It's been too long.

Hi there folks. Sorry. It has been too long between posts. So much of nothing going on that I couldn't find time to write about it!!

Our life is ordinary. Diane works. I don't.
I golf, Diane doesn't.
In between we eat alot of Thai food, sleep. I have taken up drinking. I think I told you that before and today I am actually suffering from having adopted this new pass time. It does fit in well with doing nothing though. Cause when you do drink a little too much guess what you do the next day..................

I have to share this one with you it is still a major cause of laughter around here. Maybe gives you some indication of where our heads are at:

The Supply Guy

An Italian, an Irishman and a Chinese fellow are hired at a construction site.
The foreman points out a huge pile of sand and says to the Italian guy. "You're in charge of sweeping," to the Irishman, "You're in charge of shoveling," and to the Chinese guy, "And you're in charge of supplies." "Now, I have to leave for a little while. I expect you guys to make a dent in that pile."
So the foreman goes away for a couple hours, and when he returns, the pile of sand is untouched. He says to the Italian, "Why didn't you sweep any of it?"
The Italian replies, "I didn't have a broom. You said the Chinese guy was in charge of supplies, but he disappeared and I couldn't find him."
So then the foreman turns to the Irishman and asks why he didn't shovel.
The Irishman replies, "I couldn't get myself a shovel. You left the Chinese guy in charge of supplies, but I couldn't find him."
The foreman is really upset now, and storms off toward the pile of sand looking for the Chinese guy.
Just then, the Chinese guy springs out from behind the pile of sand and yells 'SUPPLIZE!"

Hehehe, we go through our fair share of that here
Some of you may know my life relationship with Rogers Communications Inc (forgive me Beav). I have had ongoing struggles with this elephant of an organization and their world renowned customer service team. (Actually has been much better the last 9 months, wait, stop, I haven't been in the country maybe that's why). Well I have a beauty for you here. The local Internet provider is a company called TOT. They are a state owned. TOT stands for Telephone Organization of Thailand. The company was coporatized in 2002 which I suppose means that they were now to be a viable capitalist company. Profits and all of that. They own the majority of wires you see hanging around in Thailand. And I mean hanging. They don't much care if they are attached to a pole or a tree of just out there. I am 6' 2" and I regularly have to duck under these wires. But more importantly, how the blazes do they know which is which and what for?? Here are some examples of what you see and remember once the top of the pole is full they just start wrapping it lower and lower.

 You can see in this pic here that the wires going on down the soi are getting pretty low past that last motorbike. I always tease Deeds and reach up and grab the wires and then start yelling or making a zzzttzzztttttttt sound and kinda shaking. She doesn't think it that funny, but I laugh for 20 minutes until she finally punches me or calls me a goof! (That makes me stop cause I don't like being a goof, actually I don't think anyone does, especially the way that she says it................ YA GOOOF. Hahahaha. Makes me laugh right now thinking about it.

 So I live and die with the Internet here in BKK. Without it I would be a sloppy pile of goo laying around doing nothing. But with the Internet I am saved. I get to do nothing on the computer, which is way more challenging than nothing without it.
On Wednesday the Internet connection was dropped by our wireless router, it then became intermittent. Connected for 30 minutes or so, dropped and then you had to wait for the signal to reconnect. Very frustrating as you may know. So I called the Customer support team and because I am english speaking I didn't have to wait very long for a connection (there are way fewer of us). That is where the good part of the story ends. The frustration from the inability to communicate or be understood grows very quickly. I had very little success the first call, same with the second. And this frustration isn't one sided. Eventually they put me on hold and came back in a few minutes and said "Oh Mister we do construction work (maintenance on the second call) in your area. Sorry sir problem is this will fix itself sir." When I asked when the work had started in the area or when it was to be completed I got cricket sounds!
An email did get a return call where I think I was successful in convincing a rep that the modem needed to be swapped out.
See, this is the thing. You think you have made your point, especially when you start getting affirmative noises through the phone. But you never know. So we wait. I got a phone call when out this morning. Thought it was a technician going to replace the modem but since we were not home not sure. I tried to get them to leave the modem so that the local apartment techie could install it for me but not sure he understood. I called the tech back but can't tell you what we talked about and whether he is coming back or not. Guess I go through the motions again. Things in Thailand happen slower than you think they will. Even when you think they will be slow...................... takes even longer.

Sorry no great funny stories, that's why I put the supplize joke in, figured you deserved a laugh.
Hey and you may receive a post from Deeds very soon as well cause she has a story to tell about a holiday adventure we went on. Whooooa, this is a great story, you'll love it.
So so long for now and keep well
Sawasdee Krup