Above: A man and his daughter stand just underneath the car park at Playground! on Thong Lor on a rainy Sunday morning.

Monday was Tawn’s 32nd birthday.  One morning last week while preparing for work, he stormed out of the bathroom in a panic and said, “I can’t believe I’m turning 33 next week!”  After a few minutes, I managed to convince him that he still had another year to go.

We had the opportunity to celebrate several times over the weekend.  Sunday morning we met a group of his school friends for lunch at Vanilla Industries on Thong Lor. 

Of the three girlfriends (and the one who didn’t show up), two are expecting and the third is very eligible for any of you guys out there looking to meet a nice, educated, entertainment industry executive. 

Afterwards, we took them to our condo-in-progress as they were curious to see what is taking so long.  Right: Sa, Ja, Job, Tawn and the available lady, Dao, inspect the construction site.

The condo is starting to look a little more like its finished self.  All the flooring has been put in and the wall between the living room and the second bedroom / office (the one that will have a pair of sliding pocket doors) is being installed, below.  Now it gives me more of a sense of what the space will really be like.  Small living room, though!

Sunday evening we headed down to the river to The Deck.  Located on the bank of the Chao Phraya River across from Wat Arun (the Temple of Dawn), this friendly place has good food, attentive service, and a spectacular view. 

The breeze kept the humidity tolerable as we sat on the deck after which the restaurant is named, and we had a pleasant evening visiting with Tam and Markus (who are finally back from their wedding in Germany), Pune, Kobfa, Ken and Suchai. 

It was a small group, but a very nice way to celebrate Tawn’s birthday.  Especially since we enjoyed a couple of bottles of Penfold’s Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon!

The big day, Monday, was a bit anticlimactic.  I was going to take Tawn out to a nice Indian restaurant on top of the Rembrandt Hotel, but traffic was so bad that by the time he returned home from work, he was too tired to head back out.  So we enjoyed a quiet evening at home, instead.

On other news, I can scarcely believe that I’ll be heading to the United States again in just nine days!  So much work to do before then.  Tawn has to head up to Mae Hong Son in the north of the Kingdom on Friday and Saturday, so that will give me some more time to work on projects without worrying that Tawn feels I’m ignoring him as I type away on my computer.