When you receive lime wedges at Thai restaurants and such, do you eat the lime after putting lime juice on your rice? I do. I take that lime wedge down to nothing left but the peel.
And when I do it, I think about the British Navy and not getting scurvy. Those are some weird quirks of history that make me think of that every time I eat a lime, but that's the way it is.
Of course, there are many uses for the greatness of the lime.
 |
20240327 |
Somebody else can probably beat this number, but this is my current best: At least 16 soi dogs living in the empty field near my dentist office. In the same way that there is always a Cat Person feeding feral cats, so it is with these feral dogs. I have seen the Dog People, at least twice, feeding this pack.
A bit uncomfortable getting out of the car with all these soi dogs staring at us. I'm just saying.
 |
20240325 |
 |
| รถเข็นสีฟ้า / Blue Cart I saw the artist (university student) and had the opportunity to compliment her excellent work. I hope that--despite how weird my Thai sounds--she understood how much I love this painting. The fact that I came back and looked at it several more times may have communicated the idea better. |
 |
มอเตอร์ไซค์หรรษา / Motorcycle Fun I saw these two young ladies in the painting standing next to this painting, as they were apparently required to do (university students). They were so lovely that I couldn't bring myself to force them into the weirdness of listening to me speak Thai. But I wanted to!!! And the young lady with glasses seemed kind of worried that I was going to. But she was too kind. They both were. Maybe they'll remember me as "the old, bald, pot-bellied foreigner who came and looked at our painting several times". I wonder if they saw me pull out my smartphone (such a young person thing to do at an art exhibition) and use Google Translate to find that หรรษา / haansa means "fun". Thank you so much, ladies, for your wonderful painting and for helping me learn a new word.  20240324 |
Today I got to see it for real at the Toyota dealership. The 2024 Toyota Hilux Champ, out the door for USD 15,314, plus however much you need to pay a third-party company to put whatever you need on the back.
The biggest downside of the truck pictured here is that it has a diesel engine. Diesel sucks. I have lived in diesel fumes for the past 2.5 years. But it is available with two different gasoline engines (2.0L, 2.7L) as well for use in countries with competent governance.
Of course, you can't have it in the U.S. But this basic truck is going to get a lot of work done around the rest of the world.
20240323
As I remember, I'm supposed to be able to smell the rose fragrance of this one (maybe it was the white ones instead...). Nothing yet, but it does look nice.
 |
20240322 |
Note: Full rose fragrance as of 20240323.
Who's going to miss pinball when the pinball machines are completely gone? I will.
 |
20240321 They finally removed the two broken pinball machines from the game room floor at The Mall. |
I do not, without looking it up, remember the science behind what happens to toads and frogs after the first significant rain of the season. But I can report that it wakes them all up, and they are very loud, and some of them appear to engage in hanky-panky.
Herewith, the video with audio soundtrack:
Note:
You still have to press Play twice to play a video: Once to load the video and then again to actually play it.
20240322
 |
20240320 |
I salute your public health education efforts, Saint Mary's Hospital.
 |
Summary: scary stuff!!! |
Maybe not the first actual precipitation of the season, but one that I got to experience while out and about on the motorcycle. In fact, I had to wait quite a while at St. Mary's Hospital for the rain to stop so I could ride home. Not a bad place to be stuck at all on that day. Rather enjoyable actually. Thank you, early rain.
20240313-1202
Topic: Southeast Asia field-burning season
I remember this day. It was not a good air day.
 |
20240310 |
But I did not take any photos. I could have, especially during the hour or more that I watched him on the trunk of the rose bush. At first, it seemed like he may have been waiting for the 16:45 sprinklers so that he could take a shower. But, as it turns out, he didn't like the water. After a few minutes of being sprayed, he jumped off the rose bush onto the lawn.
I neglected to mention his name. He was กิ้งก่า / Ging Ga. As an English name, let's call him the Oriental Garden Lizard, as Wikipedia does. Color-wise, Ging Ga has some chameleon-functionality. Camouflaged a gray color to blend in with the rose bush trunk, I nevertheless saw plenty of red on his back. Noted, too, was the Mohawk haircut (not really hair...) running down the back of his neck and lower back.
He hit the lawn, and he took off running--standing up. He looked like a small-scale dinosaur as he made great time to the safety of some other bushes. I should like to see Ging Ga run again. It is very fun to watch. I'm sure there are other creatures out there, not just Ging Ga, who think the same of me.
Photo of กิ้งก่า / Ging Ga on a private website about Thai national parks.
Most days, it's not possible to breathe safely outdoors for three or four months every year (December, January, February, March), but it's often not safe to breathe indoors either. Hence, the need for air purifiers.
Sure, fixing the root cause of the problem would be the way to go, but that's not how it works here. I believe the idea is that if you deny the existence of a problem strongly enough, it will cease to actually exist.
At any rate, we just paid US$ 225 in order to breathe safely indoors. This is our first air purifier, but not our last. In addition to this one in the living room, we'll need at least two more for bedrooms.
 |
20240307 |
It will grow back, but it won't be as good as the original. Kind of the way I feel about every single time I've let the doctors conduct experiments on me.
I guess it was my dream that the air wouldn't get bad until mid-January. I got back right at the end of the rainy season, and the air is...
