Brattleboro Adventure – the Auckland Edition
In which we find ourselves in another part of the world
Or just about anywhere else for that matter. 
That’s a full size round dining table in the far background…
And a king bed looks small in front of the headboard.
Sixteen foot ceilings, more or less.
Honestly, just a little scary to be in at night when it’s really really dark and really really quiet.
At least I didn’t have to check ‘toutist’
Bangkok has an extensive canal system, and the long tail boats or a real attraction. I would guess they are roughly 50 feet in length, and only about 4 feet across the beam. Many of them, the entire (large) diesel engine is mounted on the tiller and swings back-and-forth. There’s no rudder at all, but instead it is the propeller itself that moves in the water at an angle to the boat for steering.
The boat ride was fun, although somewhat noisy and smoky from the old engine. We saw some interesting buildings, although nothing spectacular.
After we finished the tour, it was lunch in the mall and then grab your suitcase for the flight to Nay Pyi Taw.
A few more pictures from our tour of the grand Palace, which was the residence for a bunch of Thai kings, but is now mostly a tourist attraction and used for certain Royal ceremonies. The old King, who was much loved, died in December of last year. If I understand the tour guide correctly, his body is still lying in state and being visited by many thousands of people lined up all day for the chance to file by and pay their respects.
You have to take your shoes off before you are allowed to enter the chapel with the Emerald Buddha inside.
This campaign to be more respectful with the Buddha is all over the place, on billboards and bus stops and so on. 
The whole complex is a riot of color and decoration, and must be one of the most photographed spots in Thailand. It was wall-to-wall people (cheap admission on Sunday) but the etiquette and culture around giving people a clear picture was very well-developed. 
That entire dome is made up of 1 in. square tiles, applied by hand over a period of many years.
Made for memories including a “laugh about it later” cab ride story (the Thai pronunciation of Radisson and Renaissance is deceptively similar), Tom Yum flavor ramen, and the sharp juxtaposition of only 3 hours sleep and an absolutely wonderful bed.
But the writing is beautiful…
One day in Bangkok gave a tour of the Grand Palace and more Tom Yum,
at the biggest mall ever, 
and — as always — a reminder that the global 1% live awesome lives. 
This cool “aeroponic” garden helps feed the masses who pass in and out of the Orlando Convention Center. I kinda want one of these towers!!
I think the last time I was in Orlando, this giant London-style Ferris wheel was only some supports sticking up out of the ground. Well, it appears to be done, and it is either turning almost too slowly to notice, or not turning at all. Nonetheless, impressive. We looked it up, and it is just about 10% smaller than the London Eye, still plenty big.
Surely Jonah felt some comfort inside the whale. There was air to breathe, after all, and salty plankton broth, and some measure of warmth, and no sharks.
Ultimately, of course, i suppose he was relieved to get out of there, but I bet he took some guilty pleasure curling up in a blubber bed or leaning up against a giant rib curved just right to support his aching back.
I am having these thoughts because I violated something I guess is a core belief. I walked into the beast’s mouth on my own. Then I actively, consciously contributed to the good fortunes of our national car wreck in chief by having a drink in the bar of his hotel near the White House. It was a good drink, in fact, but obscenely overpriced. And it is a beautiful lobby, staffed full of people of many colors, from many lands, whose eyes I mostly had a hard time meeting.
Will this experience change and purify me like Jonah’s did him? Only time will tell.
In Washington DC it is expected that your car repairs should match your pussy hat.
I visited the NIH campus in Bethesda today. Walking from the Clinical Center back to the Metro station, I stopped for a second to admire how nice and woodsy it all is. And then, as if on cue, a whole herd of deer arrived. Very impressive, Mr. Federal Planning Division, very impressive indeed.
Thought I should get this shot while I still could…
They say it’s eerily calm inside the eye. Even while winds and rain are tearing things apart a few miles away, you get this patch of calm, even sunshine, and some barometric sense of stillness and quiet. And of course foreboding, because you know that calm spot is going somewhere else, and you can’t run fast enough to stay inside.
So it seems to me this week in our nation’s capital. Of course I see what I want/expect to see, and I wouldn’t presume to elevate my anecdotes even to the level of alternative facts. But still… that’s a picture inside the DuPont Circle Starbucks at 7:30 AM on a workday. In my 15 or so years of coming here, I never remember it being empty like this. As they say wherever they say things like this: Sumpin’ ain’t right.
Brattleboro Adventure – the Auckland Edition 