult, especially school teachers who are trained to watch out for signs of sexual abuse could pick it up and misconstrue. The family, especially my wife don't give a shit...kids and adults sleeping together is normal.

we have had sex with the 4 y.o. niece sleeping with us...little kids sleep like logs and wouldn't wake up if the roof caved in. But if I want some

action in the afternoon after the kids come home from school then the door gets locked, the curtains are drawn and the wife wants to get it over with as quickly as possible....terrified that one of the older girls might discover us...

there are a lot of inconsistencies...I've just had to go with the flow when at home in Suphan. Sometimes it's better when we are abroad and can have sex in the living room or on the kitchen table anytime we want. The kids never sleep with us when they are visiting when we are overseas...

Why is it that all the different bars within a bar complex play their own music? This creates a cacophony of noise.

Wouldn't it be easier if the complex played from one music source and each bar controlled the volume coming into the respective bars?

If not in a complex, bars seem to be trying to outdo each other with their volume. Walking Street is a prime example.

Go-go-bars are the worst offenders for excessive volume.

get outta here...to have sexy ladies gyrating to ZZ Top you got to have it to the max...

If only it started at school age. The youngest still flashes at any and everyone, the eldest 8, has started to cover herself a bit.

On a different note, I don't think that your 13 year old should be getting into bed witgh you, I don't doubt it is all perfectly innocent, but tongues COULD wag

I've considered this but it's my wife's call...she doesn't sleep with us often, she just sort of insinuates herself...she's a big girl and what she does is try to force me out of the bed so she can sleep alone with her mother...keep having to flop her over or there would be an uncomfortable entanglement...most of the family sleep in thai fashion together on the floor next door at Mama's...I've often woken up with the stepdaughter's arms and legs around me which I don't mind as I like to cuddle but it disturbes my sleep...plus I have to keep my shorts on and I prefer to sleep naked...

my wife is all the kids' favorite auntie...if our bed was big enough I sure we would have all of them sleeping with us every night...head nits and all

the 13 y.o. step daughter is now sleeping on my side of the bed again...she is fully clothed (shorts and t-shirt) and freshly washed. The pretext is that yesterday she had some abdominal pain in the area of her appendecctomy scar after exercising...she is taking medication and her mother wants to supervise.

This is all a bit disturbing as she is old enough for the arrangement with me in the bed to be inappropriate. However she is still a kid in her head and if I wake to find her with her arms and legs around me it is perfectly innocent...she's just a kid that likes to cuddle. The wife doesn't find any of this unusual...something that I cannot make a judgement about as I am not thai.

Has anyone else had the experience of a communal sleeping arrangement as described? I have fallen asleep on the floor with the other nieces to wake up and find that they are asleep contented next to me with no problems. Maybe just a falang problem? Thais never sleep alone, fear of ghosts or whatever and I have often seen other adult family sleeping together with the children in perfectly normal fashion. My wife is a smart lady and if there was ever any impropriety she would immediately put a stop to it. Maybe it's just that her family is poor and very close and these sleeping arrangements are from necessity.

anyone?

I'm farming earthwoms to give our lawn and plants a boost.

ye could probably throw a handful into the wok for a thai culinary delight as well...

masa mix...a mixture of cornmeal and ground limestone...cannot make corn tortillas without it...and without corn tortillas you can never have proper mexican cuisine...

when in a market in the Guatemalan highlands there were some locals crouched around what looked like rocks onna blanket...I asked 'what are those rocks for?'...one of the dudes glowered at me and growled 'para las tortillas'...then I understood, I understood that without ground limestone you could never have corn tortillas...(tutsi's guatemalan/mexican cuisine epiphany)

nobody in SE Asia seems to unnerstand...

depending on the variety tomato plants can become very bushy...that being the case it may be adviseable to prune some of the lower leafy bits to get more nutrient flow to the fruit. This has been my experience in Northern California with 'golden wonder' toms...might not be the same case in Thailand...definitely keep the topmost leaves bushy and glorious...