The Snark

I was unaware you have been appointed or authorized to speak for the entire forum and the people at the motor vehicles department.

Hey nood dude. And please consider backing down the personal attacks. Respect proper forum etiquette: Attack the points in the posts, not the person posting.

That's one that gets us cops too. Degrees of negligence on the part to both parties. In mathematics land this translates into which is larger (more culpable), A or B. Assign the values of both A and B when both argue the other is larger.

Not in Kansas any more, Toto. A law on the Thai books: Leaving the scene of an accident is an admission of guilt. No such thing here as innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Close but no cigar. Speed=incipient movement. Move, a verb denoting action. Impact, a noun denoting an object. Action -> object. No move, no impact. I'm quite willing and capable of explaining Newton's laws of motion with formulas in great detail if my button gets pushed hard enough.

I never have a facepalm emote when I really need it. Well according the my browser history I've studied 22 so far. Practicing. The question on the test. "You see a bus on the side signalling to move into your traffic lane, what should you do? Correct answer, "Slow down and allow the bus in." So I call the proctor over to explain this to me. First, type of vehicle does not count with the known physics on this planet. Bike, moped, car, bus, 18 wheeler, D11 Cat crawler, physics are all the same, impact is impact, accident is accident. You can not have a different set of laws for each different vehicle. Once the proctor understands this little slice of logic you continue. So going by the bus signaling logic, signaling gives you the right of way to enter another lane. And so, you can move into the high speed traffic lane while going 7 kph and all 28 vehicles going 80+ kph in that lane must slow down and allow you to merge, right? I try another one. "Which of the four does not cause accidents?" Correct answer: "Driving faster than the speed limit." Call the proctor over again and ask him or her, If your car is parked. Not moving. Not in a traffic lane. Say it is in your driveway, you can't cause an accident, right? Hopefully this gets understood and you go on, "Your vehicle in motion is what can cause an accident, right?" Again this might get grasped so you make the logical leap: "Then it stands to reason that the faster you drive, the more likely you are going to cause an accident up to the speed where it becomes very difficult to control your vehicle." Then you get to the point, "Speed is obviously the cause of ALL accidents. Kow jai?"

Allow me to combine my midwest and packtrain ramrod past with down to earth Thai reality here. This here saddle jockey done gots him a Thai wife with the bit in her teeth, pardner. Need I say more?

Test and forget. Easier said than done when you've been a cop and had the VC hammered into your genes. I've got, or had, 4 licenses including haz mat cert, FD heavy equipment cert, DOT class 1 explosives training cert, Ambulance operation advanced training cert and class 1, 2 3, and 4 Calif DL, all expired. @jvs I feel you're onto something here. A proposed plan of attack. I'm drawing a line at the tie but dress shirt and slacks for a start. -Every last nuance of Thai socially polite and civil 24 years here has taught me. -Use up the full allotted 1 hour to take the test. First minutely examining every nuance and detail, remembering each odd or weird question's number. Then in the utmost of polite go through the list asking the proctor to explain and elucidate every last detail. -When the inevitable supervisor gets called in consider giving her/him a wai. -Follow my CHP mentor's procedure. Ultra hard nosed 35 year veteran stickler of details -> "In a 35 zone I'll let 37 off. 38 gets the ticket". Very very politely insist on an explanation of even a hint of ambiguity. -Attempt to give the impression of possibly being the most dedicated and meticulous person to ever have taken the test. (And come about the 55 minute mark hope they get fed up and let me slide through). Thoughts?

One that really stood out was a question where slowing down to allow another vehicle to pass (or merge) was wrong. They have never heard of courteous driving habits here?

That ain't going to happen. But you're right. The right way and the Thai way. What's really driving me bats is cop recertification where I had 250 VC questions fired at me. I did far better than I have here.

Zing. Good one. How does putting every questionable question up against a US vehicle code in my head and querying each and every weird question sound? Maybe pass me to avoid the frustration?

Been doing that. A couple dozen times. It just gets worse. Ambiguous multiple correct answers and asinine ideas of basic safety laws keep bogging me down. Can't get the CVC and 50+ years of safe driving to take a hike and learn to be stupid,.

Thai test question answers: * Driving faster than the speed limit is not a cause of accidents * Merging vehicles have the right of way if they signal. * If a mirror breaks you must pull to the side of the road and turn on your flashers. (And sit there waiting for a mirror repair person to happen along?) And so on. This anti safety or common sense bullcrap is driving me nuts! I've failed the written four times. Can't get unsafe or VC violation actions into my head as proper driving here, Any suggestions?

A salient point. Even me with my qualifications this had me completely in the dark. BUT, it is rare that a debilitating or potentially fatal chronic condition is on a short time frame. The individual doing their homework and being aware counts. If at all possible, have a reliable medical expert on hand and easily contacted to give a second opinion. And always keep in mind, when it comes to medical treatment, physicians police themselves - peer review boards- and are very often hesitant to gainsay a colleague.

My complaint: general bladder area pain. Referred to a urologist. Urologist prescribed and had the diagnostics performed of radio-opaque dye injection and a full thoracic and abdominal C.A.T. scan. The area of pain was on the outer edge of the scan results. I was not informed what procedure was going to be used in the diagnostics. Suspicious, I have consulted several physicians regarding the CAT diagnostics. Their general response was mostly an unnecessary procedure that exposed me to excessive x-ray. Local x-ray would have produced the same result. Further checking. x-ray, under 2000 baht. CAT scan, 17,000 baht. My qualifications: Former EMT II, ACLS certified, Nurses Aid, Bio-medical equipment technician and certified x-ray technician. FYI, unnecessary diagnostics are a major money maker and it can be very difficult to spot and avoid these pitfalls. Your only recourse is to ask about every procedure and get a second opinion from an unrelated physician that has no possible financial gain at stake. In my particular situation, the dye injection was a give away, a cardio procedure where they went fishing for unrelated medical conditions. But, it can be legitimately prescribed!

The calls on the various com channels, all too often containing the words, Code 3, H.U.A., Motorcycle. No helmet.