Do Not Mess With Fish 102,

and you thought fish were fun! well Federal Fisheries Agency official Boris Simonov did not when trying to evade capture, I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time, to throw 10 million rubles ($320,000) out his car window on a busy Moscow street whilst being chased by the Federal Security Service, Simonov and his boss, department head Roman Postnikov, were under surveillance, Simonov tried to flee police officers in his Cadillac SUV but crashed into another vehicle because he was distracted by throwing money out the window, not knowing that all the banknotes were marked by the FSB, it said, Postnikov was nabbed in a separate operation in the Moscow region as he was handing over official documents and a forged contract to the head of Lucia Plus, a Moscow region fishing enterprise that was found to lack the required operational permits during an inspection by the Federal Fisheries Agency, 1 million rubles ($32,000) of scattered money went missing, possibly collected by passing motorists, Kommersant reported Saturday, this is not the first time that the agency has fallen foul of the law, in April, Igor Bakulin, an aide to agency director Andrei Krainy, was charged with accepting a $250,000 bribe for salmon fishing permits in the Pacific Ocean, I wonder if in the UK cod bribes or permits are being sold 'under the counter?'

Late Breakfast/Early Lunch

at the Surf Kitchen on Jomtien,

it was quite busy with about 20 or so people there,

it always looks nice with plenty of orchids and this water display at the entrance,

rose petals floating in water, nice touch, fresh coconut for Diana, she was wearing a new silver necklace that I bought her in Kingston when I was in the UK for her birthday, the glass beads are from one of her bracelets, the beads are all interchangeable,

ice coffee and prawn salad for me spaghetti bolognese for Diana, 289 baht for the two of us,

then off to see Mick and Mass, for a few cups of tea, later I called round to see Mark then it was home and feet up for home made fish and chips,

feet up for a few movies, first The Happening, great start, but it sort of tailed off a bit at the end,

followed by Parenthood, we had bought a box set of 9 Steve Martin Movies, for me it was the worst so far, it had one redeeming character Jason Robards playing the grandfather, Frank Buckman, apart from that, dire,

on a happier note we watched One Foot In The Grave - Series 2, great fun, I must admit watching Victor I am reminded of a few people I have meet over the years - one most mornings in the shaving mirror! then off to bed.

I Have A Fear Of Heights,

so I have now just found some where I do not want to go on holiday, above is an artists impression of what the 1,000m high AlpspiX viewing tower, which is to open in southern Germany on July 4 will look like, the towering structure is situated in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen region of the country and provides panoramic views of surrounding Hoellental and Garmisch, each arm of the tower is 24m long, crossing in an ‘X’ shape over an abyss at the base of the Alpspitze mountain, while jutting out 13m over an empty void, with the other 11m anchored in rock, at the end of each arm, a glass wall offers a unique view of the alpine surroundings, each arm of the ‘X’ is just 3m wide and formed of a grid, which will allow snow to pass through it during winter, now I know it is safe, but I just can not think of a number with enough 0's in it to make me willingly walk to the end of it!

Will This Be The One?

over many years manufactures have promised us a car/plane, will this Terrafugia Transition be the one to make it onto our roads in the future? it is a light aircraft that can fold itself up into a road-legal car is to go into production after having been given a special weight exemption by the US Federal Air Authority,

the exemption is an important one because the safety features, such as airbags, crumple zones and roll cages, that go to making a motor car street legal are just too heavy to allow any flying car qualify as a 'light sport aircraft', one that requires the most basic and therefore easy to obtain pilot's licence, drivers can be qualified to fly light sport aircraft after just 20 hours of logged flying time, once you have that, all you need to find is the £129,000 purchase price (the manufacturers are currently asking for £6,650 deposits from interested parties) and it's up, up and away,

I have heard of these car/planes or I should say in this case plane/car becoming available for so many years now, could this be the one?

I Just Love Stories Like This One,

back in 1956 Mike Harrison bought his first car, a black Bentley sports coupe for £150, a lot of money in those days, as an aside at that time I was 6 years old, Dad had just bought our first house, for £400, Mike 74, but just 20 then still has the car, the 1931 car was already 25 years old and had 85,000 miles on the clock and Mike has done another 100,000 since,

and despite its veteran age the Bentley is still runs like clockwork around the roads near Mike's home in Whitney, Herefordshire, he said, 'it is a real eye-catcher. It has something that modern cars just don't have - style and character, I still drive it most days - even though it only does about 15 miles to the gallon.' petrol was just six shillings (30p) a gallon when Mike bought the second-hand Bentley, 'it's been a part of the family for so long that I would never sell it now even though it is worth a lot more than I paid for it'

quite a lot more, the article states it is now worth some thing like £250,000, I remember my first car, a black Ford Popular, did we do some miles in that one, 0 - 60 MPH in just over 34 seconds - those were the days!

Diana Spent The Morning Placing Some Of Her Presents Around The House,

for me I was nursing a hangover after completing the blog,

flowers and candles, then as my head cleared it was along to one of the many gold shops, there must be 20 or more in Pattaya and the surrounding area, any way after a lot of looking and trying a few for size a purchase was made,

then to Pattaya Tai for some fruit to nibble on in the evening, no not durian, Diana bought some mango's,

after we arrived home Mass called in to say Hi,

and this is the bracelet Diana decided on, it looks lovely, during the rest of the day we watched some TV, but also more than a few episodes of The Tudors, although we have seen it before it was still nice to watch it again, then off to bed.

I Was Never A great Fan Of Spider Man,

for me it was more The Eagle with Dan Dare, but not so for 13 year old schoolboy Hibiki Kono, he turned his dream into reality, it works like this take two cut-price Tesco vacuum cleaners, design and build wooden suction pads attached to the vacuums' nozzles, put the cleaners in a back pack and hey presto, he can climb walls!

Hibiki spent five months working on the device at King's College School in Cambridge, He came up with the idea after television presenter Jem Stansfield demonstrated a similar device he had built for BBC1's Bang Goes The Theory science show last year, He used two 1,400-watt Tesco Value vacuum cleaners, bought for £14.98 each, to move higher, Hibiki switches the vacuum supplying his 'free' hand pad off, allowing it to be released from the wall on its own, without affecting the other pad's suction, each pad is attached to a stirrup, to allow him to move each leg in tandem with the corresponding arm,

the school he attends is King's College in Cambridge, His design technology teacher Angus Gent said: 'I'm hugely proud of him, when he came to me with the idea at the beginning I had my doubts, but once he proved it could be done I encouraged him, the device is based on the one Hibiki saw on television but he has developed it all himself, which is amazing for someone of his age, now I wonder if he set the vacuum cleaners to blow instead of suck will he make a hover jet next? great to hear of some one getting away from sitting and playing computer games all day,

as for the history of the school, this is how it began,

the nineteen year old Henry VI founded King’s College, Cambridge and its choir school in 1441, college records reveal that there were already sixteen choristers in residence by 1447, one of whom, Thomas Roke, left on a scholarship to the sister college of Eton that year, the statutes of 1453 laid down that these sixteen choristers were to be ‘poor and needy boys, of sound condition and honest conversation, being ascertainable under the age of twelve years, knowing how to read and sing’, Their duty was to ‘assist daily the priest …. celebrating in the chapel …. and also in the hall to assist the other servants of the King’s College by humbly and honestly ministering and serving the said fellows at table.’ founded in 1441 and still going strong.

Straight On To The Blog Today,

as I have a real hangover,

well it was a triple birthday party, firstly Diana's,

and Maureen's and mine, not all on the same day but we combined the three of them, Diana's on the 28th, Maureen's on the 26th and mine cancelled because of the Songkran celebrations on April 14th, above Nick, Maureen, Mick, Eric and Big Jim,

Diana and Mass, Grieg and his lady Noi also arrived on their motorbike,

we hired a baht bus to ferry us all there, the driver on the right,

Mick and our next door neighbour,

Eric, Nick and Maureen,

Grieg following on his bike,

everybody say 'Ah!',

Big Jim, Mass and our ex-maid,

on the way to Prechai it came over a bit cloudy, but luckily the rain held off,

we all arrived safe and sound,

the restaurant has spent more than a few baht having sand brought in to cover the beach,

Mass, Mick and Maureen, the first of the food had arrived, steamed shrimp and tom yang gung, (not sure about the spelling of that one!),

steamed mussells,

Anchisa and Riza,

also there was Brian and Sa along with Juu and his wife,

by now we all tucking into the food and drink,

Mark and Mike in the foreground,

blah kapong and small clams arrived later,

along with garlic fried rock lobsters,

curried crab,

we were expecting a nice sunset, but there was no red clouds as usual tonight,

Mass, Anchisa and Riza all getting into party mode,

as was big Jim our neighbour and the maid!

Porn and Craig with their kids and friend also popped in,

more red wine for the ladies!

guess who likes Mick!

at the last count it was three 3 liter boxes and three 2 liter bottles of wine, plus beer and heaven knows how much vodka!

everybody had a great time,

then it was time to go, our taxi driver arrived and we were off,

Eric was enjoying himself on the way home,

smiles all round,

it was just like being on holiday!

then back to 388 for a night cap,

and time to open up presents, Diana in her new dress,

with some beautiful flowers and even more presents,

some very nice jewelry,

Diana just can not wait to see what is inside,

Anchisa and Diana,

more presents!

and lots of cards,

with more presents inside them!

and perfumed candles,

and this was from me to Diana, the present that I had wrapped a couple of days ago,

oh no, another one!

and not forgetting it was Maureen's birthday as well, also I had a few nice surprises as well as friends also remembered my 60th, all too soon the evening was over, our friends and neighbors left, from Diana and myself a very big thank you to everyone for the presents and more importantly your company and good wishes, we all had a wonderful evening, but for me now I have to have a lay down - too much red wine!