Friday, 31 January 2014

We Had A Quiet Day Indoors,

watching some of The Chase on You Tube,



 but in the evening we were out,


 and making our way along Soi Diamond,

 to Walking Street,

 we made our way past the slipper stall outside of a 7-11,

 and a temporary clothes stall,

  to the Lobster Pot,

 we had a look at the lobsters,

 and other seafood's ready to be cooked,


plus a few live ones,

 there is always a good selection of vegetables available as well,

 but these fish are definitely not on the menu!

 Mick and Ja had very kindly decided to treat us to a meal as it was his last day in Thailand, tomorrow he leaves for the UK,

 we sat at one of the tables that are on the side of the restaurant,

 we were quite early, so we almost had the restaurant to ourselves,

 our drinks arrived,

 'Cheers!', from Mick and myself,

 next the food,

 we all decided on the seafood platter for two,

 a picture of the girls having their picture taken,

 the seafood platters were huge,

 by now it was dark,

 and the restaurant had started to fill up,

 just a few bones and shells left,

 then time for the desserts,

 ice cream and banana splits,

 then Mick and myself just had to have a Irish coffee,

 which was expertly prepared with fresh cream,

 and lots of alcohol, 

 some of which was set alight as it was poured,

 job done,

 another 'Cheers!',

 it was so delicious,

 by now the bar that the restaurant overlooks was buzzing, 

 as we left Mick and Ja were looking at a couple of pictures, one taken before Pattaya became really famous,

 we were then back on to the street,

 we were going to go home, 

 but decided for old times sake to have a quick one,

 in Dang's bar on the corner of Walking Street and Soi Diamond,

 even the girls had a little tipple,

 or two!

we then after saying our goodbyes to Mick and Ja and thanking them for the superb meal made our way home, we watched some television, then as it was by now getting late we were off to bed.


With Christmas Just 11 Months Away,

it might be a good time to look for presents,


before the rush, so here is one you might like to buy for a loved one, it is the Midnight Planétarium, a spectacularly innovative watch design that allows you to wear a little piece of the Solar System on your wrist, developed by Van Cleef & Arpels in partnership with Dutch watchmaker Christiaan van der Klaauw, the intricate concept replaces hands of a watch with six tiny planets orbiting around a central rose gold Sun,



the watch contains 396 separate parts and features the six closest planets accurately orbiting the sun, why were Uranus and Neptune not included I hear you ask, because you would hardly see them ever move as Uranus takes over 84 years to make a single rotation of the sun while Neptune takes an astonishing 164 years!
as for the planets that are featured, they will make a full rotation on the watch as follows:
Mercury: every 88 days
Venus: every 224 days
Earth: every 365 days
Mars: every 687 days
Jupiter: every 12 years
Saturn: every 29 years
each of the planets are represented by precious and semi-precious stones, ranging from red jasper to serpentine and turquoise, there is also a ‘lucky day’ feature that uses the bezel to allow owners to select any day of the year as your ‘lucky day’ and the Earth will fall underneath the painted star on the watch’s crystal on that day every year, so start saving now and when you get to $245,000 it will be yours!


When Viewed From The Air,

this building could be house almost any thing,


it is by the shores of Oresund in Copenhagen,

 and from ground level it still looks pretty strange,

but when you enter it is a different world, the building is the home of some 20,000 sea creatures including hammerhead sharks, manta rays, sea lions, and in the freshwater display it has the largest school of piranhas in all of Europe, housed in 53 aquariums, the Blue Planet is Northern Europe’s largest aquarium, the whirlpool-like architecture covered by aluminium metal scales was designed by architecture firm 3xn, now this is a place I would love to visit.


Thursday, 30 January 2014

First Thing,

I meet up with Mick,


 at the Punch and Judy,

 for our breakfast,

 large English for mick and a small English for myself, after saying our goodbyes I went home and waited for Wattana Computers to call around, having establish that we were receiving a signal we now knew it was the Wi-Fi modem that was the problem, mid afternoon as arranged they called in, with this,

the new modem,

and had it up and running in no time at all, Diana then did her magic and reconfigured the television so we can now watch You Tube amongst other things on the Internet,

next stop the market to buy a few things,

 with the Chinese New Year just a few days away there was a stall selling traditional New Year gifts,

 Diana was taken with these, a balut as it is known in the Philippines,

it is a developing duck embryo that is boiled alive and eaten in the shell, it is commonly sold as streetfood, but we were surprised to see them for sale here,


 I am always fascinated by these mushrooms,

 but on with the shopping, some onions and garlic,

 limes for the beer,

 some pineapple for both of us,

 and a couple of coconuts,

we decided to eat outside, and have a dish of New Zealand mussels covered in garlic along with fresh bread and a glass of wine, followed by fresh fruit complete with a candle for a romantic touch to the evening, we spent the rest of the early evening listening to music, then a couple of The Chase from the Internet and a couple of Columbo and we were then off to bed.