i-pod help

I am pondering the purchase of such an item....

Here, in deepest Asia, one is horribly lacking of knowledge about such a jewel. One is considering the plug in speaker option for happy wanderings about the abode.

Anyone?

Stephen Fry and the Manic Depressions

Just watched this fantastic documentary on Google Video (something I have recently discovered). A really brilliant program with lots of scope for thought. Some of the folks he interviewed were very interesting. I couldn't help thinking about my own position in life and comparing it to some of these people.

Some of you may remember I had some bad spells when I was about 17 and have always been a bit moody. And I have battled it as best I can. However, what he didn't really touch on is the connection between the physical and the mental, though there was a women eating a lot of oily fish and taking cod liver oil.

I think a lot of practical exercises can really help. A brisk walk really sorts a lot a things out.

My main point was though about many of these people were quite priveliged and most of them pursued very busy lives. For me, my reasons for coming to Thailand are varied but one reason was definitely about leaving the system and the eternal grind that envelopes the Western world. It exists massively here too, I hear you say, but taking teaching as a profession, where you are helping other people, and the relatively few hours we work and the long holidays we are granted really add up to having plenty of free time to relax and not stress about life. Also, Thai people, not Chinese I add, are by nature very relaxed and often only actually do what is necessary to sustain their life in relative comfort i.e. being full, being physically comfortable.

Stephen Fry was also going into shops buying multiple items of the same things he already had. He admits he has the money to do so, so it was really the rush of actually shopping. Here I am still contemplating buying an Ipod and wondering if I really need it.

So in the First World where many of these people have the resources to live a life where there is little concern for actually surviving, they look for a stimulus on another level.

And I often tell myself that in evolutionary terms we are in very unchartered waters in terms of living with all this technology and development. Even governments are relatively new and possibly the idiotic concept of ownership. So who knows what effect all this progress in society is really having on the ancient mind of the human being. Our external environment is changing much much faster than our internal environment. Therefore, like me, opting out and moving away from the centre sets me into a more serene and calmer setting to carry out my days. Whether this helps me not turn into a fruitcake or as mad as a box of frogs can never be answered, but I would suppose to think it has helped me to improve my life.

I often wonder about the human desire to be constantly busy and if it fuels itself in ever decreasing circles and if you are not doing something then there must be something wrong with you.

It is possible like the contary that I am, I may have deliberately yet subconsciously put myself at a disadvantage in terms of "bettering myself". Knowing that less is more can be viewed from many angles.

Anyway, I think what I am really saying is that I was a candidate to suffering from depression, perhaps I do, but through huge mental and physical exercises, have managed to pull ahead away from immediate threat. And I do believe that had I remained in UK the threat would be stronger than it is in Thailand. Things I like about Thailand and Thai people include the fact that as a race they are fairly simple beings. They like to talk, they like to be together, they talk about the immediate things around them (cost of eggs etc.), they seem to all have a built in book of remedies to apply when something negative happens, be it an upset tummy or a sudden rain shower. Things are more black and white here. This is good. This isn't. Don't drink more than two coffees a day. Don't stay alone for too long.

In the UK things to me seems far less defined. Folks were swilling countless cups of coffee without anyone saying its bad for you. I found many aspects of life in UK fell into the gray area where is was unclear what was considered good for you or bad for you. Possibly the fact that the role of women is a lot different in UK. Don't get me wrong, I love going to the pub and getting pissed and talking to women, friends or otherwise, but here in Thailand, good women won't set foot in a pub. There is a gray amount that do and it might give them a bit of a thrill, but the majority of women who go to pubs regularly in Thailand are prostitues and, in turn, thieves and generally not very pleasant people. Along with going into a pub would come a whole lot of other "bad" things they would also indulge in, and in effect, write themselves off as being a "bad person" and do everything expected of them. You may violently object to these comments but that is pretty much how it is over here. The Thai rules that define society are fairly nasty. Men are brutal and can basically do what they want and women are submissive and can only hope that the man in their life is a good one and be kind to them. The man will choose for himself. There are very good Thai men, but there are a lot of very bad men here too. A village elder who is allowed to rape young girls in the village and because he is an elder he can go unquestioned?

I divulge and will continue later...

Australian Question Intonation (The Language of the Sunny Delight Generation)

View and weep.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hnABeM2I7c

Parkour

I've just been watching vids on Utube of this incredible sport. There I was wishing I could do it, then I found the faceplant videos. Faceplant? Yes a new word. And OMFG I suddenly lost all desire to do it.

Amazing to watch though. Highly recommend some viewing and would love to do it. Maybe they'll make a video game of it.

There is a new buddy in Hat Yai. Karl from Chester. A funny guy - quiet and wry. He put me onto Arctic Monkeys and Hard-Fi. We had some drinks in front of WinAmp. The visualizations are amazing on it these days. Wish I had some happiness. Oh well.

One more week at home and then go to Chum Pon with Oi before venturing home.

Thanks, Tony. With the booze the only thing I have to do is to exe3rcise control. I gave orders to Karl last night before we started drinking; Don't let me have too much and don't let me turn the music up too loud. I checked with Oi this morning and she didn't hear anything - so that was cool.

New house in the country isn't too far from the city, young Peter. The thing we really want is a garden and that is hard to find in town.

A New Home

We have been looking for a new house for when the baby comes and we found a beauty. Just outside town with a lovely garden. Looking at it it looks very expensive and will rent for 8000B a month. Hopefully all will go well.

This morning I went around the park at six in the morning which was great

Home Life

A few weeks into the holiday and I am doing some private classes at home with Gee this week. Later Oi and I will go to Chum Pon to stay with her mum before I have to venture onward alone to BKK and England. I am not looking forward to the flight and I have spent far too much time worrying about this trip.

At home I have been playing Age of Empires III which has been a blast. I have got some guitar playing in too.

I have had to cut down massively on the drinking as I have drunk myself into a stupor on a couple of occasions lately, which ain't no good considering I am to be a papa. Someone said it might be because I am going to be a papa. Anyway, I had a long think and got very serious and won't stop but will cut down a lot. The thought of stopping is unbearable and I am likely to go the other way - lashing out in sober fury.

Looks like I am going to miss Peter as he flies out to Sri Lanka, but hopefully we can meet up In the Indian ocean somewhere and drink Gin Slings under the balmy, evening sky.

Oi has finished college and work now, and spends her days sleeping, watching TV, playing puzzle games (hidden object) and going to get food. One thing you guys might know that if Thais do work they a. Get very little money a month and b. Have to work incredibly long hours. So, in my view, there is very little logic in her working at all, unless she is absolutely happy with the situation. Her last boss was a Chinese Nazi bitch from Hell who told Oi that she was lazy and selfish and complained about having to pay the 300 Baht a day that she had previously offered. When Oi left the boss was on holiday in India (no doubt being a bitch to poor, suffering Indians in hotels and restaurants in Madras or the like).

Music - Asian Dub Foundation, Chemical Brothers, Death In Vegas

Movies - Awesome Jean de Florette, Forbidden Games, Wee Geordie (ancient flicks)

Off to war...

How to Stop Population Growth?

Watch this great lecture. Only 10 mins.

http://www.gapminder.org/videos/what-stops-population-growth/

9/11 In Plane Site

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5386487651203625811

Make up your own mind.

Krishnamurti

http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=J.+Krishnamurti&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=D1LASYHrDMPQkAWGsZ0x&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&resnum=4&ct=title#

Jiddu Krishnamurti

"All authority of any kind, especially in the field of thought and understanding, is the most destructive, evil thing. Leaders destroy the followers and followers destroy the leaders. You have to be your own teacher and your own disciple. You have to question everything that man has accepted as valuable, as necessary."


"The core of Krishnamurti's teaching is contained in the statement he made in 1929 when he said: 'Truth is a pathless land'. Man cannot come to it through any organization, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, nor through any philosophical knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind, through observation, and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection. Man has built in himself images as a sense of security—religious, political, personal. These manifest as symbols, ideas, beliefs. The burden of these dominates man's thinking, relationships and his daily life. These are the causes of our problems for they divide man from man in every relationship."

Zeitgeist - A reminder

Don't forget about this;

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-594683847743189197

Dire!

Listening to the radio and reading the online papers things look so grim and I agree with this title Age of Stupid. It seems that the Western world is sliding into a huge pile of manure. To me, all these polticians and experts are little better than utter morons, horribly corrupt and greedy as sin. I can never get over this term entitlement and how Man expects everything. I see in Indonesia they are killing the last of the tigers who have started attacking the illegal loggers (which, of couse isn't illegal and government backed, or at least the cunt who claims to be government). So small is the remaining rainforests that the few remaining tigers have nowhere to go. Did you know they are hunting them with machine guns? Probably the greatest species that we have successfully wiped of the face of the Earth as the fucking cat is getting in the way of progress.

Glad to see Obama attacking the AIG bonus payouts. I see cuntman Dick Cheney is on the fizzbox slating Obama for the reversal of policy.

Like I was saying to Danny, what is so idiotic is that how different US policy is from one president to the next. Shouldn't it all be moving in roughly the same direction. The utter change in policy at that level is so stupid. Talk about polar opposites!

It seems to me that the civilised world is driving a giant bulldozer with everyone fighting over the controls heading towards a huge waterfall.

Time to jump off and head to the hills.

The Dangerous J.

9th Company

Russian troops in Afghanistan.

Awesome war flick.

Oi Photo

Thanks to Rob for reminding me to take some snaps of Oi while pregnant.

Generation RX

Listening to John Zerzan's radio show, he mentioned a new documentary, "Generation RX". It's about the drug companies getting children hooked on anti-depressants and the like.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wviiFzzPiro&feature=related

Nasty stuff.

I watched another amazing movie today; "The Boy in Striped Pajamas."

An incredible film and with David Thewlis.

Glad to see Prince Charlie has told the world to wake up. And today on Any Answers/Any Questions with David Dimbleby, there was a lot of serious discussion about the impending doom. I was surprised at the amount of people calling in and at the level of fear and acceptance of what's coming down the line.

Personally, I have been fairly sociable of late and have met up with the boys as often as I can. A lot of expats here live in a room and never go out. I fight that and am determined to remain as social as possible. Thanks to Peter for teaching me valuable tip.

The holiday is going very well and now Oi has finished work and college and we have been having a relaxing time together.

Check out those movies.

Prime Cut

I have just watched one of the best movies I have ever seen and I can't believe it evaded me for all my life. Prime Cut stars Lee Marvin and Gene Hackman and Sissy Spacek. It blows the shit out of so many movies trying to do the same thing; namely Taranino. He never did one this good. Do whatever it takes to see this movie, just don't die beforehand.

Other news, Tom left for BKK yesterday and going to the States on Sunday to chill in Phoenix at his mum's and then to follow the Grateful Dead all over America on a gruelling 2 month gigfest. I wish him well. Tom is an awesome guy. Always up to party and as good as gold. I have spent a lot of time with him of late and every minute has been a blast.

The holidays are going well and Oi and I spend our days relaxing. I am doing a 3000 piece jigsaw and playing Burnout Paradise (an awesome car game). Oi sleeps, watches TV and plays the hidden item games. It has been great. We are biding our time for the baby and all the shit that will go down when it happens.

We have to move house before then as mum's a plenty will descend and we want to be somewhere with a garden and enough space for me to escape from the teeming masses that will surely dawn.

The trip home is looming and I try not to think about it too much. It's the flight I dread and the process of traveling to the other side of the globe. I thought I had hung up my traveling boots long ago, but duty calls and I must venture into the world once more. It will be great to drink ale again, see Shamus, see the English countryside, see mon frere executed, mum, Nick, eat Spanish ham and drink Spanish wine, see Raffa, Peter, Joel, Jimmy V, Marc, Marsha, Andy, Matty Beck and my sister Tish.

Yes there are many good things to look forward to. I will have to visit the chemist and dose myself up for the plane journey. I will just keep my shoes on in case I have to run over burning steel.

And then I will return to the birth of a child and join the ranks of Jimmy V and Peter.

Sounds good to me.

The Dangerous J.

Tomb Raider

Yesterday I went with Don up to the border to buy some goodies from the duty free stores near Malaysia. We took the back road which we had to find first, but it was well worth it. We saw some great scenery and it was a very quiet road. We had breakfast with the farmers who were totally freaked out by us. My rear tyre blew and I had to get it changed in a village. The guy changing it told us about some things to see near by. After my bike was fixed we went down one of the little track and came face to face with this amazing temple.

We wandered around and there was a cave network too which we explored.

Then we headed on to Padang Basar where we bought wine and chocolate in the duty free.

We came home via Sadao and I called in at Egg's house and met his dad. Then I went to my old school, Kritsana and gave some old friends a real shock. It was a great day.

UNfortunately, in the evening my eyes were really dry and I rubbed them a bit to hard and have removed the tissue from one eye. I passed out and ended up in hospital. I have to go back today to see the eye specialist.

Also have been enjoying 2 player Ice Hockey fun with Tom on the PC and continuing my search for strange and wonderful movies.

More Movie Megathon

Where will it all end?

Today I have watched most of MASH. The original Robert Altman movie and very funny it is too.

Tonight, being Monday and the beginning of this enormous holiday, I have invited Tom and Don over to an extra movie night. I am tempted to screen This Sporting Life with Richard Harris as I have ne'er seen this one. But there are many now to choose from. Here's a rundown of the current list;

Hair
The Man Between
The Man with a Gun
Leave Her to Heaven
Kansas City Bomber
Rachel and the Stranger
Geordie
The Fortune Cookie
Quintet
Lord Jim
Three Days of the Condor
Lady in Cement
Hudsucker Proxy

Many more to come.