I guess I haven't posted about this, but I've been listening to Maroon5 years before anyone else heard about them. (Ahh, the advantages of listening to NU107.) The first time I heard "This Love" I was reminded of the Fine Young Cannibals, a 1980s act, and I was amazed by their other singles. I decided to buy the album---a cassette with a maroon cover and a sketch of a nude long-haired lady holding a musical Pandora's Box.

Now that they've been, ahem, "discovered" by MTV et al, I don't like what all this fame's done to them. I am appalled at groupie girls screaming for Maroon5 simply because lead singer Adam is poster-boy material, not because of the music. (A similar situation hounds Incubus and its front man Brandon Boyd.) The album cover's been changed to make them look like some sort of rock and roll princes (which they are NOT). Worse I just heard "This Love" being played on a noontime show, accompanied by the usual brainless dance routines it has everyday.

The same thing happened to John Mayer...

Ah well. The price of fame. If I don't like Maroon5's next album I can simply skip buying it.

Jack Black had a good point in "School of Rock." MTV tends to just destroy the purity of music and turns it into brainless mush repeated ad nauseam.
===

Woke up at noon today. That's a first.
===

My view on the elections still stands: Had the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) simply pushed through with the plan to automate the process, such complaints of electoral fraud, voter disenfranchisement and slow counting would have been greatly reduced.

I can't stomach how the COMELEC is washing its hands of its failures. It's constantly telling the public that slow counting and disenfranchisement are all their fault. Who on earth squandered billions of pesos of taxpayers' money on automated vote-counting machines that are now out of commission? They could have used those last Monday and saved all of us some unnecessary suspense on who won. Who on earth pushed through with an electronic voter registration program that ultimately resorted to moldy old voters' lists of yesteryear?

Sigh...let's keep things simple all right? Our national elections are a comparatively simple and straightforward exercise compared to those in the United States.
===

Tara called me up the other day. It seems plans are afoot for the Zen Clan's summer outing, just before school starts again on the 24th...and I heard Puerto Galera being mentioned. Cool.

It's been too long since I had a chance to be with all my blockmate friends without any obligations to fulfill in school. I certainly hope my schedule allows it.
===

New e-mail address by the way. I'm sick of Yahoo's worm-infested mail servers.

My new address is bluepiranha@gmail.com.

Just thought I should post the lyrics to one of my favorite songs.

I think
It's getting to the point
Where I can be myself again
It's getting to the point
Where we have almost made amends
I think
It's getting to the point
Where it's the hardest part

And if you call, I will answer
And if you fall, I'll pick you up
And if you cause this disaster
I'll point you home
I'll point you home...

You think
I only think about you
When we're both in the same room
I'm only here to witness
The remains of love exhumed
You think
We're here to play a game of who loves
More than whom

And if you call, I will answer
And if you fall, I'll pick you up
And if you cause this disaster
I'll point you home

But I'm warning you, don't ever do
Those crazy messed-up things that you do
If you ever do, I promise you
I'll be the first to crucify you
Now it's time to prove
That you've come back here to rebuild...

- Barenaked Ladies, "Call and Answer"

We shot our first three scenes at Geraldine's house in Quezon City yesterday, and it turned out pretty good.

There I got to meet Geraldine, Reggie Curly (Denise's actors in her famous 6-minute short film "Hallucinations") and Geraldine's parents Mr. and Mrs. Tan, who were more than game to help us all out. It seemed like we were having more fun and jokes than footage, but it was all right because we enjoyed it.

I'm going to enjoy working with them again...and we will be. The next shoot's tentatively scheduled for next Monday.
===

Cher made it.

As of last count she was fifth in the councilorship race; she was the only new candidate in the top eight.

I'm happy for you my friend. Congratulations. *HUGS*
===

A dream I had this morning disturbed me. I dreamt Tita Vik had died for some reason. I simply couldn't believe my favorite aunt would die just like that.

My imagination's toying with me I guess.

Am still trying to get used to the new features of Blogger. Apparently nowadays people can add comments to mine, too, without my having to get third-party utilities and messing around with more code.

The others I'm still figuring out. I doubt I'll be able to use them though. I'm not as techie as I used to be.
===

Our first shoot's going to be this afternoon. Am crossing my fingers it's going to be a good one.

Before that...I'll try to dabble with my blog template for a while.

I thought it's about time I changed the way my blog looked. I love blue, yes, but the old template just reeks of flatness. Besides I'm still not skilled enough to trust myself with HTML code.
===

My other computer just shuts down whenever I try to go online. Turns out it might have the Sasser virus, so I'm now downloading a patch or two from Microsoft.

Apparently Sasser is so potent, it's managed to interfere with so many vital operations (I'm talking about the UK Coast Guard, banks, and government offices) in Europe, and tech analysts are spooked by this latest security threat.

All I can say is...Microsoft should write this up as another FAILURE.
===

I got to see "School of Rock" and "Drumline" on Pao's DVDs. The first movie ain't bad at all, but I guess I found it a little too simplistic for my liking. If you've seen the trailers there isn't much more to look forward to. Jack Black is way funny though, and he does show a healthy development of his character.

I can't help but notice that little kid Melinda Cosgrove though. She looks eerily like my ex.

"Drumline" meanwhile is "Bring It On" with a decidedly African-American flavor, and with big-band performances instead of flash cheering routines. The whole film is very slick and oozes high production values---just how can one explain the smoothness of the marching band routines, with all their complicated formations? You just have to give it kudos.

The film is a little generic in terms of its main story (a fish-out-of-water situation with a coming-of-age story) but it's well done and I have no complaints. Great stuff.
===

As it turns out I am unable to cast my vote. After 4 weeks of searching for my name in the voters' lists, it has never shown up.

Their loss, I guess. I have no fault here.
===

Thinking about the high school crush I bumped into the past couple of days has got me thinking. How much have I changed?

I used to think of there being no one more beautiful than her, back when my world consisted of high school and nothing else. In hindsight she wasn't as desirable as I once thought she was. She was just someone I didn't know, apart from being ludicrously smart, friendly and cute. Cute, yes, but she was nowhere near being beautiful. I bet if we had ever had a chance to talk any longer than we used to, I would've discovered more things I'd find not as desirable as I once thought.

Now that I've gotten to where I am, I think I've grown up---even just by a little bit.
===

I think I should give this new template a test spin.

Yesterday I was pretty much out the whole time. I had volunteered to join Paolo to help out with the nitty-gritty of the DLSU enrollment process. Turns out it didn't really take him that long. He's pretty much in---all he's waiting for is the payment from his educational plan.

I met one of his friends there, too. Her name was Vicky, and she was supposedly a rocker chick and "one of the boys" in terms of demeanor. Found out she was also a budding photographer itching to get a digital camera. She has a good imaginative head on her shoulders, methinks. I also noticed that Vicky and Pao were quite chummy with each other, but he told me it was nothing more than that.

After enrollment requirements we headed off to Glorietta to bring Vicky to some people she'd meet to go to a gig later on. Pao and I decided to burn some money in Timezone on a couple games of Initial D. I swear, I seem to be the only player who drives a Honda S2000.

While we were on the way back to parking, I noticed a familiar face on the escalator right in front of me. I felt like I knew this girl---she reminded me a lot of my old high school crush, and I'm still pretty convinced it was her. She was with a group of friends and they seemed all primped up for some occasion (girls' night out perhaps?) while I was having second thoughts about calling her, partly because of the lingering stench of the caramelized-onion burger I had eaten an hour earlier.

But then I looked at her legs just under her skirt and I noticed that she wasn't this chubby before. Then again it's been a fair 3-4 years since I saw her last...

I joked to Pao that the Ateneo makes one fat. Of course it's just a joke. Marc, that Atenean DJ friend of mine, has always been thin as a matchstick.

Overall it was a good day.
===

We're finally going to start shooting our thesis film's footage. The plan so far is for shooting at Quezon City on Election Day afternoon. I wonder what happened to our storyboard though...

Speaking of Election Day...it looks like I won't be able to vote after all. My name hasn't shown up on the voters list all these weeks.

Oh well.
===

Currently these are the things I want for myself.

- A new Mercedes-Benz SLK 200. This roadster is so damn cute, sporty and suave...too bad it's so damn expensive too. Then again that fancy folding steel roof may not be as useful here as it is in other places. Maybe I'll wait until I generate my first couple million or so. When on earth will that happen?

- A spare badminton racket. A cheap Yonex Carbonex model would be okay. Just in case my Kawasaki's strings snap.

- My second pair of badminton shoes. Pao tells me Asics are the best. I'll need to save up PhP3,200 first.

- A replacement phone. There's nothing wrong with my Nokia 8250, but I'd like to try a nice cheap Sony Ericsson model for now. Besides it's about time I banished the memories that came with the damn thing.

- Sennheiser headphones. Reputed to be the best, period...and I saw a PhP1,550 pair being sold in Park Square. Not bad. Pao says you get what you pay for, and I'm definitely NOT buying cheap-ass Philips headphones any more.

- The squarish gold-colored Panasonic CD/MP3 player. It looks so damn classy and it's a welcome change from all those round clamshells of plastic I usually see. PhP9,000.

- A nice budget sound system for my car. I can probably be happy with a good premium amp and some middle-class tweeters for now. Am addicted to subwoofers now, but that's going to add too much weight for my kind of driving.

I think I'm going to need some serious moolah. Must save.
===

Mao's been sending me e-mail from San Francisco. She says she's enjoying her stay, although she noted the heat was quite similar to that of Manila. I think they're off to Las Vegas now.

Been gone for a while. It's not like there's much to write about these days.

Let me start with grades. I got them around the 19th, and while I'm happy I passed MATHAN1 (got a 1.5), that also means I lose my Dean's List status when I need it the most. Oh well...I hope my schedule next term's flexible enough to help us keep shooting.

On the same day, I got started on doing our storyboard---this time using the correct 3-shots-per-page format. Because I was working alone and I had a whole lot of distractions coming my way, it took me a whole week to finish.

All in all I filled up 49 pages full of my usual anime-style sketches, and they were hell to finish. There were times when I really did not feel like sketching; that's something I can't be forced to do well. It has to come naturally because I have my sketching off-days. It doesn't help that the storyboard I made was meant to be more detailed than most (I am a stickler for visual detail).

I'm not even sure if the shots I picked and drew in were all right, but finishing in such a tight deadline is heaven for me and my aching eyes.

Finally, I had Sunday afternoon out with Paolo C. Original plan was to invite Bong and Jared but the two of us were the only ones available. We went to Alabang Town Center where we watched Hellboy and hung around. I was surprised at how critical Paolo was of Hellboy---he kept seeing "a little bit of everything" in the movie, and I tended to agree with him. While it started well, the movie gets a bit mediocre at the end, but it's still an enjoyable action movie.

While I'm talking on the subject, Paolo finally made it to DLSU. Am going with him on the 7th of May to help him with enrollment. That means I may have a potential carpool ready, if our schedules coincide.

Am amazed at Paolo's Pajero. He spent a little moolah on it to get himself a pretty spiffy sound system. We tried playing my Initial D Super Euro-best CD on it, and I heard bass being kicked out by the subwoofer that I wasn't even aware of before. He also lent me Bamboo's new CD, "As the Music Plays," which is a kick-ass track.

That cool set of sounds makes me scratch my head. I wonder when I'll get enough moolah to spend on a good, cheap sound system of my own in my little blue Honda.

Tonight I tried my hand at writing prose yet again.

Buoyed by the confidence of coming up with much of our thesis project's script---of which most of my contribution came from modifying Denise's story at a massively huge "eureka!" moment---I thought I'd go back to writing the short stories I used to do way back in high school. I even had the misguided impulse at that time to write a whole novel, although my best friend Kwapaw beat me to that twice.

Sad to say, most if not all my stories and novels got stuck in the middle. I never finished any of them. I had a better chance of finishing proper poems (which I seldom wrote) than motivating myself to get over prose-writer's block. I sort of relented to the realization that I was better at thinking up ideas for stories than writing them.

I'd like to think thesis was different though. I'd like to think that my conception of our thesis story was an insight into something genuine, something approaching talent, something more than just a one-shot deal.

But then I got thinking...what do I want to write about?

I immediately identified my weaknesses. I am bad at making characters because they come off being too perfect, too similar, too goody-goody. Somehow I was under the notion that writing should be an escape from reality. I was constantly setting my stories in places I wished to be, yet never had an idea of what life was in them (e.g. Japan). And don't get me started about rivals. I never made antagonists convincing enough to make my stories interesting.

Maybe I should write about stuff that happens to me. Rewrite it somehow so that it comes off as something a little different, a little more interesting.

That was one of the things I've mulled over when I looked at my blog after posting in here for so long. Maybe, just maybe, I should recycle all these electronic memories I've posted on this page and spin them around, use them for something else. God knows just around 100 people read this page every month anyway.

I don't know. Maybe I should give it another try. I probably won't get to write any life-changing stories but knowing my friends enjoy them will be all right by me.
===

My PlayStation's acting up very badly nowadays. There goes one of my sources of entertainment.

I now live in a sea
Full of numbers
Indecipherable symbols
Cryptic, verbose words
And enigmas who call
Themselves fellow souls

My head spins
Dazed and confused
What current do I follow?
Which wave should I ride?
How sure am I that
Whichever I set my feeble mind to
Won't drag me deeper
Drown me in the depth
Of manufactured despair?

Why can't things be
As easy as 1, 2, 3
Where there isn't any gray,
Simply black and white
Why can't I just
Pull myself out of this ocean
Float to the surface
Feel the air beyond my fingertips
Why can't life be
A little less complicated

I tread and swim
No matter how much effort I put
I see dregs of numerous souls
Sinking as I rise
...Or am I even rising at all?
This sea is simply too deep
And we are all
Drowning
Killing ourselves
In our own complexities
===

One of my grandmas was hospitalized on Good Friday (which also happened to be Mom's birthday) for high blood pressure. We had a little scare that day, but now Inang's doing better and should be out of the hospital.

I'm just glad nothing else happened.
===

Finals week, it is. Statistics went pretty good, although some doubts entered my psyche about some of the questions...

I got MATHAN1 finals later. Wish me luck.
===

Mao's leaving for the US this summer. I think she's leaving right after the calculus finals.

I wish you well, friend. Take care.
===

Rumor says it that Cher's in the running for councilorship of Isabel, Leyte. She told me she was reportedly slated at fourth spot out of eight winners, and there are 26 candidates all in all.

I'm proud of you, friend. Whatever happens, I'll be behind you all the time.

Watched the Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix last night.

Despite the inevitable conclusion (Ferrari winning AGAIN), I'm glad everywhere else on the track, there was a lot of honest-to-goodness, wheel-to-wheel racing that I thought F1 never had. All too often the 16 or so races seem so processional and boring. No wonder WRC now has more viewers.

Bahrain proved F1 has what it takes to win the hearts of race aficionados. I just wish there were more tracks like it, the kind that provide overtaking opportunities EVERYWHERE, not just in the pits. No one enjoys watching clever pit strategy, Mr. Ecclestone.

Am very disappointed with McLaren-Mercedes Benz, whom I've supported ever since I followed F1. All their cars seem to get worse and worse each year. What use is getting the best race drivers when you can't get them the machinery to do their jobs in?

But now I'm very delighted with British American Racing Honda's consistent performance, winning their second straight podium position in third. Honda seem to be able to recoup their humiliating recent record of grenading engines. Kudos to long-overdue miracle boy Jenson Button...I am now officially one of his fans.
===

After two weeks of missing badminton, I am pleasantly surprised at how well I did today, when I did come back to play. Today's record: three wins, one loss.

I am ON today.
===

Found a dead mosquito in our rice bowl tonight as I was having dinner. It must have died from the trapped heat. Ewww.

No matter what people say about eating insects as an extra dose of protein, I cannot stomach eating them.
===

Amazing how true friends can find enough time from their busy schedules to listen to others rant and whine.

Thanks for the advice, Cher. Amishu. Am always here if you need help. *LOTSAHUGS*
===

I've long been
Staring at your life
A forbidden glance
Into the secrets you hold
The workings of your mind
The yearnings of your soul
Yet I find
When it comes to being
What I want to be to you
All the staring I do
Into your being
No matter how hard
No matter how long
No matter how often
I find myself
As confused as ever
I always return
To the nothingness I began with

Attended the first death anniversary of one of my mom's friends. After the mass (way shorter than I'm used to), we had a really early dinner at the grotto area. For dessert there were four dozen-boxes of Gonuts Donuts---pretty much the local equivalent of Krispy Kreme.

Inevitably we had to talk about Krispy Kreme's pending arrival here as well. Funny how anyone with a sane state of mind will consider forking out PhP80 for each piece of what's essentially policeman food. There's something really, really wrong with that picture...
===

Sigh...I've been lethargic for the past couple of weeks and blaming it all on the heat doesn't seem to make sense.

I guess part of me isn't happy with how things are right now. I have to admit this term has been the most monotonous I've ever had---one I never really enjoyed, one I simply let slide over me, one I didn't feel any motivation to perform in. The only thing I really devoted myself to was badminton...and even then I don't feel like I got much out of it. I feel as if I wasted my time playing games when I should have been involved with orgs...even just to fill up my resume to show potential employers that I had a life.

And then there's this issue of me admiring a certain someone who suddenly seems so cold and aloof. I guess I'm doomed to never have my way with women at all.

I'm really not happy. I've become so sick of this routine...mainly because 90% of the time, I've been alone. I guess after all this time, I've gotten rather sick of myself.

Found out today that my MATHAN quiz scores were really, really low. I'm going to need a small miracle to muster enough points in the final exam just to pass.

Our prof asked me what was the matter. I told her I didn't know, myself. I'm aware I'm one of the more active people in class and I usually give the right answers orally, but whenever I'm alone and faced with a test booklet and only so many minutes to do the quiz in, I just get lost.

Shit.
===

On a side note I'm glad my instruction helped my young classmates in today's STAT102 quiz. It kinda took the edge off my moping over MATHAN.

Good luck guys. I'll tutor you again for the finals.
===

Now that the term's almost over I feel like going to sleep for a little while.

I can't just yet though. I still have to adjust my schedule next term so that I get PROJCO2 with my thesismates as well. I still have to do statistical analysis for our Market Research survey. I still have final exams to finish.

Looks like that extended nap will have to wait.

It amazes me how people can go on for so long without sleep.

Me? I'd rather hit the sack than succumb to another bout of TB.
===

It's April Fools day today...not like I'm one for pranks, much.
===

Got to YM with Chrissa last night after not having contact with my UPian friend for so long. Apparently she and Kathy had problems with their academics lately and were in danger of getting delayed.

Good luck to your exam tomorrow, friend.
===

I'm hosting our Literature Elective and Marketing Research final projects later (they're both presentations). That means I'm coming to school in stuffy businesslike clothes in the sweltering summer heat.

Right.
===

I've had my fill of driving in the cramped streets of Binondo, Manila and Caloocan. I'm sick of opportunistic drivers blocking my lane because they want to make a left turn in the wrong places. I spite the swerving buses and lane-cutting jeeps.

I'm just glad I live in the suburbs of Para?aque.
===

Honda Club's planning an outrageously packed-chock-full-of-activities Summer EB this April 24th at Subic.

MAN! I wish I can come! If only to try out a lap or two of circuit driving...

Kudos to President Jun and all the other officers for this one.
===

I'm back from school...and while our reports were a mixed bag, at least I went home happy and in a good mood.

After the extended MARKRES class (our final meeting), three of my classmates from STAT102 wanted me to help them study for tomorrow's quiz. I originally planned to go home at 4:00pm, but I ended up leaving for home at 6:30. I guess that's how much I wanted these girls to pass the coming quiz---I didn't mind being late as long as I was able to help them understand what I was able to. (Good luck to BJ, Pia and Lyn.)

I think it's also an indication of a potential career I should consider taking in the future. I've been ignoring it all this time, but on the way home, mired in the traffic of Quirino Ave., I was actually pondering being a teacher.

I've been helping classmates all this time with the subjects I was good at; I know I'll need some sort of M.A. if I'm going to teach in DLSU, and I don't really plan to take an M.A. in Economics or Statistics or whatever. Maybe I should take it to DLSZ, my high school...and while I'm at it maybe I can teach either economics or statistics?

I now have two possible careers---my dad pushed me into being a motoring writer once. What pipe dreams, these two are. Heheheheh!
===

Happy birthday Twisha! :D

Spent the night at Jensy's in Caloocan, which my parents didn't really approve of (it's in Caloocan) but let me do so anyway. We had to wrack our brains figuring out how to use SPSS to help us analyze our data for our Marketing Research survey.

Let me just say SPSS isn't the most user-friendly program around. It pretends to be as ubiquitous as Microsoft Excel, but it takes many a glance at its Student Assistant videos to get a hang of its many functions.

The five of us---KD, Jensy, Anna, Tantan and I---were crammed in Jensy's room, tallying results, playing music (through her awesomely powerful Altec Lansing speakers), laughing our heads off. It was fun, despite being pressured by time.

I was the one who hit the sack the earliest; at around 11:30 pm I succumbed to my exhaustion. Apparently I was embarrassing myself while I was asleep by snoring. I really wish I could do something about it...but it looks like I'm a born snorer. I was up the earliest as well; I had to be given that I still had an 8:00 class today.
===

More to come later.

Transparent to all
Porous, permeable
Why must I be so?
Any action brewing in my head
Before its realization
Instantly predicated by disdain
===

After all these years, I wish I had more of a spine.

I wish I always had the guts to tell people the truth about how I perceive them. I wish I always had enough confidence in myself to stand up for myself and my thoughts despite the jeers that inevitably come. I wish I could reach out and tell the special people in my life that I love them just the way they are, without coming off as insincere or sarcastic.

Yes, I am a wimp...and goddamnit, I wish I weren't.
===

I got started on our thesis film's storyboard just last Saturday night. So far I've been trying my best to draw with details, like I usually do, yet draw in the shots I had in mind with speed.

I'm not so sure if what I'm doing works, but so far I've done 5 scenes out of 25. If the cells weren't so small, and if I had more talent and/or time on my hands (I'm poor at drawing backgrounds), I could probably envision my storyboard as some sort of long comic strip.

I remember watching some behind-the-scenes specials for The Matrix and I was flabbergasted at how detailed the storyboards were. It was as if some top-flight comic book pencillers and inkers got to work on the blank cells and presented the movie's scenes almost exactly like we all saw them on the silver screen.

I sure can't come close to doing anything that marvelous!
===

I guess I have to be honest: I'm pretty bad at keeping secrets to myself. It's not that I tattle on others (I almost never tell on other people's secrets). It's just that the things I keep hidden from others are the ones that tend to eat at me inside like some proverbial can of worms. Most of these worms I keep within are all about myself.

There are times I wish I could just open up to friends and let it all out, in the hope that I might feel better afterwards. I guess I just got my hopes up too high though. I'm discovering the painful reality that in college, everyone has his/her own little world, where he/she is the center of it and everyone else is simply an actor playing some sort of part to his/her advantage. Sad but true.

I guess there's not much I can do to cure my eternal habit of talking to myself, then. Melancholic, I am.
===

I admire how you think, how creative you are, how magically your spirit conjures up its ideas. I admire your refreshing taste in fashion. I admire your sense of humor and how amiable you are. I admire how calm and unruffled you are by the challenges you meet everyday.

Yet you do not want to be admired. You view it as a sickness. You desire and long to be undesirable...yet you are doomed not to be so.

If admiring you is a disease, I am afraid it might be one I may not recover from.

Managed to dig up info from my fellow SX8ers about how I can repair my car's ills...at a smaller cash outlay than I thought. Now it's probably just a matter of saving up the money, which I should get to work on.

After finishing that thesis.
===

Reminder to self: The start of the local campaign season brings with it unbelievable traffic.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing this morning, strapped inside my car. Cars were at a standstill or crawling at a snail's pace all along the South Luzon Expressway. This had to happen when I had a quiz in MATHAN1 I couldn't afford to miss.

Obviously someone wasn't doing their job properly...

I was practically wailing helplessly behind the wheel, regretting my non-use of the Skyway.

Just so you know I arrived 20 minutes late...and by some act of God I managed to finish the test. Can't say my answers were all bulletproof though. I do wonder how on earth I'm going to pass MATHAN1?

I don't know about you guys but personally I don't like the way us Filipinos have to constantly shout to the world that one of us made it big somewhere.

I've had my fill of hearing left and right that some Fil-Am made it to "American Idol," or some Fil-Am's a second-rate actor or comedian, or what have you. The term "Fil-American" is misleading. How sure are we that this "child of the Philippines" is more Filipino and less American than we think he/she is?

I know Pinoys need an ego boost every now and then, just to prove to ourselves that "yes, the Filipino can." I wish however that the Filipinos we glamorize have a more substantial contribution to the world, rather than just being some flash-in-the-pan starstruck celebrity.

I also wish that we didn't need Fil-Ams to glorify our race. I want Filipinos to do us honor so we can prove to Pinoy-bashing foreigners that we're more than just Spanish-influenced misfits in the cultural tapestry that is Asia.

While I'm on the subject I'm pretty much amazed that some Pinoys are planning to be the first national team to climb Mt. Everest. True, it's a been-there-done-that kind of thing, but it's marvelous nonetheless (considering we're tropical rugrats that don't have the high-hemoglobin benefit of the native Sherpas). Godspeed to you.
===

I want to hold on to my SX8 Honda City, but things seem to pile up against its favor. My mom's considering ditching it and getting a new car.

Honda Makati told me about replacing the steering column, although frankly I think I was being fooled by them overenthusiastic service advisors looking for a profit. The loud knocking noise from the steering over rough terrain has gone away, being a simple isolated incident. However, the car needs new rubber on its alloys soon enough. I would love to see the various dents on the car's bodywork gone as well. And if that weren't enough, my shocks might even need replacing---my ride height seems too high especially at the back.

If I'm going to calculate the costs it'd break down to this.
Tires: PhP1,750 per tire X 4 = PhP7,000
Dent removal/painting: PhP3,000 (estimate)
Paraut shock absorbers: PhP2,500 X 4 = PhP10,000

Total PhP20,000 (estimate)

Where am I going to get that sort of money? All the meager income I get from selling Avon products goes to my thesis, and even then I'm forced to cover up for my debts because my customers don't seem to be paying as early as I'd like them to.

Mom's complained time and again about the prohibitively high price of maintenance for my little blue runabout. I can probably bring the car for periodic maintenance away from Honda Makati and its sky-high costs. For a simple oil change or tuneup I should just bring it to our friendly Caltex lube bay. I'll probably just bring it in to Honda Makati for any major checkups that will come after 20,000 km.

So many things seem to be wrong with my car...yet I love the damn thing. I have the feeling that looking after my car might be the death of me and my bank account.
===

Thought I'd indulge in some poetry of my own. Bear in mind I'm no Robert Burns.
===

I didn't notice
You were filling a void
A void I thought I'd
Plugged up for good
And I am scared
For letting you into me
Might just be the biggest
Blunder of all

Emotions
Fleeting bundles of humanity
I thought I'd best do without
Yet I am victim to them too:
Human
Not perfect
Not infallible
Pitiable and weak
Subject to the wiles and whims
Of hormones and genetics

Circumstance
You and I are to part
Yes, soon enough
How much sand do I
Still have in your hourglass?
Shall I evict you from myself
Or should I hold on
I do not know

Someone seems to have hacked into my e-mail account.

For some reason I've been getting undelivered-mail notices from people I never even bother sending mail to, for the simple reason that I don't know them. Worse, I seem to have sent them malicious mail with virus-laden attachments without my knowing.

Changed my password just to be sure.
===

I had a pretty intense night's sleep when I woke up today. I had three or four powerful dreams, all exploring my fears. These felt so real. It was as if I was really in them, although they fell short of being totally "lucid dreams" because for some reason I couldn't be in control of the situations I was placed in.

Olive just had to be in one of them---and it had to be the one that sticks in my mind the most. Yuck.

At least I got to work with Parasite Eve's hottie Aya Brea in that one. She was ball-breakingly stern in my dream, but man, she's a babe! Too bad she had to turn on me and bust my ass...
===

Got an e-mail from an alleged Filipino-bashing radio personality based in the US. Personally I could really care less about what he said about us being filthy, dirty, uncultured and Third World. So what? I don't really give a shit what he thinks. These race-bashing idiots are simply afraid and too closed-minded.
===

I had a pretty hectic Saturday. That afternoon I was around for Honda Club's March EB, and I got to watch a bit of the "Honda Excites" event.

Managed to watch the burnout competition, which featured various tuned EK Civics trying to smoke their front tires and leave as much rubber as possible on the asphalt. Some of the competitors' friends were even physically pulling the car by the window frames to avoid it from running off prematurely. That event was a total waste of motor oil (to get the tires slipping and smoking) and tires, possibly even engines...but man, did it draw a crowd or what!

Apparently I'd won the early bird award for arriving earliest among the non-officers in the club. Got a red cap and mug from Cisco Systems and a blue umbrella from HP. Cool.

I even managed to climb aboard Lyndon's mildly modified red EF Civic hatch (the SX8 City's grandpa) to grab a bite or two at Brothers Burger. He nailed the throttle until it hit the redline on the first two gears...and man, what a noise! My stock SX8 feels and sounds mild by comparison.

That evening I got to watch the DLSU Pops Orchestra's annual major concert, this time at the CCP. Pops was pretty much great, apart from a couple of noticeable fauxes pases.

The fly in the ointment was the technical personnel. So many times the vocalists were belting their throats out to the audience...only not to be heard because their mikes were off and the spotlights were wandering off somewhere else. These sorts of mistakes were irritating and definitely not worthy of a performance at the CCP.
===

Along the way home at around 10:30pm, I took the Skyway to hasten my arrival time at home. I was cruising at a steady 90-100 km/h (legal limit) when a white Nissan Patrol SUV zoomed past while we were nearing the toll plaza. Apparently no one was enforcing the speed limit at this late hour.

When I passed the toll plaza, I sunk my right foot into the floorboard, redlining the engine through the first two gears. The acceleration slingshot me past the Patrol. I then performed a quick shift to top gear to a relaxed cruise, speedo needle pinned at 100 km/h.

Around a minute later I saw the Patrol accelerating again, trying to catch up with me, definitely going faster than legal. Fully convinced no one was going to point a radar gun at me, I blipped the throttle, cranked the shifter to third, dropped the clutch and rocketed my way to 140 km/h---just to prove that this idiot ran indecent speed on the wrong kind of fuel and on the wrong vehicle.

The SUV never even came close. By the time we both exited via the Bicutan off-ramp, I was too far out of reach.

I do these things on a stock D15B7 engine with no VTEC...I wonder what more I can do had I possessed the budget to modify the car?

Pipe dreams, I guess. Not until I take 6 months on a good-paying job.

I'm just happy I got to test how the car now feels at serious speed once again, after keeping to the legal limit for a long while. The high-speed shaking is still there, still kicking in at around 125 km/h or so, but the other SX8ers of HCP experience this too so I guess I'm not alone. They tell me it should go away the faster I go, but I'm not too sure I'd want to do that.

Battle Gear 2 definitely got the better of me and my wallet today.

I was hooked up to the driving cabinet at Robinsons Place Manila for so many games on end. It's not even funny how much I've spent on the game, considering it's a lot cheaper per game than Initial D ver.2 or ver.3.

But thanks to all the practice, I can now say I've somewhat mastered the downhill mountain pass, Course 4, on all three classes. Managed to record ghosts of my best runs on each class. Class-C was with the EK9 Honda Civic Type R, Class-B was on the FC3S Mazda RX-7 and Class-A was on the NA2 Honda NSX. I've gotten the gist of how to drift these awesome JDM street stars around the tight, sequential corners.

Still have to do so in real life though.
===

I'm running out of steam. I want this term to be over immediately.

I still have to finalize the thesis script and make a damn storyboard though (so we can go shoot in the summertime). Not to mention there's also the MARKRES research plan and computations to do. And that crappy report on "Vanilla Sky" for LITELEC.

Man, I don't even want to think of doing these...all I want to do is get rested and exhaust myself again playing badminton.
===

I guess I'm just down on motivation to go finish the two or so years left in my college life. I don't know. Every new term just seems to feel like the last one.

I guess people can say I'm bored.
===

And this is not goodbye, she said
It is just time for me to rest my head
She does not walk, she runs instead
Down these jagged streets and into my bed

When I was
Fumbling through your dresser drawer
Forgot what I was looking for
To try to guide me in the right direction
Making use of all this time
Keeping everything inside
Close my eyes and listen to you crying

I'm lifting you up, I'm letting you down
I'll dance until dawn, I'm fooling around
I'm not giving up, I'm making your love
This city's made us crazy and we must get out

--- Maroon5, "Must Get Out"

I suppose I've written too much about badminton and too little about my life these days. I suppose it's because I've beem voluntarily keeping myself busy so as not to think about any other things that might ruin my days.
===

I've been single for a year or so. Most of that time was spent simply trying to get over my first relationship and burying its ghosts completely, moving on with my life. Somehow though, I feel I won't be convinced I've moved on until I get into another relationship.

Therein lies my current state of mind.

For some reason I don't feel the compulsion to go out and meet pretty girls like I used to. I see them all the time (it can't be helped, I study in the College of Liberal Arts), but I don't feel as mystified by their beauty and charm this time around. It's not simply because I'm naturally very shy and don't know jack about courting women, either. I just feel that there are better things to do than entangle myself in a relationship right now.

Granted, I miss all the emotion and the openness I used to enjoy with my ex. There are a lot of things I think of everyday that I don't divulge even on this blog. Maybe it's self-censorship, maybe it's my fear of getting rejected or thought of as weirder than I already am. But I have to agree with Lin Kong's decision in Ha Jin's novel "Waiting": if I had to choose between having burning love and peace of mind, I'd definitely take the latter.

Cher also warned me about the dangers of getting into another relationship. She told me it was actually quite good that Denise and I didn't end up together as I might just end up comparing her with my ex, because in her opinion, at that time I wasn't as finished with my previous relationship as I ought to have been. No one deserves that kind of treatment.

This is me being very honest: I'm as lustful for women and sex as the next heterosexual guy. I submit to my desires every now and then (think of that statement what you may). I'm still even idealistic enough to believe that someday, somewhere, a woman will come along in my life that will be just so right for me.

Right now though, involvement with women is the least of my priorities.
===

I remember feeling a bit of resentment towards Ms. Milette Zamora, the Marketing Dept.'s vice-chairperson, when she angrily stormed into our MARKSAM class last January and told us illegitimate students to drop the class immediately.

After her three-day seminar on Art in Advertising though, I hold her in very high esteem. Her lecture was, quite frankly, awesome. She really did know her advertising well. Ms. Zamora basically took the predominant elements and treatments from the 10 or so major art eras and studied how they got applied in modern advertisements---art including layout, architecture, catchphrases and music. She knows how to make people laugh, too. And have I mentioned she plays the meanest classical guitar I've ever seen?

I look forward to having her as my professor for MARKAD1.
===

Mao wrote in her blog that she, along with a lot of other people, wants to see people with passion for what they do.

I wonder...it's these very same people who risk a whole lot, really. For every bloke that gets noticed for the passion he puts into what he loves doing, there are at least 10 others who don't get the recognition they deserve. Unfortunately these 10 go the route of the also-rans, never to get any proper compensation.

Sad, but this is the reality of the world. Some people will never really know.
===

Paolo and Bong were inviting me to go somewhere today, but judging from their silence, they seem to have taken it back. I'm pretty much resting at home today.

Not a bit too shabby, too: I need my energy for tomorrow's tourney.

My heels hurt. Methinks they're asking for new badminton shoes faster than I can earn the money to buy them.

Then again, if you played for 6 hours, your feet would complain too.
===

While checking my e-mail, I was sent the schedule of games and the final player list for the DLSZ Alumni Association badminton tourney on Sunday.

Seems as if there isn't a lower class than what I was put in (C1). No matter, I'll play my best anyway. I didn't see any familiar names on the player listing though.

The tourney starts at 8:00am and ends around 5:30pm. That equates to quite a long stay at South Smash.

I can feel my heels protesting already.
===

After securing a computer ahead of time and suffering from inexplicable delays in accessing DLSU's website, I finally got to input my schedule for next term.

I got a loaded 4-class MWF sked and a single class on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I think it's pretty much ideal for any badminton and thesis work I might have to do.
===

I miss Cher. I'm thinking of sending her snail mail after Sunday's tournament. She tells me she's gotten a little impatient with waiting for campaign season to start on the 25th.

Kaya mo yan, friend. :)

On the subject of badminton shoes: Kawasaki or Mizuno?

Coach Hermes told us he had incoming stocks of Kawasaki badminton shoes at PhP2,500. The brand did seem like a dedicated badminton shoe brand, unlike Yonex and Mizuno which also made volleyball shoes. I do remember Bart wearing Kawasakis too...maybe I should opt for them instead?

Sigh...before that happens though I gotta save up some more.
===

I have seen the light. I've seen how expensive playing Initial D ver.2 can be. I found a game that's just as engaging and is less expensive.

I now play Taito's Battle Gear 2. It has the same RHD driving position, the same twisty mountain road courses (and even some street circuits) and a similar if less numerous complement of great JDM road cars. No saving my progress on a magnetic card though, but that's something I can let go of when I save PhP20 per game and still enjoy the capability of performing true drifts.

I tried practicing on BG2, and I even got my runs on Course 4 saved as ghost car runs for others to beat on Time Attack. Scored the Class-C ghost in an EK9 Honda Civic Type R, while I scored the Class-B ghost run in an AP1 Honda S2000.
===

Had leveling for the DLSZ Alumni badminton tourney last Sunday.

I didn't see too many familiar faces, but I did have a great time at South Smash's foot-friendlier Taraflex-on-wood courts. A lot of the players there were really great----good for A and B rank. I was initially ranked B2 myself, but the organizers seemed to take pity on my relative inexperience and put me in C1 instead. Not bad for a first tourney, I guess.

As friendly as Taraflex courts are, I'm not prepared to pay PhP350 per HOUR playing at South Smash. I'll stick to rubber-painted cement at PhP60 the whole day at Villamor AFB, thanks.
===

Leveling did leave me largely exhausted the whole week though. Up until today I still feel lethargic and running on very little energy. When I played at Villamor on Monday, I felt as if my body refused to chase shuttlecocks even if I was commanding every muscle to do so.
===

Had a seminar for my Literature elective subject today, and it was on F. H. Batacan's detective novel "Smaller and Smaller Circles." It was pretty interesting because the author was female, she wrote the very first Filipino detective novel, and the last thing I expected of it was that it was very bloody and gory.

After the seminar I wanted to buy a copy, but I was scrimping on cash and thought otherwise. PhP120 is cheap for a novel though. Better luck next time.

One unwelcome sight I saw at the seminar was Miss Olive Hernandez though. Apparently she now teaches literature in DLSU. Damn. I did not fancy seeing her again after irreconcilable differences working with her back in Zobel on Counterpoint and the yearbook.

The sooner I finish LITELEC, the better for me.
===

Yet again we are subjected to the rigors of setting up our schedules for next term. I'm now taking two "must-pass-or-else-get-horribly-delayed" subjects, MARKCU1 and QUATECH. Am taking COMLAW1, too (commercial law), and add to that my thesis subject PROJCO2, when Denise, Ercx and I are due to defend.

Critical term, the next one is...

February passed by so quickly. Damn.
===

I last wrote about my new Yonex shoes. Turns out they were devils to my tootsies. As they are they don't have much in arch support, so they left me flatfooted after wearing them the whole day just for walking. Also being thin-soled shoes, they have precious little cushioning power. Just warming up before a game left my feet absorbing huge shocks I didn't feel in my old Filas. As a result I didn't last very long in a game.

Last Friday I went around looking for some sort of solution. Personally I was looking for an insole or something by Dr. Scholl to aid the shock absorption. What I found wasn't exactly what I was looking for, but it was good all the same. Managed to find a pair of Sof-Sole AIRR insoles which were unfortunately sized for women's shoes, but fit my Yonex boots quite well anyways.

I wore them upon entry into Villamor AFB and I was pleasantly surprised with the improvement. I lasted at least 3 more hours without experiencing much pain in my feet and the shock absorption was working. The price was pretty dear though: those babies cost me PhP665. At least they're US-made and they work, I figured.

When I went back on Monday however, the left insole bunched up crosswise around the middle of my left foot and it felt quite weird, especially since I was in the middle of a game. After losing that one I inspected my shoes and found out the treaded underside of them insoles couldn't stand the strains of badminton footwork, so they simply disintegrated. Some of the gray stuff stuck to my shoe's interior. I just did my best to refit the insole sans some of its slip-resisting undercoating and it worked all right afterwards.

Yonex might be a grand name for badminton products, but now I know from personal experience that their shoes aren't as good as they're touted to be. Adding to the aforementioned comfort issues, a couple of weeks after my purchase the exterior now shows signs of wear and tear.

I'm taking Ate Lyn's advice and buying Mizunos instead for my next pair of badminton shoes. I might have to fork out a little more but judging from other people's good experience, I'd say it's worth it.
===

Speaking of badminton I've managed to break my second pair of strings in 3 months. Both were blue Yonex BG66s. I know this type isn't noteworthy for its durability, but I never expected it to dismantle itself simply from wearing itself out on the edge of my racket.

I got light blue Yonex BG65 instead---a durable string (or so it's touted to be). Already I can tell the smash sound is better than what I got from the praised-for-smash-sound BG66. Hmmm...
===

Ercx told me about a badminton tourney the De La Salle Zobel Alumni Association were planning to hold. Leveling was set on the 7th, at South Smash in Alabang.

Now I know I'm not that good (my shot placement and defense needs plenty of practice) but I'm interested in this tourney they're planning. I just want to test how good I am against fellow Zobel alumni. I'm pretty much looking forward to it.
===

The heat is almost unbearable here. That's pretty much the indicator that summer's here already. I'd kill to be able to lie in a bucket of iced water the whole day.

The gallon jug I bring with me on badminton days doesn't seem to be enough to quench my thirst, too. Just 3 hours after I enter Villamor on a typical Monday or Friday, the water's all gone.

Phew...
===

Lately I've been on a gaming spree. After not touching my PlayStation for anything other than Gran Turismo, I suddenly splurged on all these games I decided to play.

I got Tenchu 2, Parasite Eve 2, the original Rockman (a rip-off, actually, but it's dirt cheap so it's okay I guess), Ridge Racer Type 4 and Gundam Battle Assault 2. So far they've satisfied my gaming itch, especially Parasite Eve 2 which was damn hard.

This afternoon Bong and I even tried Need For Speed Underground and Gran Turismo 4: Prologue (i.e. demo version) on the PlayStation 2.

GT4's pretty much spot-on. The steering's still a LOT slower than the original, but now the game forces me to drive more smoothly than I did before and the use of weight shifting is excellent. They even got really tight and tricky tracks for rally mode too. Just a shame there aren't any pace notes to help navigation, unlike the other rally games.

NFS Underground is pretty much the best US-made effort for a driving/racing game. In terms of depth and breadth it's pretty much got the lot (circuit and street racing, sprints, drag races and even a cool drift contest). Graphics are amazing too. I say it gets 8/10 to the desirability of any GT game...which is high praise coming from a GT1 stalwart like me. I personally loved the drift contests.
===

Had to say goodbye to Cher for a while this Saturday. She's now in her hometown in Leyte devoting herself full-time to the campaign trail. We had lots of fun while we were on our final YM session though. We exchanged postal addresses and promised each other we'd send snail mail every now and then.

I'm gonna miss my kindred spirit and great friend. I really hope she does well come the May polls.

After going without a major purchase in quite a long while, I happened to go shopping in Robinsons Place Manila for badminton shoes to relieve my quick-wearing Filas (after my usual Dance Maniax 2nd Mix workout). On more than one occasion I've slipped on the courts because of the rapidly wearing soles on that pair.

Came across a good pair at just about the right price. I'm now shod with silver/black Yonex World Champion 2s at PhP2,500---my personal psychological price limit for new non-dress shoes.

They're a tad bit loose around my ankle, but as long as I tie them tight they fit quite well. Tried some usual maneuvers on the sports shop too---lunges, jumps and other badminton moves---just to get a feel of how they'd work on the court. I must say I'm impressed. The soles are even thin enough for me to perform a proper heel-and-toe.

I like 'em.

On Valentine's Day I got my car checked for its regular 40,000-km periodic maintenance, and also had it inspected for any defects and malfunctions. Turns out I need to replace my power steering column, get new tires and then get them all aligned.

Total bill's going to come around PhP21,000 including labor.

Yikes. That's almost double what my dad paid for replacing our old Corolla's clutch assembly, brake pads, axle boots and engine mounts.

Sigh...maintaining a car is expensive! Just when I was beginning to earn money of my own...
===

Got to watch "Vanilla Sky" that night and it was pretty good. At least it was more substantial than simply being a Penelope Cruz-Tom Cruise starring vehicle...it had a little more meat into it than I thought.

It's a good flick to watch.

I even sort of enjoyed watching "2Fast 2Furious" because it wasn't the racer-wannabe movie the first one was. It's over-the-top in its stunts, true, but at least there's now a clear demarcation line in the film that tells us that it's just a movie.

Hmmm...I noticed I'm watching more and more movies lately. I must be trying to keep up with my movie drought these past 6 months.
===

Nicole's probably going to drag me into watching more recent movies next term. I already asked her about enrolling in Economics 3 and she was game.

I miss her and her craziness.
===

Today I left early to claim my confiscated license back once and for all.

Left home at 7am and arrived at LTO's head office around 8. After the informative and entertaining seminar and answering all those 60 exam questions, I paid up the fee for my violation (PhP510 for "reckless driving"---probably what speeding falls under) and waited in the heat.

At 12 noon, hungry and thirsty, I finally got my license back. I took the initiative to brave the noontime southbound traffic along EDSA and get back to my Marketing Research class at 1pm...and I made it just in time. I even got to refuel my car along the way.

Not bad for a day's work...but I wish the waiting time was decreased. I even wish we never had to have our licenses confiscated, just like in other countries where they use a demerit system instead.

Wishful thinking, yes.
===

GTO seems to have ended its run on Animax...and I enjoyed every rollicking minute of it. I'm going to miss that anime. I still hope there's more in store though. Onizuka and his class are well worth watching over and over again, over all 42 or so episodes.

My car's due in for its 40,000-km maintenance servicing. I gotta do my City a favor and have it thoroughly checked. Strange little things have been happening with me behind the wheel, not least of which is an ominous metallic sound I heard from below. Couldn't tell whether it was just rocks hitting the underpinnings, or something more serious.
===

I was caught for speeding on the Skyway last Sunday---with my mom in the front seat.

I was caught by a radar gun rolling along at 116 km/h where I should've been going at 100. Apparently there were a lot of offenders caught unaware that the 100 km/h limit was now being strictly enforced along the 8-km elevated highway. I saw the cop's list and it had cars going at 140-150 km/h (so I guess I wasn't doing too bad after all).

Wednesday afternoon (my birthday), I drove along EDSA to get to the LTO main office along East Ave. to claim my license back. Unfortunately after braving all that traffic and dodging all those errant buses hot on swapping paint with me, I got there only to have my ticket renewed. They said they didn't have my license yet and I should come back on the 17th.

Major hassle. To think that I'm probably going to have to attend that stupid 2-hour seminar of theirs and pay a fine, not to mention having to brave long lines.

I'm boycotting the Skyway...unless it's an important situation. I've figured out potential reasons why the lower level of the South Luzon Expressway isn't as vigorously monitored...I'll take my chances there.
===

Birthday was pretty okay. Since it was also my mom and dad's wedding anniversary we had dinner out at Outback Steakhouse in Alabang. Got some money from relatives too.

Was rummaging the sports stores in Robinsons Place earlier that afternoon. Found a pair of Yonex AR65 badminton shoes selling for only PhP2,400. What a steal!

Too bad that was the last pair, and it was nowhere close to accommodating my size-9 feet.

Oh well.
===

I am doomed with the curse of good memory. Now that I'm 21, I should learn how to forget.

There's a lot of things I wanted to post and talk about but sadly I'm kinda pressed for time. They'll have to wait until I get to spend longer hours online.

In the meantime I am touched that so many people greeted me on my birthday (even a day early). Most touching was the overwhelming greeting from HCP, since I'd been gone from their boards for almost 3 months. They've got a new IPB-powered forum, by the way.

Cher also called me at midnight while I was watching "Hannibal" on VCD for my detective fiction class.

Thanks guys.

Played five games of badminton yesterday. 3 wins, 2 losses. Not bad at all, I guess. Coach Rey remarked that I got stronger on court already.

I got to meet a couple of guys new to the sport and were seriously enjoying it, even though they didn't have rackets of their own yet. Even without training, Val and Rey played pretty well, unlike how I did in my first couple of games. Val was a regular at the PAF gym, while pilot Rey used to play tennis.

With a bit of training they'll be better. I'm looking forward to playing against them sometime.
===

Badminton is taking a toll on me, I guess. Not that I'm complaining though.

Every night I just plop off to sleep satisfied, aching muscles and all. My blood pressure's at 90/70 mm Hg and my resting heart rate's at a low 68 bpm. That's always good.

Now if I could just lose more weight...
===

The results of our STAT102 quiz came out yesterday. Apparently I did well enough to ace the test. I was kinda embarrassed by the attention I got from my former STAT101 classmates, but was satisfied anyway.
===

I oughta get ready for school. Yaaaaawn.

Mom and Bianx are in Batangas right now. I pretty much woke up at 6:30 am to bring them to Alabang to meet up with their companions.

In the meantime, today I attended John's aerobics/Pilates class and did the grocery shopping all by myself.

I never quite thought that grocery shopping could actually be tough. I had a list in hand while I was browsing SM Bicutan's supermarket, true, but the unfamiliar layout of the place and my own unfamiliarity with the task kinda took me longer to get it over with. Sure, I accompany my mom when she shops for groceries pretty often, but this time I was alone.

List in hand, I was even making a running tally of the prices of the things I plopped into my pushcart. When I saw things that weren't in the list but I wanted anyway, I listed them down on a different column with their prices. That's a little better than what my mom usually does, I guess.

When I arrived at the counter to pay for my load, I was a bit surprised to see that the final figure was a bit cheaper than what I'd haphazardly computed, but I was happy it was pretty close.

I oughta do the grocery shopping more often. By myself. It's a mighty good way of teaching myself how to keep track of expenditure.
===

Lsat week, Mom was complaining about the increasing frequency of my visits to the gas stations. Couldn't be helped I guess, since three times a week I've been driving to school, driving to Villamor AFB, driving back to school to fetch Bianx and Bong and driving back home. As fuel-efficient as my D15B7 engine is, such frequency of trips will need gas.

So this week, with a full tank of gasoline, I tried something else. Instead of going to Villamor AFB on Wednesdays, I'd go to Robinsons Place Ermita instead and play Dance Maniax 2nd Mix. That way I'm still exercising and I use much less fuel for the trip.
===

I left for RP after the Parokya ni Edgar concert, and to my surprise Helene was there in the arcade as well, with a likeable chap I was introduced to, Richard. It seems they'd seen me playing DM2, and Helene wanted a go at it too (and she was pretty good at that).

Nice meeting you two. :D
===

So...how's my fuel consumption?

After a typical school week and a few side trips (going to Avon's Taft office and bringing Mom and Bianx to Hillsborough) tallying up to 180 km, my tank's still a bit over half full. Considering how much harder I drive and how judiciously I blip my Honda's throttle for frequent downshifts, that's a respectable result.

I might still be doing 9 km/L. That's certainly nothing to complain about.
===

I'm exercising harder than ever, but I'm actually gaining weight. Yikes.

I wonder what's wrong with me.
===

I came clean with Denise this Friday. I told her everything---how I was so bitterly jealous---and apologized for being such an ass. I was surprised that she had still asked me about what I had to apologize for...does that mean I wasn't as much of as ass as I thought I was? Maybe so.

But when "being an ass" involves taking it to the highways...ehhh, maybe that's just my head working overtime.

With MARKSAM out of the way, I figured it's about time I straighten things out so that I can work on the thesis freely. Having a bone to pick with a fellow thesismate obviously isn't the smartest thing to do, considering Denise, Erica and I are on the same thesis boat for at least 5 more months.

Selling Avon products is probably going to be my way of supporting the thesis production financially, although I still don't know how much I'll be able to raise selling just Avon. Getting a 25% sales commission by default is comparably huge, yeah, but I gotta sell a lot more.

Right now I'm just taking it easy, I guess. I should start on the darned script.

I miss Cher.

I've been calling her, sending her SMS messages and buzzing her on YM all week, but she hasn't replied. Not even once. I'm more than a little worried about my Leyteña friend. I know it's busy times for her, what with campaign season and everything, but I still worry.

If you read this, Cher, please text or buzz me.

Take care always, my friend.

*HUGS*
===

Had my driver's license renewed today at the LTO remote office close to the Parañaque City Hall. I didn't enroll for LEAP class so I had today free. Bong tagged along.

It didn't take too long. Despite having to wait for the doctor's signature on my medical exam results, the whole procedure didn't take me more than an hour and a half and PhP550. Not too shabby, despite having to come back by the end of June to claim the card itself.
===

Parokya ni Edgar performed in school the other day at U-break. Man, what an experience. Chito Miranda was game right from the start, mouthing off wisecracks and basically having a grand time---even lying down on the amphitheater's lawn.

But what was more notable for me was their front act: a band from school called Bloomfield, made up of what I believe were lower-batch Engineering students.

These guys are seriously good.

They specialized in 1950s-1960s rock and roll tunes, playing "La Bamba" and "Twist and Shout" like they wrote them. (Finally, a band my mom would approve of.) Particularly amazing was the drummer; he practically stood out with a 4-minute-long drum solo complete with complicated fills and rolls. Bong and I were astounded by this guy's skill.

Bloomfield...I'll look forward to hearing them play again.
===

I learned from my medical exam at the LTO that my blood pressure was lower than was usual.

The nurse asked me, "Hindi ka ba nahihilo? Hindi ba sumasakit ang batok mo?" ("Don't you get dizzy? Doesn't your nape hurt?")

I shook my head.

Turns out my blood pressure registered 90/70 mm Hg.

Now I know the gene for hypertension runs in my family, but I never thought I'd have such low BP. Then again, anything above 90/60 is supposedly still normal. The nurse told me to take ferrous sulfate anyway.
===

This is a hauntingly beautiful song...
===

Yoru no machi wa shizuka de fukai umi no you
Tsuzuku michi ni tada ATASHI hitori dake
Tooi koe wo tayori ni aruite yuku no
Zutto sagashiteru sotto hikaru aoi hikari

At night, the town is quiet like the deep ocean
All alone on an endless road,
I walk following a distant voice
Always searching for the soft blue light

Nee ATASHI wo mitsukete
Soshite yonde KOKORO de
Donna ni hanareta to shite mo kikoeru kara

Please find me
And call me with your heart
Because I'll hear you no matter how far apart we are

Gin no akari ga tomoru sorezore no heya
Kitto dokoka ni wa iru to negainagara aruku

A silver light shines in every room;
I walk on hoping you're somewhere out there

Nee ANATA wo mitsukete
Soshite nido to wasurezu
Donna ni mune ga itakute mo soba ni iru no

I'll find you
And I'll never again forget you
No matter how much it hurts, I'll stay by your side

Tsunaida te wo
Hanasanai kara

Because I won't
Let go of your hand

ATASHI ga ANATA wo mitsukete
Soshite nido to wasurezu
Donna ni mune ga itakute mo soba ni iru no
Zutto zutto

I'll find you
And I'll never again forget you
No matter how much it hurts, I'll stay by your side
Always... always...

--- "Ningyo Hime," second ending theme to Chobits

I had to drop MARKSAM. It turns out I still have to take MARKCU1, and to do that, I'd have to pass MARKRES, which I'm taking now.

No matter what arguments our block will present about how the flowchart isn't being followed, we are still subject to it. So, somewhat dejectedly, I went online and dropped MARKSAM right away.

At least it spares me from the obligation to sell PhP20,000 by April.
===

Progress report: As of yesterday, I sold a smidgen under PhP3,500, and two-thirds of that came from Avon products.

I guess Avon doesn't give a shit about whether I'm enrolled in MARKSAM or not. At least I considered sticking with doing business with them. More or less, any authorization to sell their products won't be affected by my dropping of MARKSAM.

I just feel bad that so many of us made the same mistake, and it left only 7 legitimate students in my former MARKSAM section. That's not enough to maintain the section; it'll have to be dissolved. Those 7 legit students have to go to other MARKSAM sections.

Oh well...MARKSAM, see you in a year's time. By then, I'll be ready.
===

I think I'm improving in my badminton game. Now I can make proper smashes in a game.

Still have to improve my ball control though. That's something I still lack.
===

When I think about it, at least I can focus more on making our thesis with MARKSAM out of the way.

Damn. I feel like I'm not a Communication Arts major anymore.

I think I played pretty well this Friday. Played 3 or 4 games and I won two of them.

Friends suggested getting a towel grip on my racket so that it doesn't slip in my right hand, and I think it's working. Didn't stop me from accidentally throwing my racket into the other court while attempting a backhand return, though.

Still have to work on my drop shots...
===

ANIMAX opened this week and I'm so enjoying it.

Thanks to this channel I finally get to watch some of the best anime. GTO and Chobits are currently my favorites. Both are commendably funny for being unapologetically honest...such leaves me laughing like a fool every night. Plus, I get to watch 2 episodes of each every weekday.

The only problem's that it can interfere with me doing my homework...
===

Most of those scabs that dotted my face this week have fallen off. Thank goodness.

I hate acne and the inconvenience it represents.
===

Gong xi fa cai!

I confess to not being very fond of tikoy (that staple of Chinese New Year's), but when Mom got home with strawberry flavored tikoy from Eng Bee Tin, I couldn't resist trying.

It's good! Too bad it's such a rich food...
===

My mom's been urging me to limit my computer use, as one of her employees got seriously sick. Something with the guy's blood and how radiation from long-term exposure to his computer made it toxic.

Seriously...does she think staring at a computer is all I do? Does she not know I do all sorts of things besides using a computer?

I appreciate her concern for my health, but I am disappointed with how she thinks of me.

After training for quite some time, my badminton game still sucks. Basically I'm too tense in a game to actually apply anything I've learned from training, and that includes ball control and legwork.

Sigh...must train more.
===

My face hurts. It looks like someone took a pen-sized firebrand and poked it at my face at random. No thanks to the facial I got this afternoon.

What was supposed to be a 20-minute session lasted more than double that. And God knows I hate the masochism I have to subject myself to in the name of looking presentable. Tell me, who wants a dermatologist systematically pressing the shit out of their pimples?

Imagine my reaction when the derma told me to come back in two weeks to have another facial cleaning session.

Riiiiiiight.

I'm so looking forward to it.

Not.

My head hurts, my nose is stuffed up and I feel sleepy.

Shit.
===

Sometimes I just wonder what would become of me if I used my head less and my emotions more. Ever since I was six years old, I've felt I've become a puppet to my conscience---one that unfortunately works on overtime too often.

Just wondering about it makes the beast in me tingle with excitement.
===

Is this an effect of watching "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers?"

Man, I remind myself of Gollum. Yikes. Seriously, yikes.

I came pretty close to getting killed this morning.

While crossing the street to school on the pedestrian crossing, an oncoming red bus didn't seem to give any regard to my safety, much more other pedestrians. Bong told me I was one foot away from being roadkill.

Such a shame I was too shocked to remember taking note of the fool's plate number.
===

My body hurts. No doubt a result from all the badminton I played yesterday, as well as my new morning jogging habit on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I haven't felt so depleted of energy in a long while.

I wonder how I'd fare in training tomorrow...that is, if I do train. Amazingly my allowance this week ran out on me without me making any significant purchases. Well okay, so I owed Ailyn PhP200 for last Friday's training and I paid for it this Monday. But other than that I was pretty stingy.

Hmmm. I'm saving nothing so far. Damn.
===

I got a subject in Salesmanship (MARKSAM) this term...which has me and my classmates selling stuff. Our quota's pegged at PhP20,000.

Yikes. I've never been great at persuading people, let alone selling anything to people. A PhP20,000 quota scares me, quite frankly.

At least I'm getting an early start though: I've found two buyers for the "magic wallet" I'm using now, at Villamor AFB. The wallet pretty much snaps folded bills into place with nothing more than folding motion and elastic thread, but it's a novel and convenient way of bringing bills. Only downside's that there's no provision for coins.

Anna was cheering me up, telling me I could do it. I sure damn hope so.
===

At least our MARKSAM prof, Mr. Carlos Maglutac, seems like a likeable guy. He's big, fat and nocturnal (he works in a call center and teaches our afternoon class without a wink of sleep for 18 hours plus), and he's the jolly type who knows how to make us laugh.

He says he can teach us to persuade people into doing what we want them to do. I always wanted that sort of ability. Bring it on.
===

Mao gave me an idea. Just thought of resurrecting an old poem I wrote four years ago.
===

[Serenade In Your Sleep]

You don’t know me, but I know you well
If I wrote your memoirs, like pancakes they’d sell
With every day, we often see each other
It’s just that with me, you never dared to bother

I know you’re so sick of capricious men
Who see you as a pretty face and nothing much else
And grow tired of you after all the wedding bells
I must confess though: I’ve been one of them

At this point in time I know I could’ve done a lot
Just to prove to you I’m worthy of your heart
I could’ve swooned you like so many men
Yet I remain aloof, seemingly indifferent

We won’t ever get acquainted, I know that by now
Perhaps it’s for the best, but I’m having my doubts
My friends tell me, all I can do is keep
You in my heart, serenading you while you sleep

Played a number of games of badminton today...and I lost all of them. Apparently my defense is nonexistent, as I hardly do any sideways movement on the court.

Must train...
===

My friend Mao's got a new blog now. I must say I admire the way she writes...most especially her poetry.

Methinks she should seriously consider joining the Malate Literary Folio. I mean, she can write poetry and take great B&W pictures---what more can MLF ask for?
===

I'm not feeling like much of a writing mood right now. Let's just say I don't want to see some people right now. I might as well bury myself in the Japanese novels I borrowed and the badminton training I have to do.

After almost a month away from badminton, I got to train again at Villamor and I finally got to buy a new racket, too. I now have a silver graphite Kawasaki Control 370 with blue Yonex strings, and it's usefully lighter than my old aluminum Wilson Aggressor 120. I didn't get to use it yet though, as it was being tensioned while I was training.

Now if I had tennis or badminton shoes to go with 'em...
===

I got someone new to train me.

Coach Rey was having lunch so he had Bart coach me yesterday. Apparently he was from the national team before, and he'd been training to get back in after a year's absence.

Let's just say that one month of inactivity, coupled with Bart's strenuous training drills, left me panting, weak and dizzy afterwards. This just showed me that there's still more to badminton training than what I've had with Coach Rey so far...and that my footwork still sucks.

Coach did tell me I could cope with Bart's training regimen if I regularly showed up at the courts. Hmmm...I wonder how long it'd take me to do so.
===

Mao, Zeri and I were talking after calculus class about the very near future. We all wanted to do so many things and buy so much stuff. Unfortunately time and money were not on our side, especially since the next 5 months or so will see us slaving over our theses.

I'd sure love to attend that 2-day Hollywood Film School seminar on the 24th, like the two girls do, but I'm wondering if it's worth the PhP4,000. As of now I have at least PhP7,000 on hand, and some more money in a vault, but I don't know whether to spend it on new tires, our upcoming feature video thesis or whatever else desirable creeps into my gray matter.

One thing I'm sure of is that I'll have to forego at least one of those major expenses, and it can't be thesis.

Times like these, I wish for a part-time job. But that'll have to wait until summer 2005. For now I have no choice but to bite the bullet and save up PhP500 a week.

These past two days of school opening have been filled with very tight driving situations.
===

Yesterday, when I drove back to school to bring Bianca, I had to park my Honda in one of the tightest spots I've ever been in. The usual parking lot at Leon Guinto St. was already full, save for one pretty cramped corner boxed in by cars and a concrete wall.

I came to within millimeters of scraping a green EK Civic's left front bumper time and again, trying to maneuver my City into the spot. Finally managed to wedge my car in with sufficient space to disembark. All the while I was maneuvering, I didn't realize I was still quite a ways from scraping my car against the concrete wall.

Extracting the car from the lot was pretty tight too, albeit with much less effort. This time I was a smidgen away from getting fresh new dents from an AUV's bumper.

The experience convinced me that I was pretty good with parking, and I could probably do the old car-driving Lasallites justice back in those days when parking was scarce. But I'd really rather not do that again.
===

The second tight situation happened on my way home today in Mom's Pregio van. I'd been tailing an old gray Mercedes-Benz 250TD station wagon who happened to be going the same way I was. The Merc had an AAK sticker on his back window, which meant the driver was probably a karateka.

At the foot of the Buendia flyover, the Merc was attempting to move to the left lane avoiding the traffic going to the Skyway. I flashed my lights signaling that I was going through, but he ignored me and crawled to the left anyway, without signaling the lane change. Had I not braked and let him through, I might have hit his D-pillar.

Same thing happened on the on-ramp to the Magallanes flyover, still without him signalling and ignoring my headlight flashes. With the Merc effectively crowding my lane, this time I inched as close as I could get to the left-side gutter and sped through. Watching my right mirror, I avoided swapping gray Merc paint by a couple of inches, but the Merc driver was blowing his horn in protest.

Funny how he didn't realize that it was mainly his fault and he did the crowding maneuver to me twice.

Approaching the 3-lane off-ramp to Magallanes, I was behind a slow-moving light truck. The Merc flanked me on the left and tried to crowd into me AGAIN. He was trying to make me crash into the passing AE101 Corolla on the right lane, or the cement barriers on the right side. At this point I was pretty pissed at this wagon-driving asshole.

The AE101 went by, freeing up the right lane with a comfortable gap. I then made my move, moving the Pregio's tiller to the right and flooring the gas. Following the AE101, I overtook the light truck, returned to the middle lane and powered through clear of the maniacal Merc.

The Merc driver might have kicked the gut out of me out of the car, but when strapped to a steering wheel and pedals, I'm sorry to say that I am a better and more alert driver.

I will repeat my mantra: "Overtake decisively and responsibly."
===

Denise now has a boyfriend. The two of them were an item since the day after Christmas, and they were the last thing I saw before I went on home.

Honestly I was...shocked. Maybe it was pretty stupid of me to think so, but I always thought she'd be single and she wouldn't delve into a relationship anytime soon. Probably cheeky of me to say this but I thought she and I would end up together. At least now I can say "BLARGH! WRONG!" to that thought.

Right now I don't quite know how to feel---happy, sad, jealous, cheated or whatnot. At least I managed to act civilly in front of them. I know the latter two emotions I don't have any right to feel, but I can't help it.

Then again, in the back of my mind I knew she wouldn't stay single. Denise just knows too many guys.

To think she was pretty much the only person I was looking forward to talking to after the holiday break.

Sigh...
===

Pam wrote about attracting the wrong kinds of men. I wonder if I was the "fuckwit" in her life. Honestly, the realization hurt and I want to make it up to her somehow, immature as I may be.

Trying to mend my friendship with her is like talking to a wall, methinks. I know my attempts at it have been somewhat feeble at best, but I know it's pretty much all I can do when she's remained as civil but cold as she is toward me.

Guess I'll just have to swallow that bitter pill called futility.
===

Sigh...I don't know what it is with women. The more I try to win their attention, love and respect, the more they seem to run scared from me. What the fuck am I doing wrong?

What an overwhelmingly sad realization.

I might as well profess my undying love to automobiles.
===

By the way, happy birthday Cher!

Big news today on my sister's birthday involves the coming elections, since today the candidates rush to the Commission on Elections to file their Certificates of Candidacy for the elections in May.

I bet Cher's already filed hers as well, for councilor in her hometown. Whatever happens, I hope she comes through the campaigning and election happy and well.

A very happy New Year to one and all!
===

Yesterday saw me pretty much out of the house. Went with my mom to get my second chemical peel and buy some gifts for her clients in Makati. At that point Paolo texted me about his plan to go to Glorietta 4 as well, so I got my mom's consent and stayed behind to meet up with him.

While waiting for him I decided to take another whack at the Initial D ver.2 arcade game, which I had avoided playing all these months because of the prohibitively high price (PhP30 per race!) and the fact that these assholes just hogged the machines to themselves. Now that Timezone had an additional 2 cabinets...people still hogged the machines. Grrr.

Anyway it was lunch time and no one seemed to be touching the machines at that moment, so I decided to try my luck with "my car": my mildly modified yellow Honda S2000 roadster, after not touching it for so long. Needless to say, by the time Paolo got there, I had already spent PhP250 just on that game, bought at least 5 mods for the S2000, and cleared two of the game's six mountain passes (which I'm pretty proud of).
===

What can I say about Initial D ver.2?

Let's just say I didn't find it good or easy at first, having been so accustomed to an older game, Scud Race, that also emphasized drift driving. But that one has proper race courses with wide roads, so comparatively it's easier to drive in and perform big drifts. In contrast, Initial D ver.2 features 6 mountain passes as its courses---all very narrow and with increasing degrees of complexity, in keeping with the anime.

I found that while drifting is Initial D's focus, simply driving normally in the arcade game without bumping into the speed-robbing barriers was tough enough in itself. Good driving in most of the harder roads necessitated a few practice runs in Time Attack mode. Since weather and night driving also factor in the game, as well as the fact that the passes can be run either downhill or uphill...let's just say I'll have to be pretty fucking rich just to practice driving in all the game's possible race events.

Oh, and did I mention the setup of the driving cabinets was right-hand-drive? This made driving tougher, as I'm not very used to having the shifter on my left hand. I swear, every time I negotiated Akina's hairpin curves, my right hand never let go of the larger-than-expected steering wheel, despite my wrist already being twisted a great deal. As a result my right thumb now feels rather stiff from holding the wheel so oddly and twirling it so suddenly.

The key rule in Initial D ver.2 is to drive as fast as possible, but to avoid bumping or rubbing into anything so as not to rub off essential speed. To do that, you'll have to practice a lot, learn how to slow down properly before turns (engine braking and foot-braking helps a LOT)...and get used to the idiosyncrasies of RHD driving. FORGET PERFORMING DRIFTS, unless you're driving in Myogi or Usui. You'll be drifting if you drive well anyway...and if you fuck up trying a drift in, say, Akagi or Irohazaka, you'll lose a LOT of essential speed.
===

As I was saying, Paolo came along and we played even more games. All in all I spent PhP350 on that game, and I was lucky to get to play PhP100 free from Paolo's mom.

Paolo just got his own Initial D car card, and he chose to get a silver Nissan R34 Skyline GT-R. He seems to have enough points as he's managed to get a fancy exhaust and alloy rims on his 4WD supercar by now, and he's adjusting to the game pretty well. He told me the game wasn't the cheap cash-in he thought it would be.

I managed to pick up a left card as well...also an S2000 on it, and it looks like it hasn't been used.

At least now we got a good reason to go to Glorietta 4 now...although this means more saving to do. Blech. I'll never have enough money.
===

On the way to the parking lot I spotted Pam going down the escalators. Once Pao and I were outside the mall, I decided to give her a call and greet her a Happy New Year. She seemed fine and I was glad she and her grandma enjoyed the food for the gods I gave her.

Was nice seeing her again.
===

On the way home we got to ride in what seems to be their third Pajero. This newest one seemed like an automatic JDM 3-door from 1995-96, converted to left-hand-drive with surplus LHD dashboard parts. The conversion looked pretty good, apart from a deep scuff on the new right-hand dashboard, and the whole car felt like my dad's old RAV4 enlarged in all the right places. Paolo's dad got on the Skyway and gunned the 2.8L diesel lump to 140 km/h.

Damn...all their cars are diesel Pajeros! How cool!
===

Went to Nanay's in White Plains for the annual New Year's media noche buena. This being one of the few occasions that I drink, I pretty much took advantage of it.

I had three glasses of red wine, a glass of champagne and a Mule...and I was all red and tipsy afterwards. Damn, I am an alcoholic wimp. I suppose it doesn't matter much, since I'll probably end up being the designated driver for my friends if we ever go on a bar trip or whatever.

I'll admit it, I love driving too much to give a shit about getting tipsy or drunk. Besides, alcohol'll just screw up my driving skills. I feel there's more to life than drinking cocktails.

This year was pretty quiet in terms of fireworks...seems people have learned better. They seem to have resorted to some other form of thrill though. The TV had us witnessing some gay revelers in Binondo gyrating in front of the TV cameras, while some others got humiliated on national TV being dead drunk. Still, this New Year's seemed a bit different, a little more reserved. I can't really tell why or how.

Ah, it doesn't matter. It's 2004. I'll try to make the most out of it.
===

By the way, it's my sister's birthday a few seconds from now. Happy birthday Bianx!

My dad left for golf this morning with another one of his "JM, please read this!" articles. This one was particularly about marketing and how to swoon Juan dela Cruz (i.e. the Filipino everyman), which I thought timely as I had just finished my Marketing intro subject and was moving toward the majors.

This evening at dinner, he gave me a piece of his mind about the article. He told me that marketing was all about common sense, and that people who don't excel in specialist fields like management or accounting usually make it big as marketers. Then he told me that an element of mystery and curiosity must be maintained at all times to keep people interested, and this applied not only to products but also to the opposite sex. In other words he was telling me to be more mysterious, less open and available to others.

As much as I don't like hearing this advice, I think my dad has a point. People usually don't go looking for me because let's face it---I'm as easy to read as a billboard up there on a highway. I'm not in any way mysterious and I always make myself available for others...perhaps even to the point of saturation, where people just get their fill of being with me and get sick of me afterwards.

I guess in this sense, maybe it's my being overly nice that turns people off, and my dad was basically telling me that "nice guys finish last."

You know what? Maybe he's right.

Sigh...
===

Or maybe this was another way of telling me that taking up marketing isn't for me?
===

My car now has a plethora of scratches all over its dented left rear door. Perhaps this is a sign that I should save enough money to get the City's dents repaired and the whole car repainted.

Where am I going to get all the money for that? I'm struggling to keep what I set aside for new tires as it is. How much harder would it be to save up for dent repair and a paint job? I bet I'd need PhP16,000 for all that.

Must...save...
===

If there was one song that best described how I am with women, this might be it.

Beauty queen of only eighteen
She had some trouble with herself
He was always there to help her
She always belonged to someone else

I drove for miles and miles
And wound up at your door
I've had you for so many times
But somehow I want more

I don't mind spending everyday
Out on your corner in the pouring rain
Look for the girl with the broken smile
Ask her if she wants to stay awhile
And she will be loved
She will be loved...

Tap on my window, knock on my door
I want to make you feel beautiful
I know I tend to get so insecure
That doesn't matter anymore

It's not always rainbows and butterflies
It's compromise that moves us along
My heart is full and my door's always open
You can come anytime you want

I don't mind spending everyday
Out on your corner in the pouring rain
Look for the girl with the broken smile
Ask her if she wants to stay awhile
And she will be loved
She will be loved...

I know where you hide, alone in your car
Know all of the things that make you who you are
I know that goodbye means nothing at all
Comes back and begs me to catch her every time she falls...
Yeah...

Tap on my window, knock on my door
I want to make you feel beautiful...

--- Maroon5, "She Will Be Loved"

The sickness that afflicts me every time I go on vacation rears its ugly head again.

Yes, I am bored.

After getting sick of playing Gran Turismo 2, watching Initial D's first season for the umpteenth time, and reading my back issues of Autocar Asean equally as many times, I wound up bored.

So bored, in fact, that I woke up this morning thinking about starting the shooting script for our feature-video thesis. So far I've gotten the intro montage done, I guess, which is just one scene.

Better to have something done than nothing at all, methinks.
===

Our house seems to have all these little annoying quirks recently.

Besides the irritating piss-inducing cold of late, we've also been unwitting mosquito fodder. Just this morning I had to walk through a small swarm of them flittering outside our front door. Where are the ever-present lizards when you need them?

There's also this awful canal stench arising from the back. I have no idea why it's there. Let me just say the stench makes the full-on smell of Lysol all the more aromatic.

And have I mentioned the non-stop fart of the chainsaw making chop suey out of this old tree at the church across the street? I have to put up with it every morning these days...

Well, at least we don't get floods...that's always good.