Bike arrives, but without receipt

Boyfriend Maiyuu has bought his bike. It is a large, smart beast - a gleaming silver-and-blue mountain bike, with seven gears.

Maiyuu bought a quality bike. 'I don't want an ultra-cheap bike which mae ban (housekeepers, cleaners) use...they look as if they might fall apart,' he said.

Unbelievably, the thing appears to have come without an instruction manual.

As I write, Maiyuu has taken the thing for a ride to the supermarket, to buy ingredients for his new takoyaki (Japanese dumpling) maker.

He turned up with one of those yesterday, too, along with a handful of new bed sets, which cost about B200 each.

We get two each. I opened one pack last night. It contains a fitted sheet, two pillow cases, and two cases for bolster pillows - the sausage-shaped pillows for which I had no name, until readers kindly supplied it to me a few weeks ago.

But back to the bike. I had hoped to look up the make on the internet, and bring you a picture of thing if I was able to find it.

However, in the few short hours since Maiyuu brought the bike home yesterday, he has stripped all the stickers off the bike, and thrown away the receipt.

He also claims that he bought it without an instruction manual. When he walked in the door with the bike late yesterday, I did not see one, so perhaps he is right.

Maiyuu says the bike cost a bit over B10,000. But without a receipt, I have no other way of telling.

He bought it from a shopping mall close to our old home in Thon Buri. If I cared enough, I could trek back to the mall and ask them.

I write this post mindful of what regular reader the Shrink has been telling me about my life.

'Love yourself more - then all your boyfriend problems will sort out themselves!'

Before Maiyuu bought the bike, I asked him to bring home a receipt. I did that in the name of self-love, self-preservation, or whatever you want to call it. No one likes to be cheated of his money.

If I truly loved myself, I would still demand evidence of how much it cost, right? Yes, yes, dear reader. Been there, done that.

In Maiyuu's absence, I have flicked through the desk drawer where he keeps the household bills and his stash of condoms.

That's a strange mix of things to keep in one place, I know. I found plenty of condoms, but no receipt for the bike. I did find what looks like a partial consumer guarantee for the bike, but it tells me neither the price, nor the make.

Boyfriend Maiyuu has reverted to his nasty, feral ways...secretive, and possibly dishonest. All this, over a mere B10,000? But then he comes from the provinces, has no job, and no income of his own.

He must be aware of the precariousness of his lot. No farang boyfriend = tough times!

If the bike actually costs less than he told me, and he spent the difference on his dumpling maker and bed sets, I do not really mind. But why not just say so? Maybe I make too big a deal out of financial accountability...demanding he show me this receipt and that.

I am not tracking every last baht...I can't be bothered. But one day, I might have to tell my boy that, as much as I love him, this childishness has to end.

The bike is too big to fit in the lift, and for security reasons Maiyuu does not want to leave it on the ground floor, or chain it up outside.

He has decided to keep it inside the condo instead.

Go for it, lad! We are on the seventh floor. When Maiyuu wants to use it, he has to cart it down an exhausting seven flights of stairs.