We Parked Up In The Friendship Car Park,

we had a few things to do today,

being as it was Friday it was packed, but not to worry,

first stop the Kodak shop, now we had our re-entry visas I had them laminated with a small copy of our passports on the other side,

the marine aquarium looked nice as it always does,

and this is one of the pieces of equipment that keeps it that way, a combined filter/chillier, if the water gets too hot many of the inhabitants would die,

then back to the dentist, my pesky tooth had dropped out again, 200 baht and 10 minuets later and I was on my way,

next door to All Seasons Travel, we wanted a rough idea of how much our tickets would be when we travel to the Philippines for Diana's brothers wedding,

a few friends called round in the afternoon for a tea and a chat, then we were off to the weekend night market on Thepprasit Road, some cloud looking towards Jomtien,

and a bit more inland,

a new banking service I am guessing opposite the bar tonight along with a clothes stall,

a new crop of durians,

I have now tried these fruits 3 times,

and each time I said never again! it must be an acquired taste that somehow I cannot acquire,

still I suppose I could always try a few bugs,

I know I always say it, mind the boiling oil,

I dropped Diana off at Tesco Lotus so I was a bit early at the market, so not many customers around,

just a couple of people looking in the pet aisle,

sunset over the market,

by now some of the cloud looking inland had dispersed,

on the other side of the bar there is a pet stall that has a parrot walking over some of the cages,

which amuses many of the passers-by,

we were joined by a friend we had not seen for a long time, Dominic, so we had a chat to catch up on old times,


also Brian told us abut his latest venture, Big Mango Properties,
 

then Brian's family arrived his wife Sa, Mama Juk and little Sofida,

and didn't she look cute in her new dress?

Mr. Tony also joined us at the bar, after saying our goodbyes to Brian and his family,

we made a move to the Punch and Judy for our evening meal,

where we bumped into two other friends we had not seen for some time, Ron and Andrew,

for our meal, 

 Diana decided on some Thai food, 

cottage pie topped with cheese for Mr. Tony,

whilst I went with the Friday special fish and chips, 'Cheers!',

we then made a move for home, we all enjoyed the last DVD that we watched from Cirque du Soleil that we decided to watch another one, this one titled Dralion the show is the fusion of ancient Chinese circus tradition and the avant-garde approach of Cirque du Soleil, it was enthralling, we then said goodnight to Mr. Tony and for us it was time for bed.

I Guess This Is One Way To Say No,

when Rhys Barker went to insure his car,

he was expecting a reasonable quote to insure his 10 year old Vauxhall Corsa which he bought second hand for £1,400, so you can imagine his surprise when motor insurance giant Zenith quoted him a price of almost £1.2 million for the year, the car owner, who lives in Salford Quays, Manchester, said: ‘I went through all the questions and then the quote came up for £1,165,977.75. I was convinced it must be a mistake, so I called them up on their helpline', well their helpline did help, they offered easy payment terms, paying in 12 monthly instalments of £104,000,


Gary Humphreys, group underwriting director at Markerstudy Group, which runs Zenith, told the Manchester Evening News, 'the price Mr Barker was quoted reflects that we have 'declined' to provide cover, as we would not expect a customer to pay such a high premium, this is not a case of pricing customers out of the market but quoting on the risks that are within our rating parameters and declining if they are outside',


so I guess that is a polite way of saying no,      off, no further details were available from the firm.

I Have Never Really Thought Of Crocheting,

 as an art form,

 but some people do and take it to extremes, like covering a four-car locomotive in Technicolour camo in Lodz, Poland,

it is the work of Textile artist Olek, she was born Agata Oleksiak in 1978 in Poland. In 2000, she received a BA in Cultural Studies from Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland and relocated to New York City, where she is currently based, Olek’s work has been exhibited in galleries, museums and public spaces worldwide and featured in numerous publications such as TIME Magazine, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Magazine, Newsweek/Daily Beast, Village Voice, Artinfo, PBS, CNN, CBS, ABC and NBC.,

for a few more pictures have a look at more of her work here, I have to admit before seeing this I had never thought of crocheting as an artwork, what will artist come up with next?

If There Is One Thing I Never Think Of,

when it comes to drawing,

 it is the humble ball point pen, I mean how many artists use a ball point pen as their preferred medium? we here is one artist that does,

Shohei, as he simply calls himself, creates dauntingly dense and bold illustrations using just 1 tool – a ball point pen, having started out doodling by pencil, Shohei eventually migrated to ballpoint pen, “I realized that ballpoints are cheap, so I’ve been using them for a while now. I also like drawing bit by bit, and ballpoints are perfect for that.”

he then tie-up he did with Pilot, 

the Japanese stationary company, creating an portrait of epic proportions using only their Justus fountain pen, what an artist.

 

I Have Often Seen Advertisements For Riverside Restaurants,

I guess you like me think of sitting by a slow moving river or stream,

but in Chongqing’s River Café in southern China you actually sit in the river! with summer temperatures reaching over 40 degrees Celsius, the Chinese are always looking for new and enjoyable ways to cool off, the River Café, in Chongqing, is inviting locals and tourists to take off their shoes and grab a seat in the waters of a cooling stream, since it’s too hot to serve their delicious food inside or in the sun, the managers of this popular venue have decided to set up most of the tables straight on the water, under the shade of trees, the pop-up restaurant now has more tables in the stream than it has on land, which can seat up to 300 people at a time,

to give you an idea of how hot it can be in some parts of China, Inspired by the real Dead Sea in the Middle East, a Chinese resort built an underground salt-water lake in Daying County, the resort covers an area of 30,000 square meters and is able to accommodate up to 10,000 swimmers at one time, it’s pretty big even for Chinese standards, but apparently not big enough, according to the Chinese press one day recently saw up to 15,000 people in the pool.

Whilst Looking On The Internet,

I chanced upon this picture,   

 a huge wooden boat, but what was it used for? looking at its size and flat top it could it be an early wooden aircraft carrier?

but no, this 100+ meter ship is really a river barge with its cargo stacked artfully on top, wooden ships like this were built by stacking logs in the forests of Russia around about 1910s-1920s, boats like these could easily haul 13,000 tons worth of logs and after they floated down the Volga and Vetluga rivers, they were disassembled, it may seem strange that so much work went into a ship for one trip, but there was a reason for such craftsmanship, the 'guiding cabins' were built on top of it all, the cabins were not really cabins, but full-size houses, and were actually sold as such at the end of log driving operations, as these massive boats were so temporary photographs of them are exceedingly rare,

speaking of 1916-1918 Russian boat-building abilities, here is an even rarer photograph of Russian 1918 Submarine, no, do not be silly of course it is not made of wood! 

We Were Up Early,

and off for a spot of fishing,

 

 

but we had a bit of a surprise when we arrived at the lake, the road behind the fishing huts had been rebuilt with new drains,

which was not a problem, but also the fishing huts had been pulled down to make way for new ones, so for us it was over the other side of that lake,

we were with Nick and Maureen,

 so a different view for today looking across to where we would have normally been,

 just as we stet up a huge school of small young snakeheads swam past,

 these are the fish that are terrorising some parts of the USA,

 

 

the threat even made the Smithsonian, but one little known fact about these fish is that they make extremely good parents, under each shoal of fry one of the parents swims keeping a watchful eye on them chasseing any predatory fish away to protect their young,

first fish of the day to Nick,

 the reason we do not normally fish this side of the lake is that the banks are quiet steep,

 so luckily one of the lakes staff used the landing net,

 the down side was that it was one of the fish that do not taste nice, so back he went,

 

I was still waiting for a bite,

 as was Ta-Taa, after we catch and eat the first fish she enjoys tucking into what's left,

 then it happened, the first eatable fish to me,

 a tilapia,

 and a nice size it was too, so off to the pot with him,

 then I was in to another,

 but with the fight he was putting up,

 I knew we would have to put him back,

 this time Nick risked a ducking to help me land the fish,

 and a nice size it was, but again back he went,

 but not so this one, he will be coming home with us,

and here is one I caught earlier,

nicely fried in garlic,

then another keeper to me,

we were then joined by one of the local cats, the smell of our cooked fish encouraged it I guess,

but it was totally fearless of Ta-Taa, sitting right under the table, the place we fish at is called the Mamak Fishing Park, it is off of Soi Nub Plan Wan, (spelt as it sounds), turn into the Soi from Sumkivitt, over the railway crossing and continue for a couple of miles, the road starts to go downhill, near the bottom of it the road the fishing park is in is on is on the right, follow that for a while and the fishing park is on the left, 

the fishing parks card,

and map,

at the end of the afternoon we made our way back to Nick and Maureen's, the score 5-1 to me,

 Nick had pushed the boat out by making a delicious Penang curry with rice, followed by cheese, biscuits and ice cream,

then the serious part of the evening, Monopoly! well no prizes for guessing who won, I was first out in no time flat, followed quickly by Diana, then Nick just had to land on Maureen's hotel on Mayfair and the rest they say is history, we thanked Nick and Maureen for looking after us so well and made a move for home, we watched some satellite television, then for us we were off to bed.