Gronk. November 17 here, so the embassy is closed due to demonstrations (or in honor of Jilli, if you are me).

Right now the radio is playing "Mony Mony" and my husband, who does not post here, is singing along with the chorus: "Schmacky Man Pony! Schmacky Man Pony!"

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with vibrato

Sorry? What? I can't hear you over the "you're just not gay enough, trudy"

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Happy Birthday, Jilli!

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Sorry? What? I can't hear you over the "you're just not gay enough, trudy"

Glam said she could help. Perhaps she has a brochure you can thumb through...

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CASS!

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vw, why are you up? It's terribly late.

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Juliana! I'd recommend Fay's stylist, Megan

I have a stylist! Go me!

is proud.

...although, as it's a good three months since I had a haircut, maybe I need to get me a new stylist. Stat. Hmm.

First Impression of Plei? Black lace and bounciness. Take that as you will.

ion, my kids? Still cutieheads. AND My Only Annoying Kid has been fabulous today. And most of this week. He's really been trying hard to be sensible and pay attention and not be a knob. It's like a miracle! I no longer want to strangle him! I was telling him how ubercool he was, and how he was the best Khush in the history of all Khushes, how in fact he was now approaching SuperKhush status, and how much I hoped that this exciting new Khush was going to be the All New Khush from now on. (Because the Totally Not Listening thing and having to make me explain things five times? Really not winning him any brownie points with me.) And then I gave him Barney to take home. He was beaming, I was beaming, it was great.

And now I'm going home early. Here I go!

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I've never been to Vegas and my birthday is January 27th. IJS

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Happy Birthday, Jilli!!!

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...so in a triumph of hope over prudence I have just handed a total stranger 7000 baht. That's about 120 sterling.

...hmm.

I may very well never see it again. Knowing that, I have still handed it over. Even though it's entirely possible that she is, in fact, a con artist. Because I figure - well, I can afford (not comfortably, but still - afford) to lose it, if lose it I must. And it's a kharmic thing, you know? I've been in the position of having to trust in the kindness of strangers too damn many times myself, so even if she's taking the piss...well. I'd rather be trusting and try to help somebody when it's in my power to do so than turn my back on her.

Um.

...yeah, quite possibly one of the dumbest things I've done. But certainly not THE dumbest, by a long chalk.

See, I was waiting to get a taxi and this white chick in her 40s, of less than slender build and clad in a navy T shirt and long floaty skirt embroidered with mirrors asked me for directions to the Citibank. And we got talking, and I wasn't really in a hurry, and it turned out that she'd (so she said) had her moneybelt stolen the night before, and had been unable to get her flight from Bangkok to Phuket. And now she was trying to find a bank that would enable her to get money transferred over from South Africa.

So I pointed her in the right direction, and then ended up thinking 'fuck it' and I offered to go with her. And when we got there it was closed, but I politely asked them for advice, and they suggested a couple of other places. So we got a taxi to try the other places, but it turned out that none of them could help.

So she was looking at having to wait until Monday to get the wheels set in motion, and she was talking about going back to the airport and staying there.

Well, you know, I've been stranded in a foreign country with no money and no friends and it sucks. And rather than having to spend the night in Warsaw train station I ended up having an English-speaking lady called Anna taking pity on me and letting me go back and crash at her place for the night, to the utter shock of her cat. And the next day she arranged for a taxi to get me to the train station and took me to a bankomat so I could get some Polish money out, and generally was a total good samaritan at a time when she could totally have turned her back on me, because she didn't know me from Adam. And her place, that struck me then as tiny, is actually about the same size as my place now. And I have a cat.

So I figured, hell, this is kharma - even though I'm not entirely taken with this lady (because she was a wee bit obnoxious to the people in the bank, I thought, in that whole priveliged-white-person-dealing-with-Johnny-Foreigner kind of way). But it's kharma. Now I'm the chick with the cat and the tiny apartment, and it's one of those moments when you have to ask yourself which person you want to be - the one who turns their back on someone they can help, or the one who risks being screwed over.

So I said she could stay at my place. But she said she couldn't do that. And I said she couldn't spend the next 4 or 5 days in the airport with 100 baht (less than 2 dollars) to her name, waiting for a money transfer to be sorted out. So we had an impasse. And she went and smoked a cigarette outside, and I texted a friend to tell them that I was doing something very stupid. And then she came in and asked if she could borrow the money from me so she could change her ticket and fly home.

And I thought about it. And I can afford it, so - yeah. I've just handed over 7000 baht and a small box of mini chocolate doughnuts and a sandalwood fan to a total stranger whom I didn't entirely take to, who may or may not pay me back. Because it seemed like the right thing to do.

Man.

Am I the most gullible person on the planet?

Quite possibly.

But you know, I'm philosophical about it. If I'm being fucked over, I'm good with that. I'd rather have done the good thing than not risk the money, and possibly leave somebody stranded like that.

Apparently the South African embassy gave her 500 baht, and that's all they were prepared to do. Which is less than a tenner.

Although of course, that may be a total fabrication.

Man. Weird feeling of whathaveidone-ness here. So I'm going to go buy books and drink mojitos and waste more money. Yeah. Sounds like a plan.

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