almost pattaya

I almost went to Pattaya.

See, I went to an annual work party last night.  Free food, free beer & whiskey, lots and lots of Thai office girls; plenty of reason to show up.  I spent an hour and a half eating, drinking draft beer and chatting with some friends.  There were probably 200 people at the party.

One of my buddies was on his second whiskey-soda of the night around 8:30 p.m. and he said to me, “I was thinking it might be fun to go to Pattaya tonight.  What do you think?”

Well, my first thought was that I was having a decent time drinking free beer, and that Pattaya was two hours away.  Then I thought about what would happen at the party in about an hour.  The Thais staff would start handing out prizes, telling jokes and singing karaoke.

Suddenly a two hour drive to Sin City sounded like a good idea.

“Sure” I said.  “Let’s go.”

20-baht books

I’d never before been to the 4th floor of the Amarin Plaza (a small upscale looking shopping center that links to Chit Lom BTS station via the skywalk), but last night I was talking with my pal Ash and he said that he’d just bought a bunch of books at a shop there.

The way he described it, it sounded almost like it fell into the “too good to be true” category, but I know and trust Ash so I went to look for some books.

Vacation

Well, I’ve confirmed my airline reservations and booked a hotel for at least the first few days.

I’ll be spending New Year’s Eve and the week that surrounds it in the Philappines.

I have three goals:

Wild & Crazy Guys

It’s Saturday night, live, in Bangkok.

I stopped by to see the Dude at his place before lunchtime today.  He was badly hungover, and told me that after happy hour at Molly Malones yesterday he stopped in at Soi Cowboy — a decision he seemed to regret.  He was moving slowly; we sat and watched a show about NFL football season 13.  When it was over he slowly got to his feet and I walked with him down to 7-11 where he bought a package of Tylenol and some banana cake.  When he went home I went to run some errands.  The Dude said he might call me tonight if he decided to go out for a cold one.

The Airport Rail Link: Ribbon Cutting Before Songkran

After a long period of planning and construction, the new Airport Rail Link should open before April according to today’s Bangkok Post:

PM: Airport Link opening before April

* Published: 4/12/2009 at 03:27 PM
* Online news: Local News

Transport Minister Sohpon Zarum had confirmed the 28-kilometre Airport Rail Link connecting Suvarnabhumi airport with Phaya Thai and Makkasan in downtown Bangkok will be in service before April, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said on Friday.

Happy Birthday!

Tomorrow, 5 December, is the King’s birthday, and, as usual, there are many events planned as part of the celebration.

being a guy

I sleep with my balcony door open.

There was a noise outside around 3 a.m. that woke me up.   I wanted to just roll over and go back to sleep but I needed to pee.

So I got up and took care of business.

Coming back to bed I decided to check my email and make a quick run through the blogs and news sites before going back to sleep.

Ten minutes later I closed my computer and laid down to sleep again.  But I realized that I was a little bit hungry.  I could try to ignore it and go back to sleep, but… oh why not?

I got up and looked to see what was in the house.

Half a pork chop.  Perfect!

Queen Sirikit Convention Center

I live just a few blocks from the Queen Sirikit Convention Center.  In spite of that it’s never had much of a place in my life or conciousness.

Back in May 2005 I went to the Travel & Leisure Expo there and bought a 6 day diving holiday in Koh Tao.  Since then I hadn’t been back.

Until today.