15th September
I wake at 07:30 fully clothed and on the sofa, so I undress and finally make it to bed, however I'm woken at 11:30 by the 'phone ringing. It's a Thai number and one that isn't in my directory, so I answer with a simple "Hello" and hear a 'northern' voice say "Hi George, I'm at the old airport now and I'm on my way to Udon Thani to see my lady. The 'plan' is that I'll be in Pattaya in about 10 days time so I should see you then." I haven't got the first clue as to who this is and in my half asleep / half awake state I decide that I'll just engage in conversation and hope it becomes clear.
After 5 minutes, I've sussed it! It's BM Manracer, so we chat for a few more minutes and he confirms that he'll be staying in Metro Apartments on Soi LK Metro when he arrives which I already knew as I'd been told this by BM Karunda Bagman last night.
We agree to meet when he gets into town and he asks if there is anything going on from the 25th that I am aware of. I tell him that the only event I can think of from the top of my head is the GoGo Bar Crawl on the last Thursday of the month which is the 27th September.
30 seconds after hanging up, the 'phone starts ringing again. This time it's A and she says that she's on her way home, so that cheers me up somewhat.
Kev sends me a text at 11:47 saying that he's having trouble with his 'net connection with some apps working and others just hanging and timing out, so I look to hook up with him on Messenger (An app he says is working) to try and troubleshoot where he's getting the problem. I try to use the Internet, but my connection is a bit hit and miss as well. It seems that connection to the upstream DNS servers is being lost, so I can access sites using an IP address but nothing that requires any name resolution. Every five minutes or so, connectivity is restored for a couple of minutes, but after 15 minutes, even this limited service fails and all further attempts to make a dial up connection fail.
At this point A arrives home and I am pleased to see her, however I'm not so pleased to see who's with her. It's 'baby me' Phil, so any ideas I'd had of a little 'afternoon delight' are shelved.
A proceeds to cook deep fried chicken in breadcrumbs and we all tuck in to the freshly frieed chicken. It's still only 13:15 and I'm now being invited to join Robin and his visitors downstairs for a drink. I tell A that it's too early for me to start drinking, but once I realise that Phil is staying the night and there will be no 'nookie' tonight, I end up agreeing and head downstairs where we talk, drink and eat whilst the kids are playing outside.
The visitor is the aunt of Kye (lady #2) and she's here to sort out a problem left by another member of the family that I'd met earlier in the trip. (Seems she borrowed money that she couldn't repay and a 'senior' member of the family has been sent in to pay the debts and avoid the family embarrassment.)
The Chang beer and 100 Pipers Whisky is in full flow and as A was one of the people 'let down', it seems that the food and drink is a form of apology (as well as having been repaid the 2000 baht that was due to her.)
By 20:30, everything winds down and the Auntie and her son are driven by A & Kye to their hotel. Tomorrow they are travelling to Bangkok and then onward to their home in South Thailand somewhere near Phuket.
We head back to the room and Phil is settling down on a bed made up on the floor. A asks if it is possible for Phil to live with us during the week and I explain that it is not possible with us only having a single room place.
She makes a few phone calls to Mama, Phil, 'Brudder' and 'Auntie'. The only one that can really manage is 'Seeter', but she has been unreliable of late and has failed to get Phil to school or provide money for his food (even though she's paid by A weekly). In addition, Phil has told A several times that 'Seeter' hits him. (I can sort of understand this happening.)
I explain that we would need at least two rooms and that I didn't have the money to pay for extra rent at the moment and additionally I would not want the responsibility of looking after a child without A being around.
Another round of telephone calls and A then says that if I can pay 5000 baht a month for rent, she can pay utilities and instead of paying Mama 1000 baht a week, I'd only have to pay 500 baht a week. This is a budget 'neutral' move and will provide us with more space, but there will be the addition of Phil. I'm unsure but will accept it as I'd expected something like this happening at some point.
A will investigate the availability of places and the logistics of getting Phil to / from school over the next week, but for now nothing is fully determined.
Expenditure :
0 baht
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