Who’s a Smart Fellow? Who’s a Fellow Smart?

This handsome (if slightly lopsided) fellow, dear readers, is me … sans beard, and avec haircut.

I’ve been pretty busy … last week Bek stopped in on for a few days on a whirlwind conference. Our social convening was limited to a movie on the Sunday, and dinner on Monday, but it was tops to see her.

Blacky will soon be online and I will have someone new to converse with. I have seen Glenn occasionally on MSN (when poker’s brewing, usually) but Lara seems to have all but vanished. Leyton’s presence online is also occassional, now that he’s got the combo of a girlfriend AND night shift in a serious job. Godfrey also seems to have dropped off the face of the earth, so to them (Leyton and Godez) I send a stern warning: dude, bro’s before ho’s.

I’m making inroads to preparing new versions of my TT videos, and have discovered that if I compile it as a Windows Media File (wmv) I can get a high quality file with good audio for 3.5Mb, waaaaay down from the 10+Mb that I had with AVI’s. So they’ll be looking smick and new soon. Buhlee dat.

Oh what a weekend

I just won a 500 baht voucher for Oh My Cod restaurant. You may recall it’s the place where Brenden, Leyton and I drank all the Bacardi at last November. I’m stoked with joy.

In other Thai news, from February 11 smoking will be banned in all restaurants and bars in Thailand. I have read online that enforcement of the smoking ban will actually be enforced, so hooray for Thailand becoming less like France.

Speaking of France, I know quite a lot about it now, having just bought another two Stephen Clarke books. The first one I read a few years ago, A Year in the Merde and quite enjoyed it. I’m currently reading Talk to the Snail which is a little too clever for its own good, but I have high hopes for Merde Actually which is the sequel to the first book I read a long time ago.

Couple of funny things to report, especially speaking of merde: Mint is trying out swearing in English, and it’s hilarious because she mispronounces it. Also, she’s the latest in a long line of people addicted to Quadrapop. Oh the humanity, when will it end?

Had a great weekend, saw Mr Woodcock at the movies, and it was quite funny, and good. Great cast: Billy Bob Thornton, Sean William Scott (who looks much older now than he did as “Stiffler” in American Pie, but I suppose the original American Pie was a 1999 movie, so most people would look older), Susan Sarandon, Amy Poehler, the guy who played “Randy” in My Name is Earl … great stuff. IMDB rating is only 5.1 but I think that’s unfair. Some parts were actually very, very funny. Not sure when it’s out in Australia.

And that’s it. Have a good week.

the return of Asian Dean

I just came back from lunch, where Mint had cooked one of my favourite “simple” meals … pork omelette with rice. How Asian am I?

Things are going well … business on PP especially, is booming. 2007 was an average year, but so far 2008 is a winner.

Mint needs a tooth crowned, and yesterday got a price from the local dentist at 20,000B. That’s a lot of money. Today she is going to see her old dentist - in a Thai area, moreso than a farang area - to see what Thai people pay for the same thing.

The sale of the Gabba proceeds. Any day now I will be debt free, then I only need to worry about how to pay myself, which is one of the downsides of being self-employed. Of course, the upside is that I’m here in Thailand eating pork omelette and loving life, but whatever

more since being back

So I was talking about the family dinner.

As usual, we were running late. Mint likes to nap almost up until the point where we’re supposed to be there, the flurry about like trapped bear while getting ready, and then usually we’re hailing a cab sometime AFTER we’re already supposed to be wherever we’re going. We went to this nice Chinese/Thai place where Mint had her 21st, and the family were already sitting. They’d ordered a few dishes already: including the sister ordering shark fin soup, because I was paying. Mum reckons this kinda passive-agressive behaviour may indicate jealousy of the comparitively-better lifestyle Mint leads - the sister lives on a farm and wants to marry a farm boy, much to her mother’s angst. The younger sister is still to shy to actually speak to me, but I’m still getting a lot of glances.

The food was delicious. My favourite was a rice dish, with pineapple, bacon and prawns, baked in a pineapple shell with a coconut crust. So tropical! Also, there were really good prawns with a pineapple sauce, and the duck and crackers (which were like “flying saucers” you get at most chinese restaurant, except slightly more biscuity, and more duck flavoured).

We good-byed the family in the taxi and then caught one ourself home. Despite an afternoon nap, I slept well.

The next day was Thursday I think. The family came over, and Far cooked. She is an excellent cook, although Mint secretly finds her food “too Chinese” which means “not spicy”. Far cooking was also billed as a “thankyou” for dinner the previous night, which was nice. I probably paid for the ingredients, but it’s still a nice gesture. After food there were discussions about the future of Mint and I, and her mother’s needs that I would be expected to meet. The younger sister, Fern, was sitting on the mother’s lap throughout this, until Mint picked her up and thrust her onto my lap. She didn’t move. In fact, that was the tipping point that decided I was ok. She was more or less “attached” to me for the rest of their time here. It was an interesting friendship because I didn’t speak chinese, and she didn’t speak a LOT of Thai (and neither do I of course), so I would show her a picture of something on the computer (animals went down well) she would say the name of the animal in Chinese, and I would repeat it, not really knowing if it was correct or not.

Anyway, we ate dinner, Far showered and they were off. Suddenly. They obviously had a bus to catch at a certain time, but because I didn’t know what time that was, it seemed suddenly they just got up and left. Mint’s mother loved the gold, and one of them was too small, so she’ll probably sell that, but that’s cool - that’s the way it works - gold is more or less the same as cash here anyway.

Since then, life has been back to normal in many respects. We’ve been to the movies, a couple of times I think, and had some average experiences. Nothing as good as Hitman in Australia. Man that was a good movie.

Meeting the family, Asian style

Most of the people who read this blog are up to date with everything that happened up to the point where I packed my bags and flew back, so I’ll ignore the one month gap in my blog history and start from there.

I was in the last floundering touches of cleaning out my apartment - emptying the several rubbish cans, taking the suitcases and last remaining boxes to the car, when I ran into Gary from my apartment complex, who happens to be an immigration lawyer. We’ve spoken in friendly terms for many years - I think he bought his apartment when it was new too - and he’s been semi up-to-date with my comings and goings, including the Mint development.

He asked how things were going and invited me around for a drink and a chat when he got back from Woolies, so I killed time for another hour and then rocked up. He painted a fairly doom-and-gloom picture of the battle ahead, and not so subtly suggested that some people from poor countries do anything to survive. Lying to a perspective partner was the least of the devious schemes he mentioned. I’m sure he’s in a job where he sees a lot of examples of this kinda stuff, but it was disheartening. I just decided to ignore his advice for the most part and see what happens.

Mum made chicken custard for dinner, so it was a great sendoff. Was delighted, but disappointed I just couldn’t fit any more chickeny goodness down my gob. Mum helped me repack my bags, including sacrificing many items that didn’t pass muster on the repack, and even so I paid $288 for excess kilos of luggage.

The flight was pretty good, I took a temazepam and slept through most of it. I found out that exit rows - while great in economy - are not as great in business, because the seat in front of you stops you sliding down the slight angle of the slightly-inclined-that-airlines-call-flat to the floor. Several times I had to wake up and hoik myself back up the chair. Food was great - I recommend the pancakes.

Through customs and baggage collection relatively easily, caught a cab and got to the apartment around 7am. Mint was suprised, she expected to see me the next day! She hussled the whole family out of bed - oh, she and her sister had migrated to the couch, so the “very big bed” was only big enough for her mother, younger sister and aunt. I distributed stuffed Australiana and chocolate, and then was permitted some sleep. I woke later for lunch, and then did some work. Mint’s mother liked me - at one stage Mint roused on her for staring, although I didn’t know it at the time. The younger sister seemed scared of me, but also intrigued by the whitey she was introduced to as “brother” and kept sneaking sideways glances in my direction. That afternoon Mint moved the family into a hotel, and we snuck in a quick nap before dinner.

Dinner was great, and also funny in many ways, but I’ll write about that more in a little while … gotta leave with them wanting more, amirite?