Today was a personal record for flights from hell. I was seated next to a raging bitch. First it's important to know that she never said a word but was able to fully articulate herself. She was in my seat. When my arm was on the rest, she used my arm to rest hers. If my elbow was on the rest she used hers to push mine off. She read the paper fully out stretch. When the paper actually touched my face I crumpled it and pushed it toward her. She pulled the paper back and shifted, but only a bit. She was unavailable for eye contact and unresponsive to human communication. Just so you see the whole picture, she's local, in her early thirties, slim, relatively well dressed with some diamonds and a nice watch. Wow,who is this evil woman and why is she allowed in public? Urg. When we stood up to get off the plane she scratched my butt with her finger nails and pushed her head under the over overhead compartment [remember she's in my window seat] trying to coax me to move faster and push harder to get myself into the exit aisle. I'm just happy to say that this was a very short flight. I can only imagine the bad place this would have led us to, had this been a transcontinental flight. The other hellish aspect to this flight was the sinus pressure and congestion I am suffering from. Oh my god. At one point in the flight I was coughing so hard, tears are streaming down my cheek and I was sure my face would explode. The ceaseless changes in cabin pressure caused on-going ear, throat and nose issues the entire ascent and decent. Oh and just to make my day, my traveling associate let me know that he has issues with my germs, and would like me to be sure to cover my mouth while coughing [he even demonstrated!]. Oh for fucks sake, who are these people?! —Now let's get on to seeing Laos...

After eating I walked around checking out the tiny town of Vientiane — which I can not believe is the capital of Laos. This is a sleepy town with little to do or see, especially compared to Hanoi. It's charming in that small island sort of way. My fried noodle with chicken lunch cost $1.50. It instantly became clear why there were a lot of stoned ex-pat backpackers crawling all over town. The "city" is really run down, no sidewalks, mostly dirt roads, every other building is in a state of disrepair, and the people seem quite poor. After walking for about 20 minutes I gave up. I just couldn't spend another afternoon in the sweltering heat. I went back to the Tai-Pan dorm like hotel and watched ridiculous movies on their one no-static channel all afternoon. Ah, more air conditioning. Freon and I are becoming fast friends.

Before dinner at a random Italian place off the circle, I cruised the Mekong river bank. the sunset was lovely and there were all kinds of vendors cooking up fish and more. they also set up impromptu cafes where people sit and drink beer all evening. For me I was thinking, watching the sunset by a river = mosquitos. So off I went.

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