byline whore...and then some

I have been churning a handful of write-ups lately, most of which, I am happy to say, have my byline. I am already on my third article, and there's one more to go before this week ends.

I admit it's not really an easy task, especially when I get distracted by the Internet. Boo. Actually, the hard part there is getting distracted in the middle of transcribing an hour-long interview. I hate transcribing. Anyone who says it's fun to do can get my share. But the writing part is very much welcome. It's weird, but I feel...happy when I write. There's a certain challenge to it that brings me this awesome fulfilled feeling after I've typed (or edited) away the last few concluding words. And of course, there's a byline. In my job at a semi-ad agency department, nobody cares about credits because, well, there's none. Most of the time, though, that works because at least no one would know you did a mediocre material based not on your own concept but on the one who pays you to execute their concept. So you see.

Anyway, it's good to be able to write a decent piece of article. It keeps my brain alive. (And it's also good to know that someone else is cramming to beat deadlines, i.e., my husband. He's not writing, though; he's trying to map out river basins, whatever that means.)

Before I ramble on some more, let me get back to my deadline.

a sneak peek

I was finally able to bring my Sanuk to Baguio!
This is me waking up at 7am to lounge and read at
PNKY's garden before embarking on a long shoot day.

I have been terribly busy this week--so busy that I am barely blogging. In fact, I was horrified to discover that my last entry in my other blog was two months ago! (Well, I just updated it, so there.) My aim to regularly (as in weekly) blog seems to be failing. Tsk, tsk, tsk. I blame work.

Anyway, I've been busy lately mainly on things I love to do. Just recently, I went up again to Baguio on a writing assignment, and it was fun, fun, fun! Because I am not yet allowed to divulge the details, let me just say that my recent trip is one for the books. Why? Two names: BenCab and Ben-Hur. These photos will prove that I've rubbed elbows with these two art maestros.

Me with the crew and National Artist Ben Cabrera

While Ben-Hur was happily regaling us with his stories
and lessons in life, I just had to have a photo op!

That's all for now! Imma get back to transcribing my BenCab interview (which was on-the-spot, I barely have prepared questions; but more on that when I'm already free to talk about the details of the trip). I'll come back with more stories to tell as soon as I beat my deadlines.

my books will now be happy!

Finally, after almost a week of waiting (yes, that's already a long wait for me), I am now a proud owner of an Aklat Eklat leather book jacket! I am so happy! Now, I no longer have to pressure myself into (plastic) covering my books before I even read them--no more fraying the covers!

The label comes with care instructions at the back.

I used to feel very uncomfortable reading an uncovered book; thanks to Aklat Eklat, I can now immediately devour books (I am sounding like an endorser here, I know!). But of course, I'd still wrap them after reading in case someone else wants to borrow my treasures.

My initials (yay!) and the built-in bookmark.
Isn't that convenient, not to mention cute?

I'd definitely buy another one in a bigger size and a brighter color combination. For now, I shall read in peace and with panache, as Aklat Eklat says!

P.S.
Now where can I buy a leather protectant for my book jacket? Any ideas?

yes, i am all for immediate gratification

So last night was almost a downer if not for Despicable Me. Two things: First, Aklat Eklat made a mistake with my initials so I had to return the item and wait for a few more days for the correct one. It's just weird that I had a feeling something might go wrong with the book jacket I ordered, and something did. Bleh! But Aklat was kind enough to promise me the new jacket will be ready within this week. Good thing they have one more of the color I chose; otherwise, I'd have to wait for three weeks--and that's torture for me! I want my book jacket asap, before I go to Baguio for a writing assignment. I want it with me making my book feel all cozy and snug in that cold, magical place.

Second, I forgot to use my Citibank "coupons" to avail of a movie discount. I totally forgot that I have receipts worth a Php200 discount, all because I was so stoked about my book jacket. So hubby and I ended up paying the full price for the movie. But since we just opted for a regular showing (no 3D for us for this one), we didn't have to shell out a lot.

Now my night would've ended in such tragedy if not for Despicable Me. It is such an adooooorable movie! The overflowing cuteness made up for the so-so plot. It made me forget how upset I am. And to be honest, I think the Minions upstaged Agnes when it comes to cuteness overload.

If you don't find the Minions cute, then poor you!

tonight, i have a plan

In a few minutes, I shall zoom past the office lobby door and rush to SM The Block to:

1) watch Despicable Me with the hubby

"Does this count as annoyin'?"
(Image from michleong.blogspot.com)

and 2) get my super awesome leather book jacket from Aklat Eklat!

Image from aklateklat.multiply.com

I am so stoked!

Then maybe tonight or tomorrow, I shall blog about my Aklat Eklat purchase. Then I will read and read and read and read. Yay!

i am so sorry to be this selfish

After my ectopic pregnancy, I do not deny that there are things that changed. These changes, no matter how subtle they are, creep up on me when I least expect them. Like when a friend announced she's pregnant. Or when a former colleague posted pictures of her newborn baby. Or when another friend tweeted about a home pregnancy test that came out positive.

I cannot bring myself to be sincerely happy for them. I cannot bring myself to even pretend I am and post a comment on their Facebook pages.

I feel guilty for being selfish this way. But my reservations to rejoice about the happy news of bringing forth a bundle of joy can only be explained by my body's betrayal. My body betrayed me. Me. My own body. No matter how I force myself to see it otherwise, to remember that my failed pregnancy is not the end of everything--that I can still conceive--I still feel the pain. I still feel betrayed. I still feel that tiny pang of frustration and hurt. I still feel envious of other people's happiness in the form of a tiny baby. There's this little voice in my head that says "You should have been experiencing her joy, too. You should have been going through that crappy morning sickness now. You should have been shopping for cute baby clothes now. BUT YOU ARE NOT. You are here wallowing in self-pity. You are here trying to deny the pain. You are here trying to push these thoughts away, but you know very well that these thoughts will always haunt you, nag at you, until that day you become pregnant again--and normal."

So forgive me if I can't rejoice with you. Maybe soon I will have enough courage to be sincerely happy for you, dear friends. For now, allow me this.

because i am hot

Honest. Open. Trusting. Those were three of the many ideas we learned during our seminar on coaching for effectiveness last Thursday-Friday. Despite the 8am call time (I made it earlier than that, hah!), the two-day seminar proved to be a really great learning experience on how to be an effective coach (not boss!) to one's partners (not just mere subordinates!). And so during the whole of the seminar, we were asked to be H.O.T., and be hot was what 15 of us became.

After that, I did feel hot...and out of breath. It was the weekend when me and hubby were to sleepover our house in Taytay as "guardians" while mom and sis were away having fun in Cebu-Bohol. Hubby thought of just staying home, but I cannot just leave our house in Taytay (and of course, our dogs there) to abandonment and neglect. Besides, I miss our dogs.

The two-night-three-day stay found me in bed most of the time. I'm glad the fever did not persist, and I was able to borrow my aunt's nebulizer to shoo away asthma. Unfortunately, I had to take a sick leave from work since yesterday just to make sure my ill health does not worsen (and also to rule out dengue). We left Taytay last night, and it made me sad to leave our dogs again. Good thing mom left food with my aunt (neighboring relatives FTW!) so Ginger and Clapton won't go hungry today.

As of this writing, I'm still not in tip-top shape. I hope to feel better real soon so I can go back to work tomorrow and drop by the mall to pay my credit card bill before the due date. And of course, I pray for sis and mom's safe trip back home.

no rest for the wicked

Crepe, crepe, hooray!

Last night was a fun night with good friends Archie, Mems and Dit. A failed salon date for me, Dit and Archie (blame our hairstylist who went MIA yesterday) turned into a fun dinner date at Orchard Road in Megamall. Of course, with a bunch of crazy, cool friends, dinner was peppered with lots of laughter, after which it was off to dessert courtesy of sweet Archie.

The crepes we had at Crepes and Cream were huge, it was a hearty dessert indeed! Thanks again, Archiekins! *hugs*

I'm thankful for the great company, as it preceded a busy weekend for me. How busy is busy? This busy:

I have to finish a 2,000-word article due early next week (heck, I had to ask for a little extension so I can get more necessary data) and come up with enough hair accessories to sell at my sister's office tiangge. The latter started from a newfound hobby, and I'm still not sure where it will take me. So far, I find making these dainty pins fun and therapeutic (I found my hubby disagreeing to this when I asked him to help, haha!).

And so I hope to finish everything on time. I do hope everyone's having a great weekend!

P.S.
I stumbled upon this really adorable and amazingly creative blog, thanks to Kat. Who can resist to follow? Not me.

why i will not drink coffee for a week or so

The liberica coffee tree, where Batangas harvests
their famous kapeng barako

Last Friday, I had the caffeine overload of my life.

I went on a photoshoot assignment for (let's call it) M magazine, the pet project whom I have a love-hate relationship with (love trumps the hate in most cases). My crew, consisted of art director Con, contributing writer Zy and our driver for the day, plus me of course as photog/managing editor, drove to Lipa, Batangas to feature the city's OTOP (One Town, One Product) as well as other industries thriving in the area. Lipa's OTOP is kapeng barako (liberica coffee). We had a shoot with two of the forerunners in the business, and yes, we did sample cupfuls of kapeng barako in all its strong, unadulterated flavor. The first entrepreneur on our list came up with the idea of instant coffee in a tea bag (that's Xandro's coffee); while the second one, Cafe de Lipa, can give Starbucks a run for its money.

Art director Con saying hello while styling
the Pinoy-inspired brownies of Cafe de Lipa

We had free brewed coffee, frappuccino, Pinoy-inpsired pastries (like pili nut and tablea brownies) and even a bag of Cafe de Lipa ground coffee!

For only Php200, you get a bag of Cafe de Lipa coffee
with this very pretty gift box!

On the way home, us three girls were all hyper and palpitating, we had to stop over at a gas station to buy bottled water so we can flush away all the day's caffeine from our system.

So now for fear of extreme palpitation, I shall do my best to avoid brewing coffee every morning for a week.

P.S.
I blame some of my colleagues for giving us a coffee maker as a wedding gift. I seldom drank coffee before, but because of that coffee maker, I've become a frequent coffee drinker. Now, I find brewing coffee therapeutic. Haha!

frustration is eating me

I am a person who is usually in high spirits. But there are days when things get to me, and the past weeks have been really stressful, and it's not even physical stress. Lately, I feel like every time I go to work, I should always be strapped up for some battle.

I've been in this job for almost five years now, and this is the only time I've felt this frustrated. Sure, I've had a fair share of frustrations for the past years that I've been working, but it's different when you're frustrated and let down by people who you rely on to come up with fair and sound decisions. It's like a slap in the face.

It makes me feel guilty for feeling this negative towards others, and I hate myself for feeling that way. I was told that I have the right to how I feel, and I know I do; it's just that as much as possible, I don't like harboring ill feelings. Still, I remind myself that hey, I am entitled to feel this way especially because I know I'm right (and that I'm not the only one crying foul) and because I am seriously affected by all the crappy things happening.

But I'm already tired--of feeling frustrated, of trying to get the point across. I'm tired of barking at the wrong tree. It's all futile. What is the point of raising my voice if it falls on deaf ears? Worse, if those same ears only hear the voice they want to hear?

I feel bad for those who feel the same way as I do. But as for myself, I guess the only thing left to do is to embrace indifference. That, or ride the wave. I guess I'm more inclined to go for the former. So from now on, I'll do my very best to leave these behind and just surround myself with happy, fuzzy things. I can only rant so much. Now it's time to find serenity in oblivion.

days like this are meant to be cherished

Weekends are like an oasis in an immense, scorching desert, offering some respite for the weary.

I particularly love lazy weekends, when my husband and I only wake up to prepare and have lunch, wash the dishes, watch a movie, then sleep again. The rain even makes it a lovely prospect to just stay in and lounge around.

I do not take weekends for granted, especially after a stressful week from work. But to make weekends special, I make sure to leave all the stress behind the moment I step out of the office.

So tonight, with a mug of hot tea, I shall relish this cool, quiet Saturday evening and offer a prayer of gratitude. I do hope everyone's also having a wonderful weekend.

and so it seems i can't stop

If this continues over the weekend, I shall then declare that I'm officially hooked on making these pretties.

as good as new

I have a dandy, new blog look!

At first, I was afraid to upgrade my template; but then I told myself, "What the heck, let's do this!"And then I found myself mixing and matching background and font colors, up until now (it's 1:58 am already). So far, I am liking what I'm seeing. It's like I bought new clothes and wore them right away for everyone to see. Haha!

Maybe tomorrow I'll polish my other blog, too. Yay!

let the DIY project begin

I had to pass up work today (for reasons I shall not divulge as they only give me headache), and found myself inspired by this creative, pretty momma. And so I headed out and bought a fresh supply of glue sticks and some rags. Unfortunately, my old, trusty glue gun is already a goner, so I made do with a candle to melt a glue stick; and with just a few hair pins and wooden beads from an old necklace, voila! DIY mania began...

My first attempt at making a hair pin.
I'm not really happy about it, but hey, I tried!

Now this one's more like it.

And look, I even had the guts to spruce up an old, plain tank top! I can say I made a pretty decent job, don't you think?

Now let's see if I can make something more out of this new "talent".

never trust a man to buy you accessories...

...unless you give him a peg, which I did. That made the job easier for Francis when I asked him to buy me accessories as pasalubong from Davao. But mind you, I have to give it to my husband; he has been patient enough to scour Aldevinco (a souvenir haven in Davao) to find the perfect tribal necklaces for me. While I was on the way back to the office from a shoot in Pampanga, Francis was busy sending me MMS just to get my approval. Honestly, I was impressed by his efforts, and so were my shoot crew.

My pretty ethnic bib necklace

My husband's labor of love paid off, because ever since he handed me his pasalubong, I've been wearing it almost every day this past week. I've been getting a lot of compliments, too (for both my necklace and my sweet hubby)! I say my husband really has good taste. Haha!

This one, I have yet to wear soon.

playing pretend

I've finally discovered a way to somehow teach myself to get used to being home alone whenever Francis is away on a field work (not that he's often away), aside from asking my sis or sis-in-law to sleep over our place--I've learned to play pretend.

The idea came to me this afternoon at work. I thought that maybe, if I pretend that I'm really living alone, like I'm in college and I'm away from home renting a place near my university, maybe I can get by without missing Francis too much.

And so when I got back, I popped in some CD, turned up the volume a bit and proceeded to prepare my late dinner while swaying to the music, all the while imagining that I've been doing this for a year or so now. Well, of course, I still had to go online and Skype with Francis, but that's beside the point.

Anyway, the only problem with this scheme of mine is going to bed. I find it really difficult sleeping alone in our place. It's just different knowing that I'm alone in our bed. Don't get me wrong, I've grown used to sleeping alone in my room in our house in Taytay, especially after my beloved lola passed away (we sleep in the same room but on separate beds; better that way so there's someone with lola in case she needs something at night). This time, it's just...weird, like there's something missing (well, there definitely is someone missing). So that part I don't know how to get around yet.

Maybe I can pretend that I'm an insomniac and not sleep until dawn? Come to think of it, I already did that before.

reminder

About a month ago, I wrote these words.

...be less of a worrywart. I need to realize and remember that there are some things I have no control of, and that I can't stress myself to death worrying about those things. That's what faith is for, isn't it? I can't just offer everything up to God and then worry about them after. That's not faith.

...make things happen. For those things I can control, then I will take charge. And then I will let go. I will do everything I can and set my heart on things I really want, and once I've done my very best, if they're meant for me, they'll be mine; they will happen.

Now I need to go back to these words and put each and every single one to heart.

"waiting is a form of imprisonment"

I thank my friend Sam for sharing this essay by Lance Morrow. Bear with me, this is a bit long.

Waiting is a kind of suspended animation. Time solidifies: a dead weight. The mind reddens a little with anger and then blanks off into a sort of abstraction and fitfully wanders, but presently it comes up red and writhing again, straining to get loose. Waiting casts one's life into a little dungeon of time. It is a way of being controlled, of being rendered immobile and helpless. One can read a book or sing (odd looks from the others) or chat with strangers if the wait is long enough to begin forming a bond of shared experience, as at a snowed-in airport. But people tend to do their waiting stolidly. When the sound system went dead during the campaign debate in 1976, Jerry Ford and Jimmy Carter stood in mute suspension for 27 minutes, looking lost.

To enforce a wait, of course, is to exert power. To wait is to be powerless. Consider one minor, almost subliminal form. The telephone rings. One picks up the receiver and hears a secretary say, "Please hold for Mr. Godot." One sits for perhaps five seconds, the blood pressure just beginning to cook up toward the red line, when Godot comes on the line with a hearty "How are ya?" and business proceeds and the moment passes, Mr. Godot having established that he is (subtly) in control, that his time is more precious than his callee's. (Incidentally, the only effective response to hearing the secretary's "Please hold for..." is to hang up without explanation. After two or three times, Mr. Godot himself will place the call, as he should have done at the start.) But the "please hold" ploy is a mere flicker in the annals of great and horrible waiting. Citizens of the Soviet Union would think it bourgeois decadence to complain about such a trifle. The Soviets have turned waiting into a way of life. The numb wait is their negotiating style: a heavy, frozen, wordless impassivity designed to madden and exhaust the people across the table. To exist in the Soviet Union is to wait. Almost perversely, when Soviet shoppers see a line forming, they simply join it, assuming that some scarce item is about to be offered for sale. A study published by Pravda calculates that Soviet citizens waste 37 billion hours a year standing in line to buy food and other basic necessities. To bind an entire people to that kind of life is to do a little of the work of the Gulag in a different style.

Waiting is a form of imprisonment. One is doing time—but why? One is being punished not for an offense of one's own but often for the inefficiencies of those who impose the wait. Hence the peculiar rage that waits engender, the sense of injustice. Aside from boredom and physical discomfort, the subtler misery of waiting is the knowledge that one's most precious resource, time, a fraction of one's life, is being stolen away, irrecoverably lost.

Americans have ample miseries of waiting, of course—waits sometimes connected with affluence and leisure. The lines to get a passport in Manhattan last week stretched around the block in Rockefeller Center. Travelers waited four and five hours just to get into bureaucracy's front door. A Washington Post editorial writer reported a few days ago that the passengers on her 747, diverted to Hartford, Conn., on the return flight from Rome as a result of bad weather in New York City, were forced to sit on a runway for seven hours because no customs inspectors were on hand to process them.

The great American waits are often democratic enough, like traffic jams. Some of the great waits have been collective, tribal—waiting for the release of the American hostages in Iran, for example. But waiting often makes class distinctions. One of the more depressing things about being poor in America is the endless waiting it entails: waiting for medical care at clinics or in emergency rooms, waiting in welfare or unemployment lines.

The waiting rooms of the poor are forlorn, but in fact almost all waiting rooms are spiritless and blank-eyed places where it always feels like 3 in the morning.

One of the inestimable advantages of wealth is the immunity that it can purchase from serious waiting. The rich do not wait in long lines to buy groceries or airplane tickets. The help sees to it. The limousine takes the privileged right out onto the tarmac, their shoes barely grazing the ground.

People wait when they have no choice or when they believe that the wait is justified by the reward—a concert ticket, say. Waiting has its social orderings, its rules and assumptions. Otherwise peaceful citizens explode when someone cuts into a line that has been waiting a long time. It is unjust; suffering is not being fairly distributed. Oddly, behavioral scientists have found that the strongest protests tend to come from the immediate victims, the people directly behind the line jumpers. People farther down the line complain less or not at all, even though they have been equally penalized by losing a place.

Waiting is difficult for children. They have not yet developed an experienced relationship with time and its durations: "Are we there yet, Daddy?" There can be pleasant, tingling waits, of course, full of fantasies, and they are often connected with children: the wait for the child to arrive in the first place, the wait for Christmas, for summer vacation. Children wait more intensely than adults do. Sheer anticipation makes their blood jump in a lovely way.

Waiting can have a delicious quality ("I can't wait to see her." "I can't wait for the party"), and sometimes the waiting is better than the event awaited. At the other extreme, it can shade into terror: when one waits for a child who is late coming home or—most horribly—has vanished. When anyone has disappeared, in fact, or is missing in action, the ordinary stress of waiting is overlaid with an unbearable anguish of speculation: Alive or dead?

Waiting can seem an interval of nonbeing, the black space between events and the outcomes of desires. It makes time maddeningly elastic: it has a way of seeming to compact eternity into a few hours. Yet its brackets ultimately expand to the largest dimensions. One waits for California to drop into the sea or for "next year in Jerusalem" or for the Messiah or for the Apocalypse. All life is a waiting, and perhaps in that sense one should not be too eager for the wait to end. The region that lies on the other side of waiting is eternity.

It's like Lance Morrow can read exactly what I am feeling right now when he wrote this, especially when he said that "To enforce a wait, of course, is to exert power. To wait is to be powerless." And when I got to the part where he wrote "People wait...when they believe that the wait is justified by the reward", I can't help but wonder: will this waiting that I am going through again finally be justified this time?

i felt like i'm in elementary again

I have more than one reason why I love writing (the editorial kind, that is). For one, I get to travel and meet new people, like in last Saturday's assignment. Well, fine, it wasn't like I flew to Cebu to feature a posh resort or something; nevertheless, I was still excited about the trip because it brought me to this big bottling company in Sta. Rosa, Laguna, and it felt like I was having a field trip back in elementary. I saw assembly lines of bottles being filled with sodas and juices, I got to wear a hard hat and this reflective vest, and learned a lot about the process of how a bottled iced tea is made.

Here was how that day went, in pictures.

the week that was...so far

Before I go on to write about my first day of school, I mean, my first day back at work, let me first rave about my trip to the CD/DVD sale last weekend.

Sure, Francis and I promised ourselves to be more careful with our spending especially now that we'll soon be paying for our new unit's equity (down payment). But who in their right mind can resist a sale where original CDs and DVDs sell for as low as Php20 (CDs) and Php150 (DVDs)? Definitely not us.

And so we went crazy and went home with these:

This isn't our first time to hoard. Last year, we went to the same sale by Universal Records and got home with loads of CDs. Majority of my selection were CDs of indie Brit bands, most (if not all) of which I'm not familiar with, but I did not regret buying them. This time was the same, though I bought more DVDs (last year had less good choices) than CDs. So now Francis and I would listen to new albums every night, or watch a DVD that we feel like watching (as of writing, Massive Attack is playing).

If you're envious (haha!) and are raring to go, wait until this weekend (and until this weekend only--Friday, Saturday, Sunday, from 10am to 7pm; the sale has been ongoing since the first weekend of June) then rush to the 10th floor of Universal Tower along Quezon Avenue (that's near Parco). But if don't have time, don't despair; Universal Records usually holds a yearly sale (sometimes even twice a year!), so there's still another chance to hoard. Just be on the lookout for an announcement in newspapers or check out their Facebook page. I'll also post here as soon as I got wind of another sale.

Now on to my return venture into the work force. After two months of leave, I got back to work yesterday. I actually sneaked back in without most of my co-workers noticing me, in the hopes that I can remain unseen so I can pretend I'm not at work yet. But of course this isn't a fantasy world so they noticed. Sure, I was touched when they told me they were glad I'm back. Still, I can't help but feel a tad sad that I'm already back to the grind.

If there's one thing I realized during my "vacation", it's that I'm ready to leave my desk job. I wouldn't be saying this if I were writing this entry three years ago. Back then, I didn't feel ready yet to be a freelancer; I wanted to belong to a team and be able to have summer outings and Christmas parties. It's a funny reason to want an office job, I know; but since there are really no summer outings and Christmas parties have become rare, then what's the point right? Or maybe, I've already grown mature enough to embrace the idea of having all of my time in my own hands. That way, I can control the stress level in my life. Now, I can imagine myself working on a deadline in our cozy pad, without me running like a headless chicken (answering emails, entertaining AE requests, printing documents, replying to a supplier's text message and conceptualizing special executions in my head--all happening at the same friggin' time).

But in life, mature people have to make choices according to their priorities; so I chose to go back to work and try my very best to still put my best foot forward; nevermind if I'm wincing while doing so. I know it's not the best attitude, but that's the least I can do to prevent myself from going jobless and broke (hello, monthly amortization!). And if there's anything I've gleaned from self-help career guide articles I've read, it's this trick to keep one's mind sane at work when mulling over printing that resignation letter: find something you really like to do to distract you from the stress and distress. In my case, that would be photography, music and writing. Staying in my job got me closer to opportunities related to these three (photography and writing, especially). If only for that, I am very thankful. So yes, Imma stick it out a little bit more and wait and see. I've waited for the past three years already, so what's a year or so? Like I have written in a previous entry, I shall grab every opportunity that comes my way and let go of things I have no control of. I'm tired of hearing myself whine without me really doing anything; this time, I will do something and just see what happens next.

On a lighter note, I found it funny when Francis and my mom asked me how my back-to-work day went yesterday, as if it was my first day in school. Where's my allowance, mom?