Via's Visit, June 2009

We are so very proud and happy for my older sister, Via, who has just taken a very demanding, rewarding and well deserved job with Nokia. Her new job has her traveling a lot, and we are so very fortunate that part of her travels include Bangkok. And that means we get to see her.



Here's my sister, Via, with my wife, Kanittha, having breakfast at her hotel, The Pullman. The hotel is really very nice and the breakfast buffet was fantastic, but the hotel isn't located in a nice part of town. Fortunately it's in a great self-contained complex that feels like it is in a less congested and more upscale neighborhood.



Little Nio doesn't agree with his Mommy where we should be going. She wants him downstairs, but he prefers to take the higher ground for a better vantage point. Not sure if you can see it in this photograph, but he's carrying his toy sniper rifle. So you can appreciate why the higher ground is more important.



Striking a pose in the connecting walkway between the hotel and the duty-free shopping area.



Tita Via bought an awesome gift for Little Nio — it's a toy chainsaw! Aside from the battery operated chainsaw with moving plastic teeth complete with sound effects, its got safety goggles, work gloves, ear protectors and a hard hat. Despite all the great added props, Little Nio is only really interested in the chainsaw. Let's hope he doesn't go looking for a creepy hockey mask to go with it.



Tita Via spent a simple and quiet afternoon visiting with us at home. We bought one of Tita Via's favorite dishes... "pork satay" and had ourselves an impromptu picnic in the bedroom.



We all watched "Kung Fu Panda" together, curled up and had an afternoon nap all on the big bed. It was relaxing and simple fun for all.





Without prompting, Little Nio instinctively knew how to operate it and the proper way to hold it. It may just be good ergonomic design that allows for the natural handling, or our son may have been a lumberjack in a former life.



Here he is doing a bit of pruning on his Mommy's plants. For the rest of the day, and over the next few days, he's tested his chainsaw on the furniture, the doors, the walls, his stuffed toys and the cat, of course.

SL+A Bangkok Projects, June 2009

While business has been difficult to find, we still have quite a few current projects that are keeping us busy. Here's a quick presentation showing recently completed work and ongoing projects that we are still in progress.

I put this clip together from perspectives created by our design team. This was a part of our office presentation at our regional group meeting held last month.

A Little Boy's Toys, May 2009

Just a quick update to let you all know how we are doing.

Things have been rough all around. Work has slowed down considerably and the jobs that are out there are under heavy competition. We don't have help at home, so my wife, Kanittha, is all alone doing all the housework and taking care of Little Nio who is well in his "Terrible Two's" mode. My wife isn't lazy, but she's not exactly built for heavy industrial abuse... so between a little boy and three floors of cleaning, cooking and all the laundry, she is past the point of exhaustion.

Despite that, she's managed to hang on and keep the house clean, the laundry and ironing done, put food on the table, keep the little boy clean and well fed. So she has done an admirable job and I love her to pieces for keeping us all going in these troubled times.

Meantime...



Little Nio has managed to stay on top of things. Here he is on the computer table taking a closer look at all the stuff he's not supposed to be playing with.



Here he is on the bathroom floor, playing with his flashlight. It's absolutely fascinating watching him play with that flashlight. It keeps him quiet and totally preoccupied for a while. At least until the bulb gets busted or the batteries run out.



We've made some preliminary attempts at toilet training, but we don't really want to force it on him yet. As you can see, it's not going very well. He's having too much fun using the potty as a helmet.





He spends a lot of time with me in my study (whenever I'm home), so he's got his toolbox stashed there. He enjoys playing with all the tools. Obviously the hammer is a favorite, but then he also has great fun with the power drill, the saw and the ratchet.





Little Nio is most definitely a little boy when it comes to play time. I have to admit that we do play a bit rough and we enjoy ourselves thoroughly, but I do have to make sure that he learns not to play too rough with other kids later on. I hope that he doesn't become a bully.



Here he is dressed up in desert cammies with a helmet. He's a real character with a very livid imagination.





Doing a bit of research on armor from his Daddy's reference library.



Here he is with the family pet, Samuel. Our aging Siamese cat is not a big fan of getting manhandled, but he understands that Little Nio is just being a bit heavy handed in his affections. Little Nio will go around calling after the cat, yelling "SAEOW! SAEOW! SAEOW!"





Here they are spending some play time together, with Little Nio carrying a plastic katana. The sword lights up on impact and makes awesome crashing sounds. At least it did for a couple of weeks, but it didn't survive the sword fights.



His latest toy is 39 THB (1.13 USD / 53.37 PHP) plastic toy gun, scaled perfectly for two-year-old hands. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be an Enfield, FAMAS or a Steyr, but Little Nio adores it.





His pretend play is impressive, and he has some pretty good moves. For whatever reason, he takes to this sort of play-acting instinctively.





Even sitting down he's still in action.





Non-stop action and it doesn't look like he's going to run out of ammo any time soon.

Rest & Recuperation, March 2009

Following his stay at the hospital, Little Nio is back at home making sure he hasn't lost his skills on the drum kit.



He misses all his stuffed toy friends and climbs into their midst for a quick bottle of milk formula to get his spirits back up.





Another toy set we got for Little Nio before he went to the hospital was a tool box. He is always trying to open up and play with his Daddy's toolbox, so it was decided that he should simply have one of his own.





Here's Little Nio having a go with a power drill. It really is a working toy drill that rotates ever so gently at a very low speed. It can turn both clockwise and counter-clockwise and with several attachments that will allow bolts and screws to be fixed (or removed) from the work surface.



After playing with his toy tools, Little Nio settles in for a power nap. Still fitful with periods of coughing, but all in all a very long much needed sleep.



Here he is after taking a nice refreshing bath. All snuggled into bed with several of his Bearista Bears, again with a bottle of milk formula. He's well on his way to complete recovery with the only the problem of getting him to drink his medicines still to be resolved.

Hospitalized, March 2009

Following a regularly scheduled vaccination, our Little Nio caught a nasty throat bug. And because of his lowered resistance, what should have been a little cold became a terrible bronchial infection. I suspect it was something that I brought home from the office as several of the folks I work with had the same bad dry cough.

Little Nio had to be admitted late Wednesday evening to Vichaiyut Hospital, where he had to be given oxygen with adrenaline, hooked up to an intravenous drip and given a couple of injections to lessen the swelling around his throat. This threatened to close up his wind pipe and suffocate him. Fortunately, we arrived at the hospital well before that became a real danger and the doctor was able to get him stabilized right away.



Here we are in the morning after our first night. More than a little bit exhausted from the lack of sleep and the scheduled medicine doses in the middle of the night. Little Nio though doesn't look too roughed up.



Little Nio is unfazed by the injections, but he hates the medicine syrups being given to him with a syringe squirted into his mouth. It takes a team of four nurses, plus his Mommy and Daddy to hold him securely and attempt to get some medicine into him. It doesn't really work. We are able to get about 20% of the dosage in him, but all the rest gets squirted back out and sometimes it is accompanied by an eruption of vomit that he somehow manages to conjure out of no where.



Here's Little Nio sitting quietly, enjoying our view down to the Samsen train station.



Later that same evening, he is able to sleep for several hours while still hooked up to a drip. The next day we try taking off the intravenous feed and attempt some solid foods. Instead of cooperating, he wanders around and explores the nurses station.





There's a garden deck three floor down with a waterfall and a pocket garden. There's even a meandering fish pond with several elusive carp fish hiding as we pass.



Little Nio is able to stretch his legs and walk around to get a bit of sunshine. He is even able to stop and visit at a small spirit house.





We bring his toy car to the hospital to lift his spirits and hope he will like being walked around in it slowly. Instead he gets on his care without a care in the world and speeds around the hospital corridors at break neck speed. Hard to believe that he is still sick.











Later that afternoon, Little Nio finds a toy tricycle that belongs to the Pediatric Ward. After spending time terrorizing the nurses and racing with them down the corridors he says goodbye as his nurse friends end their shift to go home.





Friday evening finds him back in his bed with his Mommy sitting with him making sure he gets enough milk formula.



The next morning, after a poorly eaten lunch the day before and a non-existent dinner, followed by a pathetic attempt at breakfast, we decide that Little Nio needs to get hooked back on to the intravenous drip.





This is a view of Little Nio's hospital room, Room 1927. The room is in a shade of pale green, but all the bed linen and hospital gowns are in pink because that's the color of the hospital.



Little Nio sitting by the window with his Mommy, watching something on the television. His stuffed toy teddy bear in sheep's clothing Bearista Bear is watching with them.





We have better luck at lunch time when he digs into a bowl of noodles with tremendous gusto. Definitely a good sign that his appetite is back and we can remove the intravenous feed. Little Nio gets discharged shortly after that and we go home in the late afternoon of Saturday.