going away from Pattaya on Sukhumvit, at the Chaiyaphruek traffic lights turn right and the restaurant is 100 or so yards along on the left hand side, Mr. Tony kindly gave us a lift,
as you walk in there is the bar on the right,
with seating and plenty to chose from,
and this is what we were here for, the 395 baht carvery,
there is seating on the left, today we were meeting with Jim and Cher,
who along with Diana and Mr. Tony chose the chicken soup as a starter,
I decided on the pate,
'Cheers!',
then we were up for the carvery,
I should mention there is also a pool table in the pub/restaurant,
for the carvery there was a choice of chicken, beef or pork,
decision made I went with the pork,
a quick pose,
'Cheers!'s from all of us,
then the desserts arrived,
brought over by the charming staff at the George,
and what nice desserts they were too,
a ice cream sundae,
which we all,
enjoyed,
then to round off the meal,
a coffee each,
and for Jim,
Tony,
and myself a Jamaican coffee,
Diana taking a self portrait,
this is George, who runs everything aided by Ian, what a lovely meal, we said our farewells,
and made a move for home, where much later in the evening, we had a snack,
and rounded the evening off with a Magnum, after thanking Mr. Tony for the lift we said our goodbyes, watched a few from Bargain Hunt and then we were off to bed.
as plans are made to travel to see the total solar eclipse on Monday August 21st, but it has happened before, in 1878, a total solar eclipse crossed the U.S. from the Pacific
Northwest to the Gulf of Mexico, people boarded trains and stagecoaches to
witness the once-in-a-lifetime event,
'This rare celestial event—a total solar eclipse—offered a
priceless opportunity to solve some of the solar system's most enduring
riddles, and enterprising scientists raced to the Rocky Mountains to experience
totality. Some, like University of Michigan astronomer James Craig Watson,
hunted for a planet (called Vulcan) that was thought to exist between Mercury
and the sun; others, like astronomical artist E.L. Trouvelot, sketched the
sun's mysterious corona. Vassar astronomer Maria Mitchell headed west with an
all-female team of assistants and a societal goal to achieve—opening the doors
of science to women. Even a young Thomas Edison got involved. During the
eclipse, he aimed to demonstrate the value of his latest device—an infrared
detector called the tasimeter—and to prove himself not just an inventor, but a
scientist.'
as to the scientific goals for the 1878 eclipse, The Chicago
Times outlined the most important. “First, the establishment of a relative
co-ordinate of the sun and moon”—that is, determining the precise start and end
times of the eclipse at different locations, which would enable the Nautical
Almanac to update its tables of the moon’s orbit. “Second, the study of the
physical constitution of the sun by an examination of the corona and
protuberances that jut out from behind the moon when the sun’s disc is wholly
obscured.” In this regard, Edison’s tasimeter was a new tool that could offer
new insights. “A third matter of interest,” the paper continued, “is the
opportunity the total eclipse affords in searching for any planetoid or group
of planetoids that may be between Mercury and the sun”—in other words, Vulcan, so it looks like there will be a lot of people taking some time off work on the Monday of the eclipse.
well according to this T shirt yes! the shirt states that 78.3% of them will be seen as scary and 21% will look
just plain weird, only 36% of them will be wearing spacesuits, but 93.8% of
them will possess superior technology that will probably render our defences
useless, and since 81.4% of them will be invaders we are pretty much doomed, the shirt is the work of Letter-Q Artwork who has a Facebook fan page, official website and
Twitter page, and no I am not on commission, I just thought it was a neat T shirt.
but if you have and you need to replace it, this has got to be the wallet for you, the Volterman Smart Wallet is not your average wallet, it packs about as much technology as your smartphone,
including 512MB of RAM, a built-in camera, power bank, GPS tracker, alarm
system, RFID protection and even Wi-FI hotspot capabilities, it may look like a
simple leather wallet on the outside, but inside one of the main features of the Volterman
Smart Wallet is the distance-sensitive alarm system,
once you’ve paired the
stylish card holder with your smartphone, every time the distance between phone
and wallet goes over a certain threshold, an alarm will notify you, so you
don’t accidentally leave it behind, the cool thing about this system is that it
works both ways, if you forget your phone somewhere, the wallet alarm goes off,
letting you know that its best friend is missing, and if that is not enough
there is also the global GPS tracker that allows you to locate the wallet
anywhere in the world, an RFID protection system designed to prevent electronic
pick-pocketing or RFID skimming, credit cards, some passports and driver
licenses now come with radio frequency identification chips that thieves can
clone, but the Volterman Smart Wallet prevents that,
and now for the really neat bit, if someone opens your wallet a
front facing cameras takes a photo of whoever tries to open it, every time they open it and sends the picture to you, this feature is listed as optional, so would-be customers concerned about privacy issues need not be worried,
the high-tech accessory also comes with a built-in power
bank (2,000mAh to 5,000mAh capacity) which provides wireless charging on the
go, Bluetooth 5.0 technology, and a built-in WiFi Hotspot, which provides
Internet roaming service in 98 countries at prices 10 times less than that of
standard roaming,
Volterman recently started a crowdfunding campaign for the
smart wallet, on Indiegogo, they were aiming for a $45,000 goal, but, with 6
days left until deadline, the campaign has already raised over $696,000 from
over 4,800 backers, the wallet is expected to start shipping in December, and no I am not on commission, but if I were thinking of buying a wallet, this is the one I would have.
Jim and Cher had arranged the tickets and booked a table on the first floor, or second floor if you are American,
Diana had a pre-dinner cocktail,
which looked really nice,
Jim started with seared scallops,
mushroom soup for Diana,
which was served with garlic bread,
for Cher and myself prawn bisque soup, again with garlic bread,
which was delicious,
although called a cafe, in reality it is in fact a nice restaurant,
on to our main courses, the house speciality spaghetti dish for Diana,
steak and sticky rice for Jim and a grilled pumpkin and tofu salad for Cher,
I took the easy option of fish and chips,
on to desserts,
Cher and Jim shared a walnut blondie with ice cream,
whilst Diana and myself shared a mixed berries crepe cake, all in all the meal was delicious, there was a special offer on the wine with a buy one get one free, but I am not sure how long that promotion will last, for prices and selection of dishes check out the menu,
outside a display of jellyfish was certainly different,
both Diana and myself said that if we ate here again we would chose this table over looking the lot,
'For young children like "beam", reading large Thai
literature in the library is no different to sleeping pill. Both ancient
stories and stripes. Do not make the beam feel like reading it. Until the
librarian filed a book. Whose name is on the cover. Ready to finish reading.
When the beam opens the book Unexpected is born. The beams are sucked away with
the "Gryffindor", a companion who must venture into the world where
stories and characters in literature return alive. This fun challenge. Is there
a bet that they will find a way back to the present world?'
my take on it is that a young boy in a library falls asleep whilst reading a book, in his dream he finds that he needs a key to open a special book, the key has 5 parts to it, he also finds that he has a companion, Gryffindor, who helps him on his quest to find all 5 parts of the key, so we follow Beam through,
magical lands,
on his quest,
to find each part of the key,
where along the way,
some of the people, tribes and monsters he meets help or hinder the intrepid duo,
awakening he finds he has the key to unlock the book, and can gain the knowledge the special book holds, I have to say we thoroughly enjoyed it, Diana, and I am sure a few others found it quite scary in places,
the sets and backgrounds were superb, for a brief taster have a look at the video above, the show features over 600 actors and technicians, the over head performance was spectacular, with mythical monsters and sea creatures magically appearing, the technicians worked for 3 years, the actors 2 years to perfect the 90 minuet show, if you enjoy this type of show,
you can almost be a part of it!
after the show we made our way to the auditorium,
where we could pose,
with some of the actors,
in their most fantastical costumes,
and with a cuddly toy,
who was supposedly Gryffindor who accompanied Beam,
tickets range from 2,500 to 4,000 baht each, but there are monthly offers, so check for this months special before you book, and there are permanent discounts for both Thai nationals and any nationality old age pensioners, what a fabulous and totally different night out, and with that we were off to bed.
going away from Pattaya on Sukhumvit, at the Chaiyaphruek traffic lights turn right and the restaurant is 100 or so yards along on the left hand side, Mr. Tony kindly gave us a lift,
