Up Early,

and we were off fishing,

 we tackled up,

 and Nick was quickly into a fish, 1 - 0,

 today we were with Nick and Maureen,

 the skies nearly clear,

 and it was hot,

 so hot,

 then my first,

 quickly unhooked,

 then a second for Nick,

 2 - 1 to Nick,

 whilst waiting for a bite,

 a visitor decided to drop by,

 and take a rest on my fishing rod,

 I am not sure what species he is, I have not studied Odonatology,

 and here is one we caught earlier,

 and it is a bit difficult to eat one fresher than this!

 we were not alone at the lake today, 

 these youngsters were having a great time, 

 catching a few fish,

 then I caught this one,

 a Ampullaria or apple snail,

 it was a big one too, but it did not count in the competition,

 which by now was 4 - 1 to Nick, but then I staged a come back, 4 - 2 still to Nick,

at the right hand end of the lake,

 just next to the two concrete posts in the water,

I noticed a lotus flowering,

so I waited till later in the afternoon for the suns position to change to zoom in and take a picture of it,

 my catch up spree had continued, at the close of play the score was 6 - 4 to me, so we took a few home to eat later in the week,

 just as we were leaving this skink came out to say farewell,

we all had a great day out, if you want to spend a day at the Mamak fishing park, here is the map, 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 you will see the road the fishing park is on the right hand side, follow that for a while, it twists and turns a bit and the fishing park is on the left next to a soccer ground, there are rods and tackle for hire and bait to buy, plus a fridge full of beer!,

 we made our way back to Nick and Maureen's 

 and were greeted by this lizard by their pool,

 that seemed quiet happy to pose for the camera,

 after a hot day,

 what better to cool off in the pool?

 no bananas this visit but perhaps a new flower will be forming the next time we visit,

 Maureen had cooked a delirious roast,

 of pork with crackling,

 'Cheers!', after our meal a dessert of cheese and crackers with ice cream,

 then to the serious part of the evening Monopoly, as you can see Diana had won, in no time at all,

so we had a second game, which went well for me this time, after saying our goodbyes and thanking Nick and Maureen for looking after us so well we made a move for home, a couple of Bones then as it was just past midnight for us we were off to bed.

I Have Always Thought That,

under most circumstances electricity and water should never be mixed,

so I was intrigued when I saw this chap connected to some type of electrical device with two hands and a foot in what appears to be buckets and a bowl of water, it was in fact a photograph of a mobile electrocardiograph of the Cambridge Instrument Company this one it's version produced in 1929, luckily today things have come on a pace, but what a leap of faith for the sitter in this experiment to allow himself to be hooked up to this machine!

Today We Take Information For Granted,

even the most obscure facts are only a few clicks away on any Internet connected computer,

but it was not always so, just a few hundred years ago information had to be gleaned from cross referencing subjects in many books before a overall picture appeared of what you were researching, but go back earlier still to 1408 and all of this information could be found in a single encyclopedia, the Yongle Encyclopedia is a large-scale encyclopedia–the largest in pre-modern China--arranged by subject categories traditionally used in China, amounting to about 370 million characters in all, the encyclopedia preserved textual information from about 8,000 texts of all kinds, from pre-Qin times to the early Ming dynasty, covering the works of famous specialists in such areas as astronomy, geography, human affairs, famous objects, yin-yang philosophy, Buddhism and Daoism, crafts, and so forth,


but herein lies that problem, the finished version of the encyclopedia is estimated to have weighed about 40 tons! and took up about 1400 cubic feet of space, it comprised of 22,937 chapters in 11,095 volumes and 917,480 pages, the encyclopedia also included many thousands of immaculate hand drawn illustrations, most impressive of all was that it used over 370 million Chinese characters from start to finish; all of these hand written by some two thousand scholars in just 17 months, with the entire scope of the project, including information gathering, taking just five years, from 1403-1408, what a Herculean task for all involved, yet today all of this knowledge is just a few clicks away.

First Thing We Had Some Good News,

the paperwork that we had sent to Diana's family had arrived,

from us dropping it off at the FedEx office in Bangkok, it was delivered at Diana's family home in the Philippines in less than 24 hours, well done FedEx! for us today I decided to get the truck professionally cleaned so I took it to the petrol station just past the fishing tackle shop on Thepprasit Road, the normal price for cleaning the inside and outside was 180 baht, but as it had not been cleaned for so long I had the engine and underside cleaned as well, so it was 250 baht,

 we spent the time waiting for the truck to be cleaned at the Amazon coffee shop, which was in the petrol station forecourt,

 whilst there I walked to the fishing tackle shop to buy some bait for tomorrow, then an ice coffee,

and next home,

I have not seen the truck so clean in years!

in the cool of the evening Diana spent some time potting the tomato plants, they are really growing quiet well,

then our evening meal,

Diana decided on spaghetti bolognese, but for me home made fish and chips with vegetables,

whilst Diana played with the plants I watched an old war film, The Cruel Sea, as I mentioned when I watched it before it was made all the more realistic as our English literary master, Mr. Nesbit, did in fact serve on a corvette similar to the Compass Rose, a great, if only in British eyes film, a few from Midsomer Murder, three from Bones and then for us off to bed.

If You Live In London,

you can go bird spotting,

for some that are no longer there, on the walls of buildings around the capitol beautifully painted pictures of birds are starting to appear on the facades of decaying housing estates, brick walls, railway arches and unglamourous spots around London in order to raise awareness about the negative impacts of urban sprawl, 

London-based street artist ATM paints rare and endangered British birds, he creates huge and colourful paintings often close to the location where the birds were originally found, "Birds have always meant a lot to me," he says, "I have loved their songs since I was very young, they are also incredibly beautiful, it's their balance and co‑ordination, their markings, I also love birds because I love the wild places where they live, and I associate the two with each other," what a great idea what talent ATM has.

In Case You Missed Some Of The Many April Fool Articles,

here is a great one from 1939,             

 printed in Popular Science, of course in those days you could just walk into a drug store or chemists and buy the ingredients,

but nowadays even posting this prank I guess I will have to print a warning, health and safety at work!

WARNING: This is just a historical romp—so don't try it. Mercury and its compounds are toxic and can be corrosive, they can also emit harmful vapours even at room temperature, and may be fatal if heated and inhaled, so there it is.

I Have Never Really Thought About Becoming A Vegetarian,

I would miss meat so much,                 

but if this is an example of the type of fillings that they eat I might give it a try.