A frustrating day. A day of high winds where I should have been bouncing off waves with a jellyfish attached to my head at a jaunty angle.
Instead, the morning started with a meeting with our condo managers to review progress on various projects. One of these is the complete overhaul of our waste management system which is planned to start in a couple of weeks time. The work will go on for twelve days and there will be a lot of noise and it is going to be smelly. I have further details, but you really don’t want to know.
Anyway, the sewage discussions got me in the mood to sort out one of our toilets which refuses to flush, because the tank refuses to fill, because the water is leaking into the bowl. And she who must be obeyed refuses to remember not to use it, with the inevitable smelly result which requires the carrying of buckets of water; by me. I have further details, but you really don’t want to know.
It’s an old toilet and I did not hold out much hope of getting spares; but I went to Home Pro in Pattaya Tai where a young man called Khun Boonlert was eager to assist. After much catalogue searching he found the offending bowl and a small team was then mobilised to establish the price and availability of all the bits that go inside the tank. This took a while, seven games of backgammon on my iPhone to be exact (I lost, 4-3). Finally the team appeared with a piece of paper on which was written 6,800 baht. With much tutting and expressions of sympathy, the entire staff of the shop (it was a quiet day), agreed with me that this was very expensive.
So I was pointed to their sale items where a very acceptable complete toilet was on offer for less than 3,000 baht. My new friend, Khun Boonlert, assured me he knew a very capable chap who could install it for me for 1,500 baht and it seemed like a good idea, except I was not sure it would fit in the space.
This prompted a strange conversation.>
Khun Spike, do you have a Thai lady?
Errr, yes I do. Khun Boonlert, do you have a Thai lady?
(somewhat taken aback). Yes, but I need the telephone number of your lady
Why? Do you want to ask her out? Can I have the telephone number of your lady too?
No, no, no. I just need to ask your lady about your toilet.
So I gave him the number and he had a fruitless conversation with she who must be obeyed. Fruitless, because he asked her for information about the poistioning of the toilet, and she said she didn’t know which toilet he wanted to know about because we had three of them. As if I had gone into a toilet supply shop to replace a toilet chosen at random, rather than the one that clearly was not working because I have to keep flushing it with a bucket after she keeps crapping in it by mistake. Silly girl.
Undaunted, my new best mate Khun Boonlert announced that we going to my condo for a toilet inspection. So we did. After the fifteen minute journey, he got out his tape measure and discovered that the bargain loo would not fit. Then, clearly disturbed by his conversation with my wife, he insisted on inspecting the other toilets, just in case I had been hiding multiple cases of malfunction from him.
Back at the shop they had lost the original piece of paper with the details of the 6,800 baht’s worth of bits, but after a couple of games of backgammon they found it and I placed my order. Two weeks to wait which means there will be a few more bucket-carrying sessions before we are fully functional again.
By the time I got home it was too late to go sailing, so I decided to tackle the problem of buying software from Adobe.
Adobe make Lightroom, a very cool piece of software for managing and processing photographs. Surprisingly, I have a legal copy. And now there is an upgrade which is being advertised as available for download for $99. Great, so off I go to download it. But I can’t, because I live in Thailand; as does my credit card, and the website rejects my order with a “you live in Thailand, we don’t know where that is because we are in America, so you can’t buy our software” message (wording is approximate). So I tried to contact customer support. But I couldn’t because that part of the website is not working (probably overloaded with people who don’t live in America wanting to give Adobe money).
I could of course call a support number in America and be transferred to somewhere in India where I would wait for ten minutes listening to Greensleeves before being directed to someone who has been on a two day induction course who would talk bollocks and do nothing for me apart from raising my blood pressure. So I didn’t do that.
Instead I spent more than an hour navigating around Adobe’s useless website. I did discover that it is possible to download the update from certain countries in the world, other than the USA. Australia for example, where you will be required to pay 74% more than in America for exactly the same downloaded product, probably downloaded from the identical server. Makes no sense at all, just as it makes no sense that people in Iceland, Thailand and many other countries are not able to purchase on-line at all. I have lost count of the software I have bought on-line. In every other case it has been a single price, wherever you happen to live in the world, and you can download from anywhere. This is clearly far too simple for the idiots who manage Adobe.
Eventually I found the Thai distributor and I sent him an e-mail asking for pricing and availability. I did not expect a response. Amazingly, I received a reply within a few minutes. I can order an upgrade disk for a higher price than the USA, but cheaper than Australia. Delivery is 10-15 days, which means it will arrive at roughly the same time as my toilet repair kit. Poignant timing; I will receive some software from a company whose pricing, worldwide distribution policies and support will be the same as my newly functioning toilet; full of shit.
Comments 🔗
2008-07-30| Billy saysI can tell you of a very good Russian Torrent site which will be happy to do business with you. At significantly less than American prices it has to be admitted.
2008-07-30| The Ghost saysIt’s admirable you buy when it’s so easy to get copy DVDs here that work fine.
But you should have rung up The Ghost before buying the higher-priced Thai disc, as I have a US-address credit card and could have done the transaction for you.
Next time….
2008-07-30| grandma saysSpike is a good boy, he respects intellectual property rights and supports creative work! If only everyone were to act as lawfully as him, Khun Microsoft certainly would publish the source code for Windows, wouldn’t he?
2008-07-30| mart saysIf I am not mistaken, this is your second circumstancial post about your toilets (or one of them) in 4 or 5 months time. Not going to comment on that but I thought this blog was about flowers… Ghost - I need to update a few of my Adobe apps, can you send me your credit card number please? You have my email address, don’t you? Do not forget the 3 digits on the back. Thanks.
2008-07-31| Spike saysBilly, I am shocked that you are even aware of such sites. I would never use those illegal torrent offerings. The Ghost, I will be in touch… Grandma, I do support creative work, which excludes most of the stuff that Microsoft churns out. Matt, you are right, I am tending towards the lavatorial. It’s a fetish. Forgive me.
2008-07-31| Billy saysAmazingly, I received a reply within a few minutes. I can order an upgrade disk for a higher price than the USA, but cheaper than Australia. Delivery is 10-15 days
Oh dear Khun Spike, you can be so naive sometimes. The reason the Thai distributor needs an amazing 10-15 days to deliver a simple distribution CD is because he has to work out which Torrent site to get the stuff from, download it at 28k/sec, burn it to CD and then to get the artwork looking genuine.
2008-07-31| mart saysBilly - you’re so mean! But it’s so true! Skipe - OK just call me Matt if it’s easier for you ;)
2008-07-31| mart saysSpike - anyone having 3 toilets for 2 people at home clearly has some psychological issue.
2008-07-31| mart saysbut hey who doesn’t?
2008-07-31| Spike saysHi Mitt In some cultures, a typo is considered a form of compliment. Was it not Confucius who said “man buying condo has no choice in number of toilets”? If not, he should have.
2008-07-31| mart says:-) Actually you’re wrong, Confucius is the guy who’s spinning next week at Q-Bar!