There Follows A Tale Of Hardship And Woe,

not to mention more than a little expense! Saturday morning dawned, I was up early eager to pick up my repainted truck as the garage opened at 08.30 I paid my 15,000 baht and looked at a remarkably good job well done, jumped in, started the truck, went to move away, nothing! the throttle/accelerator did not work, so out of the truck, the owner sent a mechanic out to have a look, 'No oil' but it had just been serviced by Nissan, but I was assured that the low oil level caused the truck not to move, so walk to the service station buy 1 liter of oil, the truck had been sitting with the engine off so when it was checked again the oil level was fine, now there's a surprise! next fuel filter is full of dirt, so we trickled along with the engine ticking over to the garage to change the fuel filter, after spending more money there still no improvement, but I did at least get one piece of good advise, 'take to Nissan!' so now stuck at the side of the road I called Nissan and asked for a tow truck, after agreeing to the 1,000 baht tow fee and waiting 3 hours, not to mention the 6 phone calls each asking where I was one arrived,

with a remarkably cheerful chap,

now here is the hero of the piece, he has a used car show room on Sumkivitt, each time Nissan called for directions I gave him the phone, after the fifth call he mention that the people were a bit slow, when the sixth call asked him again where I was he told them yet again, I must admit I was a bit surprised that a company like Nissan takes over three hours to organise a tow truck and does not own one of it's own,

then we were off,

to the Nissan dealership, I did not know this but under the dashboard there is a plug in terminal so the technician plugged in his little black box and followed the instructions, a read out was printed, the micro processor that sends the input from the throttle to the fuel delivery system had failed so the engine would tick over but not rev, price of a new switch? 9,600 baht! plus the diagnostic check and fitting, strange how it lasted all of 50,000 kilometers only to fail when some painting was done to the truck, now the bad news, they did not have one in stock so one will be ordered on Monday and should be here by Wednesday/Thursday next week, then it was home - or so I thought, looking back as I walked away from Nissan it is a desert, for motorbike taxi's, but after working up a real sweet in the noonday sun I found one, so off I went, thinking nothing much more could go wrong with my day,

we got as far as here, when the motorbike ground to a halt, I looked over the guys shoulder as we were slowing down, the fuel gauge show three quarters full, after flatting the battery and not responding to kick starting I made my way along the Sumkivitt highway yet again, I could not believe my luck! after a few hundred meters there was another motorbike taxi rank, as I was getting on the first driver slowly pasted as the road was slightly downhill and asked the new driver where a repair shop was, after a conversation that questioned the parentage of his bike off he went, helmet on we slowed to pass him shortly afterwards as he and his bike freewheeled it down hill, oh the joys of owning a truck out here!

then at last home to say Hi! to Nick and Maureen who called round, I had already called them to say I would be late,

Ta-Taa as always was glad to say Hi,

later Mark called by, it was getting to be a full house,

next another ring of the door bell and Arry with his 4 year old granddaughter called in for a cup of tea, we all remarked how it did not seem that over 5 years ago we were at his sons wedding, where does the time go?

then time for a night on the town,

we both took a motorcycle taxi each to the Marine Plaza then walked past the Blues Factory,

still lots of people in Walking Street, we popped in to see Juu and were very soon joined by Brian and Sa, then who should walk in? none other than Slim Jim, also Rick called in to say Hi, next a total surprise as not only Doc. Jeff called in but he was quickly followed by Damon, well as if we needed an excuse for having a few extra drinks!, then in the early hours off we went heading for home,

for another New Ticks, you have to believe in spirits (no not vodka!), to follow this one, Jack Halford hopes a clairvoyant will put him in touch with his late wife, instead he is contacted by a girl who disappeared twenty years earlier, after that off to bed.