— All Things Work Together For Good... (Romans 8:28)

Only at FreeTheAnimal do you get such a bizarre juxtaposition of title, sub-title, and banner image. A total WTF.

It's Sunday morning my time and I've been a busy beaver. Lots to report but for today, I'm popping up 2 relatively short videos of the 3 vids I cut on Patong Beach in Phuket, Thailand yesterday. The third is about Russia-Ukraine-Nord Stream that accompanies a huge and substantial post that's been in draft for days: Empires Come And Go But Pax Is Lasting (For As Long As It Lasts). Stay tuned for that after this diversional post.

Why am I in Patong Beach, Phuket and where do I go from here?

Yesterday was such a beautiful sunny day on the heels of Friday's monsoon deluge that resulted in flooding right here on the streets. Big yawn for the Thais, though. The water? Off a duck's back. Do enough monsoon seasons here and you'll get caught many times riding your motorcycle in such a blustery downpour.

What do you do? You slow down, forget about getting soaked (it can't be helped), squint, and soldier on. What happens?

You get passed by cute, 20-sumthin', 40ish-kilo Thai chicks for whom this is commonplace every year and it never gets in the way of anything.

That's what happens.

In answer to the question, I'm changing things up. Summary of the video for those who dislike my videos. Plus, this will all come out piecemeal in writing soon enough.

• I'm soon to become a perpetual SE Asia traveler; doing my standard blogging (writing), just in the backdrop of being in new and exotic places most of the time.
• My home base in Rawai will be maintained. $90 per month, total cost. Less than most people's monthly parking space.
• Travel will be on the cheap, taking maximum advantage of geoarbitrage. My upcoming Social-Security partial-principal-payback begins in February—in an amount that is more than double my monthly living expenses!
• There's the potential for surprise in the form of an amazingly sexy 20-something partner and this travel being via automobile for Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. I'll know more about that possibility in the days to come, as she's arriving here in 4 hours' time.