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.

I wish I had a poster that the Calif highway patrol had circulated for a while. Their high rez evidence camera of a traffic accident. Bodies all over, EMT crews working on things. Blood and body parts clearly visible. The caption at the bottom read: WE DON'T WANT YOUR BUSINESS Public outcry at the picture being too graphic made them take the posters down. As FD, LEO and EMT, how many times in 40 years have I arrived at scenes like that? How many 02:00 waking up in a cold sweat? How many times have I heard the words or sentiment 'It can't happen to me'? And how many total BS blowfests like some postings on this thread have I come across where people talk their trash, talked the talk but have never walked the walk, and most certainly have never knelt on the side of a road with gravel getting embedded into their knees as they try to keep a bloody chunk of meat viable and transported?

So you survive an ambulance trip to the ER. And you get lucky a POD noticed a neuro issue. Game on. Your future: - In the US, $200,000 to start. No brain bucket = many insurance companies skate: self inflicted injury. - Get to know the neuro ward real well. - CT scans and EECs regularly for life. - Diet becomes crucial. You are in the prime candidate category for CVAs down the road. - Disqualified automatically from many jobs and positions. - Self administered neuro tests in your wake up regimen. - No full self reliance. Must be periodically observed and assessed by a qualified person.

Dumb dumb here. 40 years in and around emergency services. One little comment: This Should Not Be A Topic Of Discussion. Start a new thread -> Something about being stupid and ways to avoid it or whatever. CVAs and other brain trauma are normally your frenemy for life as you become a burden for other people. GET OVER IT. OR, restrict comments on this thread to people with hands on experience in the trauma rooms of ERs. PS Just great. Posturing.

This applies to any foreigner seeking medical treatment in a foreign country - Suggestions Diagnostics If at all possible, obtain a preliminary diagnosis from your home country Purpose of each diagnostic - from simple lab analysis to CT Scans and Angioscopy et al Obtain at least two independent diagnosis from different hospitals and physicians Find a third physician, again independent that you have a solid sound reason to trust, to compare the results of the two or more diagnosis. Put on your detective hat. You are looking for discrepancies between both the diagnostic procedures, the results, and the physicians recommendations for treatment. If a discrepancy becomes obvious or even appears suspicious in any way, start over. with entirely different hospitals and physicians. Treatment As above, two or more independent medical authorities 1. Consult the physicians as to recommended treatment procedures and do comparisons Overall costs Procedures to be performed - spelled out in detail Length of the procedure - a time line Duration of stay in the hospital Follow up diagnostics and procedures Immediate and future prognosis Fact: There is little difference between medical diagnostics and treatment, and buying a new or used car. Sales pitches are common. Buying accessories you will never need or use is common. Prices can different greatly from one dealership/hospital to another. Payment plans can be open ended. Warranties may not be worth the paper they are printed on. And most importantly, as a citizen of a foreign country, you have little or no recourse if you get scammed. Even less with medical since physicians wear the hat of unimpeachable authorities. Only an expert witness of superseding medical authority testifying in a court can impeach a physician. Myself: Retired. BME, Bio Medical Engineering degree. EMT II, ACLS instructor. Certified Nurses Aid. And with all my training I've been royally scammed four times now. I write this in the hope that others don't get victimized as I have,

Smeg? Ouch! BTW, the tech that told you to unplug the unit may be right but I doubt it. Smeg would or should have a bullet proof voltage and current sense on the front end, is highly tolerant of voltage fluctuations, and probably rigged to power off when out of bounds. What @McTavish just posted is a cheap but possibly functional version of that front end. The major problem with Chinese made goods is if it is quality built and selling it will be copied within hours and cheap crap visually and packaging identical replicas hit the market rubbing shoulders with the good stuff. I don't know why certain species of ants are attracted to electrical components and I'm pretty well versed in entomology. I had a $200 Braun shaver that quit one day. Loaded with those mega bite micro ants. The formic acid from them completely compromised the iron laminations. Circuit boards. Save your money. A good coat of clear lacquer critter proofs them. Makes them a beech to repair but nobody does that now anyway. Just don't spray any heat sinks or connectors. By the way, Nvidia designs the lions share of all graphics cards then leases out rights to replicate them. My card is an Inno3D but inside is edge to edge Nvidia. My above mentioned graphics card. After I cleaned the sticky goo off of it which the sales outlet told me was rust - it was some kind of sugary kanom - I voided the warranty, tore it down, reseated the GPU, spiffed up some solder connects, and cranked the fans way up. The card only uses the power available from the PCI-e slot which is rated at 75 watts. Under test with full on 3D moving graphics it draws 72 watts. Bad design. But, it works now, though I'll switch to my overpowered antique POS graphics card for heavy loads if need be. Chinese made? As in I needed a drill bit but could only find a set of them. After one failed to drill a hole in aluminum I grabbed the vice grips and stuck them one by one in the vice. They all bent. Probably crapesium semi steel. A bearing failed in my ride. Suspicious looking, I bust open the race and smacked the balls with a hammer. They all flattened out. Unhardened ball bearings? Yo! Those are called sinkers on the end of your fishing line. And probably the best one, my Seagate hard drive, new in the box shrink wrapped with data sheet and warranty card, failed after 2 weeks. I went to the Seagate repair shop. The tech just glanced at it, plugged it in and turned it on. Not even bothering to look at the screen he turned the monitor so I could see the words. Not Seagate.

Or one can sometimes get creative. 2600 watt vacuum burned out the motor in one year. Replaced with 2800 watt. Drilled holes to increase air flow cooling by roughly triple. Still running 8 years later. Vacuum mentioned in above post now sports a 14 gauge 16 core wire and vents added, after five minutes operation the case is at 110 F as opposed to 150 F as purchased. Microwave oven gave me a mild shock when I touched both it and the solidly grounded convection oven. Got 12 VAC between the two cases. Hint hint. Silly me. Wired our house here as I did in America, 12 gauge receptacle wire, 16 gauge for lighting. Breakers were about the same price regardless of current capability. Cost me about twice as much in wire, about 2000 baht more. Okay, operation overkill. 7.5, 15, and 20 amp, per code, California. We managed to trip one breaker once when workmen wired the neutral to a switched hot. Bright side, I can run 2 ovens, hot water pot, rice cooker, hot plate and blender at the same time on one circuit without tripping a breaker.

@alanrchasehttps://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/wire-gauges-d_419.html >24 core, add 75% for short term intermittent loads. Don't even think about running your 3600 watt water heater on 16 gauge wire. Our water heater. 6800 watts. 12 gauge wire, (single core, 34 amp rated) 18 foot run. Wire starts to warm up above 28 amps (IR thermal test, went 10% above ambient). Preset water heater to 26.

@ToughsituationsI used to work in a casino. Rather than go into details, research Obsessive Compulsive disorder. It is very common but requires being dealt with on a psychological level. Consider consulting a professional.

I purchase our products going by reputation of the company and the length of the warranty. But both have recently been negated. Additionally, shoddy cost saving during manufacture seems to be more and more common. The largest computer chain in the country sold me a graphics card under a three year warranty by (a reputable company that has given outstanding service in the past). The card failed after five months. The company sent it to Bangkok and three weeks later I was sent a new card. Six months later the replacement card had the same failure. Back to the store and the card was again sent to Bangkok. One month later the card was returned and I was informed it was not the original card I bought and therefore not under warranty. This is the third consumer electronics part where the businesses avoid honoring the warranty. Since nobody repairs circuit boards any more, only replaces them, we can no longer trust a warranty period. Other: A 2000 watt vacuum with a 4 meter long cord with 1.2mm wire. 2000 watts divided by 220 volts = 9 amps. Current capacity of 1.2mm, 18 gauge stranded wire is no more than 6.5 amps. This appliance will burn out within a few weeks. Microwave oven, Very well known name brand. 3 prong plug but the ground was not connected. Cutting the cord open, there is no ground wire.

Well, dismissing all charges since they are self evident of anything is impossible. The waters around Trump enterprises is as muddy as it can get. As for 34 acquittals and zero convictions, I could be wrong but I don't think that has ever happened in the history of the US judicial system.