The Last Hurrah

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Captain's final log, star date... wait, wrong show. This is, however, the last hurrah. Sick (I've picked up some nasal cold thing) and tired, and sick and tired of it all, we head home tomorrow. If it's possible, I'm actually looking forward to the 16 hours on the plane (in leg cramped coach), 4 or so hours in layover (over 3 in San Francisco - hey, maybe we'll go to Chinatown) and the hour and a half drive home from the airport. Of course, I will follow that with about 3 days of sleep, if the kids and family will allow it.

Our last day hasn't been nearly as fun as we had anticipated. I think we've just worn ourselves out too much and are good and ready to leave. The meeting with MPI went very well, they are using the software as well as, or better than any of the other vendors we've met with all along the way. Lunch was good (we've decided that of all the foods we've had on this marathon trip, we like Thai food the best), and the shopping trip to the Hard Rock Cafe was nothing short of an ordeal.

Somehow, our host misunderstood what we were looking for, and found a nice guitar shop. Now, I'm not complaining, because I enjoyed looking and even considered buying a new guitar, but she was off the mark. We did, eventually, get there and picked up a few things (now to sell them for a premium!).

The ride back to the hotel was nothing short of pure hell. It couldn't have been more than about 16 or so blocks (the Hard Rock Cafe is on Suhkumvit 2, and our hotel on Suhkumvit 19), but the 45 minutes of winding around and waiting in traffic had me ready to scream. I wanted to get out and say, "let me walk back" about a dozen times, but was able to confine myself.

We went out tonight to see some of the local market, but after a few purchases got bored with that and went to eat. We met up with some of the local missionaries (2 couples, and 3 sets of elders) and gave them a bit of a hard time, but enjoyed the visit. The 4 cokes I had during dinner will probably keep me from getting much sleep tonight, but if I can bum an Ambien from Mike tomorrow, I'm hoping for a chemically indiced coma to take over between Tokyo and San Francisco.

The trip, overall, has been very successful, and very rewarding in that we have had some very meaningful discussions and session with the vendors here. I don't know how I'm going to keep it all straight for the expense report, but will find a way to work through it all.

Here are the last images of the trip. You'll probably be able to tell that I'm not in much of a mood for pictures and blogging, so apologies that this is all you get.


Straight across from our hotel. I guess this kind of puts new meaning to the "happy" part of the massages that we've been offered on the streets over here. To think it's just a franchise thing...

Okay... I think that's about enough lucky charms on one mirror. Maybe we should have stopped and gotten him a garter belt to add to his collection.

Bright colors to attract the tourists... lug nuts optional.

See... we really are here in Thailand.

A carved wall of art.

One of about 30,000 local taxis that they are continually trying to get you to ride. We witnessed literally 6 or more people load up in one tonight. I remember days of stuffing as many as we could in the old Volkswagen Beetles, and "dragging" main. I guess that means they're about 35 years behind the times over here.

Thai taggers...

It has been an adventure.