The morning starts with a trip out for a cup of coffee. This should take no more than an hour. But it turns out that our trip is to take a little longer than anticipated when my wife announces, mid-cappuccino, that we are going to her university to drop off some papers, a round trip of around three hours. This is one of the occupational hazards of having a Thai wife; you are drip-fed your duties, especially if there is a suspicion that you will not greet them with enthusiasm. Which I didn’t.
Of course the trip to the University had to be combined with a stop for shopping at the local market. This was a good thing because this particular market specialises in a particularly yummy snack. Take some sticky rice, add assorted extra bits and ram the concoction down a length of bamboo. Cook it over an open fire and the results looks like guerrilla warfare munitions, but are actually tasty nutrition.
On the way home I spot some sunflowers by the side of the road and stop for some photos. Turns out that sunflowers are not really at the side of the road but are at the bottom of steep bank, and they are surrounded by high grasses. I descend cautiously and I think “snakes.” Then my foot slips on a rock and one leg disappears down a hole, and the only thing that stops the rest of me following is the trunk of a bush which takes up immediate residence in my genitals. I think “castration”, and then think that maybe I will be stuck there for hours which is a bit of a worry because the genital attack has prompted an urgent need to attend to my bowels.
Some delicate wriggling and I make the comparative safety of a rock and get a few pics. Climbing back up the bank I notice I have attracted the attention of a group of Thais who are no doubt wondering why a crazy foreigner is messing about in the infamous genital removing snake pit.
Later on I take a stroll down the beach and find a single, rotting shoe. Feeling that this is somehow indicative of the human condition, I take a photograph. Later discover that it just indicative of a very average photo of a shoe. I convert it to monochrome in the hope of appearing arty, but it still looks crap.
