May 3 – 9 (Phuket, Thailand)
We spent 3 days looking at houses for rent all over Phuket, but mostly at the north end of the island. Rentals range from 8000 baht ($227.00) to 100,000 ($2844.00) baht per month. With the real estate market the way it is in the States, we have decided not to sell the California house just yet. We will rent here for a while, then start looking around for something to buy. Eventually of course we want to design and build our 'dream' house. After looking at about 10 places we think we found a house we like. It belongs to a friend of Sim's 5th brother. The owner lives in Bangkok but his sister is here in Phuket. The house is a 3 bedroom, 2 bath detached house in a small moo baan (neighborhood) with about 30 houses. There is some work that needs to be done, but it is all minor stuff. Sim needs more storage space in the kitchen so some wall shelves are on the list. Screens for all the windows is another thing that needs to be done fairly soon. We have 1 AC unit in the Master Bedroom and that is all the AC we have. Need to buy a couple more fans for around the house. Sim and her brother negotiated the monthly rent down to 11,000 baht ($313.00) from the 14,000 per month asking fee.

May 10 – 16 (Phuket, Thailand)
Monday
Now that we have a place to call home we went to Pon's place of business today. Pon is the guy who has been storing the stuff we shipped over 2 years ago, and the stuff we shipped when we finished up our RV adventure. Pon has a big warehouse with all kinds of equipment, cars and some of his toys inside along with our 5 crates of stuff. Our last shipment was in a container outside of the warehouse. So the first day we unloaded the outside container and loaded up our truck with as much stuff as we could and headed home. We spent the rest of the day unpacking, cleaning and putting stuff away.

Sew's birthday was a couple of days ago so we took her and her son Jai and his wife Fang out to dinner at MK. MK is a hot pot place. There is a big pot in the middle of the table and you order vegetables and meat and toss it all in the pot to cook in a special broth. Then you get various dipping sauces to dip. Cool. Delicious too.

Tuesday
Today we went back to Pon's place and got the rest of the stuff out of the container and opened one of the crates inside the warehouse. We took all the stuff out of the crate, opened most and decided what we were taking back to the house and what stuff is going to stay in the crates. We have a limited amount of storage at the house. Well actually we have no storage at the house. Thai houses are strange that way. There are no closets. If you want storage and closets you have to go buy cabinets, armoires or wardrobes to put your stuff. Anyway, I spent 3 hours moving boxes, opening, sorting and repacking stuff. I was just drenched with perspiration. The warehouse is not air conditioned, and it was hot today.

Wednesday
Back again to Pons today. I opened the 2nd crate and we went through that one the same way as the first. I was going to try to consolidate the stuff staying in storage into one crate but that was too much work. Pon has plenty of extra space so having 2 crates is not a problem for him.

Thursday
Today, guess where we are? Back at Pons. This time for my toys. My boats and my surfboards. I uncrated the boats first and when I opened the crate they looked pretty good for being tossed around on a ship for 4 weeks and transported in a truck for 14 hours to Phuket. The boats survived the trip and storage but they was some rust and mildew on some of the stuff. I should have put vaseline on all the metal parts and sealed up some of the stuff better. The surfboards survived pretty well too. I had one small ding in one board but it did not break the glass so I can't complain about that. The shipping company did a pretty good job packing the boards. I have all my boats and my surfboards home now.

Friday
Sim is off at Sew's (sister in law) house doing laundry and I am home alone. Today I am going to put all my boats back together and get the sails rigged and check out all the electronics. I spent all day rigging the boats and cleaning up the corrosion on the metal parts. Everything looks pretty good. Some of the electronics are suspect however. I have some glitching in the servos on a couple of boats. I suspect the potentiometers in the Transmitters have a bit of corrosion on the wipers. I am going to spray them with contact cleaner and work them vigorously to see if I can get them back in good working order.

May 17 – 23 (Phuket, Thailand)
Sunday
Just hung out at the house today. Sim's nephews came over and he and I played some Wii games. The nephews are all having a good time playing with the Wii. After their homework is done first of course. I have to get in touch with Brother Bill and get his Wii address so we can play Tiger Woods Golf over the internet.

Monday
Happy 12th Wedding Anniversary Jim and Sim. Wow 12 years. Went to downtown Phuket today to the Immigration Office to apply for a one year extension on my Non-immigrant O visa based on retirement. I had all the documents I was supposed to have and the process actually went rather smoothly. I paid 1900 baht ($54.00) and can now legally stay in Thailand for one year. I have to report in to the Immigration Office every 90 days, just like being on parole, and I have to renew the visa extension every year. At the same office I got a certified letter of residence to take to the DMV that is just down the street from the Immigration Office. After I got my visa extension, we headed over to the DMV to get new plates for the truck and a Thai Drivers License for me. Sim spoke to the girl at the Information Desk and she gave us a piece of paper with the requirements for a drivers license. One of the requirements is a certificate of health from a doctor, not older than 30 days. I had one but I got it in Bangkok 2 months ago. The other requirement was an International Drivers License or your current license translated in English. I showed her my Drivers License that of course was already in English, but she said I had to go to Bangkok and get a translation done into Thai and the American Consulate. Sim asked again to be sure and the girl said yes that was correct. We passed on the Drivers License and took care of the new plates on the truck. After that process we went back to the Drivers License desk and Sim spoke to the Supervisor and she said my license in English was fine. We are going back tomorrow to finish the plate process and get my license. We stopped at a clinic tonight and got an updated health certificate. The doctor at the clinic listened to my heart and we paid them 100 baht and we are good to go for tomorrow.

Tuesday
Happy B-day Sim.
We are off to the Transport Office (DMV) again today. Our goal is to get the updated Blue Book (Pink Slip) on the truck and get me a Thai Drivers License. We arrived at 9:00 and got our copies made and 6 pictures taken and got in line. The line was already 30 people long but it went pretty fast. They accepted all our paperwork and sent us upstairs to do the “test” I had to pass to get a license. There were 70 people ahead of me when we got upstairs at about 9:30. We waited and waited and waited. They were taking 30 people at a time in the small room where they did the testing. I finally got called in and watched the first 10 people do the test so I had a good idea of how the testing worked. First I had to sit in a chair with a simulated gas and brake pedal on the floor in front of me. I stepped on the gas pedal and a green light came on. I waited for the light to turn red and then stepped on the brake. A series of lights measured your reaction time. If it was too slow, you failed. Next I had to pick up a couple of strings and move two vertical posts about 15 feet away until they were parallel. This I suppose is the check you depth perception. Next the tester pointed to some colored spots on a paper about 15 feet away and I had to call out green, yellow, green, red, yellow, red, or whatever color she pointed at to check for color blindness. Next I had to stick my nose up to a bar and to my left and right colored lights would be lit and I had to call out the colors while looking straight ahead. I had a bit of trouble with this one as they had a fluorescent light directly in front and the glare on my glasses made it had to see. As soon as I took off my glasses it was easy. I guess this checks your peripheral vision. I passed all the tests and got my papers signed off and back downstairs we went to another office where they took my picture and laminated it to my new Thai Drivers License. The whole process took 3 hours. Most of it waiting of course.

We got home and checked to see if we have internet yet. We ordered it 7 days ago. The office told us it would take 3 days. After 3 days we called and the tech said 2 more days maximum. The 2 days was up today. Guess what. No internet. Sim called again. She was promised tonight late or early tomorrow morning. It is 10:30 p.m. we have no internet so I am hoping tomorrow morning.

Wednesday
I got all my boats assembled and checked out. I sprayed the transmitter pots and got them sort of working. The batteries did not fair too well, and some of the metal parts suffered in the long storage. Going to have to buy some new rechargeable AA batteries. But all in all they are in good shape. Now I need to find a suitable sailing lake.

Thursday
We have internet, finally. After waiting 7 days longer than we were told when we signed up, we finally have internet at home. I have been getting my internet fix at a couple of local internet cafes. One is outside, free, and walking distance from Sim's sister-in-law's house. Another is inside, with AC and again within walking distance from the SIL. They charge 15 baht ($.43) per hour. The third place is a community center with no AC but free. The places with no AC are just too darn hot to sit and work on the MAC. Need to at least have a fan blowing on you.

May 24 – 31 (Phuket, Thailand)
Sunday
Today I decided to clean the grout on our tile floor. It does not look like it has ever been cleaned. Last week I did a section of the kitchen floor just to see how it would turn out. I liked it so today I will finish up the kitchen. I spent about 3 hours in the kitchen and got it all done. It really looks good.

Monday
More floor cleaning today. I am moving into the living room. I got part of the living room done and the hallway all finished. I am on a mission now to get it all scrubbed. It looks so good when it is finished and clean.

Tuesday
Lost our internet today. That lasted a whole 4 days. Went out about 9:00 this morning. As of 7:00 p.m. we still don't have it back. Sim called TOT 4 times today and finally spoke to the head guy at TOT, who said he would take care of the problem. We will see. It will probably take another 10 days to get back online.

I finished up the tile and grout in the Living Room. Now I have the 3 bedrooms left to go. I think I will take a few days off before tackling them. I did some yard work later in the afternoon when the sun was low and shade covered the front yard. We are supposed to get a gardner in the price of the rent. He has not come yet and the grass is really long. I am just fixing up some of the plantings.

Sim wants to go shopping at the outdoor Bang Tao food market today. We headed over to Sew's house and picked her up. I dropped them both off at the market and headed up the road to find a Surf Shop that I spotted one day. I found the shop, called Saltwater Dreaming and went inside. They have some short boards and a few long boards as well. They carry a line of Boogie boards that I never heard of too. Some mens and ladies swimsuits. some snorkeling gear and that is about it. I asked the lady at the shop where some of the best surf spots were. She had no idea.

Rained cats and dogs this evening. We are inside so no matter. Toey, Sim's 7 year old nephew has been coming over to the house after he gets out of school. Sim is doing some tutoring with him.

It looks like we are going to have the nephew over every day. Sim is on a mission to make this nephew the smartest kid in the school.

Sunday
Going to the beach today with Sim's nephew Toey. Toey has been asking about my boogie board so we are going for lesson today. He is 7, so he is happy just running in and out of the water. He does not swim so I could not take him too far out. We just went past the first break and I shoved him into a few waves.

I was a little concerned that he might fall off in deep water and I could not get to him in time so the boogie board lesson was short. It seems so odd that Thai people living here on an island do not make learning to swim a priority. This month alone 3 people drowned in Phuket. Last month there were several drownings as well.

Well thats a rap for May. It is well into June now and I need to stay on top of June. I don't like being late with the postings. Our avid and faithful readers get concerned when they don't hear from us on a regular basis.