How I Spent My Christmas

while all of you were probably still dozed off from noche buena hang over, i was driving myself and my sister to the hospital. no, i was not hit by a stray bullet (thank God) nor did i lose a finger from a firecracker incident. I was diagnosed with gastroesophageal reflux disease and a bacterial infection in my upper respiratory tracht.

sucks really. it did not make it better that since it was dec 25, the outpatient department of chong hua hospital was closed, so we had to go to the emergency room to be attended to. we got there quite early, so the floor was still rather deserted. after some poking and prodding, i had ECG and CBC. the ECG machine looked like this:

it had suctions that the nurse placed all over my chest. it also had cold iron clamps placed conveniently around my wrist so i wasn't able to take a picture of my self ECG'd. ECG was followed by CBC:

this one was great, in a morbid kind of way. the nurse took so much blood, the most i think anyone ever took from me. immediately, i remembered he Cullens. hehehe... after she finished, the nurse mumbled a "Merry Christmas" and went away. probably not a greeting you should throw around patients in emergency rooms.

poking and proding revealed i had ERD. CBC revealed i had the bacterial infection (same as my sister's) and ECG revealed nothing more.

it's really great i just finished Seasons 4 and 5 of Grey's anatomy before i had this trip to the hospital. that way when the doctor at the desk asked me if i wanted to see an intern or the resident gastro doctor, i knew clearly what she meant. i mean, hey! that's like asking if i wanted Lexie Grey or Dr. Miranda Bailey to check on me... haller. (or as how you say it these days, Baler!)


so now i have a total of 42 pills to down in seven days. seven days from now, i go back to work. tsk tsk tsk, so much for the dream vacation of frolicking on the beach. now, all i can think of is getting hydrated, and staying away from coke.

i spent the rest of my christmas day contemplating gym membership with banne. we toured fitness first in ayala and was this close to signing up. the place looked great, but i don't know. i have a feeling i don't want to be a slave to physical fitness. we ended the night walking the IT park blocks 3 times. that killed our feet.

anyway, Merry Christmas! don't get sick.

Merry Christmas

It's Sam's first Christmas, so she gets to greet you:

Merry Christmas, everyone! Her Piglet stuffy from banne...

what the?!

Look, I Sparkle!

Gobama!

Obama '08 - Vote For Hope from MC Yogi on Vimeo.

America, please do the world a favor and vote for Obama. :)

This video has all the elements of grunge. I think the editor went a little lazy towards the end, but it is still beautiful.

Sleepy...

Here's my niece Sam. She just woke up in this picture, but I'm just about ready to crash to sleep. OT is a drab.

(Blogging from phone coz I just remembered I can do it. I love this phone!)

Sarah, sarah, sarah

what is up with Sarah Palin?

for the record, it is one of the most distressing thing that she would choose to run in a time such as this. not only is there a war going on, the financial sector is collectively caving in on itself, and baby-boomers in America are getting older and in need of health care, but this is also the age of YouTube, Digg, Huffingtonpost, and SNL. people will make fun of you the moment you commit a mistake and they will blog about you, impersonate you without mercy, and play your video over and over again.

where perception is readily accepted as reality, you have to play the media-game very carefully. it's bad enough that the McCain camp has to limit media interviews to a very few journalists, but with the few interviews she's given, she... well... sucked.

i used to be involved in campus politics, and debates always mean hours and hours of preparation on the part of the candidates (or slate, in UP jargon). of course there is always an allowable degree of B.S. (bull excrement) that is expected from speeches, but it should never be excessive. one rule we did enforce was: if you don't know the issue behind a question, admit it. there is always room for humility even in politics.

honestly i dread Thurday's VP debate. i cringe at the thought of it. i have heard Joe Biden speak, and i love the calm temperament. Ms Palin hugely banks on her feisty demeanor to intimidate. Joe Biden banks on quiet experience to outwit. eeeee.... *cringing*

babe just turned 24

and so it came to pass that she is once again older than i am. hehehehe...

you see banne and i only get to be of the same age for 5 months in a year (may-september). the rest of the year, i can technically call her "ate." or if i want to be a jerk, "manang." ngyak ngyak ngyak.

in celebration of 24 years of you, here's switchfoot:


for pictures and more, head on over to my girl's post. i don't have pictures because i didn't bring a cam. but i can remember every scene in the party. it's hard to forget the image of a kid called "Double-D" knocking over the lettering in banne's butterfly cake. or girls (too many of them) asking for pink balloons. and a kid named "Taboy" (sounds like that) giving me a blow-by-blow account of Pixar's Presto. it was the craziest party i've ever been in. i loved it.

see you around babe. don't go wandering ahead too much, i'll catch up with you in 8 months. but sure is nice to be the younger one again. that means i can get away with being naughty. :P

vanessa, banne, van, daria, dharma, quinn, mama ni Pi, biatch, ako G.B., Sunday school teacher, mariah, nun, violinist, NKE-er, drawer of uber-thin girls with short skirts, heart-breaker, best friend, lover, whoever you chose to be at the moment, i love you. i love all of you.

serious backlog

to all our filipino muslim brothers and sisters, thank you so much for making tomorrow a holiday! there is absolutely nothing better than a mid-week rest-day. it's way better than a long weekend, if you ask me. reminds me of UP's wednesday "wash day," not that we wear uniform the rest of the week.

nyway, i have some serious blogging to do. i have 3-5 posts in my mind which i never got published. and since it's a no-work day tomorrow, i'll blog til i drop tonight.

Road Scene 4

have you ever tried driving with an audience?

these guys watched me drive the whole stretch of the Jagobiao slope. i couldn't get pass them because of heavy traffic. they made me feel conscious. i had to put more effort on how i stop and go or they'd think i drive like an amateur. ngek ngek.

Loi Salon: Opening on September 8

I would like to invite all of you to come and see my mothers soon-to-open beauty salon.

to get to the place, please check out the bottom part of this flyer:

for a complete list of services, please check below:

if you tell her I referred you, you can get as much as 50% discount. :D

here are some pictures of the place so you will not miss it:

it's right in front of the new Banilad flyover, Caltex side. 

so don't forget everyone: if you are ever in Banilad and you want to relax and be pampered, visit Loi Salon for a complete salon experience!

at last, my brain explained

Your Brain is 40% Female, 60% Male

You have a total boy brain Logical and detailed, you tend to look at the facts And while your emotions do sway you sometimes... You never like to get feelings too involved

What Gender Is Your Brain?

Happy Birthday, Ruiz!!!

last saturday was gladys' birthday party. you will all remember her as the filipina who claims to be brazilian in a vision i once received. now, she doesn't look anything like her former self. from the resident tabachoy, she reinvented herself to something like paris hilton. when gladys hilton died, she reincarnated into someone curvy-sultry, like anna nicole smith. these days, she's the girl with the bangs, or as an old classmate would describe her, 'lami na kaayo!!'

piglet cake.

and then we decided to have our pictures taken in different combinations:

that's I-Bartlett. (UP High School first year, Bartlett section, in case you don't know.)

I-Benton. in first year, i once planned to trap banne behind the lockers. as i was pushing about 300 lbs of locker cabinet to trap her, she decided to escape. she was promptly squeezed between the wall and the cabinet. i don't think she cried, she just really hated me. nyahahaha!

II-Bocobo!!! we performed Small House of Uncle Thomas (from the Yul Bryner original The King and I). menguito: scientific dog. brian: lyre operator/pa-or-or. aby: prompter. maumau: Elisa. gladys: dancer. ngyak ngyak.

II-Palma. banne danced Arabian Nights, the opening of Alladin. in see-thru pants!!! hahaha..

III-Sinco. star section.. wooohooo....

IV-Corpuz. thesis partners.
NECers...

Alpha I in CAT...

great fun! great fun!

we hate bowling

we really do.
we just go for the pictures.

and the food afterwards.

and pose for more pictures.

kathy taking on ferosh.

we had dinner at bar-b-q joe's at the walk. the gorgeous place succeeded in making us forget the quality of the dinner.

Road Scene 3

this episode of Road Scene is a rather sad one. it was around 7 AM at the back of Cebu Doctor's Hospital when my car was clamped by CITOM.

you see, my sister-in-law was already in labor at the Chong Hua Hospital delivery room when the doctor advised us to buy blood at Cebu Doctor's Blood Bank for possible use. i was honestly a little panicky then. i was never a fan of hospitals, let alone the prospect of blood infusion. so i honestly did not see the No Parking sign. in fact, even if i saw it, i probably would have ignored it, the time being 7AM, rather ungodly for CITOM officers.

so when my mother and i went back to where i parked the car, there was the CITOM sign announcing to the world that i had been irresponsible and i needed to settle my violation at the CITOM office at the back of LTO. i was quiet furious (a little nervous because i was carrying a bag of blood, type B+), and i immediately searched the street for uniformed men. i found one and stopped short of shoving the bag of blood in the officer's face explaining the "emergency" because of which i can justify my violation to the rules of the city streets. i was in the second minute of my justified berration of the officer's inconsideration when i realized i was talking to a parking attendant. doh. so i asked my mom to take a cab back to Chong Hua and i took a cab myself. driver's license and car registration (both complete with official receipts from the government of the republic), i went straight to CITOM office.

the picture you see above is not a jail cell. it is where the tax-paying citizens of Cebu City queue and wait for their names to be called and settle clamping violations. quiet dismal if you'd ask me. it makes gotham city jail look shabby chic. the CITOM office reeks of testosterone, every corner and nook of the building. no wonder middle-aged women who work there, who could otherwise look like Martha Stewarts or even Demi Moores (why not?) have all decided to just give up on their looks and promptly dress and act like brute hooligans.

i was informed that the violation would set me back P500. fine with me, just take the damned clamp off my left front wheel, thank you. but first, CITOM must search thru my past violations, if any, and settle those. fine with me, i have never had any since that morning's clamping incident.

so i waited. and out came a receipt this long:

it was all the violations committed under my plate number for the past 11 years!!! (well, i told you i drive an old car.) imagine that, from running a red light, illegal stopping, illegal accessory, you name it! and the bill? the bill, you ask? P4,000!!!!

faced with the choice of having my car impounded and dragged by a towing car (all of which i must pay), i gave in and payed. doh.

PREVIOUS OWNER OF MY CAR: i will hunt you down, and shove this receipt in your throat! i will make you pay for your violations and charge you tripple for my efforts. i settled your violations, man! it was you who ran the red light, not me! it was you who did not stop when you should have, not me! it was you who committed six unattended vehicle violations near Osmena Circle, six! SIX! i will hunt you, and make you pay!

then again, my Christian upbringing compels me to go easy on you. just the same, what you did was bad, you.. you... you... TRAFFIC VIOLATOR!

Lord, can i just call him a really foul name for once? grrr....

digg this please!!!

you guys just have to digg this:
http://digg.com/movies/James_Batman_Filipino_James_Bond_Batman

hahahaha, too funny!!!

Rock Night website

ok, i'm finally announcing it:

Rock Night August 30 website, click click click.

please add us up as Contact. i know multiply is last season, but it is still the biggest social networking site here in RP.

UPDATE: we are now in friendster! i created a Friendster account for all those people I can't convince to go on multiply. then again, i will never maintain a multiply site myself. add us up: here.

grunge rock night

ok, i may have taken this whole grunge thing too far. my friends at church asked me to create a multiply site for the Aug 30 Rock Night (yeah... we are doing it again). and of course, i said yes, and thought immediately about the grunge theme. well, here it goes, the evolution of the site banner (arranged chronologically):





and the winner:

(will launch the site formally once we have content already).

that's it! no more grunge!

grunge butterfly

the grunge style has been around for a long time now and it's always an absolute delight for me. it combines dirt and grime and chaos but is strangely beautiful. i'm no graphics designer but i do like to play around with photoshop, so here it is, my take on grunge:

i know i'm gonna get a lot of crap about how her head looks severed, and how the splashes are a bit too much, but i absolutely love it. i wanted to bring out the pretty eyes, and i think i did it, grungely so. so don't be hatin' people, it's my first try.

my sister's boyfriends' gifts

i have a confession. one of the things i miss most about my sister is not really her. it's her boyfriends. particularly, her boyfriends's presents. haha...

you see, i have always lived with a beautiful sister. and as far as i can remember, she has never really had any problems in the boyfriend department. before, when her suitors came to our house, they always brought cakes or chocolates or ice cream. i miss those days. once i came home from school with 3 whole cakes in the fridge. all different kinds, of course.

i particularly remember one boyfriend who we shall not name here. every Friday, he would go to cockfight derbies to bet. my mom and i would know if he had won when we would come home to ice cream and chocolates on Friday evenings. hahaha... oh the benefits i had reaped from being kin to a looker. in all these years my sister had been away, i have almost forgotten how enormously gratifying it is to be in the receiving end of gift-giving, as it were.

just this evening, not barely a week after she had arrived, i came home to Red Ribbon chocolate mouse rolls! still stressed and shaken from rush hour traffic, i hurriedly grabbed a fork, took a seat in the dining table and said a prayer of thanks for beautiful sisters, gift-giving suitors, luscious chocolate whipped chiffon cake and love. then i wolfed down two whole slices.

as we speak, said sister is out on a date with some lucky man. they took my car (along with my precious gas -- still half-tank full), but promised to return it full-tank. ooohh... something tells me i will enjoy the coming days. :D

Google un-perks employees

Oohhh boy. I am hoping this story is not true.

Sergey Brin said he had no sympathy for the parents, and that he was tired of "Googlers" who felt entitled to perks like "bottled water and M&Ms," according to several people in the meeting. (A Google spokesman denies that Brin made that comment.) On Monday, Google began the first phase of its new day care plan, letting go of the outside day care firm it had been using.

If Google, the fabled paradisaical company, can't keep up with its lovely perks, what hope is there for the rest of us?

this is awkward...

if you were venus and serena williams' father, how exactly would you react? quite awkward really. i rather like serena more, but after this speech venus is kind of growing on me.

Dance, dance

Dance, one and all! Dance!

Jung Typology Test

today we took the Jung Typology Test and these are the results:

banne and i were Idealists Counselors (Mentors)

jayjay was an Idealist Champion (Advocate)

karina was an Artisan Composer (Entertainer)

kathy was an Artisan Craftsman (Operator)

explains so much, don't you think?

Bruschetta

after eating more chinese food than i ever thought possible, i am now in the look out for food that has absolutely nothing to do with china. that means no dimsum, no noodles, no raw vegetables garnished with oyster sauce, none of those.

so it was a delight to have finally eaten at Pizza Hut once more. and lo, a new menu item! presenting, the Bruschetta (bru-sket-ta).

with all the yummy goodness of slightly crushed tomatoes, basil leaves and olive oil. the Pizza Hut version has lots of garlic and mushroom. fine with me. the best bruschetta i have ever tasted was from my favorite La Tegola Restorante. eating bruschetta at La Tegola's Busay branch -- with a view of the whole city below you -- is one of my finest culinary experiences.

here's the recipe.

home, finally

choy sum, yum yum

this is my absolute favorite dish here in HK. it's also one of the simplest to prepare. it's actually just Choy Sum (Chinese Flowering Cabbage) in oyster sauce. i find that it is best to eat it with chopsticks.

got online and found the recipe.

Kung Fu Kid

i got dodong this traditional chinese shirt. it has matching pants. it's quite pricey at $150 (i haggled from $179). but check out the embroidery.

can't wait to try it on him. wahahaha...

now this is just horrific

(Photo AFP)

Hong Kong news is going crazy over this story. for a Filipino, i am shocked that something like this could happen. after all, i come from a culture that can well be described as "happy" and "light-hearted", statistically anyway. i cannot imagine that someone literally will go mad and kill everyone in sight. you can say things like, "Mapatay tika!" in Cebuano, but nobody will believe you mean that really. at best it's just you being all melodramatic and hyperbolic.

i have 3 explanations in my head:
1. the killer is an otaku. now i have many otaku friends, i work with a couple in the office. truth be told, i don't feel particularly insecure around them, they are good company actually. so i don't think the killer's otaku-ness did it for him.
2. the killer is mentally ill. for this, we shall wait for the psychiatric assessment results.
3. Japan. ah, the country of shame-phobia. much can be said about this, at the risk of offending the Japanese people. (actually, much can be said of the Filipinos at the risk of offending me.) statistically, Hong Kong and Japan in fact are quite high up in the rank of suicide rates per country. i have two theories about this: too much order makes life boring and being far-removed from nature. (the former is actually a corollary of the second.)

in any case, i am deeply sad and horrified by this incident. i dread the day that someone will invariably attack me or any of my loved ones in the streets. nothing can be done but to pray for the victims. but most especially, for the killer. my thoughts go out to him. that is still somebody's beloved child right there.

Beijing 2008

now, there is no reason why we must jeopardize the success of the Olympics because we have issues with China. China is China, and the Olympics is Olympics. two absolutely different things. so relax, let China have its way with the games. should be fine really. having 5 mascots is a bit... hmm.. unorthodox, yes.. but you know.. at least one is a panda.

note really cute kid in green shirt. he spoke Mandarin (i could tell!!!), which means he came from the Mainland. teheee...