Yearender

What did you do in 2011 that you'd never done before?

LIVED IN EUROPE. (This is the big one!)
Traveled in Europe without having to apply for a visa.
Painted my own walls (in the bedroom and living room).

Picked up furniture off the sidewalk.
Celebrated Queen's Day in Amsterdam.
Used a bicycle to get around.

Learned Dutch. 

Found myself in Paris twice in one year.

Joined a running group and worked up to running for 20 minutes straight.
Grew my own herbs.
Had fresh flowers at home every week.



Wore a bathing suit at a park.

Drove a boat.

Started writing my very own blog column!
Volunteered for TEDxAmsterdam.
Went on a hot-air balloon ride!
Witnessed the changing of all four seasons. 



Sang at a wedding in the south of France.
Went swimming in a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Went swimming in the Atlantic Ocean.
Did my grocery shopping at a market (not a supermarket).

Learned how to sew (so far, a dress and cushion covers).

Learned how to knit (made a scarf).
Learned how to dance the salsa.
Learned how to bake (my favorite dessert: lemon tart!). 

Hosted a dinner party for 10.
Hosted five house guests, the most I've ever had at one time.
Bought serious rain gear (and wore rain boots).

Stepped inside a windmill.

Edited videos for money. 
*WHEW!*

Did you keep your New Year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year? 

I don't make New Year's resolutions. But this year I set goals (something that always works for me when I remember to do it) and achieved many of them. That's something I will do again this year.

Did anyone close to you give birth?

Susie and Tinus, our dearest friends from Singapore, became the parents of a gorgeous baby boy named Max, the day before we moved to Amsterdam. We were his first visitors at the hospital!



Later in the year, another Max was born—this time to my friend Leslie in Amsterdam.



Did anyone close to you die?

Tito Rolly Cailles, one of our wedding godfathers, succumbed to leukemia.

What countries did you visit?

Switzerland, Portugal, Norway, Italy, Germany, Belgium, France, Turkey and the Philippines.

Date night

One of the things I loved about summer was the fact that the days seemed to never end. The sun would set as late as 10 p.m., and you would get lovely "late afternoon" light like this at 7 or 8 p.m. 

These days, the sun sets earlier each day. The photo above was taken a little before 6 p.m. The sun disappears from the sky by around 6:30.

But you know what? Part of me actually welcomes the return of night.

I only realized that when Marlon and I went out to for dinner and a movie one Friday night. It was a nice change, because we don't eat out as much as we used to. Dining out here tends to be expensive, which is never a guarantee that it's going to be good. We also tend to stay home a lot to save up for, or recover from, travels.

We went to Rainarai, an Algerian resto on the Prinsengracht bordering the Jordaan.

The atmosphere of this small corner restaurant is eclectic and laid-back, with quirky details like these schoolhouse chairs with African motifs drawn on them.

Service is turo-turo style. As Marlon and I were talking about how it reminded us of home, the girl behind the counter asked us if we were Filipino. Turned out she had visited the Philippines while backpacking around Southeast Asia. She said that of all the places she had visited on her six-month trip, her favorite by far was the Cordilleras: Banaue, Batad, Benguet and Sagada. Wow. To think I've never been to those places myself.

We ate dinner by candlelight while watching the sunset reflected on the windows of the canal houses. And that was when I realized I actually missed nightfall.



While walking to the movie theater, we passed the fairgrounds set up in front of the Royal Palace on Dam Square. We looked at the Ferris wheel and thought: "Hey, this is something we've never done together!" So we did.

We had lots of time to spare before the movie, so instead of having dessert or lounging around in the cinema lobby, we decided to take a walk. It turned out to be a wonderful idea. Because we don't very often go out in the evenings, I still find myself so surprised and delighted by how magical Amsterdam can become at night.

We strolled around the narrow streets and canals in the Centrum, or old center. When I think of the old center, I think red light district and coffee shops, so I rarely go there except to take visitors to see it. Otherwise, sex and weed is not a big draw for me. 

But night can blot out all that, and it takes on a different character. Shadows soften and hide, and night lights flatter a city's face.

A darkened shop window turns into a mystery that beckons us to take a closer look. 

The play of light and shadow can make almost anything lovely, almost poetic. In the daytime, would we have stopped to look? 

A few thoughts on dreams

Parang kailan lang, ang mga pangarap ko'y kay hirap abutin...

These lyrics from Florante's Handog leaped out at me from a video posted by Will, from the current Glee Club, on my Facebook wall this evening.

Bigla kong naalala na noong kaedad ko sina Will, pangarap kong tumira sa Europa. Hindi ko alam kung paano ko gagawin, pero lagi kong iniisip na sana, balang araw, makabalik ako at makatira dito.

So ang ibig sabihin, dahil nandito ako ngayon, nagkatotoo ang pangarap ko.

Kiddies in Prague, 2001. Slight digression: why did I think I was fat?

I sometimes lose sight of the fact that I'm living a dream fulfilled: when it's cold, rainy and gray for what seems like the umpteenth day in a row; when I see other people living in fantastic locations; or when I'm slogging through a ten-page immigration document written entirely in Dutch.

How easy it is to forget that my dream came true. So when I do remember, the realization can hit so hard it sometimes brings tears to my eyes.

Though it may seem like it to people who don't know me or Marlon very well, it may seem like I got to Europe by latching on to a jet-setting expat type (or an expat-to-be) with a career that would take him around the world. But I'll tell you something not a lot of people know.

When Marlon and I first started dating, the plan was very different. I was dead set on living in Europe (how, neither of us knew... but I was going to do it!) and Marlon needed to follow me, somehow. That was why he took his overseas job with a multinational company in the first place: because he thought it would give him the best chance of following me wherever I decided to end up.

This is the first step that the man of my dreams took in making my dreams come true. He believed in me. He saw me as a person who could, and would, achieve some whacked-out dream like that. Never mind that I had zero plans. Never mind that every time I thought about what I wanted, I wanted it so bad and felt so far from having it that I easily wound up bawling every time. He simply believed in me.

Over the course of the next four years, he took another simple but very difficult step. I can sum it up in four words: he stuck it out. I mostly mean the long-distance thing, but there are other, bigger things that nearly blew us both in separate directions. But he just hung in there. And because he did, so did I.

Then, last year, when I started getting itchy feet and questioning our life in Singapore, he did one last thing that bridged the gap from there to here. He listened. It wasn't easy for him to consider such a big change, with the career he had built and the comfort we enjoyed. But he listened, and that single act encompasses so wonderful things. Being someone I felt I could talk to about anything, enough for me to open up in the first place, is one. Sharing my sense of adventure and love for travel, valuing what we agreed our marriage would be, and not being bound to money or comfort, were others.

And this is why I—why we—are here.

Thanks to PKF for the photo!

There are as many dreams as there are ways of making them come true. All I'm saying, really is that this life, and the man I'm living it with, has been one of mine.

Avoidance

This afternoon I exercised for the first time since November. Yep, it's been that long—since this whole moving to Amsterdam process first got started, in fact. 

I'd been putting off this workout since we got here. When I first arrived in Amsterdam early January, I resolved to use my time at the serviced apartment by using the in-house gym. Guess how that went. Then when we moved to our permanent address, I got all excited about having the picturesque riverside a few minutes from my doorstep. I told myself every single day that I was going to run. Or at least walk. Tomorrow. Hah! Fat chance (a pun that truly applies to me at this point).

I avoided exercise with an odd, inverted determination. There were a lot of excuses, the cold being my favorite scapegoat. "When I go out in the cold, I burn more calories anyway," I told myself. E ano kayang ginagawa yung mga cold cuts and cheese sa bahay? 

Finally, today, I just went out and did it. I didn't think much about it. I just put on a Heattech top and tights plus a regular hoodie and sweatpants (a 100% Uniqlo outfit), stole Marlon's Nike GPS thingamajiggie and stuck it in my shoe, and went out.

And found what I had been avoiding all along was actually... not so bad at all. In fact, it was wonderful.

Half jogging, half walking west along the river, I discovered Beatrixpark just minutes from my house. It's a beautiful open space with long winding paths, duck ponds and large green swathes of grass. I saw lots of doggies bounding along happily, playing catch with their owners, and old ladies sitting all bundled up on park benches with their smiling faces tipped up to the sun. Because of the cold, a kind of fine mist hung in the air, making everything look soft. 

It was another "Is this really my life?" moment. I didn't feel cold at all and I didn't really care that my pace was atrociously slow. It felt that good. 

And I realized I avoid a lot of things that turn out to be less painless than I think they'll be. I think of it as the "hell week" syndrome—you know, back in college when it's the week before exams and you're terrified you're going to flunk or die, but when you're halfway into it you realize you're passing and alive and hey, it's not so bad.

Exercise is one. Housework is another. I never did housework in Singapore, ask Marlon. Getting me to do it is like pulling teeth from a baby lion. But yesterday when the sun streamed in through the windows into my house, it hit me how dirty everything had gotten in the span of a few days. And so I began vacuuming and mopping like a madwoman. I remember thinking to myself, "Hey, this really doesn't take that much time." And seeing my all-white kitchen just sparkle in the sunlight gave me a domestic thrill that bordered on perverse. Hallelujah, I have seen the light!

I also used to avoid calling clients. And it wasn't because they were difficult, I just had this strong irrational sense of not wanting to do it. It doesn't last long, maybe an hour at most; people who've worked with me always find me quick to respond and very "on." But sometimes even if I already found myself on my way to doing it, I would get a heavy, draggy feeling in my chest in those last few seconds before picking up the phone. Then we would have a normal chatty conversation, getting things done, and I would feel like myself and all fired up to work again. Weird huh?

What do you find yourself avoiding lately and why? And how does it turn out when you do get into it?

Epiphany

Sorry if this all seems rather cryptic. I'm thinking aloud.

I attended Mass today for the first time in a long time. Today is the feast of the Epiphany, where the baby Jesus revealed himself to the Three Kings.

I had a bit of an epiphany myself. I just realized that I've been forcing myself to do something that I don't like doing just to prove to myself that I can do it. Not because it makes me happy and fulfilled, or because it's something I'm passionate about, but to defy doubts unspoken (from myself) and imagined (from others) in my ability to do it.

And after all these months, I just realized that I can do it, but I just don't like it. That I have a right to not like one thing and prefer the other. Isn't that strange? I've been feeling like something's wrong with me because I don't enjoy doing it. But that's the way people are. There are things we like and don't like, and we don't have to like everything.

It's like really liking chocolate and being presented with vanilla. I don't like the taste of vanilla -- I really like chocolate but force myself to eat vanilla just to make myself seem "normal." But actually, preferring chocolate is normal too! How absurd huh?

And so this is the space I'm in for now. Being okay with not liking something, and not forcing myself to like it. It may seem to you like a "duh" moment, an odd epiphany or an insignificant, self-evident one.

But for now, it's better than the place I was in just a few weeks, days or even moments ago. Let's see where we can go from here.

What's missing, part 2

I miss music. I miss singing, and singers. I miss Europe. I miss being a singer, being around singers, in Europe.

Yes, I realize I could be more articulate but I'm writing on the fly. It's been a packed few days. Late Sunday night and most of Monday was mental and emotional bedlam; afterwards, thankfully, I slipped into relief and reminiscence.

Whereupon I found that it is far better to be in the grip of intense nostalgia than of utter panic.

Muni-muni sa trabaho

naloloka ako sa opisina lately. maraming pagbabago, maraming pangako at marami ring trabaho. minsan naiisip ko maghanap ng bagong pagtatrabahuhan na mas masaya, mas madali para sa akin at puro pagsusulat lang, tulad ng ginagawa ko dati. unang-una, mas madali sa akin ang pagsusulat. pangalawa, mahal ko talaga ang pagsusulat at gusto ko pang bumuti at gumaling dito.

pero nandito pa rin ako, kinakaya ko hanggang saan ko kaya. ayokong sumuko para lang mapatunayan sa sarili ko na kaya ko, na hindi ako yung tipong taong madaling bumigay. gusto kong patunayan na hindi ako "manunulat lang", kahit minsan gusto kong sumigaw ng "manunulat lang ako!" tinitingnan ko ang idolo ko sa trabaho -- ang aking bosing na nagmula sa bansa nina vanness wu at jerry yan, LOL -- at namamangha ako dahil ang kinakaya niya, di hamak na mas mabigat, mas marami at mas komplikado sa kinakaya ko.

binubulong ko sa sarili ko na kung kaya niya, kaya ko rin. pero minsan pinagdududahan ko kung totoo nga ang mga aking bulong-bulong sa sarili. siguro kailangan ko nang lakasan, baka bingi na ang loob ko sa mga bulong at sigaw na ang kailangan nitong marinig.

at nandito pa rin ako dahil alam ko na hindi ako dapat magpadala sa bugso ng damdamin. ang damdamin, lulu-lili diba? lulubog, lilitaw, ika nga ng philippine choral community. at hindi sapat na basehan para sa pagpasya. kung ang buhay ay parang gulong kung saan minsan nasa baba ka, minsan nasa itaas, araw-araw na yata ang pag-ikot ng gulong pagdating sa trabaho. at hindi makabubuti sa aking gumalaw at magpasya sa mga sandaling nasa ilalim ako.

pero minsan naiisip ko... kasalanan ba maghangad ng trabaho na kung saan masaya ako, suportado ng maraming katrabaho at huhumusay sa bagay na mahal na mahal kong gawin?

Moving on

it is hard to move on, isn't it?

i feel like i should be blogging about the events of last week. not just the storm and all the discontent it stirred up in me and many of our countrymen, but also unbelievably sad and infuriating events that happened to my nearest and dearest.

but i just realized that being able to leave these events in the past is actually a huge blessing! and so is the safety and closeness of my family. we are fortunate in so many ways.

i also realized i had been feeling guilty for being to continue with "normal" life here in singapore despite the widespread tragedy back home. but the life i have here is a blessing too -- although if you had looked at me all twisted up with worry last week, you'd never have guessed.

so i begin to embrace normal life again, and remind myself that i'm not a bad person, or heartless or useless, for being where i am, having what i have, and being comfortable.

(yes, i know. i can be hard on myself for absolutely no reason.)

so it's back to regular programming for me. and that's a blessing. it is in my prayers tonight, and for the nights to come, that all those who most need this blessing receive it too.

2008 was the year...

I almost missed my honeymoon flight... and ran straight from my arrival gate to my departure gate without my luggage.

I introduced Marlon to his new Indian relatives, and gave my family in India a new jamai (son-in-law). 

I fell in love with Rajasthan.

I rode a camel for the first time.

I saw my first desert.

I woke up before dawn to see the Taj Mahal at sunrise. If there's anything I would ever wake up that early for again and again, this would be it. 

I left home and moved to Singapore.

I began to create a new home -- my first. 

I learned to cook. Really well, I might add. I also discovered a new pleasure -- cooking with Marlon.

my first pasta

my first risotto

I became obsessed with Jamie Oliver.

I started writing beauty articles for Singapore magazines.

I learned that fighting with your husband never, ever means the two of you are doomed.

My grandmother died.

I got the job that I really, really, really wanted – despite having potentially screwed up my chances to get it.

I made a choice that gave me what I really, really, really wanted – despite knowing that there were going to be some people who would absolutely hate me for it.

I started working at BDA.

the office cat, da huay ("big gray")

bda's big black-and-white pre-war office on oxley road

I learned how to take ownership of my own ideas and be responsible for them – thereby killing a long-suffering suspicion that in my old concept team at GMA, the only person responsible for the kick-ass work we did was my brilliant partner. Oh, the dramz!

I delivered my first pitch.

I began to learn just what it takes to bring an idea to life. In short, I started to glimpse what it was really like to be a producer.

I conceptualized, scripted and produced my first spot for a regional network.

I bought my first piece of sculpture (from the Taka project, a piece by Juan Sajid Imao).

I made my first overseas remittance (and officially became an overseas Filipino worker!).

I saw Alicia Keys…

and Rihanna live in concert.

I traveled to Malaysia…

… Seoul, South Korea

... and Shanghai, China (where I turned 27 years old) for the very first time.

I jumped off a pier for the first (and what will probably be the only) time in my life, at Tioman in Malaysia.

I did an overnight shopping junket in Hong Kong.

Marlon and I paid off all our credit card debt.

I started having fun doing monthly budgets. Even beyond cleaning off the card, this to me is the ultimate sign of financial freedom.

I made the switch from PC to Mac… and wondered why I never did it earlier. (Oh, yeah. Macs are expensive. Now I remember.)

I learned that not all badings are fabulous and smart, and that my ACS badings are truly rare treasures.

I adopted a cat, Rogue (and inducted Marlon into the wonderful, adorable, thrill-a-minute world of felines).

I attended my first Promax BDA conference.

I got completely, passed-out-and-dragged-home drunk and had the worst hangover of my life… thanks to an office party.

battling for the honor of "drunkest expression" with my boss, james, and the creative director of our sydney office. i passed out shortly after this photo was taken.

I became a student of flamenco (which subsequently led to the most expensive shoe purchase of my life). 

I started muay thai.

I made my own Christmas ornaments, and set up my first Christmas tree.

I had a choir-less Christmas for the first time in over 10 years.

I celebrated one year of being married to Marlon... and continue to discover the thousandfold reasons why people fall in love and get married.

celebrating our first anniversary at the boutique hotel in tagaytay (i'm wearing my favorite of marlon's christmas gifts this year -- my bikini necklace!)

when i look back and see what a year we've had, how can i believe that 2009 will be any less phenomenal?

Mano mano

i was in a briefing this afternoon with some clients who are going to change their on-air look into something more realistic, natural and stripped-down. one of the guys on their team said, "the airwaves are too saturated," referring to the slick, glossy graphics that is a mandatory element of modern broadcasting. 

as someone who's part of the machinery that churns out such eye candy (really amazing eye candy, i might add), i had to agree. personally i'm growing a bit weary of all the whiteness and cleanness and reflections and glassy textures popularized by apple.

then just a few minutes ago, i happened upon this striking short on youtube -- "tyger," yet another work inspired by william blake's "the tyger". i am amazed at how much artistry this one piece of literature has spawned. 

"tyger" has shadows and depth that i find satisfying to look at in the midst of this design-wide obsession with blankness and glass. it has this raw, handmade beauty that i wish i could work into a project soon. mag-conceptualize kaya ako na may puppeteers o hand illustrations o paper cutting? di kaya ako hingan ng "glassy" ng kliyente, or sabihan ng humahawak ng pitaka ng aming kumpanya, "puwede bang i-graphics na lang yan?"

Home alone

i just dropped marlon off at the airport for a four-day business trip to kobe (as in beef). and while i love coming home to the quiet solitude of our little place with its cozy lighting, newlywed furniture and manic kitten, i could use a sleepover at someone else's house just about now. 

agree or disagree: sleepovers are a staple of a girl's life. do guys sleep over as much as we do? i don't think so. 

my sleepover history started in second grade, when my mom and her then-BFF tita nettie decided to introduce their daughters to each other, spawning a lifelong friendship and a spate of almost-weekly sleepovers. i still remember my first sleepover at chiara's house -- she told ghost stories that ingrained in me a staunch refusal to sleep with (1) my hair spread out over a pillow, (2) feet pointed towards a closet or door, (3) with closet doors open, and (4) in front of a mirror, to this very day.

i think i stopped sleeping over at friends' houses when i lost touch with chiara and nash, two of my childhood best friends (probably because my mom didn't trust any of my school friends enough for me to go and sleep over at their houses). 

in college, when my mom decided she would rather entrust me to friends then make me commute home in the dead of night after glee club rehearsals or performances. thus began a sleepover renaissance, and my kaladkarin days: sleeping over at leo's, pia's, dianne laserna's, justine's, gids', lesley/mags', eunice's, gutsy's, chris', gp's, maggie's, mimoy's. (omigad ang dami. i'm sure kulang pa yan.) 

while they were mostly necessities, college sleepovers were also the most fun i ever had. maybe it was because they usually were with big crazy groups of people, involved cry-your-eyes-out laughter and eat-till-you-burst food, and were flavored with anything from adversity (preparing for a tour, reviewing for philo orals) to whimsy (midnight baking frenzies) or obsession (marathon tv series) for that extra kick.

what do you know, i started out sleepy -- now i'm just sentimental. that tells me that it's time for bed. good night.

Friends and strangers

spotted midweek at the mac store in cathay cineleisure on orchard: leo!

how i wish. but this random dude was a shockingly close doppelganger, down to that green t-shirt leo always wears. he even had a starbucks kwofi in hand! 

this happens to me often -- i've seen a spitting image of maggie crossing the road, a demi-pia in a magazine (wearing capri pants and a giant fuschia pink bag no less), a jett from behind (down to the shuffling walk, big jeans, and ponytail! marlon quipped: "well, it couldn't have been jett if she was awake"), a female jonel, even a male rina.

friends showing up in strangers, and the foreign almost always turning into a reflection of the familiar. i guess i must be missing home.

Scary successes

the previous post made me think about what makes a good scary movie for me.

i find that the horror movies that i consider really, really good are those that sear one cinematic moment into your mind. as i mentioned in the previous post, shutter and the ring really did that for me. as did emily rose (the fear of 3am), omen II (the three little numbers on damien's scalp, plus his grey-eyed scowl), the exorcist (two words: spider walk), the others (nicole kidman and the children staring stoically into a window), to name a few.

i even remember one scary shot from early childhood, though i was too young to remember the movie: a white-faced, dark-haired girl trapped in the depths of a well, looking up in terror. (can anyone ID this scene?)

those that didn't pull off this brain-branding were pretty unsuccessful with me, and thus became largely forgettable: dark water, the reaping, the blair witch project, stigmata, gothika.

oddly enough, it must be an image; while i will forever remember the creaky-burpy sound the ghost made in the grudge ("aaa-aa-a-a-a-a-a-aaaa"), i thought that film was a complete waste of my time and money. i have no idea why hollywood picked it up for a remake.

the orphanage seems to be, so far, the only exception to this rule.

what are your success criteria for a scary movie? and what scary moments are stuck in your head, possibly for a lifetime?

p.s. if you're wondering why i didn't link to any of the movies i mentioned here, googling the first few and seeing their movie posters really creeped me out. time to go call marlon.

Getting into the game

i was beginning to get really frustrated with the results of my job search here in singapore. or rather, the non-results. after spending nearly three weeks in couchwifely languor, i had decided to really sink my teeth into the task of finding a job. not just any job, mind you -- one that i love, enjoy and am inspired by. nothing less! (this is also how i am about clothes nowadays. if i don't look spectacular in it, i'm not buying!)

and so i set about creating games for myself, games that i would change around every so often just to keep having fun. the first was the 20 game -- twenty CVs sent out in a week. then there was the 3-to-5 game -- three to five CVs sent out daily.

yesterday afternoon while i was hanging out with phyllis (the doctor wife of one of marlon's work friends) at her flat, i realized how much i had really gotten into my games. "gotta go soon, phyllis," i told her at four p.m. "i told myself i'd send out at least three CVs today."

"wow! you're so dedicated!" she exclaimed. "that's a lot!"

"oh, it's nothing! i once sent out twenty in a week," i said dismissively.

to say that phyllis was shocked was an understatement. she actually sputtered. "twenty?!" she wondered. "my god deepa! i'm so lazy! i've sent out two in the last year!"

now here's the kicker. they both want to hire her. and there i was, pushing thirty applications made, and not a single interview lined up.

after that exchange, i began to feel tired, like all the hustling for a job had suddenly caught up with me. i got very, very frustrated and very, very upset last night, to say the least. while there was no doubt i would return to my various job-seeking games anyway, i felt resigned and very easily pissed off.

i just got my very first "result" -- i'll tell you what it is in a minute -- and now i've realized all i had to do was change my game... again. thank heavens the universe will never run out of games for us to play. sick of looking at my cv? stopped looking at it, stopped tweaking it. and stopped sending the damn buggers cvs out and sat at the phone following up past applications instead.

and in this manner, i actually lined up a "chat" (is this a euphemism for an interview?) with the first company i applied to after moving here -- and one that totally got my heart thumping when i saw the job posting! the company is bruce dunlop (BDA), an international creative agency that specializes in doing on-air television promos. how perfect is that?! check out their website to see just why i'm in lust. they're putting together a pool of freelance writer/producers, and i'm dying, dying, dying to jump in and swim with the rest of them!

and the funny thing is, this is like the fifth time i've called them -- and i applied nearly two months ago! i never would have thought i'd still get the chance to come in for a chat.

i don't know how it's going to go on monday. but it's like i've gotten a jolt that's going to power me through the rest of my job hunting. just in freaking time, i might add -- i was not a pretty sight last night.

so it's time to change the game again. and this time the game is called "what am i going to wear?"

any advice... fashion or otherwise? ;-)

Couchwife and comforter

it's been cold, gloomy and raining all through yesterday and most of today -- perfect weather for curling up in my pajamas, under a fluffy comforter, with a good book. so i did just that. in this case, it was three good books -- i turbo-read my way through stephenie meyer's twilight trilogy.

it reminded me a lot of high school, which was (eeek!) over eight years ago. reading in bed was one of my favorite things to do on days when school got canceled because of the weather. i used to live near enough school to walk home the minute classes got called off, which was great -- i would practically jump into bed with a book after my ten-to-fifteen minute walk.

in contrast, some of the other girls had to wait for their parents to finish work to pick them up, or their bus services to get to school all the way from paranaque and alabang. there were horror stories of girls who spent the whole night in their schoolbuses in the rain and in the traffic, only to arrive home in paranaque the next morning. all this was were pre-ayala interchange, pre-C5 and pre-skyway, of course.

so i was enjoying myself, what with my bottomless supply of brewed kapeng barako to offset the cold, until i started feeling a little guilty, and well... baboy about spending the whole day in my pj's.

then i realized that i hadn't done this in years... not since i started working! i mean, have you ever gotten sent home from the office because of the weather? i went to work the morning that freaking milenyo struck, for goodness' sake -- and stayed there!

and i realized there was no point feeling guilty, not just about staying in my pj's, but about having this time to myself. i admit i've been antsy about being between jobs lately, but i just got that there's no point in beating myself up about it. that i can actually do things i've wanted to do for a while now. that i can actually have fun with this time in my life. and that there's nothing wrong with me for being who i am now.

which is a couchwife under a comforter, very quiet and very contented.

Burning questions

should we get a cat?

one of the things i'm looking forward to most about the move is leaving five dogs behind. don't get me wrong, they're great, but i really just want to have a cat after all these years of dogdom.

i love cats. i'm a cat person through and through. i talk to them on the street in the special cuddly voice i reserve for shoes, dark chocolate and marlon. the stray cat in our compound just gave birth to kittens and i positively melt every morning as i pass them on my way out of the house.

this is what i did in the alhambra -- take pictures of all the cats

marlon is surprisingly (adorably) game. he's a dog person, but he says knows i'd be happier with a cat than he would be with a dog that has to be small enough for condo living. (personally, i think he's waiting for us to get a bigger space so he can get his dream st. bernard.) he even interrogated an officemate who has two cats of her own in singapore to see how we could work it out.

so what's stopping me is: can the perpetually out and about, workaholic, wanderlusting couple that we are really take tender loving care of a living creature at this point in time? can we risk the damage to our landlord's immaculate, newly laid wood parquet floors? are we ready to resign the fate of one of our first articles of furniture (a custom-made acacia daybed) to that of a scratching post?

does my impending cohabitation with marlon necessitate cuter pambahay?

i've seen marlon in his pambahay, but he hasn't seen me in mine. mostly it's really big t-shirts with no shorts (i live in a house full of women so this is okay). somehow i can't picture me being young wife-ish, chopping onions in the kitchen or whatever, in this getup.

so i'm thinking shorts and tank tops, or tank tops and pajamas, or smallish t-shirts and shorts... articles of clothing that are in short supply in my closet. (my glee club friends had to give me my first pair of adult-sized pajamas after one too many sleepovers where my giant t-shirts rode up in my sleep and revealed my underwear to them.)

it's strange, but i actually want to be presentable at home. is that weird?

when will trillanes grow up?

he's a senator now, for chrissake. he can't run around doing things like this anymore. what a creep.