Specialist

Some of the 9/11 terrorists spent their last night on Earth in strip clubs.

Occasionally I've seen Windows update sequences that wanted/needed to reboot/install the first few updates before continuing to download updates.

If you haven't already, restart it and try again to download.

If that doesn't work, the next step is to USE A DIFFERENT MACHINE to download current versions of antimalware stuff, then reboot your main machine into Safe Mode and let the antimalware software take a long, hard look at things. Some of the nasties out there block Windows updates.

The FBI claims this was done by someone at the San Bernardino Health Department. (Yeah right...)

Is it in fact a law that foreign nationals must carry their passport at all times??

 

Not so sure...

For some reason, the U.S. Navy got paid with a lot of $2 bills. When I was a kid, a friend used to mow a navy officer's lawn and always had a pile of them. Quite unusual to see them in circulation though.

A buddy of mine told me a couple of stories a long time ago. In one of them, the base commander ordered change from every transaction at the base exchange to be paid in silver dollars, as opposed to dollar bills. Got some attention, it did, when the silver coins FLOODED the local economy.

In the other story, the Navy was having trouble with sailors being treated poorly by a LOT of people and businesses in Florida. Friday noon, the admiral commanding the naval district that included Florida declared the entire state of Florida OFF LIMITS. All personnel on shore leave were recalled and required to stay aboard ship or in base housing. Personnel living off-base were allowed to go home, but were required to STAY there, doing no business whatsoever with ANYONE in the state of Florida, coming onto base and using the exchange for anything critically necessary. Monday morning, the governor of Florida was in the admiral's office, literally on his knees BEGGING the admiral to rescind the ban. It seems that a whole lot of people had just found out how important the swabbies were to the Florida economy...

Watched an interview with Matt Damon where he revealed he filmed the complete movie on his own in a separate studio from the entire rest of the cast.

When they filmed the chest-bursting scene from "Alien", NONE of the actors knew what was about to happen in the scene.

"Pixels". Simple fun, no brains required.

"The Martian". Very impressive work in some ways. I don't know how carefully they worked out the orbital mechanics stuff and the mission planning. The characters were of course cardboard.

I have NEVER seen sweaters and jackets and blankets and mufflers and bunny-rabbit-style hoodies in Soi Cowboy before tonight.

NEVER.

The poor girls looked like they were FREEZING.

Heck, *I* wouldn't have minded a light jacket, myself!

I'm taking the camera with me tomorrow night, if I can, and document it for posterity. The album title will be "What's all this Global Warming stuff, anyhow?"

OK, Mr. Stupid here has to make a comment...

 

...don't stick it in so far

She had (probably still has) some kind of respiratory bug.

Meanwhile, I'm having major asthma issues, first time EVER in Bangkok, probably caused by a very recalcitrant bronchial infection. I spent Monday morning in Bumrungrad ER, to make sure it wasn't pneumonia. Conclusion: we're treating the infection, take it easy, go back in a couple of days if it doesn't improve or gets worse.

Fair chance of no more sanuk this trip. Nonzero probability of a hospital stay. And here I am with at least five (5) willing potential sweethearts in the queue...

I put her in a cab and sent her home. I'm going to check on her Sunday.

She's still coughing. She's going to be out of commission for a few more days, most likely. Oh well, lots of Plan B and Plan C options available.

Cowboy is still all right ... if you know where to go. Avoid anything too flashy and gaudy, especially bars with lots of girls outside trying to lure you in.

Write a report about your experiences with that girl!

Is it the #15? The girl with the huge plastic tits?

No story tonight, unfortunately.

One of the problems with being 60 years old is that I know what a productive cough from a bronchial infection sounds like.

I picked her up from her bar at about 8 PM. She was coughing some. We had a light dinner at Love Scene on Soi 23. She is a sweetheart, as well as a hottie, VERY well-behaved in public. She was coughing occasionally through dinner, and it sounded like it was getting worse. I was getting concerned. I offered to write off the barfine, put her in a cab, and let her go home, She insisted she was OK. We headed back to the hotel, she continued coughing, and eventually, after repeated prompting, she admitted she'd come down with something and was not OK.

She had absolutely no symptoms last night, when we first met.

I put her in a cab and sent her home. I'm going to check on her Sunday.

I went back out, just to see what was happening. I have a strong agreement for tomorrow night with the girl who took it as her mission to make my 60th birthday memorable, and a tentative agreement with a sweetheart for Monday.

I'm of mixed emotions at this point.

On the one hand, all my old standbys are pretty well gone.

On the other hand, I have a tentative agreement with a hottie from Sucker (formerly Lollipop) for LT tomorrow night, and she chose ME!

I rode the skytrain out to On Nut once, years ago, just to see what was out there.

Saw my first-ever shopping-cart-friendly escalator. GREAT idea!

This was before Swampypoom was built.

? Why is that fundamental to Mars travel?

 

The lunar lander was also a rocket that blasted off, many rockets have landed,

 

This is only relevant to the Satellite industry as it brings down cost of launch.

 

FYI we use Falcon for launches

Go out to Swampypoom sometime. Park where you can see the ramp. Look at all the airplanes. Think about how much air travel would cost if each of those airplanes could only be used ONCE, for a one-way trip. That's how expendable boosters, up to and including Saturn V, work.

Now think about how much air travel would cost if, after EACH flight, each airplane had to be disassembled all the way down to the individual component level, right down to nuts and bolts, and everything overhauled completely. That's how the Shuttle worked.

Now, consider: What Musk did was recover the FIRST stage, INTACT, *READY* *TO* *BE* *REFUELED*, *STACKED*, *AND* *FLOWN* *AGAIN*. That's the first step in REALLY reusing a spacecraft, in getting it to the point that you can reuse it like an AIRPLANE. Refuel, walk around, kick the tires, change out the crew, pump out the toilet holding tanks, load the in-flight meals, load the passengers and cargo, and FLY.

There's more to that 747 story.

There's a startup cargo airline, that is working to get their operating certificate. They claim to have purchased the airplanes 6 months ago, and have documentation to prove it, but the airport board refuses to accept their documentation.

There are commentators out there claiming that this is a shakedown by the airport board.

Spectre - 2015 - I love Bond, you would watch this, not a flawless movie, but a goody.

Agreed. Not flawless, but DEFINITELY fun! And DEFINITELY definitively Bond. Even if the vast majority of it is paying homage to scenes from many previous Bond flicks.

The problem, for me, is that that LOOKS like the exterior of Spice Girls, one of the Arab bars in Soi Cowboy, and I have a pretty-much hard-and-fast policy against going into the Arab bars...

The second problem, for me, is that the Arab bars routinely put their coyotes on greeter duty, and the coyotes are, in general, not barfine-able.

A real shame. The girl in the rabbit ears looks SWEET.

The argument against gun control makes the point that if everyone carried a gun at all times,mass shootings would be more difficult.This has a certain logic.But would you want to live in a society like that ?

You can do the Google search on Kennesaw GA for yourself.

While I'm at it, are there any similar restaurants (well, cafeterias/food courts really) — cheap-and-cheerful, outdoor (but not necessarily), plastic chairs, good basic authentic Thai food — in BKK that anyone would recommend. I know there's one on the corner of (I think it's) Soi 3/1, and another on the opposite side of Sukhumvit that gets a lot of backpackers. Any more?

My regret from the last trip is I didn't get a chance to hit them for lunch.

T minus 40 days and counting.

I will not be making the early hop in over Christmas, unfortunately. The airfares are prohibitive at the moment, and there is NO award (miles) availability for the last leg of the trip (into Bangkok).

Part of it moved to Suk Soi 7/1, west side, a few doors the Suk side of Tarntip Massage. Nowhere near all of it. I haven't had a chance to check the menu at the new location yet, although I think I'll make a point of doing that in January, probably after my first massage of the trip, at Tarntip. (I've been a very satisfied customer of Tarntip Massage for years now.)

I've ridden Thai twice now, once in Business Class from Frankfurt to Bangkok, once in Coach from London Heathrow to Bangkok.

Both flights are among my best-ever memories of flying.

Voodoo was very good years ago, as was Hollywood Rock. Those were the days...

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