a cute little kitty with a dapper kerchief:

the weather has been FANTASTIC lately… they weren’t kidding when they said it was the dry season. no humidity whatsoever, and even though i like rain i think i can deal with occasional cloud cover with temps in the 70s during the day and down to the 50s at night. makes me wish i brought my jacket with me.
so i’m out of novels to read. we brought 5 or 6 with us and i finished them about a month and a half after we moved here. now i’m looking to re-read catch 22, which was my favoritest book in high school… but i have to find a copy to buy first. there’s several used book stores around with english language books, but it’s kind of pricey – like $7USD for a used book! oh well. since we’ve been eating more-than-decent meals here for under $5USD/day for both of us, i can splurge on slightly overpriced used books.
the book store we went to today had a gigantic moth flying around in it – you can see it to the right in the picture here:

there’s a store in kad suan kaew central mall that has massive amounts of clothing in it, i think it’s called warehouse or something. everything’s under $10USD, even the jeans… i’ve been searching for some sneakers and corduroy pants but unfortunately i haven’t had much luck with the pants… i bought some men’s low top converses that are pretty rad, black with white pin dots with a black sole and toe cap.
here’s shaun digging through the piles of pants in the men’s section:

there’s a canal that encircles (well, more like ensquares since the city is rectangular and not circular) old chiang mai. there’s fountains and whatnot, and they fill up and drain regularly. the water is pretty disgusting, but at least it’s not smelly.

true to chiang mai style, the sidewalks are kind of hard to walk down, since there’s trees growing out of the middle of them every 10 feet or so. chiang mai is definitely not made for pedestrians, as the sidewalks are narrow and many vendors set up shop on them. it’s gotten a little bit easier to walk around now that the mayoral elections are over, since the giant boards with political stuff on them have been removed from all the sidewalks. sometimes it’s almost like parkour trying to walk around the city.
i caught a cold a few days ago, boooo. it’s customary to wear a face mask when you get sick, to help prevent the spread of disease (so you’re not coughing and/or sneezing on everything). luckily i got some cute face masks in a care package my friend tari sent me when she was in chiang mai several months ago.