hapi nu yir

may the new year usher in peace of mind. happy new year to all. :)

flying

there are few things in life that provide escape for me. these include reading, cruising, baking, writing, listening to music, and of course horseback riding.

i rode this morning with hepe, a high school classmate. and it was exactly like before. total freedom. i think (don't know if i mentioned this before) that horseback riding is the closest i could get to flying. although a motorcycle ride comes close, the gallop of a horse is something else. and riding bareback takes the cake.

for the first time in days i felt like i could do anything, and that my loneliness was a thing of the past, left behind in the dust. it was just for a moment, but it was enough.

i feel a little more hopeful now, and a little less depressed. and that's always a good thing.

thanks hepe.

fundador

there is a lawyer somewhere in the philippines whose first name is fundador.

but i digress. went to my uncle's birthday party. we were a little late so we had to make do with what was left of the food, which was still a lot.

anyways, we ran out of cognac. sad. my uncle gave us a bottle of fundador instead.

sigh. we finished the bottle. there were 4 of us, with some people coming over to refill their glasses. we were quite selfish, and quite drunk by the end of the evening.
my sister just tasted some so she got to drive.

got home safe though. brushed my teeth, changed my clothes, and promptly fell asleep.

now i know why my dad likes hard drinks. no hangover.

it's a beautiful day. have a good one people. :)

now THIS is definitely better!

You are Smoke and Mirrors! You are idealistic,
unpredictable, and hypnotic. People might think
youre a show-off and have a need to be
surprising, but really youre just talkative and
get carried away with some subjects. You might
easily get jealous or feel lonely if something
is going wrong in your life. You probably like
fantasy, fiction and things that can
temporarily take you away from the world. You
have a great sense of humor and are enthralling
to be around.


*~Which Neil Gaiman book are you?~*
brought to you by Quizilla

took a cue from emman's blog

HA! so true sometimes i wish i'll get hit by a car. mwehwhehweh.


narcissistic


Which Personality Disorder Do You Have?
brought to you by Quizilla

booookkkkksss!!!

got some new books. :)

1. the morning star by nick bantock. signed. (my first autographed book.) this is the 6th and final installment of the griffin and sabine series. [thanks j]

2. abarat by clive barker. try reading the title on the cover upside down. it reads the same. coolness. :)

3. city of the beasts by isabel allende. have yet to read it.

4. tiny kitchen by vicky veloso-barrera. cookbook for children. (me. :D)

time to lose myself in another world. :) bye.

pictures!

posted some new pictures.

told you am in a rut.

i have returned

i have been in a rut for the past few days (weeks? months? years?)

the year is almost at a close and i suppose it's normal for me to get depressed, considering that this time last year i was going through hell. i guess i should be thankful i'm better.

well i am.

but that doesn't stop me from feeling a little down. they are not mutually exclusive feelings.

i have taken to long solitary walks. i rarely drive, and only when asked. (convenient, actually, because there are a lot of idiots in town at the moment. they don't know how to drive.) i disappear for hours on end and my family suspects i've been out meeting with so-and-so, and so-and-so... rendezvous, if you wish. i think it's wishful thinking on their part.

sorry to disappoint them.

i bought a sketchbook, so as to put my ID materials to good use. my brother in law said my first sketch looks like a graveyard. i looked. he was right. goes to show my state of mind.

but drawing is good. no matter how bad i am at it. maybe it'll help me get out of the rut i'm in in time for the new year.

maybe i'll start writing again. my notebooks are beginning to look forlorn.

and then i'll make my resume.

there. looks like i have a plan, stan.

now to stick to the plan.

hope all you guys are enjoying the rest of the holidays.

getting some shut-eye now.

i shall return!

merry christmas!!!

to all my blog-buddies -- emman, borcee, yayie, sarah, abigail and all those unfortunate enough to have stumbled upon my blogspot ----

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!! have a good one.

in the mood for dancing

attended a party today at the lsu gym. it was the faculty and staff christmas party. since i live in the president's house, i got to go.

had to borrow a blouse since my wardrobe consisted of shorts and shirts and tanks. and i must say, i looked pretty okay. :)

there was an interpretative dance contest, (to the tune of winter wonderland) a chorale contest, and a live christmas tree contest. by the time they were done, my little intestines were happily eating my big intestines. HUUUUN-GRY!

don't even remember what i ate but i do remember that there were about one dozen lechons in the area. one for each table, but ours had two. we had the guests kasi. they don't chop the lechon here. they leave a knife and fork at the table and you cut yourself a piece. i asked somebody to cut mine. he was nice enough to do so. :)

after dinner, there was ballroom dancing. i haven't gone ballroom dancing in ages. i don't recall when the last time was.

anyways, my friend's cousin and i danced the cha-cha. i had to lead, being almost 8 inches taller than her. then we sat down and my friend's dad danced with her mom, then her, then me.

i'll say. her dad can dance. he's tall, so leading the dance is easy. and he has that loose grace of the older generation who learned how to dance on the dance floor, on their own, with legitimate partners. they didn't need DI's back then. swing was in.

so he danced the swing and the boogie with me and i did two double spins and a triple spin without missing a step. i was so proud, and my friend and her family were shocked. they asked me why i danced well.

i told them my dad and my uncles loved to dance, and they passed it on.

sigh. i miss my dad.

we should go dancing when i get back.

update

wasn't able to upload the pictures to make them links in the previous post. including a link to the album in this post.

it rained today and i got melancholy again. it helped that the little boy who lives here and i have become friends. he is 1 year 4 months old. his only word is "car." since we are both fascinated by vehicles, we have become friends.

been helping out here. it's nice helping out. it keeps me busy and i have fun and the weather is so similar to what we have at home that i don't feel so homesick. so far i'm still having fun although i have never been one to complain about the provincial life.

i think i could live here. sometime in the future i want to move here and take a master's degree in marine biology. i heard they have it here at the university. living beside the beach would be wonderful. and watching all those fish without the aid of goggles is something else.

anyways, i don't know what tomorrow's sked is. i can feel myself growing by the minute but i don't care. i'm on vacation. i'm supposed to get fat (or so that little voice in my head which sounds suspiciously like dakota fanning in taken says).

will be here for a few more days. going back home for christmas. i miss the kids.

sigh.

here are some pictures

this is the life

december 12, 2003
4:00 p.m.

first time flyer.

my friend found the fact astounding. yes, it is my first time to fly. in an airplane, that is. i am no stranger to choppers. i've been riding in them for as long as i can remember. but planes, never.

living in baguio has its downside. it was so easy for us to just hop into a car and travel. and even when i first went to tacloban, i was unfortunate enough to have a ride a bus. we were to attend the national secondary schools press conference. our school didn't have the budget so we travelled economy. literally. in a bus. baguio-manila-tacloban. my butt was totally numb when i got to the barge. still, it was a fun experience.

so my only chance to ride a plane was thwarted. and i've been grounded since then.

i'm excited. i have come to the conclusion that i like airports. they're pretty nice places to be in.

and flying has always held its fascination. i've been trying to think up happy thoughts, but i've stayed on the ground. so a plane is the next best thing. plus riding a horse at top speed, of course.

got to the airport early. when i was checking my baggage in, the guy simply said, overweight.

what? are you saying i'm fat???? but i didn't say that, of course. i thought it, though. i simply pulled out my wallet but he didn't ask me to pay. he was simply having fun at my expense pala. the baggage was well within limits. my forehead must have said "first time flyer." he made up for it, though, because he gave me a window seat without my asking.

on to the lounge. am typing this while sitting in the lounge.

my laptop's battery is almost drained. will continue after the flight.


~~~~~~~

i flew. or rather, i rode a plane. i was a little apprehensive and i felt mild claustrophobia, mainly because the guy beside me was really big. and my jacket was restraining me somewhat.

the captain announced that we were about to takeoff. and i must say, i like takeoff. :D it was fun, leaving the ground.

soon we were 33.000 feet above the ground. the rest of the trip was uneventful. the stewardess gave us newspapers to read, and some snacks with foreign characters on them. the trip was okay. just like a bus ride. except less bumpy.

i liked landing too. my stomach got left behind somewhere around 19000 feet but that was okay. i didn't mind.

all in all, an okay first flight. except my feet felt funny.


december 14, 2003
6:46 pm


yesterday i had my first boat ride. it wasn't your regular boat. it was the supercat. like a bus. rode from cebu to ormoc. it took almost 3 hours, including a short stop in the middle of the sea. then a 30 minute drive to visca, baybay, leyte.

i am now at my friend's house. her mom is the president of leyte state university (lsu) and they live in the presidential house located on campus. it is an old house. i have fallen in love with it already. the house is about 30 paces from the beach. there's a veranda and a lawn out front with a huge tree (i haven't asked what kind it is, though). it has parquet floors and a panelled ceiling. sigh. old house.


just arrived from tacloban where i held hands with macarthur and had my picture taken while on san juanico bridge, the connecting bridge between leyte and samar. i know, i know. i look huge beside it.

visited an old church in baybay, too. really nice. except they were playing the gregorian chant version of stairway to heaven in between masses, blaring from the speakers near the bell tower.


oh. will continue this later. dinner and a massage daw. how can i resist?


december 15, 2003
12:43 pm

where was i? oh. got a massage and promptly fell asleep after.

went jogging this morning. ran on the beach. it's got a lot of stones, but the water is so clear it more than makes up for the lack of sand. from the beach i went around campus, almost got lost, but got home fine.

then we went swimming after breakfast. there are no waves, and the water moves just enough to lull you to sleep. my friend's mom had the area declared as a fish sanctuary so it's illegal to fish there. the fish swim near the shore and i saw one or two of them actually jumping out of the water about 2 meters from the shoreline.

when i went into the water it was so clear i could see my feet even though it was a little over five feet deep. and there was a cute fish with a blue nose swimming near me. you could see my smile from a mile away.

good thing about the beach, too, is that it was deserted. ditched my shirt and swam in my tank top and shorts. and nobody was there to yell "whale!!!" ah. bliss.

wish i could've gone to school here.

anyways, more of that later. i might yet get to take my masters here.

cebu

well here i am in cebu. and yes i'm in a mall, checking my mail while waiting for my roommate to finish having her facial. have a blog entry about my first flight but it's in my laptop so i will have to antedate it and post it when i can.

went to plantation bay this morning to have breakfast. that's a nice place. ideal for honeymoons.... :) wore my landi draw string pants that open up when blown by the wind. up to my thighs. hehehe. watch out world, here i come!

anyways, am at the ayala mall. looks pretty much like a mall in manila except all the people speak bisaya. sigh. good thing i can figure out context clues and i know some of the basics.

that facial should be over by now. will post again soon.

off to the beach

going to cebu tonight then leyte tomorrow.

time to get some serious writing done.

there's too much blood in my alcohol

or so faye says.

the other night i went out and decided to drink my blues away. i went to a bar with the sole intention of getting drunk.

so i did. got so stinking drunk i wasn't even aware that i had charged my phone and made a call.

my blues went away that night and came back full force the next day.

there is too much blood in my alcohol. need to purge the blood.

do you ever get that feeling that everything around you is changing while you remain unchanged, locked in a past you would rather not remember?

or that feeling that the events surrounding you are conspiring to make you remember something you would like to forget, or revisit a feeling that you would rather bury?

these feelings keep haunting me now. i try to keep them at bay but sometimes they are too strong, and i'm too tired to fight them.

almost a year. what is? i'm not really sure. a life-defining moment, surely. but i'd be at a loss if you asked me to label it. almost a year.

the saddity of it all.

i'm lonely.

dear diary...

felt like writing a dear diary thing. on the way home. however, the dear diary became a rundown of the things i did over the past 2 days. not necessarily in chronological order:

1. went to the beach
2. had breakfast at the beach
3. cooked pinaputok na imelda fish (humongous. about a foot and a half long.)
4. ate lechon.
5. played beach volleyball. lost. :(
6. swam (water so clear you can see your feet)
7. took pictures of the sunset
8. made friends with a hermit crab. name's basti. had a photo shoot with basti
9. bonfire at the beach
10. made like a sardine to squeeze into a banig with 7 other people
10. slept
11. woke up early.
12. contemplated life.
13. cooked breakfast
14. ate breakfast
15. swam again.
16. cleaned up.
17. ate lunch.
18. packed up.
19. went to manaoag to say thanks.
20. went home to baguio.

all in all, a fun weekend. as calvin would say, the days are just packed! and i just have to grin.

hmmm...

i'm still trying to figure out if there's any truth to this.



Who's Your Inner Buffy Bad-Girl? Find out @ She's Crafty

itching to go

the whole family is going to the beach tomorrow. ü

it's been ages since the last time we did that. almost 10 years? 30 pounds ago? hehehe.

can't wait to go. bound to be fun and fattening. but that's life in my family.

now let's see if we can fatten tiborce up. ü

and the inevitable conclusion is...

did a lot of things today.

1. put a baby to sleep
2. slept beside the baby
3. did some grocery shopping
4. played with the kids
5. baked about 250 pieces of oatmeal raisin cookies (with help from the kids and richel)
6. made some peaches and cream dessert for my family.

and my day started at lunchtime.

not bad, huh? the cookies alone should have taken the entire afternoon. but there we go. it only took me 2-3 hours. with dinner and clean up thrown in.

...i must be depressed.

going through junk

somebody asked me if i still have the sketch he made of me. so i went looking for it in my room.

turns out i still have junk left over from the previous clean up.

i didn't find the sketch. but i found something interesting.

found the guestbook i used for my exhibit. back in college we had to construct an actual room and enclose it in glass. each student had his/her design and we set up the modules in greenhills. something like a thesis.

i made a reading room with an ethnic design.

anyways, there were a lot of comments in the guestbook. some had job offers, others merely complimented the design, and still others said i looked cute in my grad pic. o di ba? i was laughing in my grad pic kasi.

one comment struck me though. it said "don't leave this field. you have the talent for it."

how could he or she have known that i had no plans of practicing? i didn't even know it then.

well i did leave the field. at kahit tumaba ang puso ko, i know i don't have the talent for it. i didn't have it then, i don't have it now.

the only reason that room looked so good was because it was how i wanted one of the rooms in my house to look. when i do get to build my house. it was purely motivated by self-interest. i got a very good grade. but that was just a bonus.

so here i am, with a degree in interior design, the only purpose of which is to serve as shock factor.

them: hi. so you graduated from law school. what was your undergraduate course?
me: interior design.
them: WHAAAAAT?

there, purpose served.

maybe someday it will serve some other purpose. but for now, the facial expressions accompanying the WHAAAAAT is still amusing.

found him

a week or so ago i posted a blog about this guy i used to have the hots for. hehehe. hankered after is the term i used, i think.

anyways, thanks to friendster, i found him.

clicked on his profile. it says he's interested in serious relationships with men and women. hmmmm... go figure.

still, it was good getting in touch. he's a doctor now.

wonderful, this internet.

a lord of the rings: return of the king

a non-review

the character first committee

the city mayor's office has a character first committee. every month they come up with posters proclaiming what month it is (october was honesty, november humility) and it has all these sayings on it.

i have been staring at the november poster. it's on the wall above my mom's pc to provide much needed entertainment. i quote:

"it is a joy to honor someone who is not always clamoring for spotlight but instead shares the credit with others. authorities love to exalt a humble person."

excuse me? this, coming from the mayor's office? from a mayor whose huge pictures are plastered all over baguio, who had the letter "v" mounted on all infrastructure, and who even had them mounted on the trash bins???

humility? i think not. take down those streamers and "v"s then we can consider talking about humility.

character first? bullshit. i have seen more character in beggars on the street.

and since i'm lambasting the damned office anyway, and consequently their idiotic posters, let me quote again.

"i will not think more highly on myself than i thought."

somebody explain this to me like i'm a five year old.

12 years later

had some crazy thoughts 12 years ago. finally put them in writing.

who remembers zuma?

what's bugging me?

wrote a friend of mine in canada. told him was feeling anti-social. i've gotten in touch with exactly 2 friends here in baguio since i arrived. i've taken to long walks and have been staying in my room for hours on end, with a book or my laptop.

his last question was "what's bugging you?"

i don't really know.

i know i should get a job. but that's not what's bothering me.

someday we'll know.

(yek.)

drink. drink till die.

one of my favorite lines from my sassy girl.

went home at 2 am. went drinking with some friends from manila... well they left at 10. but i had such a good thing going i didn't really want to stop. it was such fun. haven't gone drinkin in quite some time.

was tipsy when i got home. and melancholy.

sigh. maybe maudlin is the word.