Flooding in Thailand

The rainy season is not over here and flooding is bad. Many of the cities in Thailand are under water and many people are displaced and living in deplorable circumstances. The crocodile farm in Lop Buri, where Pooks parents live was flooded and the crocs all escaped. She has photos of a big croc on somebody's doorstep looking into a house. Her folks do not have water in their house and they are OK, but many of the provinces are submerged. The elephant birthing center in Ayuttya is under water and the elephants are all living on top of the wall that surrounds the compound. The whole city of Ayuttya is uninhabitable. And there are many smaller communities in the same situation. Jeff and Theresa Lange are in Chiang Mai now because they were told to evacuate their place down in Bangkok. The water is still heading south and the people who are supposed to know this stuff say that it will reach Patun Thani, where we used to live and where the Langes still live, in a day or two. So they are basically stranded here until something changes. Pray for them, their belongings, and all of our former neighbors who did not leave because they had no place to go. For those of you have been here and know where these places are, Thommasat University is being evacuated. The road between here and Bangkok is under water in many places and some communities are completely cut off. Please pray for these people. It is hard to describe in a blog how bad it is for many people here in Thailand.

The last 6 weeks since we have been back in Thailand have been normal. Normal...meaning we are busy as one arm paper hangers. Never a moment to stop and relax. Tom keeps telling me we can relax after we are dead. Somehow the humor of that statement is not hitting me just right. Tom and I have both had some health issues and have been to the doctor. We have been told that we are fat. Really!?!?! I hadn't noticed that!!! We have been told to exercise. I can't believe we are actually paying people to tell us these shocking things that we already know. To make a long story shorter, but not nearly short enough, we joined a swimming and fitness place. It is very cheap to join these kinds of things here in Thailand, so we bit the bullet and did it. We have been swimming several times and are feeling much worse than we did before we joined. Nevertheless, we are told that perseverance will do the trick. We are also changing our eating habits. It has been wonderful. Saturday, I threw up, Sunday I was wiped out, and I can't even remember yesterday at all. Today it is rainy and cold and I am not going swimming in the rain and cold. Pneumonia ya know, is not good. Tom is juicing green stuff (veggies) every day and drinking a lot of it. He is wondering why he has diarrhea. DUH! Why is diarrhea so easy to get but so hard to spell that you have to do a Google search? However, we are committed...not to an asylum yet, but to our eating and exercise campaign. Pray for us. Getting healthy is no easy job.