Jak was my dad’s Shih Tzu. My bro, Adam, gave Jak the monkey a few years back. I stole it from Jak and have now given it to Max. This monkey has traveled all around the world by plane, train, ship, and automobile. I use a photo of it as an avatar everywhere. The monkey has no name, it’s only known as “Jak’s monkey.”
Category: Photos
Effluvian Cycle
I never imagined such a cute little thing could poop so often. Max, when not sleeping or breastfeeding, is soiling diapers (and our clothes as well) at a highly efficient rate. I would say at this point we are going through 30 diapers per day, as well as assorted towels, blankets, and baby clothes that get soiled as well (one downside to cloth diapers is that they have no plastic layer to keep the juiciness sealed in).
My mental checklist from the past 24 hours looks something like this:
Poo
Pee
Pee
Pee
Poo
Double double (2 pees + 2 poos consecutively/simultaneously, in random order)
Pee
Very wet fart/not quite poo
Pee
Pee
Poo
Super pee (soiled mommy/daddy’s clothes as well as own)
Pee
Poo
Hot squirt from bottom when changing
Pee
Pee
Super pee
Triple double (including attempted pee in daddy’s face when changing)
Pee
Poo
Pee with small poop squirt
/end of cycle
But so far, I have to admit this is kinda fun. My boy can pass gas loudly and unabashedly, sometimes on the very hand that changes his nappies, and that is something, as a man, of which I can be proud.
Today we must make a run for wet wipes, baby laundry detergent, and food at the local mini-Tesco. The best wet wipes and disposable diapers available in Thailand (that we’ve seen so far at least) is a Japanese brand called MamyPoko (parent company: Unicharm). Mamypoko makes great products at competitive prices… We don’t take Max out very often, but when we do, we’ve decided to use disposables… It’s one less thing to worry about, and the finished product makes a great projectile for idiots who double park.
Bonus trivia: Disposable diapers no longer employ adhesive tabs! They have a Velcro-like system, but the texture isn’t rough like normal Velcro. Actually, I’m pretty sure it’s magic or something!
I CAN HAS PICNIC?
OK. I’ve gotten all the LOLcats-babyblogging out of my system, I think.
Went Shopping for a Car Seat…
Guess he’ll have to grow into it. As a sidenote, this may have been the only car seat for sale in all of Mahasarakham. Since it was the last one in the only store that we know sells car seats, perhaps there is literally nowhere to buy them here anymore. It was about $90 and has genuine-looking European safety certification markings on it.
Dub Thee Max
I have officially decided that his western (and therefore, most important) name is Max. Nam has yet to decide on a Thai name. It would be funny to change it at this point because we tried it out for a couple days and some of our visitors overheard us – next thing you know, people are calling up and congratulating us on “Max.” Besides, it just fits him.
Next question: To -imilian or not to -imilian. Simple “Max,” or go for a bit of flair with “Maximilian?” Come to think of it, emulating the first google hit for that name might be fairly classy: His Imperial Majesty Maximilian I, Emperor of Maha Sarakham and Protector of the Northeast. I think it’s got a nice ring to it.
What to do?
Max or Maximilian?
Either way, I’m calling him Max, or Maxie until he stops breastfeeding, at least. There’s an argument to be made that the -imilian is a useless appendage. On the other hand, I sometimes think it would be nice to have a tail even if I didn’t really use it, so I’d like to hear some opinions here.
What say ye?
Contender for Best Brand Name of All Time
See? The baby really is lucky! I went to buy a case of water at a farmer’s wholesale mart and stumbled onto the grand mother of unfortunate branding – Golden Shower Brand Sugar!
“For the perverted diabetic in you!”
I just appreciate that they seemingly got the trademark (TM) – then again, in most parts of Asia, sometimes a marking is just a marking so – maybe they just claim to have the trademark. It’s time for someone to jump on this opportunity; the Golden Shower name must expand across cultural boundaries and product lines alike!
Good Morning, Morning Glory
The phantom wireless signal never returned after I lost it last night before knocking out, so I’m taking time between washing new cloth diapers at home to post these.
BTW, the baby has expressed extreme distaste for automatic transmissions AND front wheel drive – what a little purist!. Lucky for him I have the Crown..
UPDATE: I just realized that last sentence might be a bit misleading – Nam and the baby are staying in the hospital for at least a few more days. I’m at home doing chores while Nam’s little sis helps watch the baby. Nam seems to be healing nicely since the operation yesterday. She was able to get up and walk a little today after they took out the IV and catheter.
Baby is not nursing yet. I can make him stop crying on command – “Hey Poopy Pants! Stop crying!!” Just kidding, he stops because he loves me. Fear shouldn’t be necessary until he starts playing with electrical outlets and stuff.
This baby is good luck.
Today the baby was born and I got a small tax return from the Japanese government that I was waiting for for two years. What are the odds?
Plus, this amazing phantom wifi access point kind of fades in whenever I really NEED a connection, but is invisible the rest of the time.
Let’s see… born on 6/18 at 18:06 (UPDATE: Today is of course 4/18, not 6/18. Hey, give me a break – there was a lot happening. Maybe not to me directly, but there was a lot happening.). There’s definitely some lucky lotto number action happening there, or something.
We got into a VIP suite of sorts here at the hospital because of Nam’s nurse friends. I’m in a decently sized air-conditioned room with a sofa, fridge, shower room, and TV, and Nam is sleeping with the baby in the adjoining room. Nam’s little sister is keeping watch on the sofa in there. Their room is a lot warmer than in here because the baby needs to be acclimatized to the temperature outside mommy’s womb a little at a time. He likes sucking on his fingers, since Nam has been told to hold off nursing him until the doctor can give her a thorough check up tomorrow. Ah, hell, who am I kidding? He would like to suck on his fingers anyway… Or I would, at least (on mine, not his).
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Baby and mommy (kinda goofy from double morphine spinal block):
Already drinking shots:
Hates wearing socks, just like his dad:
Scenes from a University Van
From our road trip to Pattaya a couple weeks ago.
If you love frogs, you probably shouldn’t read the latter half of this post, but I’m not hiding it in the extended entry, either. Do or do not, there is no try, as it were.
(as always, click on any photo to open a larger version in a pop-up window)
This post goes out to my brother Adam, who definitely might be man enough to eat skewered frogs after a few beers (although we did it sober here). The one I pulled apart in the tissue shown above was pregnant, so the blurry black and white dots are eggs. Actually, the pregnant frogs were more expensive than the non-preggers (30 Baht/stick vs. 20 Baht/stick).
I’m going to preempt any “the trees are screaming” complaints at this time by pointing out that this is normal fare for hunters and gatherers, which many of the indigents here are.
I will also go on record that these frogs do not taste like chicken. They do not taste too bad, though… That is, they don’t really taste of anything, really – it tastes like you are eating a rich, fatty protein, if that makes any sense. Maybe like a roasted shishamo, but not as delicious. I will admit that it took a bit of courage to eat one. After all, it was the same kind of frog I found in my shoe a while ago (called un-an in Thai).
Captain Ahab: The Man Who Brought Us Lizard Salad
Yesterday provided a chance encounter with a local character which has forever changed our culinary lives. WE HAVE EATEN LIZARD, SOME KIND OF IGUANA. Specifically, this kind of iguana, although it might have been a blue-colored one since those are apparently bigger and tastier. There are so many things I want to say about this experience, it’s all just a jumble in my mind right now… I think I’ll tackle the explanation chronologically.
So yesterday, Nam and I were in front of our house taking photos. I set up a tripod in front of the pond and we started taking a long series of shots in the hot sun. Along came Captain Ahab, carrying his mini-harpoon gun:
“Do you want to try it out?” OH HELL YES PLEASE!
I tested out his fine contraption on a bunch of reeds floating in the pond, and maimed them quite handily. The trigger pull was about 20 lbs. and activated the release of the thick rubber bands (not tubes) attached to either sides of the receiver, acting much like a Hawaiian sling.
He assured us this longarm was also effective for home defense. I belive his actual words were, “you can also use this to shoot burglars!” Check out the awesomely hand-ground and nastily-barbed mini-harpoon:
You could probably do a lot more than shoot your eye out with this gun; the Captain said he’d bought it off a student 30 years ago and had speared too many fish with it to count over the years. (note: The reason I deemed this fine fellow Ahab is that he claimed to have brought in a 300 kilogram fish with this rig once. I called bullshit, first off because the harpoon was only attached with what looked like around 20 lb. test. Also,
I firmly believe anyone harpooning a 300 kg. fish with this rig would end up just like the original Captain Ahab – it’s just not possible to land. Later, I found out this may have been a misunderstanding – he may have meant 300 kgs. of fish, not a 300 kg. fish. Since the time period wasn’t specified, this sounds totally feasible. Sorry for doubting you, Captain, and sorry for the undeserved moniker) Unfortunately, he did not know where I could find one for myself. Here’s a shot of the loaded projectile (gun uncocked).
And here is where we come to lizard salad (iguana salad?). (Well not really salad. It’s about as salad-ish as a fruit salad, in that it’s not, really… ah screw it, you’ll see.) A few weeks ago some friends told me that it’s prime iguana hunting season right now and I was really jazzed about rounding up some friends and going… They hypnotize the hapless beasts with special whistling sounds, then shoot them out of the trees with slingshots made from inner tubes. Nam also wanted me to go, but was worried about karmic implications during this period just before the baby is born, so I refrained from going. For some reason, Nam thought I merely wanted to eat the iguanas (where as for me, the hunt is the only reason I would even consider eating a lizard to begin with), so she asked Captain Ahab, who certainly appeared to be able to live off the land, if he could round up some for me.
This is how we started the lizard negotiations. He asked how many she wanted, she said one or two. He said that wasn’t enough and said, “how about ten?” Nam countered with five, and we were all set. He promised to catch some later that night and asked if we knew how to prepare them. He was worried that we didn’t know how to slowly roast and skin them, and then mix various herbs and fruits together to make it all very tasty, and rightly so – we were totally like lizard virgins, man. So it ended up that he had his wife cook up the lizards he caught for us and brought us a bag of LIZARD SALAD for lunch today. Behold:
THE VERDICT: The lizard meat was smoky from being slowly grilled, presumably over charcoal. Just looking at the photo, it looks like many other variations of Thai country “salad,” most of which are based on local veggies or fruits such as eggplant, bamboo shoots, tamarind, papaya or mango, or are fish-based. This one was definitely lizard though, because I picked a spiny part out of my mouth. The closest flavor I can compare iguana flesh to is canned tuna – it had the same kind of consistency when mashed up, and didn’t taste too strongly of anything, perhaps just hinting at fish.
An added bonus was the ant queen salad Ahab’s wife also prepared for us:
Today was a good day. I learned things about this culture that even Thai people don’t know about. I KNOW WHAT IGUANA TASTES LIKE, BITCHES!
That is all.