Cut Your Losses

 I'm still alive. My family & I survived the Ondoy storm here in the Philippines. It was a heck of an adventure though. At first we thought that it was no big deal. The rain wasn't that strong. The thing is the rain didn't stop from 6pm on Friday until 11pm on Saturday. We were staying in Marikina at my aunt's place, the place that was hit by the storm worst. We thought that it would subside in a bit & we didn't know that 3 dams were opened. Saturday 9am, the flood was already 200mm high. By 2pm, the flood water reached the window sill. That's around 900mm. We left the house at 3pm when the water was already chest deep & it was very, very disgusting. We had nothing on us except the clothes on our back, some cash & a credit card. We recalled in horror that we could've died in the house because the water reached the top of the windows & that the water pressure in the house could prevent the door from opening. We already had some difficulty opening it when the flood water reached chest level.
Our cellphones had to be left at the highest portion of the cabinets where we thought it would be safe so Rio & I had no communication with our Dad & Ria, our other sister. We took refuge in Robinson's Metro East Mall where we bought new clothes & washed ourselves in the employees' CR. We also bought food & water. We slept there on laid out cardboard boxes. We were safe & dry & had access to relatively clean toilets. I was so anxious because I couldn't contact my two other family members. I was so scared that my dad would try to save us & head to the house in Marikina even if the flood was only 450mm from the ceiling. Thank God he was stranded on the road and thought it best to stay in a nearby inn. Ria, our sister, spent the night in the school where she was teaching at Makati.
6am on Sunday, we had to leave the mall & check on the house. It was really sad because we were convinced that the house was entirely submerged & our 2 laptops, Xbox360, PS2, GameCube, Dreamcast, Ipod, a pair of fabulous Sennheiser HD555 cans & my new mobile phone were swimming in murky water even if we placed them on the highest shelf. They weren't! They were all dry! It was such a great bonus. Because we found my phone, we were able to contact my dad & found out that he was ok. Ria came along & she was ok but her flu got worse because of the stress & the cold. We salvaged our electronics but nearly everything in my tita's house in Marikina was ruined. We have been able to contact our relatives to tell them that we're doing fine now. Obviously, I'm in no condition to go to work. The fatigue has just set in. I was running on pure adrenaline the past two days. Last time I ate a decent meal was 5pm on Saturday. I went up and down the stairs at Robinson's 9x on Saturday night. I went around the overpass on Sunday around 5x & I was pissing Rio off with my flurry of activity. Until now, I can't bring myself to eat anything heavy but I'm ok. We'll probably have soup later. But I survived it. We survived it & we came off easy compared to others.

To those who want to help (KSolaris already posted it):
http://ksolaris.livejournal.com/228547.html

http://www.lightamillioncandles.com

Join the campain against chilld pornography. I saw the link in the current Reader's Digest and figured, what's the harm in it, right?

It'll take you less than a minute.

Poll #781499 Patriotism
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 5

Are you patriotic?

LJ gave a tip that I could post polls in my extended account so I decided to take advantage of it. Hm. The hullabaloo regarding Israel and the Hezbollah made me think about this. Man, I can't blame Israel really. Personally, I would probably do worse when provoked like that and I'm not going to be honorable about it. I'll just kill them and sing, "I didn't start all this."

I'm not really big on humanity.

Juan Pablo Montoya is leaving McLaren to prepare for joining NASCAR next year.

Yay!

Yay again! I don't watch NASCAR and absolutely have no plans of catching it. Formula 1 all the way, baby. Pedro dela Rosa shall replace him for the remainder of the season.

As you can see, this is a public entry.

I've been somewhat inspired by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's approach to architecture so...I'd like to get some practice. Even if I am currently working in an architectural office, I am still not free to design a building however I like. It is still after all, my boss' office and therefore, whatever he says goes. Sad to say, I don't agree with him in all things. 'Course I can't tell him that.

So to remedy that...in order to not lose whatever style I have, I'd like to design dream houses for anyone who's interested. For free. My only conditions are:

1. Since I'm doing it in my meager free time, it will probably take long for me to complete a project.

2. Any mention of complimentary words for Art Nouveau, Mediterranean, Victorian and Classical shall be trampled on and spat upon. And let's be practical here, even though I'd like to I will never have enough time to detail a gothic style villa.

3. I call the houses that I'd like to make. Sorry to those I don't find interesting or challenging enough. I'll inform you though, just leave your e-mail.

4. All the designs are mine. I'll copyright it because I know how. Hahaha!

And this is all you have to do.

1. Tell me the style you like. Tropical, Modern, Asian, Industrial, Brutalist, Expressionist...whatever. Or the style-fusion you like.
2. Rooms. Do you want 12 bedrooms for the harem of man whores you're building? A cozy den? An olympic size jacuzzi? whatever.
3. Personal preferences. Do you like light, airy rooms or do you have a secret fantasy of living like Fred Flintstone? Size. Color. Oh and yeah, the climate of where your dreamhouse will be built. Circular baths. That sorta stuff.

I miss my nocturnal life.

Mornings are overrated. Besides, I was born as Batman. (But I'm penniless.)

I wish I have some genuine pictures of Brad and Angelina's baby. How much does it go for nowadays?

My Kirby's Canvas Curse has been shipped already but I might be able to shoot for another game.

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow

Animal Crossing: Wild World

Nintendogs

Mario Kart DS


To be honest, I'm leaning towards Animal Crossing...with Castlevania coming in for a close second.

I've recently seen Chicken Little and In Her Shoes. You know what? The latter was more satisfying. I don't like Cameron Diaz, all right? But the movie has some kind of a lesson in it. If you wanna know, it is, "Don't be a shoe-coveting, dyslexic little tramp with awesome legs." Hahaha!
Chicken Little, despite its numerous pop-culture references, was so very lacking in the entertainment dep. Maybe after all the stuff that Pixar made which were funny, well-constructed, endearing, etc., it was just too tall an order for Disney. After seeing Chicken Little, I thought I'd be happier watching The Incredibles. Again. CL was so weak.

Swiped from innocentlyjaded. Strange but it's fitting.

( Tarot card quiz )

I wanna play Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones (third installment in the current saga) but I have too many things to do and to be honest, I was so turned off by Prince of Persia: The Warrior Within (second installment). The stories are connected so...hmm, I dunno. What should I do? Buy God of War?

Ah, before I forget. Thanks to the people who came to celebrate my birthday. That was a blast! We should do it again. timewaster, underthemoon, innocentlyjaded are awesome singers! And traffic_likeme even sang Black Bird. Next time though, dude, we'll ascertain the schedule of LRT. Sorry talaga!

The pictures from the Neil Gaiman signing in Greenhills have been uploaded!

( Read more... )

Gulay! That was an experience. Er, my sister went to Gateway and Neil kissed her. OMG!
Hey you guys, I'm sorry that I had to resize these photos. Photobucket only allows up to 250 kb per file and if I let them automatically resize the pictures, they might turn out crappy. As soon as I get to a place with a faster connection, I'll send you the originals. Please leave your e-mail addresses in the comment box.

No bananas, no entry.

I'm kidding. I'm nuts so this is hardly an exclusivity thing. It's for your own safety.

Comment if you want me to add you but of course there's no guaranteeing that. Oh and bring one tub of vanilla ice cream and chocolate syrup. You know what for.