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Thursday, September 30, 2004

question of the month #001

hello friends, strangers, and potential stalkers (hahaha). i'll be starting a new feature in my blog, the "question of the month."

on the first day of every calendar month i'll pose a question to you people, which can be about anything and everything. (to help identify which post is the QOM post, i'll be placing the (?) mood icon right before my question.) at the end of the month i'll post the results on my sidebar for everyone to see. the previous month's compiled answers will be kept on my blog until the next question rolls around Ü so here is our debut question:



(to put your answers in context, kindly indicate how to know me, i.e. hs classmate, officemate, etc. and how long we've known each other. if you don't know me personally, you can describe me from what you've gathered from my blog Ü)

answer the question by clicking on the comments link below. thanks!

photo archive #003




Wednesday, September 29, 2004

oh dear...



He bought me a ticket to the Alicia Keys concert. The one that costs two thousand six hundred bucks. He got it so I can go watch the show with him. Maybe that should have been a big enough clue.

He found out I was working overtime tonight. He called me up at half past seven to ask if I'm still at the office. He was going to pick me up and bring me to MRT station, 'cause he also knew I commuted to work. That's when warning bells went off in my head.

Of course, I suppressed the rising panic. He's been a friend since high school. Well, on-again off-again friend. I don't know if he knows that I remember meeting him in freshman year. But we didn't really get to know each other until junior year... I suspected he had a thing for me then, and, being the immature insenstive girl that I was, I was outright mean to him. Trying to beat him off my track, if you will. It was a love-hate relationship (if you could call it such) that evolved into a not-so-normal friendship. We lost touch in college, but caught up with each other last year when I ran into him in the city's newest melting pot - the "health club," i.e. gym. And in so many years (not to mention relationships) since high school, I figured he'd have given up by now. Hence, my very platonic view of the relationship.

He's the one I bug when I want to go out and everyone else can't. We don't talk much, but when we do, we never skip a beat. It's as if we just saw each other the day before. We go out sporadically. Sometimes he'll just call and ask if I'm busy, then we go out for coffee, a movie, or dinner. When he swings by the gym in my area he lets me know, in case I'm going. (Saturday is really my gym day, for everyone's benefit.) The first time he asked me out after a long time, I had to ask if it was a date. He said no. I take it that answer still holds until today. Although there have been unexpected bursts of exhibited interest on his part.

Like our nights out, his visits to my blog are irregular. So I wouldn't know if he'll see this post or not. But, unlike the subject of an earlier post, I'd much rather that THIS guy would read my blog. Beats going up to him and asking point-blank, "Hey dude, do you still have a thing for me???"

Tuesday, September 28, 2004

waaaaah!!!



i was updating my blog template last night and the site feeding was s-l-o-w... so i thought i should just try again today. but when i checked my template this morning, half the script was gone!!! all i saw when i refreshed my blog was a blank gray background. and all i wanted to do was update SOMEBODY'S blog link. since i have to start from scratch, i've decided to use a new template. so my blog is at the bare minimum - no photo gallery, no tagboard, no links. and it took me SO LONG to jazz up my blog. sigh.

the UP side of today is i get to work at home. office is remodelling, and my boss says that people who can't take the fumes can just do their stuff at home. yeah!!! at least i can work on my blog on the side, haha! (hey, my house is as good as any office - fax machine, photocopier, unlimited internet access, and of course, a P4 processor. only thing i need now is a large format printer.)

cow. inkjet printer is acting buggy. my sister is cramming a paper and it won't print. good thing we have a laser printer upstairs. i'm pissed because i know part of the reason my computer has been acting weird is because of her abuse. and she snaps at me when i try to fix it. oh well. not my fault. i'll fix the printer settings when i get to use my computer again. right now i'm using the workstation upstairs. which does NOT have autocad. which means i'm not really working right now, though i'm supposed to start 8am. whatever.

Monday, September 27, 2004

DAMAGE CONTROL!!!



All caps title not done on purpose. Am at work (autocad is responsible for all caps). Realized female stupidity overnight, want to detract yesterday's post. Only remembered blog when it was already 10am. Was supposed to take it out when I got to office first thing. Saw friends' comments. Agree with both. Now hoping stupidity will not catch up with me. Holy cow. (For fun, will keep heinous post on page today, to see other people's comments. Hope it will not be the death of me.)

Distracting myself from object of confusion. Things not going too well today. Accounts payable sprouting out of nowhere. Only highlight is my friend treating me to Alicia Keys concert next weekend. Finally, get to enjoy something for FREE! Though also have qualms about free concert. Afraid friend and rest of the world (most especially the parents) will read too much into it. (no, it is NOT a date.)

Can't wait for payday. Dreading bills, and other unavoidable expenses which stemmed from personal carelessness. Hoping things were simpler. Thinking it will only get worse with time. End of the month coming, room still a mess. But new bookshelves are up, haha! Have to set new personal goals for the month. Will start list this weekend.

Still thinking like Bridget Jones. Must be the paint vapors. Bugger.

Sunday, September 26, 2004

fallin'

this post has been sitting on my drafts section for quite a while. a hundred bucks goes to the person who guesses the date i originally wrote this. it's been an agonizing X number of weeks, and it doesn't look like it's going to end soon.

yeah, it's the anti-thesis of being happily single. shoot me while you can.

just for the record, i am still single. and i do not hate it. BUT... i am getting confused by circumstances surrounding my life. just when i was content being alone, something, SOMEONE, comes along and makes me do a double take. i want to ask god what this means, but i'm also scared of hearing his answer. strange as it may sound, i do not want to fall in love again. not yet. not now!!! sometimes i want to ask god, "what gives?!?! you know i can't do this now. you know i don't need this!!!" but, of course, there's that small part of me that says, "can it be? is this what you want for me right now?" truth is, i am quite happy with the way things are going. and i'll definitely jump in headfirst if god gives me the go signal.

sometimes i get to thinking that god wants to make sure that i will stick to my present plan of staying single. other times i feel that he's finally working on my love life and this is his surprise for me. oh, what a surprise. it came when i least expect it. and from someone i would have noticed the least. every time i think about it i am blown away. it's just... wow. yes, i am giddy as a schoolgirl. who wouldn't be? it's like the stuff i used to read in those teenage romance novels. (but not as cheezy, mind you.) when i recall how things happened i can't help but smile and feel this funny glow. and each time i speak with god's little surprise, he seems to be more of the kind of man that i have been waiting for. he seems too good to be true.

maybe i'm falling... what does that mean, anyway? does it mean thinking of him almost every single day since the day you met? and catching yourself smiling whenever you do? does it entail waiting for his phone calls, for his messages, hoping to hear from him every so often? and maybe keeping his messages on your mobile just for sentimental reasons? even keeping a recorded message on you answering machine just so you can hear his voice? if that's the case, then yes, i am unmistakably, undeniably falling for him. however, for the time being, i am convincing myself that there is nothing more to this than friendship. i don't want to jump the gun this time and play the fool - again. i have learned enough from my past to keep a rein on my feelings until things are actually much clearer. and for someone as impulsive as i am, that takes a LOT of willpower. unfortunately, these days it seems like a losing battle.

i haven't heard from him for a while. and i am going nuts. i am moodier than i have ever been in the past six months - excluding periods of hormonal imbalance, that is. i am kicking myself for being so... stupid. these days i am wishing i can be like those charming, coy girls who seem to draw men to them like bees to a honeycomb. i used to kid around saying my charm works in reverse - it repels rather than attracts. now i am wishing it were not true.

what really gets me is that the "relationship" (for lack of a better word, though it is obviously not such) had a strong start. i can tell he was into me. (unless i am deluded, in which case this whole post is simply rantings of a madwoman.) and it was going great. he'd send me text messages. he asked for my number and he'd call. heck, he even went to my place one sunday afternoon and invited me out for coffee. but now it's like cold turkey. oh, the agony of waiting. yes, i know i posted that article that says waiting is the highest form of service. but i don't feel like serving anyone else right now. (in hindsight, that post is probably responsible for the unnerving silence i am experiencing at the moment. drat.)

now here's the clincher: i know i have absolutely no right, but i felt a tiny twinge of jealousy when i found out he was going to visit a friend this weekend. a female friend. who lives a thousand miles away. (read: has to take the expressway to get to her place.) and this i found out from the girl he's visiting!!! yaaaaaagggghhh!!! the things i put myself through. if i were any other girl i'd probably kill myself for being such an idiot. instead i blog. and take the BIG risk that parties concerned will read it. like digging my own grave. then again, he's ignoring me now. so maybe he won't see.

if he does, let's just hope he's dense like most guys. then again, if he were like most guys i wouldn't be so crazy about him.

Wednesday, September 22, 2004

ugh.

in emotional slump since monday. reason not completely unknown, but currently being ignored and / or denied. cow. feel v UNprofound these past days. like am the world's biggest dunce. alright, maybe not biggest, but close. argh! am just so... off. not myself. and don't know how to make self feel ok. bugger.

have a couple of posts in works, saved as draft in dashboard. but am currently not in proper state of mind to finish poetic or prosaic writing. have one almost done, just sitting there waiting to be published. but am gonna sit on it a while longer. posting will have definite repercussions. may make current situation worse. might throw self deeper into hole am currently in. suffice to say, post is thought-provoking. especially to parties concerned. yes, v controversial.

am currently writing in helen fielding-bridget jones mode. feel that this method most matches mood. short. unadorned. random thought bursts to match confused emotional state. but am not consistent with style. have to brush up on writing techniques. too tired to bother editing. will go to bed soon. hope funk will disappear in morning.

Friday, September 17, 2004

the sacrament of waiting

by Fr. James Donelan, S.J.

The English poet John Milton wrote that those who serve only also stand and wait. I think I would go further and say that those who wait render the highest form of service. Waiting requires more discipline, more self-control and emotional maturity, more unshakable faith in our cause, more unwavering hope in the future, more sustaining love in our hearts that all the greatest deeds of deering-do go by the name of action.

Waiting is a mystery - a natural sacrament of life - there is a meaning hidden in all the times we have to wait. It must be an important mystery because there is so much waiting in our lives.

Everyday is filled with those little moments of waiting (testing our patience and our nerves, schooling us in self-control.) We wait for meals to be served, for a letter to arrive, for a friend to call or show up for a date. We wait in line at cinemas and theaters, concerts and circuses. Our airline terminals, railway stations and bus depots are great temples of waiting filled with men and women who wait in joy for the arrival of a loved one - or wait in sadness to say goodbye and give the last wave of hand. We wait for springs to come - or autumn - for the rains to begin and stop.

And we wait for ourselves to grow from childhood to maturity. We wait for those inner voices that tell us when we are ready for the next stop.

We wait for graduation, for our first job, our first promotion. We wait for success and recognition. We wait to grow up - to reach the stage where we make our own decisions. We cannot remove this waiting from our lives. It is a part of the tapestry of living - the fabric in which the threads are woven to tell the story of our lives.

Yet current philosophies would have us forget the need to wait "grab all the gusto you can get." So reads one of America's greatest beer ads - get it now! Instant pleasure, instant transcendence. Do not wait for anything. Life is short - eat, drink and be merry because tomorrow you will die. And so they rationalize us into accepting unlicensed and irresponsible freedom - pre-marital sex and extra marital affairs - they warn against attachments and commitments - against expecting anything of anybody, or allowing them to expect anything of us - against dropping any anchors in the currents of our life that will cause us to hold and wait.

This may be the correct prescription for pleasure - but even that is fleeting and doubtful - what was it Shakespeare said about the mad pursuit of pleasure - "Past reason hunted, and once had, past reason hated." Not if we wish to be real human beings, spirit as well as flesh, soul as well as heart, we have to learn to wait. For if we never learn to wait, we will never learn to love someone other than ourselves.

For most of all waiting means waiting for someone else. It is a mystery, brushing by our face everyday like a stray wind of leaf falling from a tree. Anyone who has loved knows how much waiting goes into it - how much waiting is important for love to grow, to flourish through a lifetime.

Why is this? Why can we not have it right now what we so desperately want and need? Why must we wait - two years, three years - and seemingly waste so much time? You might as well ask why a tree should take so long to bear fruit - the seed to flower - carbon to change to diamond.

There is no simple answer - no more than there is to life's other demands - having to say goodbye to someone you love because either you or they have made other commitments; or because they have to grow and find the meaning of their own lives - having yourself to leave home and loved ones to find your own path - good-byes, like waiting, are also sacraments of our lives.

All we know is that growth - the budding, the flowering of love needs patient waiting. We have to give each other a time to grow. There is no way we can make someone else truly love us or we them, except through time. So we give each other that mysterious gift of waiting - of being present without asking demands and rewards. There is nothing harder to do than this. It truly tests the depth and sincerity of our love. But there is life in the gift we give.

So lovers wait for each other - until they can see things the same way - or let each other freely see things in quite different ways.

There are times when lovers hurt each other and cannot regain the balance of intimacy of the way they were. They have to wait - in silence - but still present to each other - until the pain subsides to an ache and then only a memory and the threads of the tapestry can be woven together again in a single love story.

What do we lose when we refuse to wait; when we try to find shortcuts through life - when we try to incubate love and rush blindly and foolishly into a commitment we are neither mature nor responsible enough to assume? We lose the hope of truly loving or of being loved. Think of all the great love stories of history and literature - isn't it of their very essence that they are filled with this strange but common mystery - that waiting is part of the substance - the basic fabric against which the story of that true love is written?

How can we ever find either life or true love if we are too impatient to wait for it?

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

it's raining men

had i known that the tropical monsoon will bring with it such questionable elements, i would have gotten my extra large umbrella.

since july this year i've been having weird run-ins with men. ok, so maybe it started earlier than july, but the abnormalities seem to be picking up lately. let's run down my list of men...
  1. engineer who is already in a relationship (oh, it gets worse)
  2. unmarried (then, at least) father of 5-year old girl (see?!?!)
  3. thirty-year old (somewhat aggressive) fitness trainer
  4. security guard of macea parking lot (who calls me ms beautiful?!?)
  5. ANOTHER fitness trainer (hoo boy...)

i REALLY don't know where these men come from. sometimes i would just be walking along and an unfamiliar male voice would call out "hi," or some security personnel would greet me "good morning, ma'am." (and, for the record, i did NOT initiate eye contact.) truth is, i find it strange. usually men would just gaze past to prettier, sexier women walking behind me. now i get greeted by strangers??? how on earth did i suddenly become pick-up material?!?

as far as i know, the only thing that changed was my weight. so does that mean extra poundage = greater attraction factor? hmmm... might have to rethink that fat-burning program i intend to undertake. (i wonder what the upper limit of my weight gain VS attractiveness factor is, i.e. where they will intersect in a graph. oh man, nerdiness showing through...) could it be that i give off this "come on, hit on me" vibe? i hope not. at any rate, i don't see it (but then again, i can't really observe myself from afar) anyway, going back to our main subject...

yes, the sudden surge of attention is flattering, but still... there is the nagging question of "if i am attracting so many men, how come there is STILL NO DECENT GUY TO CHOOSE FROM?!?!?" answer: there are more eligible women than there are eligible men. (i look at my pool of friends and my theory is proven correct.) and because that (sadly) is the case, i would much rather have a drought than have unlimited manfall. less chances of weirdos catching up with me. statistically speaking, anyway. there is still the loser magnet factor to consider. and given the above male selection, i think it's pretty much established that i AM a loser magnet. unless by some miracle a knight in shining armor comes galloping into my life on his white steed. shyeah, right.


Sunday, September 12, 2004

underweight no more!

woohoo!!! i have reached my goal of hitting 125lbs, and surpassed it by one pound. Hopefully that one pound is just water retention, because now i am beginning to feel FAT. i suppose my earlier post of feeling like a blimp is no longer irrational and unfounded. i AM fat (compared to before). imagine, from 113lbs back in college (five years ago) to 126lbs. wow. the most i weighed during my UP years was 120. and that lasted barely a year.

so this is how it feels to not be underweight. hmmmm... now i am beginning to get conscious of what i eat, and how much. i used to munch whatever i wanted, whenever i wanted (and that occurs every two to four hours. YES, i am a pig. a slim pig, mind you.) now... let's just say i have to stop myself from eating all the time. got to work on that growing midsection.

well, according to the halls.md website, i am well within the ideal weight range, and my body mass index is 19.7 kg/m2 (the "ideal" would be 19 to 25 kg/m2) somehow, i am not comforted. this must be what normal people feel.

Thursday, September 09, 2004

me against the world

apparently i am always wrong. apparently my parents would never take my side even if it is not completely my fault. sure, blame it on me. not like i have enough things to worry about. not like i didn't suffer major emotional breakdown a year ago. not like i'm still recovering from all the scars... not like a relapse isn't likely to happen.

sometimes i just want to die.

sometimes i wish i did.

Saturday, September 04, 2004

to all the men i've loved before

and still love to this day.

no, not my exes. my guy friends.

my life would never be the same without them. and i am eternally grateful to these creatures who seem to be gifted with patience. (and high tolerance levels?) they listen to me gripe when i have a bad day. they help me pull myself together when i get lost on the highway. they laugh and poke fun at me when i talk about my so-called admirers. they offer to call me up when i'm feeling down... or if they're not quite sure how to handle the situation, they ask a gal pal from halfway around the world to call me up. they make me smile or laugh out loud with their slapstick comments. they provide me with valuable male insight when i have just about had it with men. they give me unexpected phone calls just to have some lighthearted conversation. they take verbal - and even physical - abuse during my "grar" moments. what can i say? guy friends are a commodity i cannot live without.

though i grew up in an exclusive girls' school (yes, i am an ican. and yes, i know i don't always look or act like one.) i seem to prefer the company of males on most days. i suppose the mystery of the male psyche is part of my preference. i already know how women think. men, on the other hand, are totally different animals. they never cease to amuse and surprise me, even though "you are SUCH a guy" is fast becoming my favorite expression. i already have some theories on male behavior stocked up in my mind, but i am sure i've still got a long way to go before i can truly understand them.

and it goes both ways. my guy friends cannot completely understand me. (actually, i don't think my gal pals don't really understand me, either, but we're digressing.) they, being male, do not exert much effort into deciphering my behavior. as such, they simply let me be, and chalk up my dramatic episodes as "being a woman". it's quite convenient for all parties concerned. they let me cry when i need to. they let me scream when i want to. heck, they let me hit them when i have to. they help me get through emotionally taxing moments by simply being there to take my rantings and beatings. and at the end of the day, they're still my friends.

which is all the more reason for me to love them.