GammaGlobulin

OK!!!!!!! I will certainly listen to this, within the next 2 days. Thank you!

This Topic, especially as it is posted here on our Farang Pub Forum, can be very helpful to all those who intend to come to Thailand for retirement, and/or who plan to stay in Thailand for years, maybe even until the day they die. When I first arrived in Thailand, I was not able to walk. and could only move from room to room with the aid of a wheelchair. I had to think of something that might keep me busy while I recuperated in this beautiful land of helpful and gracious people, good food, and pleasant weather, not to mention this land of the Thai Myna bird, an avian specie possessed of uncommonly complex linguistic ability. The reason I am RETURNING to this topic, after a few days of posting-quiescence is becuase I really wish to encourage older people, like me, to NEVER fear the language acquisition adventure which is available to all of us old ones who are willing to put in the time, in order to achieve great success in learning an L2. In fact, anyone between the ages of 50 and 70 can most DEFINITELY learn passa Thai. I know this to be true after having witnessed this happen, many times. The more important requirement for success in learning Thai is.... TIME ON TASK! In addition, in order to learn to speak passa Thai, then you should be willing to learn Thai script, which will also benefit you during your days, months, and years in Thailand. I mean, if you love Thai food, then you need to be able to easily read a Thai menu, which you WILL be able to do, maybe after one or two years of passa Thai learning, and Thai-food eating. Therefore, My Dear Friends, my most important advice to you is to NOT waste your Golden Retirement Years here, in Thailand, without learning to READ and Speak passa Thai. Passa Thai is not an easy language, and I think it is a bit more difficult than learning Mandarin Chinese. Still, passa Thai is easier than several other languages, and there is really NO DOUBT that any guy or gal, worth his or her salt, can fairly quickly (within one to three years) learn to comprehend simple spoken Thai, and also be able to speak simple Thai, and, what I consider crucial, be able to read Thai script at a fairly high level, meaning the level taught by university classes at Year Two in their Thai language curriculum. Dumb and Ignorant as I may be, yet, I do know a thing or two about learning languages. Trust me, that if you are between the age of 50 and the almost impossible age of 75, you will STILL be able to make good progress in learning Thai, month by month, if only you possess the will to put in the TIME ON TASK. Passa Thai is, in my opinion, quite a beautiful language. Good Luck to ALL, in our Thai-language-learning endeavor which so many of us share in common!

Does one require a work permit to carry another's leather bag around in the hot Sun, for free? I think, definitely, NOT. But, am I mistaken in my judgement about this? Please elucidate.... Tks!

Please Note: aa. I really wonder why this topic cannot be pinned, and maintained well, on the Farang Pub forum. bb. Because, I am sure that there are many here who might find this interesting. cc. In other words, we already have two topics pinned for music selections from two other genre of music. And, maybe now is the time to PIN one more music topic on the Pub Forum. dd. This is only my strong suggestion and wish. I LOVE classical music, and have for over 55 years. And, for me, classical music has become more important and interesting, and helpful to me, the older I become. Hopefully, some moderator will PIN and Maintain a Thread and Discussion, such as this. Tks!

Such a GREAT and Overdue Topic! I hope this topic lives LONG, because, it will be interesting to add to this thread, from time to time. aa. I love JS Bach, in all cases. bb. Verdi, I love, too, even though Verdi is second-fiddle to JS Bach, who is a true god, never to be trumped. cc. OK... In answer to the original question, which is a difficult question: I would need to say that Rostropovich playing JS Bach, on Cello, cannot be duplicated. Also, JS Bach's cantatas are amazing. dd. So, here is Rostropovich with his fantastic cello, curtesy of YouTube. (Thank you, again, for this great Topic.) Over several years, I must have listened to this entire thing, maybe 200 times (conservatively speaking). One never tires of JS Bach.

WOW! Very beautiful piece of craftmanship! I just ==WISH== I had an abode beautiful enough to house such a treasure. Unfortunately, where I am living, though not a pauper's place, by any means, such a treasure as you picture would stick out like a sore thumb. Let us all keep in mind that beauty is important for our common wellbeing. Thank you for the image which makes me both nostalgic and sad in some ways.

Please keep in mind that we humans feel happiness because we smile, not the obverse, just as we feel scared because we run. One might also argue that we, thusly, feel greater happiness living in the land of smiles, being forced to smile every day, interacting with the locals. Truly, Thailand is a miraculous country and culture. I DO believe this. I do. What about you? Concerning appreciation of British humor, this is something enduring that one takes with one, even into the bush, and sometimes, also, into places where it is most needed.

My Dear Friends, Somehow, while clicking on the internet, I came across something that I had forgotten, a true gem of days gone by, when humor was both silly and interesting, and satisfying, deep down. What I mean is that British humor is something to be savored by everybody, with half a brain, or more. Personally, I grew up on British humor through books, as well as through film. Maybe, British humor shaped me a bit. You know, humor is something which is not easily shared between different cultures. And, also, humor is something that is not easily shared within a culture between members of the same culture who are not humorously aligned, particularly. Still, I say, humor is like music, and music takes many forms, and also, in my humble opinion, one should not believe that one form of music is inherently somehow "superior" to the next. In Thailand, for example, culturally speaking, humor is different than humor of another country. However, this definitely does not mean that humor in Thailand is any less subtle or refined, for sure. Yes, perhaps, but not assured, that it is often the case that Thai people do not understand various genre of foreign humor, as has been discussed, so many times, in past posts on TV. You see, I do recall what others have written on this forum, during the past many years, concerning the differences in humor, such as the understanding of "jokes" told by farang, and the understanding of them by people growing up in Thai culture. One truism that I keep in mind, especially when studying differences in humor, cross culturally, is that there is FAR more diversity between people in any given country than there are differences between the "average" person, country to country, and far more diversity within a country, compared to generalized differences between countries. Each to his own, concerning forms of humor. Personally speaking, just stating my preference, I do love this Peter Cook & Dudley Moore skit. Perhaps, this might provide a chuckle to you, as well. Peter Cook and Moore must have brought much pleasure to many around this world, even in Thailand. We should not look at Thailand's populace as being monolithic in any way, ever. Stereotypes quickly and naturally fall by the wayside when one finally ceases to be a tourist, and begins to know the people amongst whom one lives. As I say, just for my own enjoyment, I have always seemed to gravitate to British humor. Sometimes, gallows humor, as well. Humor, among humans, is universal, and most diverse. Like music, it is just too difficult and improper to assign a valuation to one form or another. Anyway, I hope you find this Cook and Moore selection, linked here, mildly diverting...... Best regards...... Take care......

I don't know how much you know about Mexico. However, I once raced, at breakneck speeds, in 1990, for 5 hours, through Tabasco, down near the border of Belize, and mostly across the Yucatan Peninsula, where you would see almost nothing but almost totally unclothed natives, while driving a Mercedes, chasing two faster Toyotas. The guys in the Toyotas were maniacs of speed.. Every time I would inch up on them, they would just go faster. Toyotas are faster than the 420 SE Benz, for sure. This was a very hair-raising ride, and foolish, on winding roads through the jungle. No cars coming or going on this highway, for hours, 33 years ago. Just three cars together, racing as fast as we could go, for hours on end, through the Yucatan, on an extremely lonely road. Very few (basically zero) hospitals in that area back in 1989. On the way from Naples Florida, through Mexico City, to Belize in a Benz, at a time when there were zero Mercedes in Mexico City, and this was just a couple of years after the earthquake there. Lots of excitement. I would not repeat it. The food in Mexico is wonderful. The water in Mexico, the drinking water, is terrible.

Aspergillosis is not serious, presumably like you. There are various cures available for both seriousness and aspergillosis, according to how both illnesses present upon reaching your clinic for treatment. The asparagus and cabbage treatment is sure fire. Day One: Eat nothing but asparagus Day Two: Eat nothing but boiled cabbage Day Three: East nothing but asparagus Day Four: Eat nothing but cabbage Day Five: Eat nothing but asparagus Day Six: Eat nothing but cabbage Day Seven: Gorge Only on mouth-watering decent Stilton, and nothing else.... After two pounds of prime Stilton, on the seventh day, you will be cured of all ills. Such a beautiful cheese. Not to be wasted on the likes of those who don't truly fancy a Stilton cheese. It has been many years since I tasted Stilton. And, it has been even more years since I tasted what some consider to be the essence of a woman. After you move from HK, Stilton is hard to get. After you give up Stilton, then it is easier to give up women, too. From my experience, if one gives up womanizing, then it is easier to lose weight, just from everlasting pining after them.

Thankfully, a new Wordle will be available each day! Interesting concept. Probably one might become completely engrossed in this, for better or for worse. Something for a rainy day, for sure.

Dear Jingthing, After reading your good posts for almost a decade, all I can say is that NPR is something that we might both share in common, among very few other things. You are somewhat of an enigma to me, for one. Let's see if you, probably much less likely than I, will still be posting in the year 2032, by the time the Thwaites glacier is just a distant memory. The water is rising. NPR is a shadow of what it once was. The Himalayan glaciers are melting, which could, conceivably, affect the rice harvest in the not too distant future. NPR has become bastardized during the past many years, probably due to lack of interest among the public, and lack of funding. NPR, as it now stands, is nothing like what we once believed it stood for. Anyway, who cares, now.

My Dear Friends, Soon, we will emerge from this pandemic into a New Brave World. And, I am thinking about ways in which I can recover from two years of unwelcome indolence and the resultant weight gain, concomitant staying-at-home blues, as well as generalized feeling of missing out on two years of my life. What I need is to get out on the links, see the beautifully manicured fairways, not to mention the sandraps, and even raking them. To make this short: I will caddie for you, for free, if you give a large donation to some good cause, maybe. This is something to consider. What would you offer to a good cause, in this case? (Please Note: At my age, I can only carry your clubs, minus your bag. You would need to keep your bag in your cart.) What is a caddie? What is a caddy?

You know, My Friend, these days, my heart belongs to the Farang Pub, only. The reason I enjoy the Farang Pub is that this forum is the one from which all wisdom, not to mention goodness, flows. Truly, I say unto thee, I shall never stray from the Farang Pub, again. Posting, too much, on other places, might risk my total undoing. Therefore: Lessons learned, I am always cautious, polite, and empathetic in my postings here...which.....is the way life actually SHOULD be, anyway. Take care.

Have you ever experienced, in your wife, a lack of responsiveness, anytime the weather gets cold? Maybe she begins with goosebumps in the afternoon. And then, by the time you are ready to sleep, she is just not ready to have a go. You cannot understand it, simply because you are used to very cold weather. Yet, for her, 18 degrees C, is cold, and she just becomes dry, and wishes to sleep through the cold. How many times has this happened to me during several recent decades. Probably, given my postings during this past decade, you might mistakenly believe that I have never been with a woman. And, you might discount my experience living with women. Actually, I know quite a bit. And, I can tell you that...when it gets cold....then, women are more likely to become frigid. If it were otherwise, then there would be far less frolicking in steaming hot tubs during the winter months. Sure, maybe I may have become bitter, just because I am not willing to go walking on walking street in Pattaya. And, these days, I would never be willing to fall in love with a bar girl, even if she were a regular from the most famous bar in Pattaya. Cold weather is incompatible with decent (or indecent) lovemaking. And so, just a word of advice, if you might wish lovemaking which you will never forget... Then, a. Buy some sort of portable electric room heater, 4000 Watts, minimum. b. Choose a room with a very HOT hot tub. c. Buy some food and snacks that you know she likes. d. Tell her that you love her, and that she is extremely beautiful. Other than these four points, I am not sure what else can be done, when the weather is cold and rainy. Regards, Please Note: During winter months, or cold months, when the weather gets cold, ......

TV hater, did you say? No way! NOT for me. (Anyway, that is the way I feel, obviously.)

My Dear Friends, The reason I write to you at this time is to help you recall great moments in literary history. Speaking of Fanny Hill, a simple novel loved by most of you, should you be my age, here are a number of quotes which you may fondly remember... And, the reason I post these quotes here is not to be provocative, but only to show you that, no matter how contentious some of the posters on TV once tried to be, then they are but NOTHING compared to the great John Cleland, a man who chose to stay hidden, and never received true acclaim, as was his due, Please provide your thoughts concerning the following quotes, which are, basically, nothing, other than what most scholars consider to be great literature. Quote One: "I had it now, I felt it now: and beginning to drive, he soon gave nature such a powerful summons down to her favourite quarters, that she could no longer refuse repairing thither: all my animal spirits then rush'd mechanically to that center of attraction, and presently, inly warm'd, and stirr'd as I was beyond bearing, I lost all restraint, and yielding to the force of the emotion, gave down, as mere woman, those effusions of pleasure, which in the strictness of still faithful love, I could have wish'd to have held up." Quote Two: "He did not return till six in the evening, to take me away to my new lodgings, and my moveables being soon pack'd, and convey'd into a hackney-coach, it cost me but little regret to take my leave of a landlady whom I thought I had so much reason not to be overpleas'd with, and as for her part, she made no other difference to my staying, or going, but what that of the profit created. We soon got to the house appointed for me, which was that of a plain tradesman, who, on the score of interest, was entirely at Mr. H———'s devotion, and who let him the first floor very genteelly furnish'd, for two guineas a week, of which I was instated mistress, with a maid to attend me." Quote Three: "Mr. H——— continu'd kind and tender to me, yet, with all this I was far from happy; for, besides my regrets for my dear youth, which though often suspended, or diverted, still return'd upon me in certain melancholic moments with redoubl'd violence, I wanted more society, more dissipation. As to Mr. H———, he was so much my superior in every sense, that I felt it too much to the disadvantage of the gratitude I ow'd him, thus he gain'd my esteem though he could not raise my taste; I was qualify'd for no sort of conversation with him, except one sort, and that is a satisfaction which leaves tiresome intervals, if not fill'd up by love, or other amusements. Mr. H———, so experienc'd, so learned in the ways of women, numbers of whom had past through his hands, doubtless soon perceiv'd this uneasiness, and without approving or liking me the better for it, had the complaisance to indulge me." Anyone here who is not my age probably sees not the beauty is such literary writings from the years 1748 and 1749, concerning Fanny Hill. I have read Fanny Hill, many times, and I find every word of it miraculous, and to have been written by an almost superhuman being, and equal to any works of writing, anywhere. I first read Fanny Hill when I was 12. And, I will read Fanny Hill, one more time, when I am 92. We all believe that we, each one of us, will live forever. We all believe that our world will continue, as it is now, forever. Sometimes we worry about the end of the universe. And, for some reason, we don't first consider real risk. Somehow, it seems so ridiculous to take our collective future....seriously. Really? Still, whether or not something or nothing happens, I am past my prime, and I will be dead soon. Therefore, being so close to my jumping off point, into the next great experience beyond the grave, I would like to ask for another 10 years of my life without the need to live these years with FACEBOOK. Someday, maybe not within the next 500 years, but sometime in the distant future, there will no longer be a FaceBook, and, then, Humankind will become less robotic, and more "Human". Maybe we should not question anything.

Is the "Stickboy" author actually sort of like John Cleland? Sort of the same, yet less literate? Less a man of taste. Less a man of wealth. Not even a Mick. Not even a Dickensian Jaggar? Who has any sympathy for Stickboy, one might validly wonder.

Anyway, as we continue to age, we miss what we once had, which was our juices....like this..... Thankfully, most of us, due to not being far too crazy, have outlived Janis. And so, now that we have more wisdom, then we should communicate to the next generation, 50 years younger than we, what life is really about. And so, even you do not know what Life is REALLY about,.....do you? Life ain't fair. No one tells us, before we are born, what this life might be like, without a silver spoon.

Facetiously speaking, and, perhaps sexually speaking, as you say...the Top always enjoys teaching the Bottom a lesson. Maybe, this has been your case, too. I dunno.

Beautiful! I LOVE this photo which you posted. For sure.

Was Stickman, and maybe his son, Stickboy, too, just a mythical figure who never really existed? Was Stickman just, in actuality, no more than a marketing tool used by this less than upright industry to promote a sort of sleazy industry? I am sure you will all recall the novella Animal Farm. And so, reading this novella, not everything one reads should be accepted as literal. Therefore, even if some might say, which still must be proved, that Stickman and Stickboy have somehow left us, still their spirit resides amongst us all, in minor ways. The dregs of Stickman and his boy, like Batman and Robin, will reside and resonate with us for so many years to come, no matter how we might wish to rid ourselves of the memory of these two loveable figures.

My Dear Friends, Throughout my short life, and Life is Short, I have never lived even one minute during which I was not focused on the Golden Ring, which is education and erudition for its own sake, a true Man of Learning. And so, now that I find myself so ripe, after almost seven decades, it is not strange to tell that I still am just interested in this same old thing, learning and knowledge, and continued amassing of limited wisdom. When I was very, VERY young, I read many books, books like Fanny Hill, and, certainly, these books were the cause of my belief that being the greatest monger who ever lived might be something worth aspiring to. Mongering is a pursuit for two groups of men: I mean, Young men with hard members, and, also, Old men with large bejeweled rings, and piles of money, who mostly suffer from gout. Maybe you might not know what I am driving at. I am just saying that, pursuits of the flesh are never satisfying, in the end, and can lead to depravity, debauchery, and ill health. Let’s not be bounders, for example, such as those who have very few redeeming qualities. Instead, one should find some other passion in life which provides oneself, and others, some good advantage and satisfaction, and some reason to remain alive. So, anyway, what I have found is the pursuit of teaching, and this need not be for money, either. I teach because I love to witness the mind of another change for the better. The students I teach improve with each of my classes, and, for sure, they grow in many ways. Yes, My Friends, I am a fairly dynamite teacher, when I put my mind to it. Most of you already know without any coaxing from me that you should do something to give back for what you have received during years gone by when you were younger, and when you received so much from this world. However, from just one other perspective, you can truly gain so much satisfaction in your later life just by the act of contributing to others, even in a minor way. I hate to be maudlin. But, why not be, in this case? So…anyway, I think I have reached the end of what I was attempting to communicate, here. And now…..let’s talk about SATISFACTION, maybe.... If you have ever watched the Chick-Flick Series, Big Little Lies, and if you, like I, love Chick Flicks, then you will recall how satisfying that series truly was. . Also, this series exemplifies the rampant Materialism in America, these days, maybe, which I found shocking and demoralizing, especially among the young players in this series. This comedy-drama probably not only satisfied your feminine side, but it also bowled you over in the clover, Music-Wise! For example, there was a fantastic Cover of Janis Joplin’s Ball & Chain, but so much more great old music interspersed throughout these great Chick-flick episodes of Big and Little Lies, or Little Big Man, or, whatever the title was. Well? In case you don’t believe me, here is the cover from YouTube of the Janis Joplin tune, if I can find it on YouTube. Pretty amazing cover, I would say, because…..listening to this cover, I can almost see Janis stomping her shoe into the stage, SO many years ago. This music provided me a true feeling of SATISFACTION; I must admit. Best regards, and sincere caring to you all, as usual, forever, and forever, Glob Note: There has been, and will only ever be, just ONE Janis. Janis is the REAL THING. Janis was such, SUCH, a true Siren. Only difference is...maybe....instead of leading men to their ruin, she, herself, crashed into the rocks, and died too early. What do you think?

Interesting. Watson wrote a textbook which was used by very many schools, many years ago. However, did he actually write it himself, do you know? Re: You "would see Watson occasionally at Cold Spring Harbor" Did he ever visit Stoney Brook, do you know?