blazes

That's the one! A poundstore intellectual, alas.

I believe the Phukhet authorities will be appointing a falang experienced in the issuance of red and yellow cards to be the regulator of this system, at quite a substantial remuneration. My sources have informed me that there is a short-list of 3, whose names apparently are: Mr H. Webb Mr M Dean and Mr M Clattenburg.

Good name for a new beer ....."Who You Know".

Macha Bucha was an English guy who never left the Malayan jungle in 1945 after helping the war effort by driving out the Japanese so that the rightful owners could take over again. He had been a butcher in civilian life in Great Britain before the war, and now, once he had crossed the border into Thailand (before the days of visas), he set up a butcher's shop in Hat Yai and called himself a Master Butcher. The rest is history....

This is of course all hogwash. London's only claim to fame is the fact that Arsenal F.C. resides there (for the time being). Paris's only claim is to excellent wine at (relatively) cheap prices. New York's only claim is that one can be granted bail seconds after one has committed a crime.

Doesn't leave an awful lot in the enjoyable city department, does it?

Hua Hin, coming into air-quality problems: https://www.iqair.com/thailand/prachuap-khiri-khan/hua-hin

don't forget Gender Studies....

Molly Bloom recalls confessing to the priest how in her teenage years she committed sins with Leopold ( as in sex before marriage). Priest: And where did he touch you, my child? Molly: On the canal bank, Father.

I was conducting Beethoven's 5th at the age of 13 , with my mother's knitting needle as my baton, so please don't patronise me like that. Clearly you don't read the concert programmes for the year ahead in some city orchestras around North America. If you did, instead of relying on YouTube, you would then see what I mean by "dumbing down."

While I agree with your sentiments, I find, as a lover of classical music, that while it is "timeless" (and lasts centuries longer than your average rock <deleted>) the fact is many symphony orchestras all over North America (less so in Europe) are dumbing down their concerts so as to make them more "accessible" to the modern breed of illiterates that our schools and universities are now producing. They have to be "tempted" into the symphony concert with some kind of assurance that it is a safe space, even though it is produced in the main by (gosh) white middle class people who have actually reached their position as musicians through lots of hard work and by MERIT. If posters here want a definition of woke, one aspect of it can be found in the numerous examples in modern life of people being promoted, not on merit, but on factors covered by the hateful term "diversity."

Tipping: in Hua Hin, in the restaurant I frequent quite frequently, I note (it's easy to do) how much different people leave for a tip. (Btw, as far as I can see, it is only higher-end restaurants that include a 10% tip - or "service charge" - in their bills.) I note that North Americans are likely to leave a 100 baht tip, no matter what the actual bill. I note that North Europeans (especially Swedes, Norwegians, Dutch and Germans )are total cheapskates and tend to leave 20 baht or NOTHING!!!!! Do these people think that leaving 20 baht is a serious way of acknowledging service? Have they ever stopped to think how much 20 baht buys????? Makes my skin crawl to see Europeans with far superior salaries to anything available to your average nong in a restaurant here being so cheap.

I wonder if Mrs Vardy's legal debts will be folded into that write-off?

"We"??????

Weird, truly weird......

Arab Israelis have the vote. What does "if they gave Palestinians a vote" actually mean? You can of course imagine how wonderful would be the "democracy" formed by the Palestinians whose first aim in life is to sweep the Israelis into the sea.....

Amnesty International's reputation for political neutrality has plummeted in recent decades (imo). Your quotation (from Wiki, a useful source when dealing with actual facts, but hopelessly biased when offering opinion) could apply to scores of modern states (including the United States and its historical dealings with indigenous people!) The fact remains that Israel is the ONLY country in the whole of the Middle East that has free and fair elections. You may not like the results, but their brand of democracy has guaranteed a vitality to all sectors of society. It is an insult to our intelligence to equate Israel with the former S Africa, where Israeli-type democracy was only a distant dream for 90% of the population.

Exactly how is Israel an "apartheid" state?

Oh goody. My shares in Raytheon and Northrop Grumman are going to zoom upwards. Thanks, Joe.

Enjoyed many trans-pacific flights on Eva Air. Still used for cargo, aren't they?

"Biggly" : the only other human being I ever heard converting "big" into an even greater adverb "biggly" was Donald J. Trump.....

Sorry, off topic, but this does remind me of an Eton report card about Anthony Armstrong Jones, later Lord Snowdon, and a little bit later, husband of Princess Margaret. The form master wrote: "He may be good at some subject, but it is not a subject we teach here."

This thread is largely a waste of space, since there is zero probability that Putin's invasion depended, for good or ill, on a conversation with the former Mayor of London. What the thread is omitting is Biden's (rather dementia-inspired) remark about an "incursion" being acceptable (with, presumably, the unspoken thought that maybe an "invasion" might be a missile or two too far).

From the headline I thought it was Putin threatening Johnson personally. Which might have been a useful contribution to the re-building of Britain....