The small city of Ubud has developed a serious tourism industry, promoted as an arts and culture centre.
More than three million foreign tourists each year, many of those NOT YOUNG. (Youth are on some beach instead.) I saw many families with young kids, as well.
One part I did enjoy was a chase on Maine’s Hundred Mile Wilderness.
Jane Whitefield helps people disappear.
Fearing for their lives, fleeing dangerous situations, her clients come to her when they need to vanish completely—to assume a new identity and establish a new life somewhere they won’t be found. …
… Jane finds a young woman fresh from LA with a whole lot of trouble behind her. After she cheated on her boyfriend, he dragged her to the home of the offending man and made her watch as he killed him. She testified against the boyfriend, but a bribed jury acquitted him, and now he’s free and trying to find and kill her.
Jane agrees to help, and it soon becomes clear that outsmarting the murderous boyfriend is not beyond Jane’s skills. But the boyfriend has some new friends: members of a Russian organized crime brotherhood.
When they learn that Sara is traveling with a tall, dark-haired woman who disappears people, the Russians become increasingly interested in helping the boyfriend find the duo. They’ve heard rumors that such a woman existed—and believe that, if forcibly extracted, the knowledge she has of past clients could be worth millions.
He does plan a 10th book to be called The Tree of Life and Flowers (2026).
After 20 years having a family home in Parksville B.C., … I FINALLY got to lovely Milner Gardens near Qualicum Beach. It’s open Thursday to Sunday during the good weather months.
For most people, Instagram and TikTok are the most entertaining. I don’t much look at either.
If you want to avoid POLITICS, Meta (Instagram, Facebook, Threads) has definitely reduced the emphasis on political arguments. In Canada, a bonus for using Facebook is that news links are banned.
I haven’t quit Twitter — surprisingly — as my own feeds focused on Gymnastics and Hiking are still good. If I click on Following and avoid For You, the stream is valuable. Of course I quickly block anything I don’t like.
I post today as many of the people online I trust and respect are migrating to Bluesky.
Looking more for VIDEO than anything else, these are the sites I use most:
I hate advertising. Facebook doesn’t offer paid ad-free feeds, so I use ad blockers.
I hate Elon Musk and refuse to send him even one penny. So use ad blockers.
I use WhatsApp only for small group communication. It’s excellent. Messenger, as well, only for communication with very few people.
I’ll check Reddit once in a while if I’m looking for something specific.
Mastodon could be my favourite, but it’s not caught on with the people I want to follow.
LinkedIn should be best of all. But I’ve never seen much value for my purposes.
I never signed up for Snapchat. Hikers are mostly on Instagram. Gymnastics coaches mostly on Twitter.
I’ll try Bluesky. But I’m worried it will never grow big enough.
If desperate, I’ll create a browser bookmark folder and open all these social media sites simultaneously to check the latest news in Gymnastics and Hiking. OR … could I use an A.I. client to do that for me?
Rick McCharles 