Mental Preparation

As it begins to look more and more like I will be able to leave Thailand, I have made it a point to try and catch up on news and events back in the states. In hindsight, that might have been a mistake. Holy cow!!! The federal government is running out of money. The Justice department is running guns to Mexico. People are just randomly opening fire in skating rinks, casinos and car shows. Oh, let's not forget the Casey Anthony fiasco. What on earth is going on over there? I guess I'll find out for myself soon enough.

I do get some English speaking news channels here. The two I get most often are FoxNews and AlJazeera. Talk about opposite ends of the spectrum. It's pretty bad when I get better unbiased news from AlJazeera than I do from so called "fair and balanced" Foxnews. I guess I just see the world and especially America in a little different light these days. Just like anything else, it helps to stand back a little and get a view from the outside looking in.

As for my current status, I checked in with the courthouse again this week regarding the posting of the court documents and my judgement back to the local police who still have my US passport. The answer was the same "one or two weeks" that they have been telling me for nearly three weeks now. My contact at the US Consulate attempted to negotiate a planned exit, but was stonewalled by the local authorities. Once again, I just get to sit and wait. I am beginning to think my landlord is in cahoots with the court. I think she wants to make sure she gets one more month's rent out of me before I get shipped off and she can rent the place twice for one month. Yes, I am joking of course, but anything is possible here.

Depending on what flight I can get on short notice when the paperwork goes through, I may or may not have enough to get out. I am trying to stay optimistic, and am very thankful to all who pitched in to at least give me the possibility of getting out in one piece. There are still a few hoops to jump through here, and once I do get back then the real challenges begin. I was having an interesting conversation with some Thai friends the other night. They reminded me that for the price of a plane ticket to the states, you can build a small house here. Irony indeed.

That's it for me in the here and now. As always, be good to yourselves and each other out there.

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