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All about me

By March 11, 20093 Comments
[slideshow_deploy id=’787′] As I write this, I am looking down the barrel of a birthday with a zero at the end of it.  I should be happy it has only one zero … I should consider myself lucky that I’m having another birthday at all.

Anyway, I thought it was time to bring my website up to date. After all, since I last posted anything significant on here, I have had two more books published and acquired a degree.

I have fallen in love with Vietnam and I am planning to lead a couple of tours there – one will be tightly related to Tunnel Rats and A Sappers War (my books with Sandy MacGregor) and the other will be much more about Vietnam as it is now.  You can read about them HERE.

Somewhere along the line, I have become an ‘expert’ on apartment living – if the definition of expert is that I know where to find out the stuff that other people don’t know.  The Sydney Morning Herald Flat Chat column is now has a Melbourne edition (the laws are very different so the columns usually are too) and I have started getting invitations to speak at conferences, which is cool as it scratches the itch that might otherwise have me foolishly try to do an open mike night at a stand-up club.

You’ll find the new, enhanced website here  http://www.flat-chat.com.au. That’s  the place to be if you want to find the most recent examples of my trouble-making and attempts at problem solving in the area of strata living. After a blistering first year when I was getting about 1000  readers a day, it has settled down to a sensible 5-600, although it peaked one day when I had a story in the Herald’s online pages read by 123,000 people and at one point 518 people were all,  at the same time, reading the follow-up on my little website. What was the story? Whether ot not it was illegal to photograph someone’s illegally parked car.  Don’t ask!

Oh, and I finally acquired a university degree – an MA in writing from the Open University and Swinbourne in Melbourne.  So I can now legitimately lecture about writing, as I occasionally do, to students who are less well qualified than I am. And, as part of my final submission, I wrote the first 20,000 words of a crime novel that I desperately want to finish but which has lain untouched ever since.

Time moves on so quickly. The kittens (below) who appeared the last time I revamped the website are now cats – one of them a ginger monster. And I have discovered a new desire – the desire to have done something (rather than wanting to actually do it). I’m calling it my Empty Bucket list.  I would like to have run the City to Surf, I would like to have parachuted from an aeroplane and run for parliament.  I have no desire to do any of these things in the future, I just think it would be cool if I had in the past.

And on that note, I wish I had started fixing up this website two years ago when those kittens were just fluffy little balls of fur.

Mac and Pepper at about 8 weeks

Mac and Pepper at about 8 weeks

 

 

 Jimmy Thomson, December 2013

 

3 Comments

  • John Barr says:
    April 15, 2012 at 4:34 am

    Jimmy, the actual original VC HQ Tunnel. is at 11 deg 07’ 12 21”N. 106 deg 30’ 02.18” on Google Earth. That BHQ & B Company’s area. I was the guy that found the VC HQ while going to have a bog. I’ve been to the exact location. Nothing much there now but worth a look. You can get to it by the Highway 15. When you leave the first set of Chu Chi tunnels & join the Highway again , drive about 2.5K & look for a road that veers to the right slightly. That’s Cay GO rd. That’s the road B Company walked down & cop all the flack. Or, from where the road veers it’s 5.6 K on the highway to BHQ HQ. If you look on Google Earth you will find it. The open space where we were looks like a dog or a cat. There is a road of to the right that joins Cay Go Rd & you can drive back a 370 meters to the 2nd. bend. I think our AO was from the next road on back to Nguyen Van Tiep Rd. The Iron Triangle is directly over the river.

    The woman that gives the lecture was a little amazed when I stood up & took over from her & told the story of our Ho Bo Woods. I enjoyed that. The tunnels at the complex are a lot bigger than I remember. They’re made big for tourists.

    I took my guide down Cay Go Rd. & told him when to stop. I got out & had a look around & told him all about it. He & the driver were worried we were lost. They usually only stay on the Highway. I guided him back to the Highway & he was amazed. “40 years & you still remember.” “Of course.” I didn’t have the heart to tell him about Google Earth. We were treated really special after that.

    Reply
  • bill says:
    February 11, 2013 at 10:32 pm

    cool stuff.

    Reply
  • Ken Guider says:
    November 10, 2013 at 5:26 am

    Hi Jimmy
    It was good to catch up with you in June, in the Ash St Cellars, at Sue’s Larapintian reunion.
    We were discussing about revisiting Vietnam next year. I was wondering if there has been any developments on more tunnel ratting.
    Please say hello to Sue for me.
    Regards
    Ken

    Reply

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