I have at last managed to buy a thermometer! Having avoided several offers of clinical ones I tracked it down in the stationery shop. Much mystification as to why I would want such a thing. Tasks such as this, which would be simple even in Pwllheli-quick trip to the hardware shop where I did indeed acquire two- a simple one and one of those that record how cold or hot it has been-are fraught with obscure problems here. Turns out that there are of course three words for thermometer. I had avoided the clinical one, but of the two remaining candidates I chose the wrong one-the Thai word. In Thai a thermometer is, of course, a Turmommeter…Oh well.

So, today at 6.00 am it is freezing at 14 degrees. Another hour and the population is still covered in anoraks and furry hats. By 8.30 it has risen to 20 degrees and now at 10.00 it is 25 degrees. Still considered a bit chilly. Hats been removed but not coats. As K says, what you really need at 8.00 am is a nice hot bath to warm you up..

Have been assembling books for Samui: Orhan Pamuk-Istanbul, Robert Kaplan-Mediterranean Winter, Sherrill Tippins-February House, Dai Sijie-Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstresses, John Keay-Mad about the Mekong, Alain de Botton-How Proust Can Change Your Life. Some debate as to whether to actually take any Proust which languishes on the bookshelves! Whether this is a case of, in his own words, "Negligence deadens Desire", I am not sure. Certaily negligence on my part and little desire. My oft repeated defence is that it is being saved for the end when, I hope at least, I shall not have to lie in bed for several years writing a weblog, In Search of Lost Posts!

I bought several others In BKK last week but seem, inexplicably, to have read them. How I find the time to do this I fail to understand.