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I'm on their Line account, can't remember if posts still arriving, as I tend to delete them once I have read them.

It could open up a new line of enquiry! Is your family shoal of piranha doing well, etc! How is your anaconda - pun intended!

I don’t mind participating in the act of giving, but I prefer to give or to donate when / how much / to whom I want. All the asking and dry begging takes away the joy of giving from me.

(old) farangs are welcomed?

The last time this Central American country was talked about on here was 5 years ago. In that time their sexy new President has given it a complete 180, and it seems completely different from the gang-riddled and dangerous image that it had in the past. I'm thinking of going there in the Fall to see if the world's bitcoin paradise is also a paradise for insatiable bottoms. Does anyone have any new info or tips so this slut can have a successful trip?

Yes , for some reason it always must me that @ sign. I had the same problem while ago and moment on enlightening helped

It not unless you are idiot wearing 10 kg golden chain arround your neck and have wads on money sticking out of your every pocket.

Of course he was. Not jealous at all. Lol

It’s the lone website I’m aware of but if you’re on its mailing list you’ll likely receive postings by mamasan Barbie.

From Pattaya Mail By Barry Kenyon The Thai government aims to rewrite the military-inspired charter to prevent coup makers from being regarded as sovereign or legitimate rulers. Moreover, a new law is expected to give the prime minister the authority to sack generals suspected of plotting to overthrow the legitimate authorities. Pheu Thai deputy leader Chusak Sirinil said the plan was to prevent wannabe coup leaders from appearing legitimate in the eyes of the public. This isn’t the first time. In 2013 there was a similar bill before a parliamentary subcommittee which promptly collapsed amid political bickering. During the May 2023 general election, Move Forward party leader Pita Limjaroenrat advocated that army generals should be restricted from entering politics and that compulsory military conscription should end. These notions were promptly placed in the bin and the Move Forward party consigned to the back benches. In a 2024 NIDA poll, most respondents did not believe Thai coups are a thing of the past. Ken Connor in his book on military interventions wrote that there is a strong coup culture in Thailand, even an addiction. Putsches have occurred on average every seven years in the last century. Many members of the public actually expect the army to intervene once the political situation boils over into violence on Bangkok streets: that is precisely what happened in the most recent coup of May 2014. Life quickly returned to normal, the trains and buses ran on time and opposition to the army quickly faded away. Neither the Thai press nor the courts opposed that coup, nor indeed any of its predecessors. Politicians tend to maneuver for position. In 2014 a Cabinet minister of the Yingluck-led civilian administration (when the coup occurred) actually ended up as the justice minister in the new military government. Even if a future coup maker tore up the constitution, which authority would challenge him? The technical agency would be the constitutional court which does not to date have a convincing record in opposing the generals. It is also possible to argue that a coup is not really a coup. In 2021, the army in Myanmar displaced the civilian government but the generals claimed they were within the law as chronic voting fraud had made the country ungovernable and its parliament illegitimate. In May 2014 the Thai army introduced martial law under a 1914 act, stressing that the reason was solely public security and nothing to do with a coup. Two days later Government House was under military occupation and supreme power vested in the army leader. Army spokesmen claimed it was the public will. Thailand does not presently appear to have the mechanisms to enforce a constitutional or legislative answer. The stark reality is that only failed coups are illegal. Successful ones by definition bestow the levers of power on a new regime inevitably claiming to be acting in the national interest. As Barbara Tuchman noted, “To put on the garment of legitimacy is the first aim of every coup.” The big question is whether it will work again in Thailand.

Thank you so much. That helps me 🙂 I will check it. HAHA I only know such a long line from our sauna (boiler) in Berlin

From The Thaiger Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin will attend the Bangkok Pride Festival 2024, becoming the first Thai premier to join the event. This decision comes despite security concerns highlighted by a recent warning from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). On May 10, both organisations issued a joint release warning that foreign terrorist organisations (FTOs) might target events during LGBTQ Pride Month. Although the release did not specify any particular city or Pride event, it noted that FTOs or their supporters may exploit the increased gatherings associated with June 2024 Pride Month. The release said that FTOs or supporters may seek to exploit increased gatherings associated with the upcoming June 2024 Pride Month. The release also mentioned that FTO efforts to incite or commit violence against holiday celebrations, including Pride events or LGBTQIA+ venues, are exacerbated by the current heightened threat environment in the US and other Western countries. Additionally, it pointed out that FTOs have previously promoted anti-LGBTQIA+ rhetoric and targeted related events or venues for attacks. Last June, three alleged ISIS sympathisers were arrested for attempting to attack a Pride parade in Vienna, Austria. The release warned that attackers might try to gain access to restricted areas, bypass security, impersonate law enforcement officials, or make violent threats online, in person, or via mail.

The standard is beyond reasonable doubt, not beyond any doubt. Is it reasonable to think that Donald Trump did sleep with stormy Daniels? Yes. Is it reasonable to think that Donald Trump did pay off stormy Daniels? Yes. Is it reasonable to think Donald Trump did this in order for the information not to be released prior to the election? Yes. Is it reasonable to think that Donald Trump wanted to treat this as a deductible tax expense so he can save a few dollars on his taxes given how miserly he is? Yes. Is it reasonable to think that Donald Trump did not know any of this was going on under his nose? No. Is it reasonable to think that Michael Cohen was a rogue operator who uses his own money to pay off stormy Daniels without knowing that Donald Trump will reimburse him? Hell no. Is there any reasonable doubt that Donald Trump did not do any of the crimes for which he is charged? Hell no. Emmet Klown?

You know this for a fact or just speculation? But if that’s what he did, at least he had the courtesy to leave the boys behind. Personally, the manager has never been a priority when choosing a massage shop to visit. 🙂

Jamie Raskin: Justice Alito turned the flag upside down. Donald Trump turned the Bible upside down. MAGA turned the Capitol upside down. The Roberts Court turned the Constitution upside down. Let’s set America right side up in November.

Yeah. Poor Joe. Lichtman, who has always been right, says Biden will probably win unless a lot of really big things change quickly. And he will win based on reliable fundamentals, like economic growth and getting laws passed. Poor Joe. What a mess! Your strategy, @EmmetK, is simple. Be demented. I mean, you are not really demented, I don't think. But you act demented, in that you deny reality. Lichtman has been right every time. Even Trump, personally, in writing, acknowledged that. But your strategy is basically, "I'll just put my head deep up my ass like I am some crazy fuck and pretend facts are not facts." By the way, polls are not facts. Except on the day they come out. Maybe. So the fact that Trump and Biden are about 1 % apart in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania in the RCP average should tell us this race is close. And either could win. I think that is a fact. You don't really want to believe that fact, do you? Here's another set of facts that is interesting and relevant. If you are interested in facts. In Arizona, Democrat Gallego leads Lake by 6 % on average. In Nevada., Democrat Rosen leads her strongest opponent by 5 % on average. In Michigan, Democrat Slotkin is statistically tied with her strongest opponent. (Slotkin, like Trump, has a statistically insignificant 1 % lead). In Wisconsin, Democrat Baldwin leads her opponent by 7 % on average. In Pennsylvania, Democrat Casey leads his opponent by 5 % on average. Those are all states you are assuming Trump will win, based on the current POTUS polls. Even though the Trump/Biden poll averages clearly show Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania are toss ups. If Biden wins all three, Trump is toast. Lichtman is strongly suggesting Biden will win all three. But, again, what does he know that you don't? 😉 Now let's talk about two states Biden will almost certainly lose. In Ohio, Democrat Brown leads his opponent by 5 % on average. In Montana, Democrat Tester leads his opponent by 5 % on average. See the pattern? Here's the thing. Since Trump entered the picture and played his "divide and conquer" card, the nation has been very divided. The only Senator that won in a state that did not match with the POTUS result in 2022 was a Republican win in Wisconsin, which Biden won in 2020. In 2020, the only non-match was a Republican win in Maine, which Biden won. In 2018 there were a few more non-matches, including Democrats Brown and Tester above winning in what are now seen as strong red states. But, generally, states that vote for Biden vote for Democratic Senators. States that vote for Trump elect Republican Senators. Even in Maryland, where anti-Trump Republican Hogan was a very popular Guv, the latest polls show voters just won't elect a Republican, even an avowed anti-Trumper, if it helps tilt the country to Trump. Does this tell you anything? Of course not! Silly question. Facts just don't matter. Too complex. There are three possibilities. First, this could be 1980. In May 1980 Carter led Reagan by 8 points. He even led Reagan by eight points in October 1980. So much for polls, as Lichtman says. (But, hey, what does he know?) Not only did Reagan win. He also took out Democratic Senators that were not even seen as particularly vulnerable. So maybe a red wave is building, like in 2022. Maybe all these Democratic Senators who appear to be headed to victory are actually headed to extinction. Egads! Except there are no signs of a red trickle, let alone a red wave, like in 2022. By the way, did anyone ever find 2022's AWOL red wave? 😉 Second, maybe the fever has broken. And we are going back to compromise and bipartisanship and ticket splitting as a governing strategy. I personally would vote for that. Maybe Trump will win all the states I cited above. Even as they elect Democratic Senators and a Democratic Senate majority. Possible, but unlikely. I see the MAGA minority's embrace of a law breaker and wannabe democracy destroyer like Trump as evidence that the fever has not broken. It is more heated than ever. Everything you post here in anecdotal evidence of the same. You're into fever, not facts. So as much as I would like a more bipartisan Congress, I don't hold my hopes up. And, if people want a POTUS who is good at getting bipartisan laws actually passed - infrastructure, CHIPS, Ukraine/Israel - that's a reason to vote for Biden. How many bipartisan tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans did Trump get passed, anyway? Third, and most likely, the reason most Democratic Senators outpoll Biden is that most people do not like Joe Biden. It's now pretty clear that won't change between now and election day. Mostly because Biden won't stop aging. Nor will the majority of Americans suddenly decide they like Donald Trump. Mostly because he won't get any less crazy. So in all these states where Democratic Senators have strong leads, is it possible that the underlying trend says that people will vote Democratic? Even though they have serious problems with the guy at the top of the ticket? Yes, it's quite possible. I just described about how half my nieces and nephews feel. It's back to that old South Park episode, about the choice between a douche and a turd sandwich. So the idea that people who tend to vote Democratic and say they will vote for a Democrat for Senate will ultimately see Biden as the lesser of evils seems possible, and even probable. The thing that is funny about you, @EmmetK, is that you are deeply committed to ignorance on two very important points. You see them as Trump's greatest strengths, when they are in fact much more likely to be his greatest weaknesses. And his reasons for probably losing again. The first point is the five party race. You keep citing polls that show Biden is further behind Trump in polls that count RFK, Stein, and West. True. But that is Trump's problem, not Biden's. He has a lead that is built on quicksand. It's a fact that every four years, to the degree there is any third party that even registers, you can take whatever they are polling now and divide it by at least half. People just do this, literally every four years. They shop, but don't buy. In October or November they decide it is a wasted vote. With Stein and West, those are mostly younger or non-White voters who lean toward Democrats. That said, we also know for a fact that Jill Stein alone was capable of handing the election to Donald Trump in 2016. Which every single American who doesn't want Trump will be reminding Stein supporters this Fall. What you are essentially arguing is that a house built on quicksand is as good as a house built on cement. A Trump victory premised on the idea that these polls are right about how RFK or West or Stein will do is just bullshit. That's a fact. It literally never works out that way. Literally every four years. The second point has nothing to do with any argument you make. It is the whole Trump/MAGA philosophy that ignorance is not only bliss. It is a ticket to victory and power. As a conniving brand huckster, Trump needed poorly informed people to go to Trump U, or buy Trump crap. So of course he loves "poorly educated" voters. Because, as this study showed, if you read newspapers or websites or watch networks news, you're probably voting for Biden. The people who Trump does best with, by a whopping 26 point margin, are not cable news viewers, like Fox. They people who follow no political news at all. What does it tell us when a political leader's success (meaning he won one very close election, one time) is based on people who are committed to being ignorant about politics? It tells us mostly bad things, in my opinion. But that's me being anti-Trump. One thing it tells us for a fact is that these are absolutely the least reliable voters ever. If Trump's poll lead, such as it is, is based on people who don't follow politics, because they mostly don't care about it, those polls are particularly unreliable. That's true in two ways. Trump clearly knows he has this vast army of "poorly educated" voters who are pissed off. And to the degree that tune in at all, they want to be thrown red meat about how the Deep State ... [name something about a conspiracy or how Democrats drink the blood of children]. Trump could win in 2024 in part because these occasional voters did turn out in 2016. And they gave him just enough votes in enough states so that Trump could lose by millions of votes, but still somehow win. Trump actually got millions more of them to vote for him in 2020, when he lost by 7 million votes. So this is a politics built on quicksand. Ignorance is not bliss if you want to win. This is also true for Biden, way more than in 2020. Mark Penn's polls are particularly detailed and interesting. Trump always does better than average in those Harvard/Harris polls. Like right now Penn says Trump is leading Biden by 5 points, compared to Trump's statistically insignificant 1 % lead in the RCP average. One big reason is that Penn shows young voters are split on Trump/Biden. Whereas most polls show young voters overwhelmingly for Biden, like they actually voted in 2020. And why Biden won. So Penn's polls could just be fucked up. Or they could be right. But if they are right it is because he taps into young voters whose political views are vaguely based on Tik Tok rants about how inflation sucks and Biden sucks and the cost of living is out of control. And that's it. Gaza? What's that? Trump's tax policies? Huh? So who knows? Maybe this young Tik Tok/You Tube contingent, which is not the same as the equally uninformed and older MAGA cult, will actually vote for Trump. Or maybe they just won't vote, even though they are the demographic that sealed Biden's victory in 2020. Nobody knows. Nobody can know. Anyone who believes polls that are based on this kind of quicksand make sense should also believe that Carter actually beat Reagan by eight points in 1980. The thing we do know is that the more people read newspapers or websites, the more reliable they are as voters. Reliable both in terms of the fact that they know who they will vote for, which is more likely to be Biden. And they know they will actually vote. So the idea that the least reliable voters, who know and care the least about politics, are somehow going to be the vanguard of a Trump victory is more than shaky. It could work again, like in 2016. Lightning can sometimes strike twice. Just don't count on it. These are Trump's greatest weaknesses. Which helps explain why Lichtman is probably right about reliable benchmarks, Like how Biden will win based on how he has governed. You see Trump's greatest weaknesses as strengths.

Hurricane season is coming up soon, so DR might not have a lot of posts for a while. As for other destinations, flights to Medellin have been coming up cheaper for me than to go to SDQ. Maybe the cheaper cost of flights to Colombia is also leading to the lack of posts.

As I view it, the target and likely market is Europe and the Middle East, not Africa or the Americas.

Haha, although the "OneSpa" name is within the Facebook page address (https://www.facebook.com/people/OneSpa/100093989228505/), you'll notice that stamped on the header image is the name "Sky Massage". Seems like when the manager absconded and ran away with the database last month, he also took the keys to the Facebook account.

Thanks, it works. I stupidly tried to add "g.beat" without success. Then realised I should include the @ symbol. And then it worked.

That's in the Asian forums, Latin America has it's own list of dilemas, would be funny to ask them how's the water buffalo next time they're asking for money 😱

I think saunas would be your best bet. Check R3/Mania (both owned by the same guy) social sites (Twitter, FB and IG) from Monday/Tuesday of pride week. I'm sure they will have daily foam parties on that weekend like they had on Songran and NYE/Christmas. Both saunas have ample dark rooms and during festivities like those two dates, most of the action actually happens outside as it gets so packed with people and the number of cabins, especially in Mania is relatively low. During Songran for example, Mania had foam parties 5 days in a row. It opened earlier than usual, I think around 2PM. By around 3 you had to wait in line to get in and the line kept getting longer and to lasted till around 9:00PM, way after the foam party was over as you can see from my pic. amazing times!