Prubangboy

Just now, GinBoy2 said:

Actually at 71 by US standards you'd be on medicare and paying  $174/month with a $1632 deductible, with no pre existing conditions

 

I was a high earner so it's a lot higher. And I'd need to find some poor quality doctor who even takes medicare, and then the prices would be insane. I had supplementary insurance for $180 a month too. And then there's my younger wife who was paying $1,500 a month.

I can stroll into Chiang Mai Ram Hospital and get a consult within a couple of hours for 500 baht. In North Carolina, anything was 2-3 month wait and costs at least triple. 

I do the 5 X 5 weight training program twice a week. Internet tells me that the third session a week was doing little or no good for my 71 year old bones. Recovery is everything.

Alternate days, I do 45 minutes on the treadmill. Maybe 4 alcohol units a week, under 2000 calories a day, no sugar, light/medium carbs. 100 grams of protein a day.

Still have a big gut a year later. Clothes fit just a bit better. Starting late, it's hard to get results.

Much more energy and noticeably more strength. I'm doing it at this point to stay out of managed care, not impress girls.

Cigna will insure you. according to my agent. Get a quote.

I'm 71, pay about $500 a month for a $7,500 deductible. Cheap by US standards, but maybe not by godless socialism standards.

They have aggregate insurance websites, plug in your deets and wonder no more.

Trump ruined political comedy by being an actual menace. It's no fun to laugh at him anymore. 

And for acts like Maher or Rogan who are trying to play the common sense contrarian centralist, it comes off as "on both sides, on both sides" blather. 

Joe Biden is, as advertised, a Weekend at Bernie's coma-victim. But he had one job, beat Trump, and he did it. Not sure he can do it again. Anything anti-Joe is anti-me.

Parsing low hanging fruit democrat foibles to appear balanced in the face of the new Republican bullying anarchy is true Titanic deck chair rearranging. Which side are you on?

Maher and I are no longer on the same side and him being much less funny has killed my fandom for good. 

2 hours ago, Fat is a type of crazy said:

How do you go with the pollution. You do make that part of Chiang Mai sound pretty good.

 

Spending 2 and a half months in Thailand in a few months including a month in Jomtiem with and without my girlfriend to see if I love it or hate it. 

 

Went to Phuket 6 months ago and enjoyed Phuket town  

We just signed a second year lease in Nimman. The smoke is already getting bad. Our condo full of air bnb's is emptying out. Jett's Gym usage decreases by 75%.

Do we love it enough here to spend 8-12 weeks away from it each year and keep paying rent for those weeks for the privilege?

Reservedly, yes. We like it that much.

And we still have a few years worth of world to go out and see during smoke season. People without the flexibility and degree of Chiang Mai-mania that we have should think twice or thrice.

On the other hand, you can be in a studio in Hua Hin or Cha Am for $200 a week on a long term rate to wait it out. Ubon is also on the wait it out-list. And the rainy season here is a pleasure. 

Jomtien was on my short list, as a more benign, lower key Pattaya-option. Liked it fine as that, but I'm just not much of a beach person. And you get much more apartment for your money in CM.

Phuket Old Town -is it likewise mobbed? I loved Penang and it looks like a cleaner Penang. I'd be the rare Phuket tourist who very possibly never sees the beach.

I already live is a supposedly dystopian tourist hell (Nimman, Chiang Mai) -and I really, really love it.

So if it got so-called worse (more sushi, more hat stores for Chinese people, more 200 baht Durian Ice Cream stands), I guess I'd like it even more. It's great to live in a place where everyone has some money and is blissed out while spending it. I used to live near Times Square NYC and liked that too. If I lived in Bangkok, I'd be by some heavily used BTS stop along Sukhamvit, Phrong Phong, maybe. Tourist buzz means good restaurants.

Def. heaving here for Chinese New Year. We had to reserve at Sushi Umai. For lunch, no less. For Omakase, it's two days in advance. How do we get our Asian theme park life back? Just wait a week, I guess.

This thread has successfully killed a planned Phuket outing for me, so thanks.

Just did Koh Samui and found it a bit packed out, so if Phuket is double-that, I'll wait a couple of years for the Russians to thin out. 'Love them in Chiang Mai, but apparently they're a bit overbearing down at the beach.

Not funny for about 5 years.

The people here who I read for laughs are the people that no one's missing back home. Slip out the back, Jack, and......

12 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

I think it's incorrect to say "attractive". I think everyone has an ideal that they want to meet, 

 

when we finally get some of it figured out we are too old to attract the right one.

They are, on average, less attracted to us. We are a thirsty lot. What to do?

Keep living. Grab that pension.

On 2/4/2024 at 12:56 PM, uttradit said:

How can they both be 20% more attractive?

They can't. Hence, the unhappiness.

The internet allows you know exactly who finds you hot enough to bother to dash off a 4-word text.

No one's happy with the dogs who actually will bother. Even less so on the woman-side.

14 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

Dude has it bad. 

Yellowstone pro's:

-Beautifully shot, I'm usually fast forwarding thru animal nature sequences, lovely soundtrack of new country music like Jason Isbel, who's Bruce-level. Very binge-able, but very low re-watch potential.

Lots of nudity. Every female lead must show her crack. I'm sure Costner demanded it.

In the Myanmar Lineage, your merit is compounded by offering up your accrued merit to others, partic. neutral others, or people you do not know.

You might also offer up merit to people you don't like, in the hopes of it bringing reconciliation. Someone else's merit is also useful to a sick loved one.

Offering up merit accrued from a vipassana mediation sitting is partic. valuable, but you must not let the ego intrude.

So quite the merit triple-accruing hat trick.

Finally got around to watching Yellowstone. It's gleefully awful. Kevin Costner completely phones it in, but it's soapy enough to enjoy.

I had hoped it would be more Trumpy as promised, but it def conveys the madness those types have about pretending to "preserve" the land while treating the land like a donkey show whore to squeeze every last nickel out of.

I moved here from Appalachia where similar newcomers versus gomers dramas are playing out post-Covid and the fantasies and deranged contradictions are the same.

And the shows a bit old, which implies that these butt hurt conflicts are eternal. They def like the idea of bullying people with violence to toe their retard Jesus line.

My in-laws also want hot looking women who are hellcats in bed like on the show, but who are also fit to meet pie bakin' Mom, but God didn't make nearly enough of them to go around. 

I save about 20 10's in case I have to do laundry while traveling. Increasingly, a hotel with a coin op laundry option is appealing to me. 

Otherwise, we let the change pile up and then give it to FreeBird Cafe here in Chiang Mai to help Myanmar refugees.

2 minutes ago, jvs said:

 

How dare you like petite females!

 

Swissie,have a nice day and enjoy your company.

 

Dating site data shows that everyone -men and women- wants a partner that's exactly 20% better looking they they are.

What sane person would not?

Or going by my theory: 20% more sexually adventurous/exotic than they are to offset a 20% looks deficit.

As always, it will come down to turn-out. Joe's a bucket of warm spit, but Trump's a bucket of warm you-know-what.

The voting against Trump will be higher than the voting against Biden -just like if I had to choose between those buckets if I had to drink from one

Who's more motivated -abortion-ragers or border-worriers? We'll know soon enough.

My money's on the abortion ragers. Quite the landmine for Trump in the debates and beyond.

Biden can say, "I tried on the border, but they were just too nuts". What's the Republican waffle on abortion?

A lot of seriously looks-mismatched relationships are kinky. I mean, duh.

Partic true when you see a Brad Pitt-type with a fattie. Most hot, submissive-lifestyle women start at size 12.

How badly do you want to be the dark lord and master? Since these women are practically never single, many, many men do.

When I popped into the Demonia Fetish Club in Bangkok, it seemed like Thailand's entire obese women population had convened there to wear rubber dresses.

Don't believe the Dakota Johnson/50 shades of grey-hype. If you want to tie up the average kinky woman, you will need a lot more rope than you thought.

And: Married thrice. One died, one grew to hate the very sight of me (English), the third one is likely good till the grave.

In '64, I was 11, and hoping the stupid Beatles would go away.

Early Motown, Early James Brown, New Orleans Rhythm and Blues -they crushed it all like a tank. They worshipped Chuck Berry too, but that didn't stop them from quickly rendering him to history's trash heap.

My mother had a mob boyfriend who would bring me a bag of singles each week from his money laundering juke boxes (why the juke box was invented, really). I'd get a lot of Vic Damone and Sinatra in the mix too. Histrionic Vicky Carr and Frank remain high in my esteem, but once I heard JB, I was gone from crooner-dom for good. 

Said my mother's paramour whenever he came over: "Get that sweaty <deleted> off the record player and put on The Sound Of Music".

7 hours ago, GypsyT said:

 

Why is Mexico City so smoggy?

 

 

Otherwise I agree; lot to see and very rich in arts but won't be back.

 

Tried it, but the area's you might live in comprise an area smaller than the Chiang Mai old city. The city is laid out so that you are constantly confronted by an eight lane mega-road or other you have to cross. The downtown historic district really shuts down after dark.

Weird quirk: hard to find an apartment with air conditioning. Everything was $1,200 a month plus. Renting in Zona Roma would be as hard  and expensive as renting in Soho or Greenwich Village (Thai food options: adequate). Loved that it had proper bookstores and Sun Ra playing in them, but it was easy to get bored after a month.

Def no cheery Thai-style sanuk vibe. Medium hostility about Yanquie Gentrification. Less English spoken then in Chiang Mai too.

And: someday, the mother of all earthquakes awaits you -we know not when- due to Mex City being built on a sinking, old lake bottom. 

Looked in on Quetetaro too. More spread out than the other mountain towns, and a fair bit duller.

I forget the name for it, but they had a bad idea-sandwich where the bread is served sopping wet, covered in red sauce. Yuck. Do you love low grade, gristly pork?  Because you'll be eating it twice a day, if you're lucky.

The day after Thailand opened up post covid, I left.

2 hours ago, GypsyT said:

San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato

 

"In fact, it's one of the safest cities in all of Mexico

 

Tried it for a month 3 years ago. Didn't see a one bed room for less than $1,500 and those were scarce and out of town.

Very small, not much bigger than Nan. Good but not great restaurant selection. I stayed at the Zen Center for $10 a night. Maybe 3 people show up on a busy night at the Zen Center

Supposedly, it has the largest proportion of older western woman expats in the world, surpassing even Bali. Those old hags must have been in hiding -and hiding out from Zen too.

Guanajuato had more life to it, but was another 3 day town. They have a Thai restaurant. But not one you'd go to twice. If you go to two of these mountain towns with expensive silver and craft stores, you can skip the rest.

21 hours ago, Yellowtail said:

The restaurant's photo the OP posted looks like only two ribs to me. 

 

That said, the actual meal does not look very appetizing. 

Agreed. Poss kitchen error on the skimpy French fries?

Tho on average, the fries portion in Thailand is (thankfully) smaller than in the west.

28 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Anything to say that doesn't involve juvenile insults?

 

For me at this mature stage of drunken whoremonger forum participation, almost certainly not.

I love TBL. No one has praised him here more than me. He's like Bukowski, trapped in New Zealand.

But would I take political advice from NZ Bukowski? From a socialist, tit-sucking faux hardman poseur?

No. I mean, duh.

Just now, Will B Good said:

Before you?.....You have something planned?

She has a lot of chronic health problems. That's why I always encourage her to order the dozen oysters, not the half-dozen.

1 minute ago, Mike Lister said:

It looks like you're going pretty much by the book for your age,

 

 

 

 

Another consideration: No need to provide for heirs beyond my wife. She's 10 years younger, but will likely go before me.

I am reminded of the lesson of Howard Hughes's butler: When asked how much money Howard left, he replied, "well, he left all of it". We are front loading and upgrading our travel plans.

Our Christmas tree biz is a fluke. My wife grew up in the Veuve Cliquot region for Christmas tree-growing (Blue Ridge Mountains) due the unique climate.

You plant 'em (or someone else does and takes half the money), you give 'em a light trim and fertilization every year, and they are impervious to drought, insects, everything. They are a rare plant that does well on a poor soil hill slope, so otherwise useless land is valuable where we live.

The tree's for Rockefeller Center or the White House often come from our area. A Rockefeller Center tree costs about $15K wholesale, but it's a 20 year wait to get paid. Bunting (pine roping used for rails, stairwells ect.) makes more money than the trees. 20 years ago, it was just useless trim that was thrown away.

I'm 71 (today). I invest for current income first and capital preservation second. Growth, third.

My allocation:

15% muni high yield via VWAHX (one of the few HY Muni funds without Puerto Rico bonds -I got burned).

15% broad muni ETF (MUB)

30% mix of high and middling div stocks (including 5% foreign)

10% MLP and REIT's (for income, not growth).

20% S+P ETF (to get a little growth in the mix)

10% Foreign Stock ETF (15% total is a standard allocation for foreign stocks)

I'm following a Morningstar-style bucket strategy. In a crash, I can collect income off of 70% of my portfolio and wait it out for a comeback without selling anything. This is a low growth, high yield approach. 

Also have a 2 year income pile in Bangkok Bank, a heart attack fund, and a Christmas tree farm back in the states.

Christmas trees are only going straight up in price. But you have to wait. It's one year, one foot, one dollar accrued per tree.

Mike, I too sub to Morningstar, and also Seeking Alpha. SA has a lot of fluff, but also decent analysis of REIT's and MLP's, which are less covered elsewhere.