one more day

One more day to go before the Samsung AXN Challenge....I'm excited, but I'm also afraid. It's my first adventure race (not counting the utrekarera race within our small group), and of course I am afraid. I'm pretty sure I'm not as fast as the race veterans, but what if they're too fast and they bump into me and I can't jump out of the way in time and I fall splat straight towards the asphalt ground and I have to cry because the injury hurts too much? Waaa!

Sigh...breathe in....breathe out....in any case, I learned a lot in the short month that we've been preparing. I learned to ride a bike around the metro, rollerblade (sort of, I can still walk faster), sisid (yes I never learned to do that before), rappel properly, and dragon-boat row. I learned that rowing is an interesting sport, as long as 1) I overcome this inability to wake up very early, and 2) I keep at it because my endurance at this sport isn't really all that good.

I'm afraid. But right now, I should concentrate at my work. Stupid work and reworks. Reworks not my fault but I have to do them, and I can't bring myself to concentrate enough on the task at hand. You know how sometimes when you're done with a project, you don't want to think about it anymore? Well, here it is. I don't want to think about it. I am concentrating very hard to re-format my brilliant solution into the new framework being designed by other people. I mean, that's well and good and as it should be, but the problem is, there's a time frame, a project deadline I was trying to catch. And now more work needs to be done but the project deadline did not move at all. And it's my fault since I can't concentrate. I can't think. I want to be a mindless athlete earning big bucks. Or a social butterfly who just needs to be charming and doesn't need to actually do any work. Bah! Why am I complaining. This is my bread and butter. This feeds my whims and fancies.

Some days I like my work. And some days...I just want to leave it all behind.

sugar-free

I finally broke up with my boyfriend, and I AM FINALLY FREE!!!

haha, of course he still doesn't know it yet. But really, enough is enough. The fact that imagining myself free of him gives me such a sense of relief means it is time. Hmm...of course I'm a teeny weeny bit afraid that it may always be time to move on, and that I may never have that chance to settle into my happy-ever-after ending. Maybe there is no ending for me. Maybe I'll be a fabulously hip single person at 60. Who knows. Anyway, let the future decide itself. Today, my quote of the day is from Eleanore Roosevelt. "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." And starting today, I don't, and I won't, consent anymore.

Dearest (for Virginia)

Dearest,

I feel certain I am going mad again. I feel we can't go through another of those terrible times. And I shan't recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can't concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don't think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can't fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can't even write this properly. I can't read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that - everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can't go on spoiling your life any longer.

I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been.
V.

5:30 Rants

Let me rant.

• There was this email that I was trying to compose and send to a customer, but this email client keeps on hanging up on me. It takes me more than 30 minutes to get the darn email to send, and before I even do that, I find out that my boss has already replied to the customer. All because it took me very long to send the goddarn email.
  



• Why can't SquirrelMail be like...yahoo!? Look at the documentation for Squirrelmail version 1.4.3a (the version we're using):
  
  The SquirrelMail development team are pleased to announce the release of 1.4.3a. This release contains a minor bug fix that seemed to have caused some issues with users in replying to mail. This release also contains numerous XSS fixes from the 1.4.3 release.
  
  --> Waaa!!! I'm still having "issues" when replying to mail!!!!
  



• From their website (squirrelmail.org):
  
  SquirrelMail has all the functionality you would want from an email client, including strong MIME support, address books, and folder manipulation
  
  --> Nooooo. It doesn't contain *all* the functionality I would want from an email client. I want to be able to compose in HTML, which Squirrelmail doesn't support (or I don't know how to configure this). And it tends to hang when replying to email! (see previous bullet point).
  



• Haven't slept yet. Haven't you noticed? Haha. And today of all days, when I'm supposed to meet someone at 6:30 AM. I am so trying to bury my ass in the mud.
  



• !#$#%@#$@$@#$**^*#
  



• Well, here's to another day....

William Shatner's Common People

This is the funny song of the day.

It has been 35 years since the release of William Shatner's debut album (yes, this is true). In his new album produced by Ben Folds (sounds familiar?), Shatner sings/raps/speaks his way through the song "Common People":

I took her to a supermarket.
I don't know why, but I had to start it somewhere.
So it started there!
I said, pretend you've got no money.
She just laughed and said, oh, you're so funny!
I said, yeah? Well I can't see anyone else smiling in here!
Are you sure you want to live like common people?
You want to see whatever common people see?
You want to sleep with common people?
You want to sleep with common people like me?
But she didn't understand...

He speaks throughout the song, putting in a little tune here and there. Imagine poetry reading with a bit of background music thrown in. Nevertheless the song is catchy, and strangely enough, it almost made me smile (in amazement? in ridicule? in respect?) The song has a deeper meaning in there somewhere, but knowing the song is by William Shatner sort of makes it easier to overlook that fact. I don't know about the whole album, but the song "Common People" is quite tongue-in-cheek, and you never really know if you're laughing at Shatner, or laughing with him. Yes, Captain Kirk is singing with a wink and a smile.

You'll never live like common people!
You'll never do whatever common people do!
You'll never fail like common people!
You'll never watch your life slide out of view,
and dance, and drink, and screw!
Because there's nothing else to do!

The song "Common People" also features Joe Jackson, and is from Shatner's new album, "Has Been", released October 2004 in the US of A (where else, the self-proclaimed capital of the world). For more legitimate information about William Shatner's album, you can try that bastion of American journalism, CNN.

Starting off on the right foot

Yes, it took me a lot of effort to get my day started. It's one of those "cold-engine" days when you just can't get rev up and get into gear at once. You're just idling around, taking your own sweet time, while the office frantically calls you up every few minutes and you calmly make excuses as to why you're not still there.

---===ooo===---

It's always great to want something, right? So, off the top of my head right now, my top ten wish list:

1. "Island Riddims", a Pinoy reggae various-artists compilation CD
2. Watch "First Daughter". (Yes, I can be really shallow. And I find Katie Holmes cute.)
3. Watch "Before Sunset" (supposed to be an intellectually romantic movie, where "words, not plot, matter". This, from Dolly Ann Carvajal's column in the Inquirer. What can I say? I'd like to find out what the heck a romantically wordy movie is!)
4. Watch that James Stewart movie that is always shown on TV in the US during Christmas (at least that's what I remember reading somewhere.) It's a really old black-and-white movie, yep! It's A Wonderful Life!
5. Lose some pounds (yes, yes, yes. women can be vain and border on the anorexic)
6. Finish all my work so I can slack off in peace
7. Watch Cabaret, the musical (showing every Fridays and Saturdays, 8PM at the Music Museum, till December 4)
8. a new bike?

Great. My own Top Ten list, and I can only fill it up till number 8. Oh well. This only means one thing -- there's room for a whole lot more. Cheers.

---===ooo===---

<silence>

Yes, it is past 2:30 AM.

*sigh*

<silence>

Bicol, Part 1

It started out as a possible road trip from hell.

Due to (my) unattainable work goals, bus trips had to be re-scheduled, and we had to brave the weekend All-Saints-Day rush to the province. A lot of people were going back to the province, and we couldn't find an aircon bus where we can reserve seats. We ended up meeting up at 5:30 AM at the Cubao bus station, to try to catch the first trip to Bicol. We boarded a non-aircon bus, which was supposed to leave at 6:30, but ended up leaving Manila around 7:30. Don't ask me why.


Beautiful Bicol as seen from the bus

At first, the bus breezed its way through Edsa, South Super Highway, then Laguna. It sort of stalled somewhere in Quezon...the sun was beating down, the bus wasn't moving, and it was really HOT. And you know how humid-hot it can get in the Philippines. Anyway, the bus started moving again, and by 2PM there were high hopes of reaching Sorsogon by at most 7PM. But no! The bus had to stop at several gas stations along the way, and finally, the bus broke down. It was 8PM then, and we were still around 2 hours away from Sorsogon.

Anyway, not everything that starts out bad, ends up bad. We had fun, the sights were good, and we had lots of good luck, good fortune, and good food. Our friend had a fishpond in Libmanan, Camarines Sur, and their tilapia was truly yummy! Most tilapia when cooked are dry and taste like..well, tilapia. Their tilapia was juicy and tasted like lapu-lapu. According to Mang L., who took up a fisheries course at Gerry Geronimo's Ating Alamin program, it was because of the fresh water in their pond. In fact, Mang L. will be featured soon in the segment where Gerry Geronimo interviews successful alumni of his program. Watch out for that! (Sorry, I don't know what time Ating Alamin is shown)

At the ruins of Barcelona (Sorsogon)	The church at Caramoan (Camarines Sur)

It was seafoods galore, and we ate, drank, and were toured like we were kings (and queens). As my friend Beng said, we were really blessed. We had a priest-friend who hooked us up with his other priest-friends assigned to the different parishes we visited. When we asked our friend how we can ever repay their generosity, his reply was, "just be good". To someone who rarely goes to church (that's me), the whole trip has been a sort-of eye opener about the church's role in our culture. Bicol had plenty of beautiful old churches, and the Catholic Church and its traditions are deeply ingrained in the lives of its people. The Church was ever present in the lives of the people in the Spanish times, and even upto now, the Church is ever present still in their lives. All of the priests we met were young. You wouldn't be able to guess they were priests by the way they dressed. They didn't wear stuffy cassocks or that ubiquitous white band around their neck. They may be young, but they know what they wanted to do. They are smart, idealistic, and most of all, human, just like us ordinary people.


Caramoan

Yep, we were lucky indeed. There are still a million things to see and do in our country. The world is a beautiful place, and I do hope that someday, we all get to fulfill our potential to be good.

Camarines Sur, is dubbed as the rice granary (camarines) of the south (sur). It is home to Mts. Isarog and Iriga, and boasts of stretches of pristine beaches like Gota in the Caramoan Peninsula and those in the Atulayan Islands in Sagnay. Camarines sur is basically agricultural, but mining is also a growing industry. There are deposits of gold, silver, chromite, copper and other metals in the eastern side. The province also has rich fishing grounds.

Sorsogon in the Bicol Peninsula is at the southeastern tip of Luzon Island. Mountains sprawl along the northeastern part of the province. The tallest peak is Mount Bulusan, an active volcano 1,560 m above sea level; Lake Bulusan lies on its slopes. Except for landlocked Irosin, all the towns lie along the coast.

More pictures at http://www.pbase.com/xieurx/bicol&page=all. Information about Bicol from http://oasis.fortunecity.com/acapulco/215/region5/region5.htm.

when?

...I had a dream
I had an awesome dream
People in the park
Playing games in the dark...

When does love change from gooey romantic love to a resigned disinterested one?

More dramatically, maybe the question should be, when does love die?

How did it die? Did it die suddenly, as if waking up with a jerk from some dream? Did it die slowly, with every insult and every hurt a stab that eventually kills you?

Whatever the cause for thinking love is dead, when do you know if it's time to go, or if you should give it one more chance?

...And what they played
Was a masquerade
From behind the walls of doubt
A voice was crying out...