A PetiX Life

It’s been some time since my last blog post. It’s been very difficult to update my blog entries with the various things I’m involved in right now. The irony of my life is that I don’t seem to have enough time to write about what really interests me even though my regular day job is writing . Knowing that I’m a journalist, you probably imagine me doing nothing but write all day, but you’d be surprised how much of my work right now actually involves real writing. I still do some writing, of course, but I don’t consider business e-mail, plans, strategies, reports, and playing surgeon on badly-written news articles, as real writing. Real writing requires one’s soul and personal emotions to mold the stories, not just the mind shaping someone else’s story. That’s news writing–a mere retelling of somebody else’s life story. Real writing involves personal feelings and one’s own life story– something that I hope to do more from now on.

Coming soon…

I plan to move my blog outside Friendster soon. Actually I already have a blog on Blogspot, but as you already know, I haven’t been able to update it. Friendster blog is alright, but I find it too limiting. I love to play around with the design and layout so I want a blog host that can allow me to do that.

It’s quite encouraging to meet old friends again after so many years of separation. A couple of weeks ago, I had an impromptu reunion with some of our high school friends–Ike, Ruby, Angela (with her husband Sam), Atty. Jonnie, and Agnes–and we all had fun doing what old friends do: reminiscing and sharing the stories of our lives. So that’s my next project: I want to build a site where all my old school friends can get together virtually. We’ve all moved on to bigger things and a lot of our friends have gone on to live abroad or faraway places, so a Web site is the perfect vehicle to help us keep in touch with each other. More on this soon.

I’m back on the road again.

After a brief hiatus from foreign travels, I’m packing my bags again, preparing for India this time. I took a short leave from my travel adventures after I accepted a new work assignment that kept me stuck to my office desk.  But now I’m free of that and next month I’ll be leaving for Bangalore for a quick visit. I can’t wait to go. I wonder how many mosquito nets I could buy there. Wow!

I saw luther on DVD this evening. You can probably tell what kind of DVD I got because you know that Luther isn’t being shown in local cinemas yet. I guess the producers are smart enough not to schedule screenings right beside tom cruise’s war of the worlds, which by the way, was an interesting show of digital animation at its best.

going back to luther - this movie is far different from the science fiction war of the worlds. luther is a historical retelling of the roots of protestantism and its main proponent, martin luther of the 16th century.

more on this in my next blog.

Yes, Dominic. That too.

My friend, Doctor Dominic, Internal Medicine, (such a long way from being Dominic the walking sari-sari store, eh?) wrote here to say that I’m still the same ma-senti at ma-drama guy (isn’t that an oxymoron?) he knew way back in high school. Oh, c’mon, I’m a frustrated movie actor! My showbiz dreams got shattered the moment I stepped into grade school and forgot the lines of a poem I was reciting for a christmas party in school. I remember my teacher saying, "I’m sorry kid. You’ve got the gift, but you’re not the one."

What did I tell you about me and blogs? I always have trouble keeping my blogs updated. My friend, May Fydee was right all along: I don’t know how to stay interested in anything for even a short time. It’s a curse, she said. "You better grow up, buster," she told me years ago. "Or else," she said with a wry on her face. If I saw her today, she’d probably say the same thing.

My scanner’s been broken for over two weeks now. I’ve been meaning to have it repaired but I haven’t found the time. Time is a super luxury for me right now. I have a major deadline coming up in June but from the way things look, I’ll probably miss the mark by at least a month. one thing i’ve learned about my new job is that it’s much harder to finish even a simple job if you have too many hands working on it.

I’ll talk about this in my next few blogs. I’ve run out of time. I gave myself 15 minutes to check my friendster and update my blog. time’s up.

It’s so nice to hear from old friends, especially from the ones you’ve cherished all your life but not have had the chance to catch up with as much as you’d want to.

For the past few days, I’ve been able to talk and learn about some of my good friends from high school and I’ve been struck with some nostalgic bug. One thing about hearing from old friends is that you get to think about how you’ve lived your life since the time you were with your old friends. You’ll marvel at how much things have changed and maybe even feel renewed, inspired by what your friends have acoomplished.

Then there are friends who I’ve missed so much who suddenly pop up in the radar. More than nostalgia, I’ve felt a more intense kind of longing, a kind that disrupts the day to day routine, because the mind can’t think straight, the mind can’t think of nothing else but the next opportunity I can get my friend on the message line again.

In my field of work in IT Journalism, we call this "disruptive technology" because it changes the way things are done in such a drastic and powerful way. I wouldn’t go about calling my friends, a kind of technology, but friends affect us in a similar way, only deeper and much more personal. Hearing from old friends have warmly touched me, especially because these friends, despite being physically distant for a long time, have always been right here, occupying a space in my heart.

I’ve just heard that there’s a new Choco Peanut-flavored ice cream from Nestle. I haven’t tasted it yet, but if it does indeed tastes like our childhood favorite snack, Chocnuts, I’m pretty sure Jing Simes, who is somewhere in California, would fall off her seat, get goosebumps on her skin and make like a bee with a mild panic attack.

Oh don’t you just wish you were back here, Jing?

I wouldn’t have expected it, but my XDA phone just saved my hide a few days ago. I was sprawled on a poolside bench somewhere in a far away beach resort last Thursday when I got an urgent text message asking me to make some corrections on two stories posted on our Web site. I panicked as soon as I read the message - the only computer on the island was broken and, except for cell phones, there was no telephone in the resort.

I didn’t expect to get a GPRS signal on the island, but I still brought out my XDA II smartphone to try connecting to the Internet with my phone. Lo and behold, I got connected in a flash and was able to log in to our Web site’s admin pages without any trouble. I was done with the corrections in a few minutes and in no time at all I was back enjoying the sun and imagining how I’d look in my cell phone provider’s next TV commercial.

Here’s one petiks tip on how to change a light bulb and take probably two days to do it:

1. The first step that you need to do is buy the light bulb that you will install. In my case, I bought a 40-watt flourescent lamp for our living room. Now, for some people, a 40-watt lamp can be too bright for comfort, but I still went for it because I enjoy the daylight effect which makes me feel it’s still day time and that I haven’t wasted any time at all.

2. Choose the site where you want to install the flourescent lamp. When you’ve spotted a nice place for your new lamp on the ceiling, bring out your tools and take the lamp case out of the box.

3. Go back to the hardware store and buy some screws, because you forgot to ask if the new lam you brought came with any. Before you go back home, drop by the new Ice Cream Store near your house and take 15 minutes to pick out a flavor you want. So that you won’t waste too much time, eat your ice cream while on the go. Not only will that make walking back home less inconvenient, you will also become the envy of people you pass by along the way.

4. When you get back home, place the screws near the lamp and leave it to boil for 30 minutes. Get your favorite bean bag, pop in a copy of The Quiet American on you DVD player and watch until the end.

5. When the movie ends, watch Paparazzi, a movie directed by Mel Gibson and then follow it up with Jet Li’s Once Upon a Time in China and America. If you still feel sluggish, take down the Motorcycle Diaries from the DVD rack and recite this line, "Che Guevara’s not dead!"

6. After the movie, open your computer, log on to your DSL line and open your Friendster account. Reply again to all your past messages (save the new messages until the next day) and then write what you did today on your Blog. Cross your fingers that somebody might read it and send you pizza.

7. Go to sleep and pretend you’ve already installed your new flourescent lamp.