We Are Going Out Later Today,

so straight on with the blog, first thing I picked up Diana's Christmas presents, then over to Mike and Riza's for the afternoon, stopping on the way at the permanent market on Soi Nong Pla Wan, (spelt as it sounds), for Diana to pick up some fresh fruit,

just opposite another motorbike shop had opened up, there are so many of them scattered over town now,

we followed Geoff, Fe and baby Samuel as we arrived at the estate where Mike and Riza lived,

Fe and Samuel,

Mike was in fine spirits as usual,

the cat called by to say hi.

as did the neighbours dog, it has free range of Mike and Riza's, not sure what the cat thinks about that though,

Jay was also here, but Precil was unwell so she stayed at home, we naturally put the world to rights, we also chatted about the complete waste of £50,000 per pedestrian crossing that have appeared in 42 locations in Pattaya, so far there have been no injuries as far as I know, but it is unfortunate that most drivers ignore the red light that tourist think the cars and bikes will stop at, if the Pattaya Mail is to be believed they actually have a photograph of a police car going through a red light missing pedestrians on the crossing as it did so, still £50,000 X 42, just over a couple of million UK pounds, I guess city hall is flush with money so it must be a good deal, but here is a prediction, in 1 year less that 50% of the lights will be working, (I think I might win this one, since they were switched on about two weeks ago 3 sets are already dead! I can not think that for 1 minuet any money has been allocated for maintenance,

then home, we stopped off at the soup stall for some of that delicious chicken feet soup,

the stalls were quiet empty this evening,

no customers here either,

then a few fresh cherries for dessert,

I know I should not but the lure of an almond magnum in the freezer was too much to bare,

in between the soup and the cherries we watched Adaptation, screenwriter Charlie Kaufman has just taken on a new assignment, that is, to adapt writer Susan Orlean's "The Orchid Thief" into a screenplay, all of it based on the life of the eccentric John Laroche, an exotic plant collector based out of Florida, the good news is that I first read the book,

a bit tatty in the corner but a brilliant read, the film suffers from so many XXX years ago lines, but for me it was really enjoyable, Diana was totally underwhelmed, though part based on fact the screen play was a bit OTT, but the lime light was stolen by Chris Cooper who plays the part of John Laroche, what a great performance,

after the ice cream we rounded the evening off with another Poirot, The ABC Murders, he receives taunting letters from a serial killer who has dubbed himself ABC and leaves a railroad schedule at the scene of each crime, the victims as well as the crime scenes appear to be chosen randomly, but maintain an obsessive adherence to alphabetical order, but are they really random? then off to bed.