Wednesday, June 30, 2004
8:55 PM |
Random Thought 3
Tomorrow, I start gym. I'm getting fat. I, of course, jest when people notice -- always vocally -- my expanding girth. I say, "
Kay ginapalangga man. [It's because somebody happens to love me very much.]" Which is true
naman, and it is a cute answer, too, and it always gets the best response from the insufferable
himantayons of the world. But I'm fat.
Tomorrow I start gym.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:55 PM |
Random Thought 3
Tomorrow, I start gym. I'm getting fat. I, of course, jest when people notice -- always vocally -- my expanding girth. I say, "
Kay ginapalangga man. [It's because somebody happens to love me very much.]" Which is true
naman, and it is a cute answer, too, and it always gets the best response from the insufferable
himantayons of the world. But I'm fat.
Tomorrow I start gym.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:55 PM |
Random Thought 3
Tomorrow, I start gym. I'm getting fat. I, of course, jest when people notice -- always vocally -- my expanding girth. I say, "
Kay ginapalangga man. [It's because somebody happens to love me very much.]" Which is true
naman, and it is a cute answer, too, and it always gets the best response from the insufferable
himantayons of the world. But I'm fat.
Tomorrow I start gym.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:40 PM |
Random Thought 2
The sixth book is
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It's
for real. There were rumors of other titles of course.
A "rumors" section of the [official Harry Potter] site had included a post from fans Monday that the new title would be "Harry Potter and the Pillar of Storge" but Rowling dismissed that idea on the site, saying, "I am trying very hard not to be offended that anyone thought this was possible."
Another posting in the rumor section said that the title would be "Harry Potter and the Toenail of Icklibogg" to which Rowling responded, "Well, if you believed the Storge one..."
She's funny, that J.K.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:40 PM |
Random Thought 2
The sixth book is
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It's
for real. There were rumors of other titles of course.
A "rumors" section of the [official Harry Potter] site had included a post from fans Monday that the new title would be "Harry Potter and the Pillar of Storge" but Rowling dismissed that idea on the site, saying, "I am trying very hard not to be offended that anyone thought this was possible."
Another posting in the rumor section said that the title would be "Harry Potter and the Toenail of Icklibogg" to which Rowling responded, "Well, if you believed the Storge one..."
She's funny, that J.K.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:40 PM |
Random Thought 2
The sixth book is
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It's
for real. There were rumors of other titles of course.
A "rumors" section of the [official Harry Potter] site had included a post from fans Monday that the new title would be "Harry Potter and the Pillar of Storge" but Rowling dismissed that idea on the site, saying, "I am trying very hard not to be offended that anyone thought this was possible."
Another posting in the rumor section said that the title would be "Harry Potter and the Toenail of Icklibogg" to which Rowling responded, "Well, if you believed the Storge one..."
She's funny, that J.K.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:26 PM |
Random Thought 1
I want to go somewhere alone and hide behind a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:26 PM |
Random Thought 1
I want to go somewhere alone and hide behind a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:26 PM |
Random Thought 1
I want to go somewhere alone and hide behind a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Saturday, June 26, 2004
10:18 PM |
Sadness is the Best Medicine
Some recent news in psychology: "Sad people are nice. Angry people are nasty. And, oddly enough,
happy people tend to be nasty, too."
Read on about how
happiness is really bad for you.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
10:18 PM |
Sadness is the Best Medicine
Some recent news in psychology: "Sad people are nice. Angry people are nasty. And, oddly enough,
happy people tend to be nasty, too."
Read on about how
happiness is really bad for you.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
10:18 PM |
Sadness is the Best Medicine
Some recent news in psychology: "Sad people are nice. Angry people are nasty. And, oddly enough,
happy people tend to be nasty, too."
Read on about how
happiness is really bad for you.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
11:30 AM |
"Now Why Didn't We Think of That?"
From the forwards...Sometimes it
does take a rocket scientist! This is a true story.
Scientists at Roll Royce built a gun specifically to launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, and military jets, all travelling at maximum velocity. The idea is to simulate the frequent incidents of collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the windshields.
American engineers heard about the gun and were eager to test it on the windshields of their new high speed trains. Arrangements were made, and a gun was sent to the American engineers.
When the gun was fired, the engineers stood shocked as the chicken hurled out of the barrel, crashed into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens, blasted through the control console, snapped the engineer's back-rest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the cabin, like an arrow shot from a bow.
The horrified Yanks sent Rolls Royce the disastrous results of the experiment, along with the designs of the windshield and begged the British scientists for suggestions.
You're going to love this...
Rolls Royce responded with a one-line memo:
"Defrost the chicken."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
11:30 AM |
"Now Why Didn't We Think of That?"
From the forwards...Sometimes it
does take a rocket scientist! This is a true story.
Scientists at Roll Royce built a gun specifically to launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, and military jets, all travelling at maximum velocity. The idea is to simulate the frequent incidents of collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the windshields.
American engineers heard about the gun and were eager to test it on the windshields of their new high speed trains. Arrangements were made, and a gun was sent to the American engineers.
When the gun was fired, the engineers stood shocked as the chicken hurled out of the barrel, crashed into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens, blasted through the control console, snapped the engineer's back-rest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the cabin, like an arrow shot from a bow.
The horrified Yanks sent Rolls Royce the disastrous results of the experiment, along with the designs of the windshield and begged the British scientists for suggestions.
You're going to love this...
Rolls Royce responded with a one-line memo:
"Defrost the chicken."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
11:30 AM |
"Now Why Didn't We Think of That?"
From the forwards...Sometimes it
does take a rocket scientist! This is a true story.
Scientists at Roll Royce built a gun specifically to launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, and military jets, all travelling at maximum velocity. The idea is to simulate the frequent incidents of collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the windshields.
American engineers heard about the gun and were eager to test it on the windshields of their new high speed trains. Arrangements were made, and a gun was sent to the American engineers.
When the gun was fired, the engineers stood shocked as the chicken hurled out of the barrel, crashed into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens, blasted through the control console, snapped the engineer's back-rest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the cabin, like an arrow shot from a bow.
The horrified Yanks sent Rolls Royce the disastrous results of the experiment, along with the designs of the windshield and begged the British scientists for suggestions.
You're going to love this...
Rolls Royce responded with a one-line memo:
"Defrost the chicken."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Just in case anybody's wondering, the title of the last two posts come from a Barbra Streisand song.
I know, I know... Son of Dorothy!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Just in case anybody's wondering, the title of the last two posts come from a Barbra Streisand song.
I know, I know... Son of Dorothy!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Just in case anybody's wondering, the title of the last two posts come from a Barbra Streisand song.
I know, I know... Son of Dorothy!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Friday, June 25, 2004
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 1
What I miss most about Kaide is seeing her nose wrinkle when I call her by her full name: Kaija Sofia Ermelli Korpi. Which she hates with slapdash reasons bordering on cute. I keep telling her there is music to her full name: it sums up her Nordic drive for sun and fun, and yet, when you say it, it trips in one's mouth like a child at play.
Ka--eee--ya. So--feee--ya. Er--me--li. The name lolls around the tongue. Kaide, which is the nickname I have given her, is another soul mate I haven't seen for the longest time -- almost eight years now? -- because she lives with her snow and spa in Finland. And newly-married too! But she haunts my thoughts now and then, especially when the sky turns grey, and then I remember those autumns we spent together shopping for crazy knickkancks in Kichijoji. Or when the sky is blue, and I'd remember that day when snow first came to Tokyo in 1997. The morning had begun fair, and the lawns were coated in wintry brown grass, everything the color of muteness. We had just started on our Medieval Arts History class and had pulled the shades down for the teacher's slide show; when we tumbled out of our classroom three hours later, there was a vast carpet of powdery whiteness everywhere.
Magic. The sunlight, glinting down onto the snow, bounced to Kaide's blond hair. I told her she had a halo over her head. She laughed. "Hey, Tropics Boy," she told me, "have you ever seen snow before?" When I left for home a few months later, we promised to see each other ten years later, on June 16, on top of the Empire State Building.
Just like in the movies.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 2
Ted Regencia is in Chicago keeping fit, while spending days dreaming ways to burst into mainstream American journalism.
The future Pulitzer Prize winner, you could say. As yet, he is still paying his dues, starting out small, slowly inching towards the bigger bang by the skin of patient ambition. "I am both editor, writer, and janitor," he laughs, describing his job working for a Filipino newspaper in Illinois. But he has what it takes: the guts, the patience, the talent that oozes. A Ted Regencia article is a work of utter brilliance, scintillating in its simplicity, powerful in its uncanniness to drive home a point without the common blather. Today, he emails a picture of himself top-naked, and says, not exactly verbatim: "See? I look good." That's because he is intent on running the Chicago Marathon this year. He says: "This early, I'e already started training at the gym, which is just five minutes walk from my apartment, and outside during the weekend. Except for my mugging incident, my hometown (for now) located just a little north of Chicago, is a pretty safe place and it has lots of green spaces so it's nice to run here. For about a month now, I'e been running three to four miles, twice or three times a week. Tough, if you ask an amateur like me. Tougher even because my two legs are uneven..." I love this gentle man who is full of heart. He loves without condition, which sometimes borders on martyrdom -- especially when in the throes of falling for _____. I haven't seen Tedo for about three years now. He is the very manifestation of emotive missing. He proves the paradox of intimacy despite distance, and for that I owe him my deepest gratitude. He is someone one can truly call "friend."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 1
What I miss most about Kaide is seeing her nose wrinkle when I call her by her full name: Kaija Sofia Ermelli Korpi. Which she hates with slapdash reasons bordering on cute. I keep telling her there is music to her full name: it sums up her Nordic drive for sun and fun, and yet, when you say it, it trips in one's mouth like a child at play.
Ka--eee--ya. So--feee--ya. Er--me--li. The name lolls around the tongue. Kaide, which is the nickname I have given her, is another soul mate I haven't seen for the longest time -- almost eight years now? -- because she lives with her snow and spa in Finland. And newly-married too! But she haunts my thoughts now and then, especially when the sky turns grey, and then I remember those autumns we spent together shopping for crazy knickkancks in Kichijoji. Or when the sky is blue, and I'd remember that day when snow first came to Tokyo in 1997. The morning had begun fair, and the lawns were coated in wintry brown grass, everything the color of muteness. We had just started on our Medieval Arts History class and had pulled the shades down for the teacher's slide show; when we tumbled out of our classroom three hours later, there was a vast carpet of powdery whiteness everywhere.
Magic. The sunlight, glinting down onto the snow, bounced to Kaide's blond hair. I told her she had a halo over her head. She laughed. "Hey, Tropics Boy," she told me, "have you ever seen snow before?" When I left for home a few months later, we promised to see each other ten years later, on June 16, on top of the Empire State Building.
Just like in the movies.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 2
Ted Regencia is in Chicago keeping fit, while spending days dreaming ways to burst into mainstream American journalism.
The future Pulitzer Prize winner, you could say. As yet, he is still paying his dues, starting out small, slowly inching towards the bigger bang by the skin of patient ambition. "I am both editor, writer, and janitor," he laughs, describing his job working for a Filipino newspaper in Illinois. But he has what it takes: the guts, the patience, the talent that oozes. A Ted Regencia article is a work of utter brilliance, scintillating in its simplicity, powerful in its uncanniness to drive home a point without the common blather. Today, he emails a picture of himself top-naked, and says, not exactly verbatim: "See? I look good." That's because he is intent on running the Chicago Marathon this year. He says: "This early, I'e already started training at the gym, which is just five minutes walk from my apartment, and outside during the weekend. Except for my mugging incident, my hometown (for now) located just a little north of Chicago, is a pretty safe place and it has lots of green spaces so it's nice to run here. For about a month now, I'e been running three to four miles, twice or three times a week. Tough, if you ask an amateur like me. Tougher even because my two legs are uneven..." I love this gentle man who is full of heart. He loves without condition, which sometimes borders on martyrdom -- especially when in the throes of falling for _____. I haven't seen Tedo for about three years now. He is the very manifestation of emotive missing. He proves the paradox of intimacy despite distance, and for that I owe him my deepest gratitude. He is someone one can truly call "friend."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 1
What I miss most about Kaide is seeing her nose wrinkle when I call her by her full name: Kaija Sofia Ermelli Korpi. Which she hates with slapdash reasons bordering on cute. I keep telling her there is music to her full name: it sums up her Nordic drive for sun and fun, and yet, when you say it, it trips in one's mouth like a child at play.
Ka--eee--ya. So--feee--ya. Er--me--li. The name lolls around the tongue. Kaide, which is the nickname I have given her, is another soul mate I haven't seen for the longest time -- almost eight years now? -- because she lives with her snow and spa in Finland. And newly-married too! But she haunts my thoughts now and then, especially when the sky turns grey, and then I remember those autumns we spent together shopping for crazy knickkancks in Kichijoji. Or when the sky is blue, and I'd remember that day when snow first came to Tokyo in 1997. The morning had begun fair, and the lawns were coated in wintry brown grass, everything the color of muteness. We had just started on our Medieval Arts History class and had pulled the shades down for the teacher's slide show; when we tumbled out of our classroom three hours later, there was a vast carpet of powdery whiteness everywhere.
Magic. The sunlight, glinting down onto the snow, bounced to Kaide's blond hair. I told her she had a halo over her head. She laughed. "Hey, Tropics Boy," she told me, "have you ever seen snow before?" When I left for home a few months later, we promised to see each other ten years later, on June 16, on top of the Empire State Building.
Just like in the movies.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:30 PM |
Lucky People 2
Ted Regencia is in Chicago keeping fit, while spending days dreaming ways to burst into mainstream American journalism.
The future Pulitzer Prize winner, you could say. As yet, he is still paying his dues, starting out small, slowly inching towards the bigger bang by the skin of patient ambition. "I am both editor, writer, and janitor," he laughs, describing his job working for a Filipino newspaper in Illinois. But he has what it takes: the guts, the patience, the talent that oozes. A Ted Regencia article is a work of utter brilliance, scintillating in its simplicity, powerful in its uncanniness to drive home a point without the common blather. Today, he emails a picture of himself top-naked, and says, not exactly verbatim: "See? I look good." That's because he is intent on running the Chicago Marathon this year. He says: "This early, I'e already started training at the gym, which is just five minutes walk from my apartment, and outside during the weekend. Except for my mugging incident, my hometown (for now) located just a little north of Chicago, is a pretty safe place and it has lots of green spaces so it's nice to run here. For about a month now, I'e been running three to four miles, twice or three times a week. Tough, if you ask an amateur like me. Tougher even because my two legs are uneven..." I love this gentle man who is full of heart. He loves without condition, which sometimes borders on martyrdom -- especially when in the throes of falling for _____. I haven't seen Tedo for about three years now. He is the very manifestation of emotive missing. He proves the paradox of intimacy despite distance, and for that I owe him my deepest gratitude. He is someone one can truly call "friend."
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:02 PM |
Final Advise to the Goodbye Girl
Don't burn too many bridges, dear ______. Somewhere along the way, you might get trapped in a small island, alone. There won't be any chances to get back. Accept the fatality of your haphazard goodbyes.
Don't make too many friends either. Don't set anyone's hopes up in considering you a possible friend. Tell them, to their face, meeting them for the first time, that they will just be "phases" for you. Something disposable, like tissue paper.
Tell them to forget "trust." With you, there must only be cold distance -- the safe distance devoid of any possible "hurt." Hurt, after all, is
much too human. It is, for you, a flaw.
Erase
love, or
care, from your vocabulary. Don't speak of connections anymore. You have no right.
And don't bother getting near anyone at all and telling them,
"I like you, can we be friends?" -- the way you did with me once upon a college day. Now I know it was only empty invitation, something you can easily discard.
Finally, don't look back.
Never ever look back.
Just go.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:02 PM |
Final Advise to the Goodbye Girl
Don't burn too many bridges, dear ______. Somewhere along the way, you might get trapped in a small island, alone. There won't be any chances to get back. Accept the fatality of your haphazard goodbyes.
Don't make too many friends either. Don't set anyone's hopes up in considering you a possible friend. Tell them, to their face, meeting them for the first time, that they will just be "phases" for you. Something disposable, like tissue paper.
Tell them to forget "trust." With you, there must only be cold distance -- the safe distance devoid of any possible "hurt." Hurt, after all, is
much too human. It is, for you, a flaw.
Erase
love, or
care, from your vocabulary. Don't speak of connections anymore. You have no right.
And don't bother getting near anyone at all and telling them,
"I like you, can we be friends?" -- the way you did with me once upon a college day. Now I know it was only empty invitation, something you can easily discard.
Finally, don't look back.
Never ever look back.
Just go.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
6:02 PM |
Final Advise to the Goodbye Girl
Don't burn too many bridges, dear ______. Somewhere along the way, you might get trapped in a small island, alone. There won't be any chances to get back. Accept the fatality of your haphazard goodbyes.
Don't make too many friends either. Don't set anyone's hopes up in considering you a possible friend. Tell them, to their face, meeting them for the first time, that they will just be "phases" for you. Something disposable, like tissue paper.
Tell them to forget "trust." With you, there must only be cold distance -- the safe distance devoid of any possible "hurt." Hurt, after all, is
much too human. It is, for you, a flaw.
Erase
love, or
care, from your vocabulary. Don't speak of connections anymore. You have no right.
And don't bother getting near anyone at all and telling them,
"I like you, can we be friends?" -- the way you did with me once upon a college day. Now I know it was only empty invitation, something you can easily discard.
Finally, don't look back.
Never ever look back.
Just go.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Thursday, June 24, 2004
7:51 PM |
Amazon Spree
I just shopped for some books in Amazon -- using my dear elder brother's credit card -- after more than a year of total self-control and withdrawal. I swore,
see, not to be too credit card-happy.
Of course, my brother knows about my latest spree. So why do I feel sexy-wicked all of a sudden?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
7:51 PM |
Amazon Spree
I just shopped for some books in Amazon -- using my dear elder brother's credit card -- after more than a year of total self-control and withdrawal. I swore,
see, not to be too credit card-happy.
Of course, my brother knows about my latest spree. So why do I feel sexy-wicked all of a sudden?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
7:51 PM |
Amazon Spree
I just shopped for some books in Amazon -- using my dear elder brother's credit card -- after more than a year of total self-control and withdrawal. I swore,
see, not to be too credit card-happy.
Of course, my brother knows about my latest spree. So why do I feel sexy-wicked all of a sudden?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
You want to disconnect, to retreat, because you suddenly find "friendship," especially long-distance ones, "artificial." You say that all we do -- blogs, "half-hearted" emails -- is show a superficial accounting of each of our lives, which barely skim the surface, which does not even beg to be personal. You say you've been "hurt" before, of finding out that friends are not really "friends," just "phases" people undergo. That ultimately there is no one to trust. And that the best thing to do, really, is run away.
Then have a life that will always be about the same thing: running away, and running away, and running away,
and running away.... Just because you don't want to get "hurt," whatever that means. An idea of human connection that demands to be a blackhole of want and need.
Not much of a life.
Is it.I have a friend in Spain named Kristoffer. He is a FiIipino artist, and we don't get to email each other often because he has a life to lead, and I have mine. Both are extremely busy, and characterized by flux. Sometimes we send each other pictures, and sometimes we dash out a line or two.
But rarely. But when we do get together -- like once in four or even five years -- the warmth is still there. Each reconnection is a continuation of the intimacy that came before it. The distance and the silence are not even enough to tear something sacred and vital.
Gail Godwin once wrote that real friendship should be about learning to appreciate the other's burden. It is not always about "being there" for each other, because lives are too much in a flux in a contemporary world.
Friendship is never about knowing the details of everybody's every single day. It's not about requirements. It's not about the singular.
It's about bigger, better things.
It's about proving paradox to distance and silence. It's about knowing, even when you are alone at night thinking of the next day's heavy schedule, that you're not really alone. That somewhere out there in this frustrating world, somebody actually cares for you, as a human being.
Friendship transcend physical dimensions. It's about meeting in dreams.
You can tell me if I have quaint ideas of what friendship should be, but if you notice I try to go the high road. To not always invent villains of other people, to not always burn bridges. To grow and learn from HURT, but never to turn the coward's way and run.
Friendship must edify. Otherwise, one is probably better off as a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
You want to disconnect, to retreat, because you suddenly find "friendship," especially long-distance ones, "artificial." You say that all we do -- blogs, "half-hearted" emails -- is show a superficial accounting of each of our lives, which barely skim the surface, which does not even beg to be personal. You say you've been "hurt" before, of finding out that friends are not really "friends," just "phases" people undergo. That ultimately there is no one to trust. And that the best thing to do, really, is run away.
Then have a life that will always be about the same thing: running away, and running away, and running away,
and running away.... Just because you don't want to get "hurt," whatever that means. An idea of human connection that demands to be a blackhole of want and need.
Not much of a life.
Is it.I have a friend in Spain named Kristoffer. He is a FiIipino artist, and we don't get to email each other often because he has a life to lead, and I have mine. Both are extremely busy, and characterized by flux. Sometimes we send each other pictures, and sometimes we dash out a line or two.
But rarely. But when we do get together -- like once in four or even five years -- the warmth is still there. Each reconnection is a continuation of the intimacy that came before it. The distance and the silence are not even enough to tear something sacred and vital.
Gail Godwin once wrote that real friendship should be about learning to appreciate the other's burden. It is not always about "being there" for each other, because lives are too much in a flux in a contemporary world.
Friendship is never about knowing the details of everybody's every single day. It's not about requirements. It's not about the singular.
It's about bigger, better things.
It's about proving paradox to distance and silence. It's about knowing, even when you are alone at night thinking of the next day's heavy schedule, that you're not really alone. That somewhere out there in this frustrating world, somebody actually cares for you, as a human being.
Friendship transcend physical dimensions. It's about meeting in dreams.
You can tell me if I have quaint ideas of what friendship should be, but if you notice I try to go the high road. To not always invent villains of other people, to not always burn bridges. To grow and learn from HURT, but never to turn the coward's way and run.
Friendship must edify. Otherwise, one is probably better off as a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
You want to disconnect, to retreat, because you suddenly find "friendship," especially long-distance ones, "artificial." You say that all we do -- blogs, "half-hearted" emails -- is show a superficial accounting of each of our lives, which barely skim the surface, which does not even beg to be personal. You say you've been "hurt" before, of finding out that friends are not really "friends," just "phases" people undergo. That ultimately there is no one to trust. And that the best thing to do, really, is run away.
Then have a life that will always be about the same thing: running away, and running away, and running away,
and running away.... Just because you don't want to get "hurt," whatever that means. An idea of human connection that demands to be a blackhole of want and need.
Not much of a life.
Is it.I have a friend in Spain named Kristoffer. He is a FiIipino artist, and we don't get to email each other often because he has a life to lead, and I have mine. Both are extremely busy, and characterized by flux. Sometimes we send each other pictures, and sometimes we dash out a line or two.
But rarely. But when we do get together -- like once in four or even five years -- the warmth is still there. Each reconnection is a continuation of the intimacy that came before it. The distance and the silence are not even enough to tear something sacred and vital.
Gail Godwin once wrote that real friendship should be about learning to appreciate the other's burden. It is not always about "being there" for each other, because lives are too much in a flux in a contemporary world.
Friendship is never about knowing the details of everybody's every single day. It's not about requirements. It's not about the singular.
It's about bigger, better things.
It's about proving paradox to distance and silence. It's about knowing, even when you are alone at night thinking of the next day's heavy schedule, that you're not really alone. That somewhere out there in this frustrating world, somebody actually cares for you, as a human being.
Friendship transcend physical dimensions. It's about meeting in dreams.
You can tell me if I have quaint ideas of what friendship should be, but if you notice I try to go the high road. To not always invent villains of other people, to not always burn bridges. To grow and learn from HURT, but never to turn the coward's way and run.
Friendship must edify. Otherwise, one is probably better off as a rock.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
9:23 AM |
Prozac Moments
Quddus texted you the other day. "I'm taking Prozac," he said. "And you know what? I feel so much better. I'm no longer as dramatic as I'm wont to be." He is 25, an up-and-coming chef who lives in Palawan, and struggles to find his way in the world after some years of getting lost and knowing
that was the point. It's everybody's story. When you, too, were 25, getting lost and grappling for meaning was also the way
to be. The way to live. Prozac was not even a consideration then. Depression, after all, was a beautiful by-product of post-adolescent emotional wrangling; wallowing in despair in the vein of Woody Allen meeting Schopenhauser was
de rigeur, especially for those who fashioned themselves intellectuals, or bohemians. It was a wonderful pretense. One's 20's could be so romantic in the Existential sense -- Ethan Hawke in
Before Sunrise, Winona Ryder in
Reality Bites --
but then we grow up.There was a time when you would have envied Quddus that full sense of being brought about by pharmacology. Depression, after all, was easy and cheap. It came with each demand of the every day. Happiness, meanwhile, was something not easily gained: some people buy it through fleshy comforts, or pursue it to the very bottom of beer bottles, or through the hallucinogenic high of ill substances. A fix through controlled medication seems the easy way out, and for a long time you've thought about it -- Prozac and its magic -- if only to reel-in the growing randomness you call your life. You lived in a pressure cooker. Bursting was in the cards.
But soon there comes a certain balance in your life, one that you can arrive at only after a period of much hand-wringing, overzealous contemplation, and painful considerations of priorities. The catharsis takes its time; it comes only after making tough life choices. But when it comes, things fall into place, like lost pieces to a puzzle -- and you suddenly understand how life
can be so much better, once you know how to stare it in the face. Then you breathe in deep and proceed to do the work to make worthwhile every minute of the rest of your existence.
Maybe it is because you are in love, and in the throes of being together ten months with somebody you genuinely like and love, despite the differences between you. But there are other things: a family coming together again after briefly unraveling, for one. An acceptance of place, for another. A sense of Divine Hand, too.
But there are also the Fates.
Gabby,
your new bestest friend, and you talked about this early this summer, when she brandished her tarot cards and read your fortunes, with so much insight that she might as well have read your soul. Or your mind and its web of unsaid apprehensions, steeped in a cha-cha of denial and avoidance. You remember that night well, somewhere in Dumaguete's Capitol Area; you were drinking a caloric summer evening away with assortments of food and talk-buddies. Krip Yuson was somewhere with Cesar Aquino and Gemino Abad. Bobby Villasis was in purple conversation with Ernie Yee and John Bengan. Marie La Vina had fallen under a spell, and the others were listening to a compilation tape of Beatles songs.
"Read my cards," you told Gabby -- already half-disbelieving the suspected outcome. You were not much into horoscopes and such. It was easy to dismiss the stars' randomness -- "but tarot is very different," Gabby told you. There was a blah-blah about this and that, and you nodded, for effect, to convey you understood -- but knowing you still had your cynicism around you.
"Read my cards," you told her again.
"You have to ask a question," Gabby replied, "silently if you want. Then cut the deck."
You did, and then she proceeded to construct her tree of cards.
The symbols were exotic and obscure, and you don't remember the details of each one, except that these were designed by Alistair Crowley, perhaps the most notorious occultist of your time.
Then: "You've been too complacent," Gabby told you. "You don't want to lose what you have right now. And you will, if you just don't do anything to change your lot. You come from a place of high position. You may fall if you do not do anything. I see change in your cards. You will be able to deal with it, of course, and then you will find success and happiness.
If you will change your complacent status quo, of course." Not exactly verbatim, but it was the core of what she had to say. That struck you.
Until now, you still remember the gnawing in the pits of your stomach, knowing how much this is true of your life. And knowing just how much you needed to go on, to finish unfinished things, to change the rut you have found yourself wallowing in. The tarot was just the impetus. It was just something concrete sprung from the haziness of your own buried fears and disappointments.
A month later, this is where you are now. So much more self-assured. And armed with knowing what is the right thing to do. People call this self-actualization, or even finally growing into a complete sense of adulthood. Luke Skywalker called it becoming a Jedi knight. Neo in
The Matrix called it swallowing the red pill. The mythologists call it the end of the journey of the hero. I just call it a breath of fresh air -- something vital and relaxing, even when you realize things have not really slowed down, and even when there are more demands on your time, on your duties.
You just know where you are in the scheme of things, and so there are comfortable niches for everything. You have learned to say no. You have learned the fact that it is impossible to please everybody. You have learned to control your moods, your temper. You have learned to understand other people better, to see the light of things in their eyes, to know that there is really good in everyone. You have learned to buttress your weaknesses, and to marshal your strengths. You have learned Oprah-speak, of course, but there is now none of those old cringing that comes with dealing with New Age hocus pocus philosophy. You still hate Dr. Phil and his shiny head, but you have learned to let go of even that.
Tonight, you come home again quite late, having to attend to late classes, work, and electronic correspondence, and now you are about to push your strength further by coming up with an article to beat tomorrow's newspaper deadline.
But you are okay. None of the panic of yesterdays. You listen to Toselli's
Serenade, or Vivaldi's
Concerto for Two Violins, or your favorite: Debussy's
Clair de Lune, while you plan the intricate schedule of the next day, while you freewrite to put to shape the essay that's in your head, while you also negotiate the priorities of the tasks ahead of you.
You feel okay. You feel actually excited for work, something you have not felt for a long time. Maybe it is the fact that you are back in school -- being both teacher and student. You have forgotten the strange comfort of just being in the classroom and sitting and scribbling away silently in your chair, listening to someone else talk without you yourself having to gab one-and-a-half hours away about literature, or theory, or what-not. It is a change of place, and pace.
Whatever it is that's making you happy these days, you know you like yourself so much better now.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:23 AM |
Prozac Moments
Quddus texted you the other day. "I'm taking Prozac," he said. "And you know what? I feel so much better. I'm no longer as dramatic as I'm wont to be." He is 25, an up-and-coming chef who lives in Palawan, and struggles to find his way in the world after some years of getting lost and knowing
that was the point. It's everybody's story. When you, too, were 25, getting lost and grappling for meaning was also the way
to be. The way to live. Prozac was not even a consideration then. Depression, after all, was a beautiful by-product of post-adolescent emotional wrangling; wallowing in despair in the vein of Woody Allen meeting Schopenhauser was
de rigeur, especially for those who fashioned themselves intellectuals, or bohemians. It was a wonderful pretense. One's 20's could be so romantic in the Existential sense -- Ethan Hawke in
Before Sunrise, Winona Ryder in
Reality Bites --
but then we grow up.There was a time when you would have envied Quddus that full sense of being brought about by pharmacology. Depression, after all, was easy and cheap. It came with each demand of the every day. Happiness, meanwhile, was something not easily gained: some people buy it through fleshy comforts, or pursue it to the very bottom of beer bottles, or through the hallucinogenic high of ill substances. A fix through controlled medication seems the easy way out, and for a long time you've thought about it -- Prozac and its magic -- if only to reel-in the growing randomness you call your life. You lived in a pressure cooker. Bursting was in the cards.
But soon there comes a certain balance in your life, one that you can arrive at only after a period of much hand-wringing, overzealous contemplation, and painful considerations of priorities. The catharsis takes its time; it comes only after making tough life choices. But when it comes, things fall into place, like lost pieces to a puzzle -- and you suddenly understand how life
can be so much better, once you know how to stare it in the face. Then you breathe in deep and proceed to do the work to make worthwhile every minute of the rest of your existence.
Maybe it is because you are in love, and in the throes of being together ten months with somebody you genuinely like and love, despite the differences between you. But there are other things: a family coming together again after briefly unraveling, for one. An acceptance of place, for another. A sense of Divine Hand, too.
But there are also the Fates.
Gabby,
your new bestest friend, and you talked about this early this summer, when she brandished her tarot cards and read your fortunes, with so much insight that she might as well have read your soul. Or your mind and its web of unsaid apprehensions, steeped in a cha-cha of denial and avoidance. You remember that night well, somewhere in Dumaguete's Capitol Area; you were drinking a caloric summer evening away with assortments of food and talk-buddies. Krip Yuson was somewhere with Cesar Aquino and Gemino Abad. Bobby Villasis was in purple conversation with Ernie Yee and John Bengan. Marie La Vina had fallen under a spell, and the others were listening to a compilation tape of Beatles songs.
"Read my cards," you told Gabby -- already half-disbelieving the suspected outcome. You were not much into horoscopes and such. It was easy to dismiss the stars' randomness -- "but tarot is very different," Gabby told you. There was a blah-blah about this and that, and you nodded, for effect, to convey you understood -- but knowing you still had your cynicism around you.
"Read my cards," you told her again.
"You have to ask a question," Gabby replied, "silently if you want. Then cut the deck."
You did, and then she proceeded to construct her tree of cards.
The symbols were exotic and obscure, and you don't remember the details of each one, except that these were designed by Alistair Crowley, perhaps the most notorious occultist of your time.
Then: "You've been too complacent," Gabby told you. "You don't want to lose what you have right now. And you will, if you just don't do anything to change your lot. You come from a place of high position. You may fall if you do not do anything. I see change in your cards. You will be able to deal with it, of course, and then you will find success and happiness.
If you will change your complacent status quo, of course." Not exactly verbatim, but it was the core of what she had to say. That struck you.
Until now, you still remember the gnawing in the pits of your stomach, knowing how much this is true of your life. And knowing just how much you needed to go on, to finish unfinished things, to change the rut you have found yourself wallowing in. The tarot was just the impetus. It was just something concrete sprung from the haziness of your own buried fears and disappointments.
A month later, this is where you are now. So much more self-assured. And armed with knowing what is the right thing to do. People call this self-actualization, or even finally growing into a complete sense of adulthood. Luke Skywalker called it becoming a Jedi knight. Neo in
The Matrix called it swallowing the red pill. The mythologists call it the end of the journey of the hero. I just call it a breath of fresh air -- something vital and relaxing, even when you realize things have not really slowed down, and even when there are more demands on your time, on your duties.
You just know where you are in the scheme of things, and so there are comfortable niches for everything. You have learned to say no. You have learned the fact that it is impossible to please everybody. You have learned to control your moods, your temper. You have learned to understand other people better, to see the light of things in their eyes, to know that there is really good in everyone. You have learned to buttress your weaknesses, and to marshal your strengths. You have learned Oprah-speak, of course, but there is now none of those old cringing that comes with dealing with New Age hocus pocus philosophy. You still hate Dr. Phil and his shiny head, but you have learned to let go of even that.
Tonight, you come home again quite late, having to attend to late classes, work, and electronic correspondence, and now you are about to push your strength further by coming up with an article to beat tomorrow's newspaper deadline.
But you are okay. None of the panic of yesterdays. You listen to Toselli's
Serenade, or Vivaldi's
Concerto for Two Violins, or your favorite: Debussy's
Clair de Lune, while you plan the intricate schedule of the next day, while you freewrite to put to shape the essay that's in your head, while you also negotiate the priorities of the tasks ahead of you.
You feel okay. You feel actually excited for work, something you have not felt for a long time. Maybe it is the fact that you are back in school -- being both teacher and student. You have forgotten the strange comfort of just being in the classroom and sitting and scribbling away silently in your chair, listening to someone else talk without you yourself having to gab one-and-a-half hours away about literature, or theory, or what-not. It is a change of place, and pace.
Whatever it is that's making you happy these days, you know you like yourself so much better now.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:23 AM |
Prozac Moments
Quddus texted you the other day. "I'm taking Prozac," he said. "And you know what? I feel so much better. I'm no longer as dramatic as I'm wont to be." He is 25, an up-and-coming chef who lives in Palawan, and struggles to find his way in the world after some years of getting lost and knowing
that was the point. It's everybody's story. When you, too, were 25, getting lost and grappling for meaning was also the way
to be. The way to live. Prozac was not even a consideration then. Depression, after all, was a beautiful by-product of post-adolescent emotional wrangling; wallowing in despair in the vein of Woody Allen meeting Schopenhauser was
de rigeur, especially for those who fashioned themselves intellectuals, or bohemians. It was a wonderful pretense. One's 20's could be so romantic in the Existential sense -- Ethan Hawke in
Before Sunrise, Winona Ryder in
Reality Bites --
but then we grow up.There was a time when you would have envied Quddus that full sense of being brought about by pharmacology. Depression, after all, was easy and cheap. It came with each demand of the every day. Happiness, meanwhile, was something not easily gained: some people buy it through fleshy comforts, or pursue it to the very bottom of beer bottles, or through the hallucinogenic high of ill substances. A fix through controlled medication seems the easy way out, and for a long time you've thought about it -- Prozac and its magic -- if only to reel-in the growing randomness you call your life. You lived in a pressure cooker. Bursting was in the cards.
But soon there comes a certain balance in your life, one that you can arrive at only after a period of much hand-wringing, overzealous contemplation, and painful considerations of priorities. The catharsis takes its time; it comes only after making tough life choices. But when it comes, things fall into place, like lost pieces to a puzzle -- and you suddenly understand how life
can be so much better, once you know how to stare it in the face. Then you breathe in deep and proceed to do the work to make worthwhile every minute of the rest of your existence.
Maybe it is because you are in love, and in the throes of being together ten months with somebody you genuinely like and love, despite the differences between you. But there are other things: a family coming together again after briefly unraveling, for one. An acceptance of place, for another. A sense of Divine Hand, too.
But there are also the Fates.
Gabby,
your new bestest friend, and you talked about this early this summer, when she brandished her tarot cards and read your fortunes, with so much insight that she might as well have read your soul. Or your mind and its web of unsaid apprehensions, steeped in a cha-cha of denial and avoidance. You remember that night well, somewhere in Dumaguete's Capitol Area; you were drinking a caloric summer evening away with assortments of food and talk-buddies. Krip Yuson was somewhere with Cesar Aquino and Gemino Abad. Bobby Villasis was in purple conversation with Ernie Yee and John Bengan. Marie La Vina had fallen under a spell, and the others were listening to a compilation tape of Beatles songs.
"Read my cards," you told Gabby -- already half-disbelieving the suspected outcome. You were not much into horoscopes and such. It was easy to dismiss the stars' randomness -- "but tarot is very different," Gabby told you. There was a blah-blah about this and that, and you nodded, for effect, to convey you understood -- but knowing you still had your cynicism around you.
"Read my cards," you told her again.
"You have to ask a question," Gabby replied, "silently if you want. Then cut the deck."
You did, and then she proceeded to construct her tree of cards.
The symbols were exotic and obscure, and you don't remember the details of each one, except that these were designed by Alistair Crowley, perhaps the most notorious occultist of your time.
Then: "You've been too complacent," Gabby told you. "You don't want to lose what you have right now. And you will, if you just don't do anything to change your lot. You come from a place of high position. You may fall if you do not do anything. I see change in your cards. You will be able to deal with it, of course, and then you will find success and happiness.
If you will change your complacent status quo, of course." Not exactly verbatim, but it was the core of what she had to say. That struck you.
Until now, you still remember the gnawing in the pits of your stomach, knowing how much this is true of your life. And knowing just how much you needed to go on, to finish unfinished things, to change the rut you have found yourself wallowing in. The tarot was just the impetus. It was just something concrete sprung from the haziness of your own buried fears and disappointments.
A month later, this is where you are now. So much more self-assured. And armed with knowing what is the right thing to do. People call this self-actualization, or even finally growing into a complete sense of adulthood. Luke Skywalker called it becoming a Jedi knight. Neo in
The Matrix called it swallowing the red pill. The mythologists call it the end of the journey of the hero. I just call it a breath of fresh air -- something vital and relaxing, even when you realize things have not really slowed down, and even when there are more demands on your time, on your duties.
You just know where you are in the scheme of things, and so there are comfortable niches for everything. You have learned to say no. You have learned the fact that it is impossible to please everybody. You have learned to control your moods, your temper. You have learned to understand other people better, to see the light of things in their eyes, to know that there is really good in everyone. You have learned to buttress your weaknesses, and to marshal your strengths. You have learned Oprah-speak, of course, but there is now none of those old cringing that comes with dealing with New Age hocus pocus philosophy. You still hate Dr. Phil and his shiny head, but you have learned to let go of even that.
Tonight, you come home again quite late, having to attend to late classes, work, and electronic correspondence, and now you are about to push your strength further by coming up with an article to beat tomorrow's newspaper deadline.
But you are okay. None of the panic of yesterdays. You listen to Toselli's
Serenade, or Vivaldi's
Concerto for Two Violins, or your favorite: Debussy's
Clair de Lune, while you plan the intricate schedule of the next day, while you freewrite to put to shape the essay that's in your head, while you also negotiate the priorities of the tasks ahead of you.
You feel okay. You feel actually excited for work, something you have not felt for a long time. Maybe it is the fact that you are back in school -- being both teacher and student. You have forgotten the strange comfort of just being in the classroom and sitting and scribbling away silently in your chair, listening to someone else talk without you yourself having to gab one-and-a-half hours away about literature, or theory, or what-not. It is a change of place, and pace.
Whatever it is that's making you happy these days, you know you like yourself so much better now.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Tuesday, June 22, 2004
9:13 PM |
Something in Passing
Learning to breathe...
(Huff... hufff...) There. I feel so much better. (I still wonder how I can be alive. I'm thinking of getting a full-body massage tomorrow.
Mmmmm.)
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:13 PM |
Something in Passing
Learning to breathe...
(Huff... hufff...) There. I feel so much better. (I still wonder how I can be alive. I'm thinking of getting a full-body massage tomorrow.
Mmmmm.)
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:13 PM |
Something in Passing
Learning to breathe...
(Huff... hufff...) There. I feel so much better. (I still wonder how I can be alive. I'm thinking of getting a full-body massage tomorrow.
Mmmmm.)
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Saturday, June 19, 2004
Dumaguete is drenched. It looks beautiful that way. It's been raining for several days now, but always in a gentle tease. It's not the hard kind of rain because water doesn't come down in sheets -- more like a watery massage for earth parched after a long summer. I don't remember June being this cold for some time now. This is like a return to familiar climate, and for someone like me who hates the narcotic overabundance of sun, I am suddenly happy. Rain becomes my own Prozac. The rain begs to be made sonnets of, but there's no time for that. Besides, I feel silly enough as I do, loving the rain, letting the gentle cold bring back memories of better times. I look at the gray clouds, and I remember winter. I haven't seen snow for a long time now, and I know I miss it. Who cares about the slush that comes later? I can endure slush for another sight of snowfall: imagine the whiteness that drapes over the landscape overnight. I told Mark last night that I celebrate Christmas in June. That's when I take out my old records and sing along to Christmas carols, which must confound the nosy neighbors.
But let them shake their heads in puzzlement! June's cold is too perfect to waste time over such things as approriateness for calendar holidays. This morning when I woke up just before lunch, I played Bing Crosby. Later, I liked the way the cold air blasted onto my face when I left my apartment, cumbersome umbrella on one hand, while the other hand balanced a bag full of books as fingers also grappled with key and lock. Spatters of rain did get past beyond the flimsy defense of my small black umbrella, but I didn't mind. I just took a deep breath and wondered how air could be so cold, and so fresh.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Dumaguete is drenched. It looks beautiful that way. It's been raining for several days now, but always in a gentle tease. It's not the hard kind of rain because water doesn't come down in sheets -- more like a watery massage for earth parched after a long summer. I don't remember June being this cold for some time now. This is like a return to familiar climate, and for someone like me who hates the narcotic overabundance of sun, I am suddenly happy. Rain becomes my own Prozac. The rain begs to be made sonnets of, but there's no time for that. Besides, I feel silly enough as I do, loving the rain, letting the gentle cold bring back memories of better times. I look at the gray clouds, and I remember winter. I haven't seen snow for a long time now, and I know I miss it. Who cares about the slush that comes later? I can endure slush for another sight of snowfall: imagine the whiteness that drapes over the landscape overnight. I told Mark last night that I celebrate Christmas in June. That's when I take out my old records and sing along to Christmas carols, which must confound the nosy neighbors.
But let them shake their heads in puzzlement! June's cold is too perfect to waste time over such things as approriateness for calendar holidays. This morning when I woke up just before lunch, I played Bing Crosby. Later, I liked the way the cold air blasted onto my face when I left my apartment, cumbersome umbrella on one hand, while the other hand balanced a bag full of books as fingers also grappled with key and lock. Spatters of rain did get past beyond the flimsy defense of my small black umbrella, but I didn't mind. I just took a deep breath and wondered how air could be so cold, and so fresh.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Dumaguete is drenched. It looks beautiful that way. It's been raining for several days now, but always in a gentle tease. It's not the hard kind of rain because water doesn't come down in sheets -- more like a watery massage for earth parched after a long summer. I don't remember June being this cold for some time now. This is like a return to familiar climate, and for someone like me who hates the narcotic overabundance of sun, I am suddenly happy. Rain becomes my own Prozac. The rain begs to be made sonnets of, but there's no time for that. Besides, I feel silly enough as I do, loving the rain, letting the gentle cold bring back memories of better times. I look at the gray clouds, and I remember winter. I haven't seen snow for a long time now, and I know I miss it. Who cares about the slush that comes later? I can endure slush for another sight of snowfall: imagine the whiteness that drapes over the landscape overnight. I told Mark last night that I celebrate Christmas in June. That's when I take out my old records and sing along to Christmas carols, which must confound the nosy neighbors.
But let them shake their heads in puzzlement! June's cold is too perfect to waste time over such things as approriateness for calendar holidays. This morning when I woke up just before lunch, I played Bing Crosby. Later, I liked the way the cold air blasted onto my face when I left my apartment, cumbersome umbrella on one hand, while the other hand balanced a bag full of books as fingers also grappled with key and lock. Spatters of rain did get past beyond the flimsy defense of my small black umbrella, but I didn't mind. I just took a deep breath and wondered how air could be so cold, and so fresh.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Thursday, June 17, 2004
Ummm... okay. I have nothing to say. Really. Except that it's a Thursday night, and I'm tired and I'm happy, and that it's been more than a week of stress and sweat. I have an overload of teaching units, and I'm back as a graduate student, with six units overload as well.
How do I survive? Basically, I'm Superman these days. Living on runaway time, Stresstabs, and cups of coffee. But loving the work, nevertheless. I live to punish my body. So give me time,
Gabs, to settle down a bit, soon. But I should be back blogging like there's no tomorrow. In the meantime, June will be a silent month, with occasional spells of loquaciousness. But...
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Ummm... okay. I have nothing to say. Really. Except that it's a Thursday night, and I'm tired and I'm happy, and that it's been more than a week of stress and sweat. I have an overload of teaching units, and I'm back as a graduate student, with six units overload as well.
How do I survive? Basically, I'm Superman these days. Living on runaway time, Stresstabs, and cups of coffee. But loving the work, nevertheless. I live to punish my body. So give me time,
Gabs, to settle down a bit, soon. But I should be back blogging like there's no tomorrow. In the meantime, June will be a silent month, with occasional spells of loquaciousness. But...
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Ummm... okay. I have nothing to say. Really. Except that it's a Thursday night, and I'm tired and I'm happy, and that it's been more than a week of stress and sweat. I have an overload of teaching units, and I'm back as a graduate student, with six units overload as well.
How do I survive? Basically, I'm Superman these days. Living on runaway time, Stresstabs, and cups of coffee. But loving the work, nevertheless. I live to punish my body. So give me time,
Gabs, to settle down a bit, soon. But I should be back blogging like there's no tomorrow. In the meantime, June will be a silent month, with occasional spells of loquaciousness. But...
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Wednesday, June 09, 2004
8:56 PM |
Dude, Where's My Car?
In the light of things changing, and the breaking of old fetters, I have -- at 28 -- decided to learn how to drive.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:56 PM |
Dude, Where's My Car?
In the light of things changing, and the breaking of old fetters, I have -- at 28 -- decided to learn how to drive.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
8:56 PM |
Dude, Where's My Car?
In the light of things changing, and the breaking of old fetters, I have -- at 28 -- decided to learn how to drive.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Tuesday, June 08, 2004
5:58 PM |
The Comings and Goings
Late afternoon, on a Tuesday. You feel the heat of the ending day still bearing down on your skin. The sweat has transformed into a kind of mugginess all over you: oil on the tip of your nose, fumes in the weaves of your shirt. It has been a worthwhile day. You took meds earlier, after all, to make sure it becomes such. And for once you do not feel tired. Now it is close to night, and finally you can allow yourself to relax,
just a bit. There is much to celebrate, you think: the second day of school has ended, and you have sailed through it with a fortitude you find surprising. Who knew there was breathing space between negotiating the monster traffic Dumaguete has become of late, and the taxing to-the-letter appraisals of classes to face? There was also the added pressure of having found yourself a student for this particular schoolyear—you had promised, after all, an end to your days of Graduate School complacency. "I want to finish my MA this year!" you had gallantly promised everyone in your life. In your heart, you find that to be a true road map for the year ahead.
You want this done, finished. If only to be able to get on with the next chapter of life. Unfinished business is always unsexy. Now, what else is there to say except to muse that change takes its time... It requires minute patience, and small charities—forgiveness, for example, for slight transgressions, like the occasional inability to wake up early every morning. Or not doing enough to complete the list you call your day. Or eating a little more than you allow yourself to, because... It takes time.
It takes time. You allow yourself happiness.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
5:58 PM |
The Comings and Goings
Late afternoon, on a Tuesday. You feel the heat of the ending day still bearing down on your skin. The sweat has transformed into a kind of mugginess all over you: oil on the tip of your nose, fumes in the weaves of your shirt. It has been a worthwhile day. You took meds earlier, after all, to make sure it becomes such. And for once you do not feel tired. Now it is close to night, and finally you can allow yourself to relax,
just a bit. There is much to celebrate, you think: the second day of school has ended, and you have sailed through it with a fortitude you find surprising. Who knew there was breathing space between negotiating the monster traffic Dumaguete has become of late, and the taxing to-the-letter appraisals of classes to face? There was also the added pressure of having found yourself a student for this particular schoolyear—you had promised, after all, an end to your days of Graduate School complacency. "I want to finish my MA this year!" you had gallantly promised everyone in your life. In your heart, you find that to be a true road map for the year ahead.
You want this done, finished. If only to be able to get on with the next chapter of life. Unfinished business is always unsexy. Now, what else is there to say except to muse that change takes its time... It requires minute patience, and small charities—forgiveness, for example, for slight transgressions, like the occasional inability to wake up early every morning. Or not doing enough to complete the list you call your day. Or eating a little more than you allow yourself to, because... It takes time.
It takes time. You allow yourself happiness.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
5:58 PM |
The Comings and Goings
Late afternoon, on a Tuesday. You feel the heat of the ending day still bearing down on your skin. The sweat has transformed into a kind of mugginess all over you: oil on the tip of your nose, fumes in the weaves of your shirt. It has been a worthwhile day. You took meds earlier, after all, to make sure it becomes such. And for once you do not feel tired. Now it is close to night, and finally you can allow yourself to relax,
just a bit. There is much to celebrate, you think: the second day of school has ended, and you have sailed through it with a fortitude you find surprising. Who knew there was breathing space between negotiating the monster traffic Dumaguete has become of late, and the taxing to-the-letter appraisals of classes to face? There was also the added pressure of having found yourself a student for this particular schoolyear—you had promised, after all, an end to your days of Graduate School complacency. "I want to finish my MA this year!" you had gallantly promised everyone in your life. In your heart, you find that to be a true road map for the year ahead.
You want this done, finished. If only to be able to get on with the next chapter of life. Unfinished business is always unsexy. Now, what else is there to say except to muse that change takes its time... It requires minute patience, and small charities—forgiveness, for example, for slight transgressions, like the occasional inability to wake up early every morning. Or not doing enough to complete the list you call your day. Or eating a little more than you allow yourself to, because... It takes time.
It takes time. You allow yourself happiness.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Monday, June 07, 2004
Orkut, you say? I browsed the site just now. It's a Google company.
Hmmm... Now there's a magic word. Anything
Google is heavenly -- and trustworthy, like Blogger. So get going, Alds, and invite me again!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Orkut, you say? I browsed the site just now. It's a Google company.
Hmmm... Now there's a magic word. Anything
Google is heavenly -- and trustworthy, like Blogger. So get going, Alds, and invite me again!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Orkut, you say? I browsed the site just now. It's a Google company.
Hmmm... Now there's a magic word. Anything
Google is heavenly -- and trustworthy, like Blogger. So get going, Alds, and invite me again!
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
Thursday, June 03, 2004
9:01 PM |
Signs of the Times
Wanggo posted this message in his Friendster bulletin board today:
this coming saturday, i'll be deleting this account... i'm kind of sure of it. i may be back if i hear friendster is working without glitches... but right now, the system is so screwed up! i am logging in in my old password... not the new one that i set up. how screwed up is that?
And I agree with him. Friendster is getting weirder these days, which is why I barely check my account -- that is, if I
am able to log in, of course. Sometimes, I am refused entry due to some "temporary" bugging errors, but often it is because of some "scheduled systems maintenance," which is not improving the system at all. There's also the fact that the 278 Friendsters I have are now down to 273. The question foremost in my mind was:
Am I getting unpopular? But, taking Wanggo's tact, I understand a bit better. There's also the fact that I've been getting old messages back, most of which I've already deleted
months before. Or the fact that I'm getting Friendster requests from friends who already in my list. And the disappearing friends! And the disappearing pictures! And the fact that it takes just about forever to approve a testimonial! The whole thing's becoming less fun now, and more a compendium of exasperation.
(a) Do I stay?
(b) Do I leave?
(c) Do I just ignore the whole thing and get on with my life?
Frankly, I don't really care. And don't even think of inviting me to My Place, or Pinoyster, or Vibester, or... They're just added headaches. Friendster was a
singular experience, and I don't intend to do the same thing over and over again.
But it's not just Friendster that's fucked up. Internet connection
everywhere has been excruciatingly slow, too, even on reputedly fast servers. What gives? Also: Computers inexplicably freeze up when I go to some websites; the New York Times, for example. And I'm tired of fighting the Netsky virus, really. And other variations that're popping up every single day. And the last time I heard, more than ten friends reported their hard drives crashing.
What's with the world
ba?
Grrr.On a pleasant note, I just had a lovely dinner of scrumptious grilled squid in Mamia, with teacher-friends. We made
libak all our bad students, and updated ourselves with how we are all coming along with individual counter-offensive plans for the coming schoolyear (which officially begins Monday). This includes no longer giving out Incompletes.
I feel full. And I am beaming with such enthusiasm, too. Which is good, isn't it?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:01 PM |
Signs of the Times
Wanggo posted this message in his Friendster bulletin board today:
this coming saturday, i'll be deleting this account... i'm kind of sure of it. i may be back if i hear friendster is working without glitches... but right now, the system is so screwed up! i am logging in in my old password... not the new one that i set up. how screwed up is that?
And I agree with him. Friendster is getting weirder these days, which is why I barely check my account -- that is, if I
am able to log in, of course. Sometimes, I am refused entry due to some "temporary" bugging errors, but often it is because of some "scheduled systems maintenance," which is not improving the system at all. There's also the fact that the 278 Friendsters I have are now down to 273. The question foremost in my mind was:
Am I getting unpopular? But, taking Wanggo's tact, I understand a bit better. There's also the fact that I've been getting old messages back, most of which I've already deleted
months before. Or the fact that I'm getting Friendster requests from friends who already in my list. And the disappearing friends! And the disappearing pictures! And the fact that it takes just about forever to approve a testimonial! The whole thing's becoming less fun now, and more a compendium of exasperation.
(a) Do I stay?
(b) Do I leave?
(c) Do I just ignore the whole thing and get on with my life?
Frankly, I don't really care. And don't even think of inviting me to My Place, or Pinoyster, or Vibester, or... They're just added headaches. Friendster was a
singular experience, and I don't intend to do the same thing over and over again.
But it's not just Friendster that's fucked up. Internet connection
everywhere has been excruciatingly slow, too, even on reputedly fast servers. What gives? Also: Computers inexplicably freeze up when I go to some websites; the New York Times, for example. And I'm tired of fighting the Netsky virus, really. And other variations that're popping up every single day. And the last time I heard, more than ten friends reported their hard drives crashing.
What's with the world
ba?
Grrr.On a pleasant note, I just had a lovely dinner of scrumptious grilled squid in Mamia, with teacher-friends. We made
libak all our bad students, and updated ourselves with how we are all coming along with individual counter-offensive plans for the coming schoolyear (which officially begins Monday). This includes no longer giving out Incompletes.
I feel full. And I am beaming with such enthusiasm, too. Which is good, isn't it?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
9:01 PM |
Signs of the Times
Wanggo posted this message in his Friendster bulletin board today:
this coming saturday, i'll be deleting this account... i'm kind of sure of it. i may be back if i hear friendster is working without glitches... but right now, the system is so screwed up! i am logging in in my old password... not the new one that i set up. how screwed up is that?
And I agree with him. Friendster is getting weirder these days, which is why I barely check my account -- that is, if I
am able to log in, of course. Sometimes, I am refused entry due to some "temporary" bugging errors, but often it is because of some "scheduled systems maintenance," which is not improving the system at all. There's also the fact that the 278 Friendsters I have are now down to 273. The question foremost in my mind was:
Am I getting unpopular? But, taking Wanggo's tact, I understand a bit better. There's also the fact that I've been getting old messages back, most of which I've already deleted
months before. Or the fact that I'm getting Friendster requests from friends who already in my list. And the disappearing friends! And the disappearing pictures! And the fact that it takes just about forever to approve a testimonial! The whole thing's becoming less fun now, and more a compendium of exasperation.
(a) Do I stay?
(b) Do I leave?
(c) Do I just ignore the whole thing and get on with my life?
Frankly, I don't really care. And don't even think of inviting me to My Place, or Pinoyster, or Vibester, or... They're just added headaches. Friendster was a
singular experience, and I don't intend to do the same thing over and over again.
But it's not just Friendster that's fucked up. Internet connection
everywhere has been excruciatingly slow, too, even on reputedly fast servers. What gives? Also: Computers inexplicably freeze up when I go to some websites; the New York Times, for example. And I'm tired of fighting the Netsky virus, really. And other variations that're popping up every single day. And the last time I heard, more than ten friends reported their hard drives crashing.
What's with the world
ba?
Grrr.On a pleasant note, I just had a lovely dinner of scrumptious grilled squid in Mamia, with teacher-friends. We made
libak all our bad students, and updated ourselves with how we are all coming along with individual counter-offensive plans for the coming schoolyear (which officially begins Monday). This includes no longer giving out Incompletes.
I feel full. And I am beaming with such enthusiasm, too. Which is good, isn't it?
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
I am so frequently bored these days that in the middle of writing an email, for example, at the crest of rush-hour Internet cafe traffic, I find myself waking with a start, realizing that I have somehow nodded away to sleep. It can't be narcolepsy, although that might explain a lot of things.
Then again, I am bored with most things lately. Action movies, for example. I don't remember much of Vin Diesel in
XXX because I snoozed through the chase scenes and the explosions, which is to say I missed the bulk of the cinematic monstrosity. I have become too numb to appreciate the otherwise vicarious testosterone thrill of such and such. Increasingly, I now want the searing interior tapestries of quiet drama and comedy. Rambunctious comedy is okay, as long as they show a hint of a brain. Jim Carrey in Bruce Almighty, for example. Or the antics of Monty Python. Small dramas, too, are more intense than the brawny promises of action heroes. Charlotte Rampling in
Swimming Pool, for instance. Or Diane Lane in
Under the Tuscan Sun.
But after that movie or this, I still return to the old boredom, and forced to confront a day that may be busy, yes, but forever lacks the "bite" that would make all things worthwhile, and banish away a stir-crazy life.
A man
needs his excitement.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
I am so frequently bored these days that in the middle of writing an email, for example, at the crest of rush-hour Internet cafe traffic, I find myself waking with a start, realizing that I have somehow nodded away to sleep. It can't be narcolepsy, although that might explain a lot of things.
Then again, I am bored with most things lately. Action movies, for example. I don't remember much of Vin Diesel in
XXX because I snoozed through the chase scenes and the explosions, which is to say I missed the bulk of the cinematic monstrosity. I have become too numb to appreciate the otherwise vicarious testosterone thrill of such and such. Increasingly, I now want the searing interior tapestries of quiet drama and comedy. Rambunctious comedy is okay, as long as they show a hint of a brain. Jim Carrey in Bruce Almighty, for example. Or the antics of Monty Python. Small dramas, too, are more intense than the brawny promises of action heroes. Charlotte Rampling in
Swimming Pool, for instance. Or Diane Lane in
Under the Tuscan Sun.
But after that movie or this, I still return to the old boredom, and forced to confront a day that may be busy, yes, but forever lacks the "bite" that would make all things worthwhile, and banish away a stir-crazy life.
A man
needs his excitement.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
I am so frequently bored these days that in the middle of writing an email, for example, at the crest of rush-hour Internet cafe traffic, I find myself waking with a start, realizing that I have somehow nodded away to sleep. It can't be narcolepsy, although that might explain a lot of things.
Then again, I am bored with most things lately. Action movies, for example. I don't remember much of Vin Diesel in
XXX because I snoozed through the chase scenes and the explosions, which is to say I missed the bulk of the cinematic monstrosity. I have become too numb to appreciate the otherwise vicarious testosterone thrill of such and such. Increasingly, I now want the searing interior tapestries of quiet drama and comedy. Rambunctious comedy is okay, as long as they show a hint of a brain. Jim Carrey in Bruce Almighty, for example. Or the antics of Monty Python. Small dramas, too, are more intense than the brawny promises of action heroes. Charlotte Rampling in
Swimming Pool, for instance. Or Diane Lane in
Under the Tuscan Sun.
But after that movie or this, I still return to the old boredom, and forced to confront a day that may be busy, yes, but forever lacks the "bite" that would make all things worthwhile, and banish away a stir-crazy life.
A man
needs his excitement.
[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich
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