Getting By in Bangkok

Jennifer Songs

2009-11-12T14:39:41Z

Last month I disclosed in one of my posts that I have a small collection of Jennifer songs. Yesterday, M-----l included a great Jennifer/ba-ba song by Lloyd Cole in his post and mentioned my list. I think M-----l's VOX neighborhood is a bit bigger than mine, so the cat is out of the bag (so to speak). My collection of songs is small since I haven't been a very dedicated collector. I'm usually happy that one shows up in an album I've bought.

The first "Jenny" song I really remember is Tommy Tutone's "867-5309". It's a song from high school and a telephone number I can remember even now when I can't remember my own. Sometime around 2000 I became obsessed with Vasco Rossi's song Jenny E Pazza (a recommendation from a Dutch friend). I have no idea what the song's about, but it made me want to learn Italian. Jennifer Smiles by The Nines was the next Jennifer song I fell in love with. I could sing that song every day. Last January, Homebody posted Bikeride's Jennifer on her blog. I thought it was wonderful and got the song from eMusic right after I finished listening to it. Around this time, I noticed I had a handful of "Jennifer" songs in my library so a "Jennifer Song" Playlist was born.

I took a clue from Homebody and made a screenshot of the "Jennifer Song" playlist.

Jennifer Songs

Many thanks to Homebody, M-----l and Crankypants for adding to the collection. I'd love to hear more suggestions!

I have another collection of "Science" songs if you guys know of any good ones.

Weird Science

DNA strands in my hair

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You want fruit with that?

2009-11-06T13:09:57Z

Recently, the coffee shop on the ground level of the office building started offering a couple of Thai dishes for lunch. There's a food market just down the street that I usually go to, but the coffee shop is near, clean and (most importantly) air-conditioned. Yesterday, I thought I'd try a latte after lunch. This is how the order went:

Me: I'd like a hazelnut latte, please.

Coffee lady: Would you like some fruit?

Me: (??) No, no, just a hazelnut latte.

Coffee lady: You want hazelnut and coffee? Hot or cold? No fruit?

Me: Hot, please. Just coffee, no fruit.

I sat at my table and she brought me a latte. It tasted overwhelmingly like bananas!

Coffee lady: How is it?

Me: It tastes like bananas.

Coffee lady: It's good isn't it?

Me: hmmmm

Well, the coffee lady is very nice and maybe she thought banana latte is much better than hazelnut latte, so I just went with it. I have to say that I don't like banana latte and couldn't finish it. I'll keep going for lunch, but will skip on any future lattes.

Banana latte is quite a change

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Halloween Bowling

2009-10-31T12:31:37Z

A couple of weeks ago my boss volunteered me and couple of my co-workers to spend Halloween day bowling at a charity event. I went bowling once when I was 10 or 11 and I think that experience was enough to last me a lifetime. However, refusing to go would have been really bad form since it was for charity.

It turned out to be quite fun. Sure, my bowling was horrible but a lot of other novices were there so I didn't stand out too much...other than being the only blonde haired, blue eyed foreigner at the event. I may have to try bowling again in another 30 years or so. Heh.

Waiting to Bowl

Of course, any post about bowling should have some Camper Van Beethoven.

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Weekend Glam Rock

2009-10-25T00:51:52Z

Friday was a holiday in Thailand, so I had a three day weekend. Mostly I just ran errands and took care of chores that I've been putting off. Yesterday evening I decided watched the 1998 film Velvet Goldmine.

VelvetGoldminePoster

I'd never heard of the movie until last year when a friend recommended it. The movie would have come out after I moved to Bangkok and I'm thinking that it wasn't released here. The Thai censors would surely have cut or blurred many scenes. I've had the movie since January but never made time to watch it, which is surprising since Ewan McGregor is in it and I have a small crush on him.

Much of the movie deals with the 70s London glam rock scene. The main characters are said to be based on David Bowie and a combination of Iggy Pop and Lou Reed. David Bowie apparently didn't like the movie script and would not allow any of his songs to be used, but I think they did a good job without them. I was surprised that Placebo had a small part in the movie as the band Flaming Creatures. They played a pretty rocking cover of T.Rex's 20th Century Boy.

Placebo - 20th Century Boy

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QotD: Best-Seller

2009-10-14T15:04:50Z

If you were going to write a book, what would you write about?
I'd write a story about a Cajun boy named Gris-Gris that plays a guitar.

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My Sister's Birthday

2009-10-10T11:56:47Z

My sister's birthday was yesterday. Of my four siblings she's the closest in age to me, but still 6 years older. She looked after me quite a bit and put up with me even when I was annoying. When I was very young, I would sneak into her room when she was away and listen to her records (with headphones!) which probably started my music habit. I tried to emulate her a lot, which I think was a good thing. With both my parents gone, her's is the home I go to when I "go home". She had a great birthday and I wish I could have been there to celebrate it with her.

Some childhood photos

A couple when we were older

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A Cats and Bananas Post

2009-10-05T00:33:26Z

This weekend we harvested some bananas from the banana tree. It's a bit of an ordeal involving climbing on the roof with a machete. It's a nice bunch but not as many as last year. Nevertheless, I'll be eating bananas for a while. I'll have to take some to the office.

Bananas havested Oct. 2009

Since it wasn't raining the cats were all outside soaking up some sunshine and checking out the silly humans with bananas.

NamPung and bananas

NamTan in the leaves

There's another bunch that was a little too green to be harvested...maybe next weekend.

Green Bananas

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Only Partially About the Weather

2009-10-02T13:38:37Z

My last post was about my house flooding. Things have dried out and only a few shoes were casualties. The rain is still falling, but the house hasn't flooded again. The front yard has been turned into a swamp a couple of times, though.

IMG_0001

IMG_0002

Just a couple more weeks and the southwest monsoon should be over and it'll start to get a little cooler and a lot drier. I'm more than ready.

Sometime late in August eMusic gave a 50 free song "loyalty bonus" to the people who stuck with them through their price restructuring. My monthly subscription refreshed shortly after that, so I had decide which 100 songs I wanted to download (Oh, how to choose? How to choose?). I ended up with quite a bit of garage rock inspired by Homebody's post of Have Love Will Travel. I also downloaded the new Brendan Benson album My Old Familiar Friend.

I normally download complete albums, but there's always one or two credits left over. Those stragglers can be the hardest to decide how to use and many times I just make some wild choice based cover art or song title. That was the case with Blueboy's Jennifer Yeah!. This brings my Jenny/Jennifer song total to 9 songs.

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Nam Tuam Baan (House Flood)

2009-08-30T15:41:51Z

I've lived through 13 rainy seasons in Thailand, but this is the first time my house has flooded. There have been several close calls, but this is the first time water has come all the way through the house. I really understand why Thai houses usually have tile floors on the ground floor. It's finally stopped raining so there's nothing to do but wait for the water to recede. There's still more than a month left of rainy season. This could get interesting.

It must be time to start up my "rain songs" playlist

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Today...

2009-08-26T13:42:46Z

Is my mother's 79th birthday. She passed away in May 2007, but I still like to celebrate her birthday in some whay. She was named Bobbie for her uncle Robert. Her birth certificate actually had her gender as male for awhile. I guess there weren't very many females named Bobbie back then. She was outgoing (unlike me). She was a nurse (a very good one, in my opinion). She loved her family. I think I lucked out in the mom department. Here are a few of the photos I have of her. My sister has some really good ones, but I keep forgetting to scan them when I visit.

Bobbie J. - Alabama

Bobbie J. - High School

Pre-wedding Photo

Dad and Mom - 1966

Bobbie and grandson - 1997

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