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| Lilies blooming in a pot in the front yard. |
With a good Wi-Fi signal in the house in Phuket, we’ve been able to stream a few Showtime series, we’ve enjoyed, Ray Donovan and The Affair, both gripping and entertaining which we watch in the evenings after dinner.
We signed up for Showtime at Amazon US $8.95, THB 311, as an adjunct to our Prime membership which we’ll cancel when we’re done with both series, most likely by the time we leave here in a few weeks.
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| Garden area inside the gate of the villa. |
As football season approached, Tom renewed his membership for NFL GamePass, for only US $99, THB 3442 per season, which now, as opposed to in the past, includes all the team’s games, playoff games and Super Bowl games.
To use this app one must watch the games outside the US or use a VPN showing an outside-the-US Wi-Fi connection. As a result, Tom doesn’t need to use our VPN (Hotspot Shield) while watching since our point of entry will show we’re outside the US anyway.
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| House in the neighborhood with gate open. |
We often giggle over how we ever figured out all these things. Many of these apps are complicated to use and don’t work as readily as one expects. Even impatient Tom has learned to make it all work without any prompting from me.
As a note, using Hotspot Shield provides us with an added layer of protection against hackers as well as showing we’re entering a site from the US. Some shopping sites we may use for buying gifts for family members show different prices if we aren’t in the US. Using Hotspot Shield ensures we get the US generated web page and pricing.
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| Messy yard in the neighborhood. |
All of the above is only relevant if one is living outside the US or their home country. It can be very confusing. Honestly, it took us a year or so to get it all figured out and working properly during which time the technology improved as it all became easier to use.
Thus, yesterday afternoon Tom plugged in the HDMI cord from his laptop to the flat screen TV in the living room, activated NFL GamePass and within minutes was watching the Minnesota Vikings football game which had aired four hours earlier rather than watch it live which when doing so would result in pauses for commercials and halftime,.
By waiting until after the game is over, he can watch the entire game commercial and halftime free. Instead of it taking over three hours to broadcast each game, he can watch it in its entirety in around 90 minutes.
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| We pass by this house on our way to the highway. Many motorbikes have attached carts such as shown here. |
Of course, a decent signal is required to watch an uninterrupted game. When we return to Bali in a few weeks with its poor signal, there will be numerous pauses during the game as it attempts to stream the contents.
We had to deal with these frustrating streaming delays when we attempted to stream a few shows while we were in Bali a few months ago. That’s the way it is. There’s nothing we can do about it and Tom will deal with it while watching the games in September and October.
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| Tall house in the neighborhood. |
Otherwise, all is OK here. There have been no new bombings in the last 24 hours, even though security is reinforced everywhere in Thailand, especially in tourist areas. We’ll remain diligent and careful when heading out.
Tomorrow, we’ll begin to share photos from our sightseeing outing from a few days ago as we wind down our remaining 18 days in Thailand.
Have a blissful Saturday or Sunday, whichever it is, wherever you may be.
Photo from one year ago today, August 14, 2015:
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| Nothing is more exciting for us than spotting wildlife in its natural habitat as was the case in Trinity Beach, Australia when we spotted this pelican. For more photos, please click here. |
