Random Rim Jobs

[Continued from "Thailand, Revisited, Reworked (Part 4)."]

I taught English most mornings and worked in the law office most afternoons.  “Teaching” English to about 15 18-year-olds who could easily communicate in a remedial, passable way with me and any other understanding English speaker was hardly a feat of mental acrobatics, and since my French boss was not in the law office, I had very little to do.

That, of course, left me with plenty of free time since I had to do absolutely no prep for either my teaching job or my law office job.  Another thing having two very easy jobs meant was two incomes.  The teaching job paid very generously, and though I was working less at the law office, my salary there was not reduced when I cut back my hours.  Add to that that I didn’t have to worry about paying rent (since that was included with the law office job), and food in Bangkok is extremely cheap, and I had a lot of disposable income.

Lots of time and lots of money.  Hmmm.  The previous year I had become acquainted with various areas of town with cool nightclubs.  This time, though, I tended to stick to the Patpong area of town because it was close to both the law office in the pyramid-shaped building and Eat Me, and a relatively inexpensive, traffic-free cab ride to and from my apartment.  It is certainly not my intent to imply that Patpong isn’t about sex, because it is, but it’s not all about sex.  There are nuances and layers to every place, and Patpong is no exception.

In the mornings I’d take a cab to the university and teach my class.  My students were all around 18 and adorable.  They had to wear school uniforms, which consisted of black pants for boys, black skirts for girls, and white button-down shirts.  Bangkok University wasn’t the most prestigious institution of higher learning in Bangkok.  Actually, according to Daniel (because I didn’t bother doing any research myself), the students who went there were spoiled little rich kids who didn’t do well enough to get into better schools.  To be truthful, anyone who attends university in Thailand is necessarily rich since there are no government-subsidized student loans.

My main job in teaching English was to get my students more comfortable speaking English.  Every day we’d practice typical conversations; I did the same thing in French classes when I was in high school.  Thais tend to be quiet people, and when speaking English, a language in which my students were not proficient, my students were practically inaudible.  Add to that my usual rapid cadence and there wasn’t a whole lot of communicating going on.

There was one student who stood out.  He was very cute.  As has been established, I like Thai boys.  However, he did not stand out just because of his looks.  He also spoke English rather well.  Better than any of the other students.  I asked him why.  He had spent a year in the US when he was in high school.  It was a foreign exchange program where he was placed with a family in Utah.  I tried not to apologize too profusely for his lack of a well-rounded experience in the US considering his host situation, but we were at least able to carry on a real conversation, which was more than I could do with any of the other students.

To that end, I endeavored to speak a lot slower, and to enunciate clearly.  And I tried to make them speak up.  Overall, they were a good group of kids.  They were very solicitous and nice to me.  Often, on the way off campus to go to my law office job, I’d run across some of my students having lunch.  They always invited me to sit with them.  I always declined.  I thought it best that we keep a professional distance with my students.

Not so with Daniel’s students.  I figured I could hang out with students so long as they weren’t my own.  That may have been an arbitrary line, but it was my line, dammit.  Remember, I had already fucked my friend’s boyfriend, so I knew I didn’t have all that much self-control; I thought it best to limit myself somewhat.  I hung out with – and went out with – one of Daniel’s student’s, Bee.

To be continued ….

[Continued from "Thailand, Revisited, Reworked (Part 3)."]

On one of the many occasions I hung out with Darren at Eat Me he introduced me to his friend Daniel.  Daniel was a very interesting guy.  He was Canadian with dual citizenship in Canada and Israel.  He spoke English, French, Hebrew, Thai, Japanese, and a few other languages.  He had lived in Canada, Israel, Japan, and Thailand, and a few other countries.  He had served in the Israeli Army.  He and his brother, who lived in the Caribbean, ran an auto reselling business wherein they bought mildly used cars in Japan and resold them in the Caribbean.  He was able to conduct his business whilst living in Bangkok and teaching English at a local university.

In my experience, the expatriate farang men in Bangkok tended to be “older” (in their mid- to late-30s) with a penchant for “younger” (early- to mid-20s) Thais.  Daniel and Darren were no exception.  We often dished about cute Thai hotties.

When I wasn’t going to the gym with Darren, or hanging out at Eat Me with Daniel, I did some occasional “work.”  I went into the office in the pyramid-shaped building … and sat.  I had little direction from the boss.  The boss who wasn’t in the office much.  The secretary and paralegal had little to say to me.  I ended up going into the office, sitting in front of a computer … and falling asleep.

The office was very hot and in the heat I couldn’t help but get sleepy.  I told my tale of employment woes to Darren and Daniel.  Daniel suggested I teach English at the university where he taught.  He said so long as he vouched for me it didn’t matter that I’d not taught before since I had a college degree and was a native English speaker.

I asked my boss if it would be ok if I went into the office less.  I had only one class that, because it was summer, met four days a week, but only for an hour a day.  I told my boss I’d be able to work in the afternoons.  He acquiesced.  It was about this time that his business partner, a fellow French attorney who was holding down his end of the practice in Paris, kicked the bucket.  My boss was devastated.

He had to go to Paris for the funeral.  My boss – my French boss – was a smoker.  He choose to take the one airline that still allowed smoking on flights to go to Paris from Bangkok.  This was 2001, and Emirates still allowed smoking so my boss took that airline to and from France.  However, he did not return from France for quite some time since he had to take care of business, go to the funeral, and attend to his partner’s family.  He and his business partner were also very close friends, and my boss felt an obligation to his family.

While my French boss was out of the country I began teaching English.  The university didn’t ask for any credentials, and I didn’t have access to my college records or degree from Thailand anyway.  Nonetheless, I was hired to teach an English class at Bangkok University.  I eventually learned that the class I was teaching was a kind of remedial course; everyone in the university had to take an English class and my students were required to take the class because they had failed to qualify for a more advanced class.  Daniel was teaching the more advanced class.

My class ….  To be continued.

I swear.  True story.

[Continued from "Bed for Four (Part 1)."]

The Brit and I chatted for a bit.  She asked if, perhaps, she could get another guy to join us, if I could host.  She had been in my place, she knew very well that I had it to myself that night.  I said I could host but I didn’t want to guarantee sex with just anyone.  She assured me the guy she had in mind was cute, that he had a big cock, and that he was a good fuck.

Mrs. Vet and her date took off.  They had been making out like teenagers and needed to continue their fun in a less public place.  That left the Vet, the Brit, and me to our own devices.

We went across the street to get some pizza.  While waiting for the food, we saw the acquaintance who had spoken at the Make-Out Room.  The Vet and I talked to her while the Brit met the new guy out front.  I had told the Vet some inside information about the acquaintance before we left my place.  I had not made it clear that the information was inside information, but I still didn’t think the Vet would tell the subject of said information that he knew the information.  Out of my earshot, though, that is exactly what the Vet did.

I was embarrassed that I looked like a gossip, especially considering the information I had was, according to the acquaintance, not accurate.  It was interesting to know that there were most definitely two sides to the story, and chances are the “truth” was somewhere in between.

We got our pizza and our foursome gathered on the sidewalk.  The Brit was right, the guy was cute.  The four of us stopped at a liquor store for provisions – vodka and soda for me, and gin and tonic for the Brit and the Irish.  The guy the Brit had join us was Irish.  Two people with sexy accents for sexy times?  Yes, please.

After some pizza and drinks the four of us made our way to my bedroom.  Then, because we all knew why we were there, we were naked and our bodies were writhing about each other.

It was a good combination of people for a foursome.  The Brit and I are both of curvy figure. Both the Vet and the Irish both had nice thick cocks.  It’s always good when there aren’t huge discrepancies amongst the naked bodies.  I had a foursome that I would not qualify as a success, partially because the guys’ cocks were of vastly different size.  I spent a lot of time in that threesome avoiding the guy with the tiny cock because I didn’t want it in me.

Not so with the Vet and the Irish.  They both had lovely cocks that I wanted in my pussy and in my mouth.  With the aid of the boxes of condoms I keep on either side of the bed, there was penis-in-vagina fucking.  There was cock sucking.  There was pussy licking.  There was watching.  The Vet likes to watch. 

When I’m in a fuck mood I can be pretty rough and like it pretty rough.  Both the Vet and the Irish throttled me whilst fucking me.  I like the feeling of getting my pussy pounded while feeling a bit lightheaded.  The Vet is often surprised he can be as rough with me as he can, but I can take a lot.

And because I can take a lot I sometimes forget that not everyone can – or wants to.  I’m a biter.  I like to bite as hard as I like to be bitten.  When I’m in the bitey mood it really is rather difficult to get me not to bite.  I left both the Brit and the Vet with bite-induced bruises.  The Brit has since told the Vet that she’d like to have another group situation so long as I promise not to bite.

Along with biting I also swallow.  I was lucky enough to get to swallow two loads of come – one from each of the gentlemen – that night.

Generally, my mouth was pretty busy.  I licked the Brit’s pussy.  I don’t get to lick enough pussy in my life.  I need to do something about that.

My mouth also found its way to the Vet’s ass when he was fucking the Brit.  That’s one of my specialties in group situations:  licking man ass while his cock is otherwise engaged.

The Brit and the Irish left, leaving the Vet and I to fuck once more before falling asleep.  The Vet left in the morning, but not until after taking Isis out.  He’s quite the gentleman.

I swear.  True story.

July has quite a few national days or constitutional days, or other such patriotic celebrations.  Us Americans seem to think we’re the only party in town, but there’s a whole world out there.  A whole world.

July 1 is Canada Day, which is apparently the day back in 1867 when everyone agreed to continue putting Queen Elizabeth on their currency.  July 1 is also the day of both Burundi‘s and Rwanda‘s independence from Belgium.

Belarus has two significant days in July.  On July 3, 1944 the capital city of Minsk was freed from German occupation by the Soviets.  After years of one of the Soviet Republics, Belarus declared its sovereignty on July 27, 1990, after the collapse of the USSR.

In celebration of America’s Independence Day I went to a party, drank a lot, and then passed out before I saw any fireworks.  There’s a great view from my building’s roof, but San Francisco’s fog often prevents actually seeing the official fireworks, which are set off near Fisherman’s Wharf – several miles from the Mission.  The Mission, however, is home to many Latinos who have a penchant for fireworks.  Other than those set off officially, fireworks are illegal in San Francisco County, so all the fireworks that are let off by my lovely neighbors, though pretty, are not kosher.

Along with the fireworks being illegal, they scare the shit out of poor Isis.  The Vet told me to give her Dramamine, which I did, but still every time she heard a boom she shook and cowered.  The Viking took her out twice but she was too scared to go to the bathroom as soon as anything went boom.  Poor girl had an accident in the house, which is extremely unusual.

The Venezuelan Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 5, 1811.  Venezuela, by the way, was the first of the Spanish American Colonies to tell Spain to fuck off.  France no longer ruled Algeria after July 5, 1962.  Cape Verde became independent from Portugal on July 5, 1975.  Cape Verde is an island nation off the west coast of Africa.

Malawi declared independence and named itself on July 6, 1964.

July 7 is the day the Solomon Islands became an independent nation.

Argentine Independence was declared on July 9, 1816.  I would love to go back to Buenos Aires some day; it has great markets, good food, and beautiful architecture.

The Bahamas gained full independence from the United Kingdom on July 10, 1973.

On July 12, 1979 Kiribati became independent from the United Kingdom.  Never heard of Kiribati?  Yeah, neither had I.  It’s an island nation in the Pacific.  Also on July 12, São Tomé and Príncipe declared  independence from Portugal.  That’s also an island nation, but it’s off the southwest coast of Africa.

Bastille Day is July 14.  That’s France’s National Celebration when there are fireworks and spontaneous expressions of patriotism.  Sound familiar?

Though it was still part of Czechoslovakia, on July 17, 1992 Slovakia declared it’s independence.  It wasn’t until January 1993 when Czechoslovakia was peacefully resolved into the independent nations of the Czech Republic and and Slovakia.

July 21 may or may not be Belgium‘s independence day.  That date in 1831 is when independence from the Netherlands occurred and when Leopold I was made the new nation’s first king.

On July 26, 1965 Maldives became independent from the United Kingdom.  Also on July 26, but many years before, in 1847, Liberia became an independent nation settled by colonists who were freed US slaves and captured potential slaves for whom there was no longer a market in the United States.

Peru became independent from Spain on July 28, 1821.

There may be some more, but this is enough education for y’all for now.  Learning new stuff is fun and sexy, isn’t it?

I swear.  True story.

[Continued from "Thailand, Revisited, Reworked (Part 2)."]

I’m not sure when I had to report to work the first time, but I know I had some time to meet up with my friend, Darren.  I had met Darren the summer before.  He was an Melbournian tram driver who had moved to Bangkok and started a restaurant.  When I first met him I challenged his qualifications for restaurant-running and he had assured me that he was no more qualified than the next guy who loved food.

I fell in love.  Darren was charming and generous and fun.  He was also fabulously gay.  His Australian accent wasn’t too annoying; he didn’t call everyone “mate” and he didn’t sound like a guy from an Australian tourist board commercial.  The Ex and I had enjoyed Darren’s company – and his restaurant – on many occasions.

So when I arrived in Bangkok in the summer of 2001 I went to Darren’s restaurant soon after settling into my new home.  His restaurant called, I kid you not, Eat Me, was also his home.  Architecturally, the building was cool.  It was poured concrete with modern, square lines.  It had black-paned, swing out windows and French doors that opened out to a balcony that took up the entire front of the building’s second floor.

On the balcony there was outdoor furniture where it was pleasant to sit at night, provided mosquitoes didn’t like you too much.  My ankles seemed to be irresistible to the particular species of mosquito that flew around Eat Me, but I still sat on that balcony night after night.  It was nice, especially after the restaurant closed and Darren sat with us, drinking limoncello, or chocolate vodka – which he made by mixing melted chocolate with vodka – or any number of mixed drinks.  Oftentimes the mosquito population wasn’t quite as annoying when I was full of booze and there were geckos on the building’s walls, barking and eating.

Darren greeted me heartily.  It was that second summer in Thailand that Darren and I became very close.  Soon, we began going to gyms together.  Gyms, plural, because we’d purchase day passes at gyms all over the city.  We’d check in, go to our separate locker rooms to change, work out together, and then go to our separate locker rooms.  In my locker room I’d usually get naked so I could sit and relax in the sauna.  I love saunas.  Darren would similarly get naked and go to the sauna, but he didn’t just relax.  We didn’t talk details, but I got the very distinct impression that he more often than not hooked up with random strangers in the locker room.  We both left the gyms very refreshed.

With letting Darren know I was in town out of the way, I met up with another friend, Mickey.  I had also met Mickey the summer before.  He was an American law school student who was in the same study abroad program.  Actually, he had practiced law for years, and was returning for an LL.M. with an international law concentration.  After the summer program in 2000, Mickey completed his LL.M. at Golden Gate University School of Law, where Jesús happened to be getting his law degree.  A Master of Laws takes only one school year so after he finished up his schooling in San Francisco, he returned to Bangkok.

By the time I arrived in Bangkok, Mickey was well-ensconced in an apartment with his boyfriend, a Thai man-boy many years Mickey’s junior.  He was many years my junior and Mickey was significantly older than I.  Mickey was so old he had worked as an extra on early episodes of “Happy Days” which began the year after I was born.

On the second day I was in Bangkok I visited Mickey at his apartment, which was in a high rise.  I met his boyfriend, who seemed to do little more than sit around the apartment.  He was happy to meet me because I was someone other than Mickey.  The boyfriend had moved from his little town to Bangkok to be with Mickey and had few, if any, friends in the city, which was understandably huge and scary to him.

I was itching to go out and so was the boyfriend.  We’ll call him Ait.  Thais tend to have long names that they shorten to very easy to pronounce nicknames.  Their nicknames can change throughout their lives and they can have multiple nicknames at any given time, depending on their relationships.  A parent could call someone one name and her friends could call her something completely different.  This name fluidity doesn’t seem to make Thais uncomfortable; it would me.

So the day I met Ait, we went out to a club.  We drank.  We danced.  We drank.  We drank.  And then we ended up back in my new apartment fucking.

I had promised the Ex many, many times that I would not fuck anyone when I was in Bangkok without him.  It was my second night in the city and I was fucking my friend’s boyfriend.  My friend, who was silly in love with his boyfriend.

I felt pretty shitty.  But not nearly as shitty as I felt when Ait asked me if all foreign women’s pussies were as big as mine.  Thais are not known for their tact.  Actually, it’s just that they don’t think saying out loud what is obvious is tacky like us Westerners.  I was nice enough not to say that the reason my pussy felt so big was because it was a pussy, not Mickey’s ass, and because his dick was small.

I figured it was inevitable that I’d fuck when I was in Bangkok without my husband looking over my shoulder so it was a good thing I got that first fuck out of the way on my second day in the country.

That left me the rest of the summer for fucking.  And a few other things.

[To be continued.]

I swear.  True story.

[Continued from "Chicago: June 17, 2010."]

The hotel room had very effective shades so it was easy to sleep well into the day.  I am slow to get up on the best day, and without the cue of sunlight I moved very slowly.  By the time we made our way to our breakfast spot, it was lunch.

It was Friday afternoon in a part of town with a lot of office workers; our chosen restaurant, Xoco, had a long line.  The line provided us plenty of opportunity to choose which of the several tortas we wanted.  When the Viking and I eat out together we always choose something different from each other so we can taste more things.  We got a torta with chorizo and another with short ribs.  They were both tasty.

We walked to Millennium Park.  The landscaping was lovely with plenty of trees and flowers.  We rushed past some sort of family friendly area to the outdoor concert venue.  It looked damn cool.  The Viking told me there are free concerts on most days.  On that day a symphony was practicing.  Well, a symphony plus a chorus, plus four “opera” singers.  I don’t know a lot about classical music, but I do know what sounds pleasant.  We sat down in the shade that fell on some of the affixed chairs facing the stage.

We decided it’d be a lot of fun to go back for a concert in the park and have a picnic on the lawn.  The sound is good all across the lawn due to the design of the venue.  A picnic with a good soundtrack?  Sign me up.  I love picnics.

After a leisurely walk over the freeway via the park’s sinuous walkway, we made our way to the Art Instiute of Chicago.  It is huge.  The breadth of the collection is overwhelming.  The collection includes pieces from ancient Southeast Asia, Greece, Northern Africa, and the Middle East; mid-century Europe; and modern America.  I get overwhelmed at huge art museums.  Given the opportunity, I’d take in a museum’s collection one era at a time, one gallery at a time.

My favorite things tend to be furniture.  I really loved this mirror frame and desk combo.  I loved that they weren’t symmetrical, that they had Moorish influences.  I think they were Italian in origin.

Because of the huge variety of work at the Art Institute of Chicago we didn’t get a chance to see everything before the museum closed at 5pm.  We left through the old part of the building, onto Michigan Avenue.  The lions in front of the entrance were wearing Chicago Blackhawks helmets in honor of their Stanley Cup win.  Apparently this is a tradition in sports-crazed Chicago.

By the time we left the museum it was raining.  I’ve lived my whole life in California, where it does not rain in the late spring or summer; this year was an anomaly because it rained in late May.  My whole life rain was associated with winter and cold.  So rain in mid-June when it’s not cold was a novelty.

We didn’t have umbrellas but figured we didn’t have far to go and it wasn’t cold anyway.  We walked back to Millennium Park.  By the time we got to the park it was no longer sprinkling, it was raining.  It still wasn’t cold, but my soaked-through clothes combined with the breeze made my nipples hard.

We happened upon a very cool fountain that was meant for people to splash around in.  There were children and teens, and even some staid adult-types doing just that, though considering it was raining they needn’t have bothered.  The Viking and I really liked the fountain, but weren’t about to get even wetter.

The rain continued.  I remembered the Bean and wondered if it was close.  Thanks to the wonder that is the iPhone and GPS, we figured out that we had passed it before but amazingly hadn’t seen it.  The rain continued.  We made our way to the Bean, which was serving as a shelter from the rain for a number of people.  It’s pretty damn cool, and looked lovely with rain dripping down its shiny surface.

It kept raining.  Soaked through, we went to the hotel and got ready for dinner.  Dinner was decent.  Our waiter had just taken the LSAT and said he wanted to go to law school in California, preferably at Berkeley.  Yeah, I wanted to go to Boalt, too.

The Viking and I were smart enough to bring umbrellas so when it was again raining when we left the restaurant we were prepared.  It was raining even harder than it had earlier in the evening.  We stopped in a nice restaurant/bar for a drink, thinking we’d be able to wait out the storm.

We found a spot at the bar and ordered drinks.  I ordered some sort of fortified wine, which I proceeded to spill on the chick sitting next to me after just one sip.  Oops.  I immediately apologized and offered to pay for her dry cleaning.  She wanted to know what it was I spilled.  Uh, some sort of fortified wine.  I’m really sorry.

She ran off to try to get the wine – which was not of the red, staining variety – out of her skirt.  Her ugly, ruffled, patterned, tiered, mini skirt.  It looked like it had been hiding out since the 80s.  She was not happy.  She was the opposite of happy.  I told her date I was very sorry and that I had offered to pay for her dry cleaning, but that she seemed inconsolable.  I felt for the guy because it was clear that uptight chick would not be giving it up to him.  My clumsiness probably didn’t help to that end.

The bartender had refilled my glass by the time I turned to the Viking to tell him that we needed to get the fuck out of there.  The chick in the ugly skirt was really pissed and I had no interest in dealing with her further.  We downed our drinks, the Viking threw some money down, and walked out – very quickly.  Maybe I should have left my email address with her date ….

Up again went our umbrellas, but they weren’t doing us much good; the rain was coming down very hard.  We ran toward our hotel.  The wind kept blowing our umbrellas inside out, and it was impossible to miss major puddles.  The Viking’s umbrella sacrificed itself in the storm.  The Viking’s jeans were so heavy with water he had trouble keeping them on (his belt had broken before we went to dinner) as we ran.

Once back in our room we got out of our wet clothes and into bed.  The fucking was fun.  The fucking with the Viking is always fun.  We went to bed pretty early because we planned to get up early to go to a farmers market.

[To be continued.]

I swear.  True story.

The summer following my second year of law school I returned to Bangkok.  The school year had gone by pretty quickly, mostly because I had been planning for the summer.  Planning for the summer included taking a Thai-language course via an adult education community program in San Francisco.

I had wanted to return to Thailand over my winter break.  I had met plenty of people the prior summer that I would have had a good time, and probably some work.  My plans to return in the winter did not involve my husband, however.  By the fall the Ex had moved up to San Francisco from LA and got a job.  Also, we couldn’t afford for both of us to go.  If I had gone over winter the Ex and I surely would have broken up – seven years before we finally did.

It was some time in the fall that the Ex found a picture of the guy I’d spent all my time with the two weeks after he left.  This was back before most anyone had digital cameras.  I had borrowed a friend’s 35mm camera and had taken a lot of photos over the summer.  The friend ended up dying; I still have the camera.

The Ex found the picture and got all sorts of angry and hurt.  He tore up the picture (which was foreshadowing of what he’d do to pictures of him and me after he caught me cheating seven years in the future) and scratched out the guy’s face in the negative.  You see, kids, cameras used to have film, from which negatives would be developed and prints would be made.

I found out that he found the damming evidence when I came home from one of my Tuesday night Thai-language courses.  He was upset and stayed, just a block away near the Great American Music Hall, with Jesús.  [Really, if you've not yet read "Smooth as Silk," about my first summer in Bangkok, you might be a little confused as to the cast of characters.  Go read it, it's pretty good.]

I remember feeling sorry he was hurt for seeing the photo, and feeling angry that he’d destroyed the photo of a guy with whom I’d had a lot of fun.  I also remember feeling like he was making a big deal out of little; I had come home to him, hadn’t I?  I could certainly love him and fuck other people, only I didn’t know it myself, and didn’t have either the self-awareness or the balls to tell him that.

After a few days of debauchery with Jesús the Ex came home.  In order to get him to do so I had to promise not to go to Bangkok over winter break and to start therapy.  I’m sure if “sex addiction” existed at the time I would have been accused of having one.  If he only knew ….

Throughout the school year I had to assure the Ex that I would not cheat on him again if I returned to Thailand in the summer.

During the school year I sent a number of letters of inquiry to law firms in Bangkok that had international business practices and that wanted to cater to English-speaking clients.  Technically non-Thais cannot practice law in Thailand.  However, since the Thai definition of “practicing law” is very narrow – arguing a case in court in Thai – it mattered little that I was not yet a lawyer in the United States, as I could never be a lawyer in Thailand.  That I was American was a major boon.

A few firms were interested, but I finally settled on a small firm with a practice in Bangkok and Paris.  The major reason I chose the firm was because the job came with an apartment.  We had stayed very inexpensively at a shitty hotel the previous summer, but I liked the idea of having a kitchen of my own and not having to worry about nosy hotel personnel.

For my birthday in 2001, the Ex gave me a Coach umbrella.  He knew how the summer rains in Bangkok were, and had seen what can happen to an ass in the rain.  [If I've not yet told the story of the Bangkok rain's effect on my ass, I will.]  But it was (and is; I still have it) a full-sized umbrella, which wasn’t very practical for traveling.  A friend drove me and the umbrella to the airport.  At the curb I realized how unwieldy the umbrella was and I asked her to return it to the Ex for safe keeping.

I was off to work in Bangkok while the Ex worked in San Francisco.

[To be continued, for sure.]

I swear.  True story.