Good To Be Home

Wow. We're finally back home from an extended vacation due to the typhoon Pedring. Our front screen door was a bit broken (by the strong winds, most probably), and our induction cooker refuses to work, but other than those minor casualties, the house was exactly how we left it.

Anyway, as to be expected, weeds grew in the front and side of the house while we were away, so I took time the whole morning today to weed out all of them. I don't do this very often nowadays, mind you. I have been stuck up with work during the past several months that I hardly do any household chores. So now I have a clean environment outside the house and really, really dirty fingernails.

I had a couple of packages waiting for me at the guard house, contents of which have yet to be revealed, but I'm pretty sure I know what's inside. It's been several months late in coming. Yes, several. Says a lot about how efficient the postal service in this country is.

So yeah. That's my life so far since we got back.

All We Need Is Love

My mom and my aunt (one of the people in my life closest to my heart) got into a misunderstanding a couple of months back. I'm not at liberty to discuss the details, as it is a rather very personal family affair that seemed to have gone from innocuous enough to just plain ugly. Who started the silent war between the two, I can only guess, but during those times that they were not speaking to each other and have completely ignored each other on Facebook, I was naturally sad. To see the two women I most love in the world not in good terms, of course it broke my heart.


I did what I know what to do, that is, try to get them into speaking terms again even if it was just to say hi to each other. I miss their banter filling my Facebook News Feed, and I felt it was somehow my duty to help them make amends with each other. I would always manage to talk about my aunt in a good way while me and my mom talk, and I would do the same when me and my aunt would talk through Facebook messaging. Today I found out that my mom has removed my aunt from her blocked list (seriously, they are like highschoolers sometimes) and my aunt, well she has been expressing an intention to talk to my mom for quite some time. Ain't that a good news? Turns out they can't stand to be without each other for very long. I guess they just took some time off to clear their minds and be at peace with themselves.


I feel so happy right now that I feel a bit giddy. It wasn't only me who was responsible for their decision, of course. Me and my sisters as well as my aunt's children have been hard at work bringing them back together. All's well now, I think. Of course I can't be certain that it will stay that way until forever, but for the time being I will enjoy what peacefulness between them they offer.


 

Connection Horrors

I haven't gone online lately as much as I want to because our internet connection is intermittent due to the storm. I'm only glad that Ramil (local storm name) is not as fierce as the last two that passed, so we still get a breath of connection every now and then. Plus we get to watch movies while the internet is down because the electricity is still on. I saw 17 Again the other day, and Fedhz told me she's going to review it (she's the one who told me to watch it, fyi) but I have yet to read that. Hee hee.

I'm (kind of) busy with a very violet WordPress site right now, but what with the crappy connection, I can't test it live and it's really slowing down my progress. Anyway, I hope the owner is not too anxious about having it installed already. Hee hee. I will be back and blogging away once our internet is stable. Gawd I can't wait for November so I can change our stupid ISP to a (I hope) better one. That's when our contract for the current ISP expires, so I'm going to have to wait until then. I hope this post finds you safe wherever you are. Have a happy weekend everyone!

Oh man!

Do-do-do-do-do-Dora! Do-do-do-do-do-Dora! Do-do-do-do-do-Dora! Do-do-do-do-do-Dora! Let’s go! Dora Dora Dora the Explorer! DORA! Boots and super cool explorer Dora!

We need your help!

Grab your backpack! Let’s go! Jump in! Vamonos!

You can lead the way!

Hey! hey!

Do-do-dora, do-do-dora, do-do-dora

Swiper no swiping! Swiper no swiping!

Oh man!

Dora the Explorer!

If you have a kid at home, chances are, you know what the heck was that all about. Gawd I could sing that in my sleep while snoring. Swiper is such a pain in the ass. What does he get out of stealing other people's stuff and throwing them away? He's a kleptomaniac. Oh no. I seriously need other stuff to watch. Grown up stuff. Like... porn. Tugugsh.

I Miss My Sis

I have a sister who's a year younger than I am and she lives miles away so I don't get to see her often. She already has her own family too, and sometimes I wish she lives near us so we can go to her often and visit her and my nephew as well. But her husband's work is near where they live right now, so that wish is unlikely to be fulfilled. I was deleting stuff in my hard drive and found these two pictures, one photo of us back when we still didn't have kids and another one with both our kids in the picture:


Taken on 2007, I think. We looked so innocent then. Haha.



Taken the last time they went here. Svet was just seven months then.

I hope to see them when we go there before the New Year. I miss it when we were all still living together with my mom. God those were the days. Oh well. We all have to grow up and have our own families one time or another. I just wish she goes online more often. Like she used to. Miss you RB. Give my kisses to Hendrix ☺

Taxi!

Living in Baguio also has its downside when it comes to taxis even though I have always admired how most of the drivers here are not opportunists and are most always kind. Why am I blabbing about taxi drivers all of a sudden? We went out today to do the grocery because the stock at home was running dangerously low and as usual, we took the taxi home. It's always freaking hard to get a taxi (I think there's not enough to go around) and Paulie, as usual, took forever to get one. Makes me wish this was California, where an Online Taxi Ordering System called WebCabby.com already exists. Cool, eh? That way we never have to stand in the cold waiting for the next empty taxi to come ever again. Plus the site keeps a history of your orders so if you accidentally forget your laptop or whatever in the taxi, you can always look up your history and call the company to get it back. Oh dear that would be sooo nice.

Uh-oh. Blurring Vision.

I've been having them (again) lately, and I think it's because I haven't worn my favorite high fashion eyeglasses in about a year already (I left them in the old office and never had the chance to go back for them. And yes. They were high-fashion). My eyes are screaming "I need glasses. Now." and not even the old trick of looking away from the screen from time to time help. Now of all times, huh? When I'm up to my nose in work. But, anyway, I'm bound to get them glasses anyway sometime soon, what with the amount of time that I spend drooling staring at my monitor, willing my mind to string together something even remotely coherent.

I don't splurge on eyeglasses (heck on anything for myself!), so I usually look for something not-so-pricey. I could use one of those $8 Rx eyeglasses from ZenniOptical, although ALL these beauties (affordable, yep yep) would be a much, much better Christmas (eherm) present. I like this one below for the lovely polka dots. It has a retro-ey feeling. And they come in black, which is how I like most of my glasses. Just fab.


It didn't occur to me that I would want to wear the half-rim shaped glasses below but it was love at first sight. It'd definitely look sophisticated and brainy. Who would dare argue with sophisticated and brainy-looking? Plus it has sparkling crystal on the temples. I am swept off my feet.


And this one definitely tops the list. I could wear this in my sleep. LOL. Just looking at it makes me feel pretty already. And it's below $40! Almost one-eight the price of most prescription glasses. Now that's how you can start spending smart. Doing away with the unnecessary expensive purchases when there are better-quality and lower-priced alternatives. Gawd, why wait for Christmas? This could be my birthday gift to myself. ZenniOptical, here I come.

I'm Still Here

Yes, I still am. Our power was down for 43 hours due to the storm (actually, it was more than that but I stopped counting at 43 because it was getting depressing) and that time we had no choice but to spend it inside the house because the storm was raging outside. Other than being deathly bored, we were quite safe and warm inside our home and I want to thank everyone who were concerned about our family's safety. As soon as the rains died down, we went out to buy stuff at the night market (sweaters, mostly, and food, of course) and when we went home we already had electricity but no internet. Hah. Good thing the connection went back up today (still intermittent but I can deal with that). When I learned of the extent of the damages to the city I was shocked and sad for the people who were greatly affected, but thankful just the same, that amidst the weather Paulie, Svet and I had nothing serious to complain about other than boredom.

So here I am, up to my neck in backlog and gravely behind everybody's contests but I'll manage. In fact, I have more than a week of scheduled posts now. LOL. So you'll be hearing from me again everyday for at least the next week here and at WAHMaholic. I hope everybody's okay and had a great weekend in spite of the weather and everything else crazy. All the messages in the shoutbox and the comments left here would be attended to tomorrow. I better get back to work. The boss (Svet) is screaming for Sesame Street and I can't give it to her until I finish a couple of paid posts. Sheesh.

Slow Day

We've been holed up (yet again) because of continuous rain everyday. Well, okay, it's not as if we go out everyday but when it's raining it's really hard to summon up our strengths to even jump out of bed. Especially here where it's extra cold even on normal days. Although what we have is nothing compared to what I read and see in the news. But you know when it isn't actually happening to you. It's like we're part of another world and there's this thin veil between us and the rest of the country. It's just weird.

Anyway, I should've had my blogversary banner done today but as implied, I was not feeling up to it. Maybe tomorrow. I still have no idea what the mechanics will be, but if I did the banner maybe the ideas will follow? Hmm... Anyway, I already have a few good prizes in mind, including one (or two months, it depends) month of advertising on Adgitize since it seems to be everyone's favorite site at the moment. But it occurred to me that they do not offer this as a feature, giving advertising time to other fellow Adgitize community members as a gift. Like some sort of EntreCard credit.

So I wrote Ken Brown and asked him if we can have that and he said it's definitely going to be a future feature (I dare you to say that fast, ten times in a row), although he doesn't know if he can have it up and running in 38 days (37, today). But he mentioned he will work with me and the rest of us, so here's keeping my fingers crossed. Which reminds me I have to send him a thank you note. He's a pretty great chap, that Ken is. Fedhz was right about him. I think that's about it for today. And yes, this is a scheduled post (oh my gosh I am scheduling my posts like Pehpot and Niko now!) so I'm not awake right now.

What'd Men Do If They Had A Vagina For A Day

10. Immediately go shopping for zucchini and cucumbers.

9. Squat over a hand-held mirror for an hour and a half.

8. See if they could finally do the splits.

7. See if it's truly possible to launch a ping pong ball 20 feet.

6. Cross their legs without rearranging their crotch.

5. Get picked up in a bar in less than 10 minutes...BEFORE closing time.

4. Have consecutive multiple orgasms and still be ready for more without sleeping first.

3. Go to the gynecologist for a pelvic exam and ask to have it recorded on video.

2. Sit on the edge of the bed and pray for breasts too.

1. Finally find that damned G-spot.

Honestly, I didn't know that women can do number 7. But then hubby showed me this video and I was like, "Ohhh" and "Ewww" at the same time. There's more of this tomorrow. Yep. The version of the other sex. Trust me. It only gets funnier.

Sick Here And There

I woke up with a damn cold. It's the most horrible feeling: a stuffy nose, a scratchy throat, a bit of cough. WTF. And the weather's not been exactly uplifting the last few days so yeah. Hard to get through. Svet's the first to have a cold, then her dad, then me. The child has put up wonderfully with it, all things considered. I wish I have the same attitude as hers. But unfortunately I don't. I get crabby when I'm feeling all these unpleasant things (which isn't often, thank God!) Svet's is even up to their daily lessons (learning animal sounds, the last two weeks) despite her being sick. This kid is amazing, I tell you. I hear Pehpot's and Fedhz's children are sick, too. The bad weather is getting to us all. Oh dear.

Rekindling My Youth

The title is actually a euphemism for "I did not work as hard the last several days because I was busy playing PC games". Haha. When I was in high school I was addicted to PlayStation (yes,. I am THAT old). Me and my sisters and cousins would play Crash Team Racing, Snowbow Kids Plus, South Park Rally and all those uber cool games we had all weekend long. Our parents were thankful that we were not out on the streets like most other teens because they can keep a close eye on us, but when the electric bills came I'm not sure if they were as thankful. But anyway, last week I discovered about several PlayStation emulator software. They have been in existence for a while now and I am shocked that I only found out about them last week.

Since I've download a pretty good emulator, me and hubby have been downloading PSX games (that's what they call PS games that can be played on a desktop) like mad. First there was Harvest Moon (that we haven't finished yet) and then there was Snobow Kids Plus (which we finished in two days) and now there's Crash Team Racing. The graphics are horrible compared to the newer games today. Hubby laughs at how some of the characters were drawn (he can do that because he can draw quite well. I can't because I would sound like a superficial toad as I can only draw stick figures) But I'd rather have that and a good storyline than eye-candy graphics and crappy plot.

Anyway, I don't know if anyone can relate. I feel like I'm the only one (aside from my hubby) who plays them anymore. LOL. I've been so out lately that these things distract me easily from my work. I feel guilty, really. I feel like I should stop playing these childish games and focus on work instead but somewhere in my mind it says I should loosen up a bit or I end up deranged from work overload. I'm a little crazy but I don't want to be deranged, so I'm gonna end this entry now to play some more. Haha. Another blog redesign project is in the works for a friend, I hope to finish it by tomorrow. Tell me what you think about it by then.

This Blog WAS In Hiatus

Just in case you didn't notice. Ha ha. The operative term here is "WAS" (is was, hmmm. I didn't realize you can actually write those two words one after the other without inciting the wrath of grammarians everywhere.) Twenty days. Wow. That long already? I didn't realize. Must be from watching all those movies while I was on break. I HAD to take a break, see. My 512 speed was killing me. It wouldn't be too bad if I wasn't on Vista. Unfortunately, I am, so there. But I'm back (yay!) and I will be visiting your blogs as soon as I get the more immediate tasks out of my back (paid writing opps (one of which is about to expire in two hours. yikes!) and mTurk, mainly). Thank you for all those who missed me and searched high and low for a sign of me. I was on Twitter some of those days (if you were following me you would've known. Ha ha. And yes, that was a ploy to get you guys to follow me. LOL!)

You know what's weird? When I'm not blogging I feel like I can actually live without all of this, but when I start typing in this New Post page, I ALWAYS, always realize how much fun I have blogging and how much I love to just write. Another thing that came out of this hiatus was that I have found a new love, in the person of Riley Poole (played by Justin Bartha) of the National Treasure movies. I LOVE his dry sense of humor and he's cute. Plus I'm acting like a school girl and I know I should stop now. Ha ha. Seriously. Watch it if you haven't already. Just forgive the highly improbable plot and enjoy the dialogue.

There's another contest coming. I think. First I just have to finish Denise's blog (I'm sorry hun for taking too long!) and then on to a new giveaway. Again, I'm sorry for being the pestilential toad by not even peeking in here all those twenty days, but I'm back now and that's what matters right? (or not. ha ha). And besides, you probably are used to me suddenly floating out of space. Hehe. I WILL be blog hopping later, so see ya!

Your Wish Is My Command, Part 2

You all. Thank you sooo much for that lovely reception. And since some people had also expressed their interest, I am donning my genie suit again, "Bewitched" style, in the hopes that I reach out to more souls this time around. No joy for me still, actually running out of "lifeline" and getting more and more depressed by the minute, so instead of this world being one BIIIIG sucking place, why not create happiness for others, eh? So here is the second batch of free blog siggys, and like the first release, I hope y'all like these, too:










I have a bad news and a good news. What do you wanna hear first? I pick the bad (for dramatic effect. bleh.). Okay, so here goes. I will accept no more requests for customized siggys from now on (all together now. awwww....). Yep, that's right. I want to focus on "bigger" things. And here comes the good news. By bigger I mean a FREE BLOG MAKEOVER! My birthday's not-so near already (July 26), so I thought as a way of showing appreciation for the 25 years that I spent here on earth, I'd give something back and make someone truly happy. At least I hope I could make you happy by doing that.

By makeover I mean the template, the header, the siggy, the 125x125 button, the installation in your blog. The whole works. I'm sorry I could not give it sooner. I am still occupied by stuff that I promised people I would do for them. But yeah, the BLOG MAKEOVER thingy will definitely happen, I promise you that. Right now I'm still thinking of "contest mechanics", if I may call it that.

Buh-bye for now.

Can I Cry?

Because right now I am seriously on the verge of doing so. Someone spoke harshly to me on messenger a moment ago, called me shameless and a lot of other hurtful things. I might have just accepted it whole heartedly had it been true, but right now I just feel like bursting from anger and humiliation and pity on myself. Apparently, some people on earth just don't have manners.

Recently, and I haven't been telling you this for reasons I cannot say, I quit my job. Yep. The one I was telling you about, the 40-hour a week job. Okay, I might as well say it now. The pay was too low and promises of an increase was not as high and came waaayy later than expected. I felt like the work I rendered was way more than the pay I receive, and I don't like being treated unfairly, which is why I quit. With how the economy is shaping I cannot hold out anymore with what I was receiving from them.

So I went back to mTurk. I didn't want to, because the job is not stable. I didn't know when the HITs I am working for will cease appearing at the site. But the pay is great. In fact, just last week I was able to get a little less than $150 from it. So while I am still looking for another job, I Turk. The catch here is, you only get your earnings through two options: Amazon gift certificate or a U.S. bank account. I didn't want to work for Amazon and then spend all my money AT Amazon as well. That would be stupidity, right? And not very practical.

So I needed someone with a U.S. bank account to transfer my earnings to so that in turn, the person will send my money to me through Western Union. My mom knows this guy friend from California, and things were working great, he was very, very kind. Imagine, he gave me his bank details and his driver's license and other stuff that I need to be able to send money to his bank. He shouldered the taxes that has been incurred by the money I send him. And he told me he was okay, and was glad to help. After all, he and my mom have known each other for like forever.

UNTIL HIS WIFE came home. That was when the problems started. Her paranoia glazed in jealousy led her to say things to me which are hard to swallow for someone like me who isn't used to such harsh words, but I stayed. The reason because I really do not know anyone else like my mom's friend who would be so kind to me as him, and we really needed the money because the bills have piled up, mainly brought about by the very limited money flow from my last job.

He doesn't go online often, my mom's friend, and his wife uses his messenger account all the time, so I sometimes make the mistake of saying hi, hoping it was him on the line and not the wife. It turns out that I am not the luckiest woman on earth, because each and every time I am met by hostile words. I don't know how long I can take that. I don't know when he will go online. I don't know much about anything right now, save for the fact that the Internet bill is already due and the house bills are coming in a week and I see no money coming in. Fark. Why is the world unfair? You try your best to help other people and be nice, you try your best not to bitch about things, you try your best to make a living, in hopes that when you are good, the world will also be good to you. But I guess the world just doesn't work that way. Double fark.

Can I cry now?

My New Layee Is Out!

Is this pretty or what? *grins* I spent like five-six hours doing this, and I am very tired. But I LOVED the results. My blog is less cluttered, too (at least IMO). I disposed of many sidebar widgets that I and the readers obviously don't benefit from. There is still so much tweaking that I want done, but I am so sleepy right now that I will be doing the rest of the overhaul next time I get in front of this computer. I am rambling now, I know. I really gotta go get some sleep. Please leave comments below, lemme know what you think. Damnit. I better check the comment section later as well. I hope it's not screwed up. And my signature looks gross on a yellow background. Augh. So much to do.

EDIT:
I already did my signature (see below for all new and improved (?) siggy), plus a couple of extra design tweaks (if you're observant you'll probably notice that it's the post separator and the bottom border of the post title.). I still have to work on the post title itself. The padding and margin is messed up in there. But that will be work for another day. Thank you to all those who commented. Makes me feel like I've done something right (finally). But really, THANKS A BUNCH, y'all!

I Knew It!

I was laughing at Svet's antics yesterday when it suddenly hit me. The reason why I keep making excuses to leave this blog. I should've known it all along. It wasn't that I didn't have the time. I could make time if I want to. It wasn't that I have nothing useful to post. I could choose to write something of use to someone. The real reason? I AM GETTING TIRED OF THIS BLOG'S LAYOUT.

When I went to peek in this morning, I was dismayed at how messy the sidebars looked. It appeared okay to me before, but somehow, being more exposed to WAHMaholic this past weeks (which has a way cleaner interface) made me realize how cluttered the side blocks are. So before today ends, I am cleaning up my sidebar. I will rearrange everything so it doesn't distract the readers from the content (as per criticisms to this blog by several LinkReferral members). What's better (and this is purely to serve my purposes), I will overhaul the design of this uber pink blog. Yep. You read that right. Although make no mistake, the new layout will be pink in majority still, but as a couple of LinkReferral members suggested, I will tone the pink down a bit.

So yeah. That got me excited already. I should've done this a while ago. I should have realized sooner that all I needed to do was breathe a new life (in the form of a makeover) to this blog and everything will be fine. That was stupid of me to even think of leaving this baby. So I am going to get off here, and start with my header. As in right now. Will show you my work in progress later.

And The Rain Goes On Forever...

Ever since we moved here in Baguio, I started to hate the rain. I used to love it, I would even let myself be drenched under the rain (yes, even when I was working already) because it's something I find soothing. But here, I hate it. I hate it because it gets colder than it usually is, so I become uncomfortable. I hate it because it's harder to dry our clean laundry. I hate it because we cannot go to the park to just laze under the sun in the grass. I hate it because I can't kiss hubby under the rain anymore because doing it would mean exposing ourself to the bone-freezing cold. I know. Silly. But have you tried kissing the person you love under the rain? Like in the movies? If seeing it on screen makes your hair stand on its end (and not because of horror), then you would miss out on one of life's feel good moment if you don't try it at least once in your lifetime.

So here I am freezing in the dark with only the light of the monitor on, wanting so much to just lie beside hubby and hug him tight to keep me warm, but I still have an hour to go before I can go to sleep because of work. And what am I doing blogging while working? No, I won't get fired. I fired myself from my work already and I'm back to my mTurking sideline in the mean time while I look for a decent enough full time work with good enough pay. And while I'm in between full-time jobs, I found a little time in my hands to spend on changing my blog signature for WAHMaholic, which looked like this after an hour of thinking of a good concept:




From now on I'll be using my old signature there in here, the signature here is eww. I also found the time to design the site for Paulie's drawings, something that he's been thinking of doing for a while now. I posted a screenshot of it at WAHMaholic, so if you're curious enough you can go there, or if not, I'll be posting the screen capture below. Hehehe. Here it is, tell me what you think. Click for full view:

Death Note Is My New Religion

Death Note is what's been keeping me busy the past two weeks. Hubby already read the manga, and I have been dying to watch the series for like ever, so we finally got down to watching to whole thing. Now we're about to watch the movie, which will keep me busy for the next day again. Hehe.

I am starting to feel like this blog is useless. I mean, I am not helping anyone out with the things I am writing in here. I just post stuff about myself. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love to write what's happening in my life (and love to read what's happening in yours, too), but it seems I am having less and less time for this site. It makes me guilty as hell, considering this is the first blog that I ever had the patience to update regularly (okay, not-so-regularly) and this is where I made most of my friends.

I don't know how you people with multiple blogs deal with it. It is so hard for me to update the two that I have. So lately I'm thinking of totally ceasing to write in this blog and focusing on my other site instead. Although I don't honestly know how many people will follow me at WAHMaholic if I did, which what makes me think twice of doing it. Oh crap. What do I do.

Only Human

One mistake
And I’m jaded for life
Never given a chance
To hear out my side
Blind to what’s good
Always see what’s bad
Like a spot that stands out
In a sheet so white.
Is it so wrong to be wrong sometimes?
Is it such a sin to be careless for a while?
I’m sorry I’m not faultless
I’m sorry for being human
I’m sorry I’m not perfect like you
I’m sorry I never do anything good.
You make me regret I even lived
You make my life seem like a waste of time
What’s said can’t be taken back
What’s done is done
Got no voice, what’s the use of pretending
Can’t speak, can’t breath
Won’t speak, won’t breath now…

Oh wow. A week vacation from blogging here and I'm suddenly poetic. Is that a good sign?