Progressive crawl

Most would agree that the whole world will be watching Real Madrid's first proper game of the season with the La Liga kick off. At the final whistle with a 3-2, the pundits and fans are divided by the optimism of continuous improvement and the omen of not living up to the expectations. Personally, for all the two hours I stayed up in the middle of an ungodly hour (there is a six hour difference between my country and Spain), I haven't enjoyed some decent 10 minutes or so of the match with the stuttering live streams from all those websites hosting it. Unfortunately, whenever I got a glimpse of the match, it was showing tons of proof that our defense is still loosely created without Pepe and Sergio Ramos to concrete it.

I watched the match highlights today for the sake of not wasting my sleep earlier; Kaka's magnificent pass between two players' legs absolutely nailed the proof that he deserved that transfer money let alone his humility itself would outshine any gaffe he could've committed during the match. The pressure for Cristiano Ronaldo was understandably onerous what with the dubbed highest paid transferred in football history. Unfortunately, the almost caught penalty kick will not suffice the fans' exigency for a golden ticket to the CL finals. Lass' goal was brilliant and I think with how he sliced the defense of Deportivo for several times showed that he's one of the best players in the match. The defense, from what you can glean of the 3-2 score, is obviously wobbly. That will not do if we are to face more difficult teams ie. Espanyol next week. Pepe is still under ban and Ramos is injured so it will be Pellegrini's job to stabilize the defense, which has been the team's problem since everything went downhill.

On another note, Bayern Munich's Robben and AC Milan's Sneijder served their revenge best cold to Perez with 3-0 and 0-4 victories over their respective matches. Robben hauled 2 out of the 3 goals with the help of Franck Ribery, who was rumoured to be in exchange for Robben's immediate transfer to the Bundesliga club. It's terribly unfair that Robben, who's got the speed of a bedeviled Ferrari albeit always prone to injury, would easily be disregarded for another player, brilliant or not. It should've been a fair exchange with Robben in Bayern and Ribery in Real Madrid now and not next season or next year. It's sad how the management is treating their transfers with half a mind from the inexplicable based on the players' statistics and the embarrassing tag prices. Real Madrid should be one of the leading clubs for usurious rates, what's the point of being a rich club if not for a little graft and/or corruption for well-deserved players?

Tons of Barcelona fans are already pointing out that even with tons of money utilized for the transfers, Real Madrid will not be able to beat them. Admittedly, there is some truth to those cocksure statements. Almost half of the squad are new and establishing good communication amongst the players will not be a cake walk. The good side of things is that with the good atmosphere built around the friendlies and a acceptable win against Deportivo, I'm all for the continuous progress of the team's performance. One cannot expect an immediate 5-0 victory just because it is possible once in a while. The promised beautiful play by Pellegrini is on the works from what Kaka, Lass and Xabi Alonso have shown. Fans are still going to breathe down Cristiano Ronaldo's neck and Benzema's consistent performance is a good foretelling of what can be achieved for this season.

So, Hala Madrid!

Get off the high

Camp Aguinaldo, unknown to an inutile like me, is actually the AFP Headquarters in Santolan. Apparently, it's not shown on the gates unlike PNP's Crame (who knew Crame is actually a person, lol). Anyway, I was led to Gate 1 where I was welcomed by tons of octogenarians for god knows what purposes. I kept on asking about the CPAD OJ1 which 3 out of 4 personnel of the camp did not know of. The official headquarters building (because the whole goddamn compound is the headquarters) was like 5 miles away and I was running on borrowed time. It's all my fault actually when they emailed me for an interview I mentioned I would be available before lunch whereas they never actually gave a specific time. So I went to the main building and was ushered to the chief admin officer who, by all means, was friendlier than the stereotype government employee. You can't deny it, most of government employees are snobbish beyond your tower of patience. But somehow, it was a pretty good day and she welcomed be with all smiles before hauling me towards the actual interviewer, a captain. Now, I was never born in a family of military personnel so seeing a room half full of uniformed men was a new and a tad formidable scene for me. Until I was presented to the captain who was pretty friendly too and a bit young for captaincy (if my ken on military ranks is softly accurate). It was not a room stacked with cubicles so asking me bluntly how much my former salary was was a bit disconcerting. Everyone's got some sense of discretion and it somehow left a sour taste in my mouth that I had to tell it. He explained that it might not stack up with my former salary which I had promptly answered with some lack of tact because who in their right minds would apply in government institution and expect the gold mine of a call center? I won't mind much of the money because it is a contractual position; I don't want to rot with the government at an early age. I was kind of expecting a test but it still surprised me that there was an actual test. There were 4 varied questions from the standard definition of success, a difference in case I get hired to the downright Ms. Universe queries of what makes a woman/man special to how to fit in an authoritarian leadership as per the institution's method of management. It sucked bigtime because as I was sitting in front of the PC, I knew my brain was still sleeping. It was not working the way I wanted so I kept shitting about pure instantaneous rubbish. Manic and chopsuey. It was full of tautologies and pompous barbs even critters would have scoffed at it. It was more pathetic since every question should be at least 250 words. My first draft of essay was like 80 words per question. It totally fucked me and I could do nothing about it. The bigger shit of it was I had to present it in a powerpoint presentation in a professional way, as the captain emphasized. And I say, what the hell. I believe I have evolved enough not to put peewee and cute cliparts to go with every slide. In the middle of making the presentation, I had an epiphany of being thankful to my Computer 101 subject back in college who, despite her wordy gaffes, really taught us tons about MS Office. As for passing the test, I might have signed my rejection already with the total crap I made.

Here are some souvenirs because obviously, I will not be back here. I actually liked inside the compound, it's clean, quiet and pretty much vehicle-free. The only problem I saw was that despite the cleanliness there was no sign of a garbage can for like a kilometer or something.

The grounds

The main headquarters

Along the main headquarters

The walkway

Anyway I had to go home in the middle of the blistering weather by past noon because my feet were killing me. Rode a jeep, assumed it will drop me off Santolan, but as it turned out, went to Cubao. Fantabulous. The temptation to buy new earphones was seducing me like no tomorrow and the hedonistic whore that I am, my feet had dragged me to SM Cubao which by the way, has been recently renovated. I went to the appliance store and out of the 3 SM Appliance Stores I had visited for the past months, this one totally owned in terms of the earphone selection. There were tons! Tons of Philips and Nike but no Sennheiser (which surprisingly was available at SM Fairview back then). I bought the same earphones which I already had thrice. It's the cheapest and it's the only thing I can afford as my financial support is already dwindling beyond comprehension.

With my new earphones, it made me a happy monkey. It actually stemmed from my latest addiction to the Rolling Stones' Forty Licks. Sorry about the X-Files OST, haha. But no, Forty Licks is brilliant! To think the online reviews proved otherwise because 40 of the best songs are not enough I suppose. But for me, the songs were lovely; provided I have yet to finish all 40 tracks (I'm down to the 11th) but from the songs I've heard they are amazing and awe-inspiring. I actually liked it more than Zoso but that's for another day of explanation or something. Back to the Rolling Stones, Mick Jagger's voice is fucking sexy as hell and the first few tracks had me signed, sealed and delivered to his godly feet. Of course Bellamy's got my perennial fealty but I can always extend it by a few fingers or toes to others. My favourite track would currently go with She's A Rainbow--the melody and harmony are downright brilliant and the simple, which simply proves that Jagger and Richards are genius.

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I can imagine that the James Bond films are pretty famous around air-conditioned buses around the metro. I can't even remember how many Bond films I've seen throughout my life of commuting. On the way to AFP, it was with luck The World Is Not Enough was just starting. The opening credit (yes, with the usual dancing naked women) was lovely and totally suited Garbage's sultry interpretation of the song. The delightful and sophisticated Sophie Marceau probably thought the film was not worth her time because I thought she was just swaying along with the film's flow. Dr. Christmas Jones, played by the back then alluring and sexy Denise Richards, gave a shitty version of her Russian tongue. Pierce Brosnan gave a better accent, I suppose but that might be an unfair call out since Richards' line was longer but her last two Russian syllables totally curled with an American accent. Absolutely funny. Yes, well she was playing an American doctor so the accent must have been a requirement but I don't know, it was not convincing but her barbs were amusing. Unfortunate that I had to drop off at Timog.

Anyway, I'm all petered out and Duran Duran is not really encouraging a sleepy environment so I'm signing off.

Fuel it up

In limbo as usual, it's pretty useless to write these posts even for my own pleasure since it's all bland and plain as bread. I'm in the middle of a battle in finishing The Island of the Day Before by Umberto Eco. Despite all my proclamations for the author's capacity to encourage headache and eye strain I still forged on because hey, it's been a while to read a challenging book. Too bad my tongue ran before my body could accommodate such onus. I mean, seriously, if we'll go back to the time I last read a decent book it would be during my college years. Obviously, I've been pertaining to the death of my creative juices upon my first employment which is so shitty all my grey matter fluidly went out of my arse. It's terribly appalling and the more appalling thing is that it's taking me light years to regain what I had back then. Provided, classes for five days a week will make you push your stone towards the hill but it's no excuse, isn't it? I'm still hell bent on finishing the book before shifting towards the bookshelf-worthy ebooks I downloaded a few days back. I should probably go slow and mild again with the short stories, mythology and fables before donning a chainmail for Shakespeare and Tolstoy.

Books aside, I've finally downloaded the long desired X-Files Fight the Future album which was in tandem with the 1998 movie. I have a cassette copy of this album which is probably ruined beyond grace with all the continuous playbacks it suffered. Absolutely missed listening to the collection. Many are not satisfied actually with the album but this was one of the few albums which totally blew me away because I was still in grade 5 back then. Imagine that, I've been acquainted with Bjork for more than a decade. You should listen to some of the songs like Ween's Beacon Light and Sting & Aswad's Invisible Sun. Fucking brilliant. It simply tastes of my childhood years. It's fortunate by the way that I've nicked this torrent because I recall a few months ago I was coercing Aya to look it for me too. Luck's shining on me this time for this so I'm not being selfish so I'm seeding it.

These past few nights I've been having a highly imaginative and colorful bunch of lucid dreams. They are lucid enough for me to know that it's still playing in my brain while I'm on the brink of waking up before dragging me back to sleep. The most memorable would have to be like two days ago. It was me and my other 3 college friends aboard the MV Princess of the Stars. Oh, pretty fucking incredulous but I'm not fibbing. The ship unlike the real one is pretty nice and new, something like a Super Ferry although I haven't been in one so this is pure assumption. Anyway, it definitely went down and lo and behold, I managed to convince myself and my 2 friends to jump off the ship before it totally turned around. Beth's got a starring role in it for dragging me down the water while trying to save her, similar to what she did back in our swimming class. The next thing I knew we were saved by a small ferry with Julius Babao sitting a few feet from us typing on his laptop; not before Cors catching me trying to forage a bag for money (how barbaric of me) for our survival. To think Cors glared at me; I should've left her inside for her to drown. Haha. Anyway we had moored on an unknown province which totally did not look like a port but what the hell, we went to a nearby mall and ate at the food court. It's pretty twisted already and that's saying something. Now then, bring out your Freud's Interpretation of Dreams and let's see if we arrived at the same conclusion.

Of course before I forgot, a big belated happy birthday to Cors! One of the few snotty people whom I can protract my patience for. That's how much I love her. So there.

Blinding heights

Palazzo Barbaro, Venice. Photo by Jandudas

When I was a kid, I was always fascinated by a book's cover depicting a statue of a girl, head cocked to the side, palms turned upwards holding a bowl each. It would give off a fey air with a tinge of dark atmosphere as it seems that it stands upon a cemetery. A few years later, as I have had enough consciousness to delve into books, I read John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil wholly assuming that it was a fictional novel until I turned to the last page. An edifying moment occured after relishing the novel's festal yet daunting air as I drank the cover that it was a non-fiction work.

Berendt regales again with his second non-fiction work with The City of Falling Angels, a turn towards the city of Venice, far from the cemeteries and idiosyncrasies of Savannah. Introducing elites and dilettantes throughout the floating city, Berendt leaves one grasping towards the subtle nuances of each person, families, palaces, histories and relationships towards the neighbours and the beloved city. Centered around the hubbub as the Fenice burned down, the consequential vicissitudes throughout the murder of a precious landmark marks the connection of Berendt's people. On a side, it leans towards the situation of the conflagration--was it an accident or a crime of negligence? Malfeasances and eccentricities sprawl out through Berendt's signature seamless inquiries as it stretches towards the important people of Venice. From the formation of organizations, Venetians who are not and the seemingly innocuous happenstance of crimes and Venice's version of bilious elegance and unending secrets.

The book gives a vicarious air not as much as a coup de cœur with Savannah but a dilatory and forbearing ken of what Venice is about with its citizens and denizens alike. One would adore the city and the people long before the conscience acknowledges it. As famous and infamous people who were seduced by the city's unique allure for fame, power and quietus, the title of the book seems ironic enough.

Partial resistance

I dropped by the office last week only for them to drop a bomb on me. As it turned out, a senior employee walked up to me and calmly inquired if I would be interested to re-apply in the company under another department. To say I was flabbergasted would be quite apt since from what I had reasoned out, I resigned in the first place to look for another career and start anew, not enjoy a 2-week vacation and come back as a converted employee. Admittedly, the offer has the telltale signs of spark and interest since the position would assure a constant challenge per project and the unending writing of reports. Sure, I had said in the end as I submitted my updated CV and would welcome an interview any time despite the steadfast notion of not considering the opportunity as a priority. Obviously. I would be not half crazy to join them in the blink of an eye. Unfortunately, not many offers are flying towards me. It can be blamed to the fact that I lost the aggressive drive to apply online after the 2nd week of unemployment. It would be nice to get my civil service result already and properly woo NCMH for a position.

Richard and I were chatting about our respective so-called careers when he asked if I was seriously considering things based on the formation of a career. Technically, I would agree with it. It would be a terrible waste if I swivelled towards another career veering off my major since in the first place, I adore psychology. I adore it so much I would suffer the lack of air-conditioning and the pungency of wards if it meant I will learn how to interpret Rorschach. It doesn't matter if I wasted 2 years of my life proofreading reports from day 1. However, turning towards a new career would not be so bad if I am agreeable towards it. Who wouldn't? By the time I submitted my resignation letter and had released a big sigh of relief it dawned upon my pathetic self that what others said were true: money cannot buy you happiness. In my case, by the remaining days of my employment back then even a 100% mark up on my salary would not have made me wary of my ultimatum. It's a powerplay between earning a satisfying bunch of moolah and achieving the satisfaction your mind's exigency.

That said, I'm still stuck jobless and dead broke.

Pass the bread, spread the jam

- Should make a review on Berendt's The City of Falling Angels. I owe him one since I was not able to write something about Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil back in college.

- Currently trying to stomach The Mosaic Crimes. I bought it from Bolix; the prose is as crippled as of The Da Vinci Code. Understandable perhaps since it was originally written in Italian nonetheless every page always leaves a bitter aftertaste on my mind.

- Too lazy to even read anything online.

- Recently reformatted my laptop again due to some unprecedented problem on the memory. I had to endure a day of downloading the updates and upgrade for Ubuntu. Pain in the arse, totally.

- Too lazy to apply online. Again. I'm relying on pestering acquaintances to refer me to a semi-decent job somewhere near home.

- Got several films to watch and I got the whole day and I don't even give a whopping pile of horse shit to play it.

- Currently downloading ZOSA and Forty Licks. Still part of the perennial ennui.

- At some point, I have to make a list of what I should listen to. I know I got tons of songs on my iPod although I only appreciate a quarter of it. It's probably time to change that while I still got the time.

Pushing and pelting

A week of indolence made me intolerable to travel already. Barely halfway to Ortigas I was already gaining a major headache and a grouchy demeanor. Perhaps the headache also rooted from a restless night of sleep but the bus travel really topped it off.

The online English tutorial center is actually a rather small room with cubicles reminding me strongly about the workplace I just left. The overall atmosphere is one of loose office rules and minding your own business. There is no interview actually, only a grammar test which I passed despite my mind off somewhere I can't reach. The recording-something which could not take place at that time will be held upon a next call up. That rather sums up that their recruitment process is as shitty as crook and I'm not that interested in coming back and wasting my precious savings on them. My feet were also killing me, the damn cheap flats I bought (I just loved the colour green) had something inside which made my left heel aching. I managed to peek at the building's directory and saw the British Council as one of the tenants. I went to their floor, inquired about a vacancy and in which the security guard informed a hapless me that they had just hired 4 new employees. I was already nearing Megamall when I realized I should've dropped off my resume with the guard vacancy or none. Anyway, if the damn tutorial company decides to call me again for another round I might go just for the sake of submitting my resume to the British Council.

In time for the baptism ceremony on Saturday, I checked Music One for my target gift: an apt CD for a baby. Apparently, not only Mozart, Beethoven and Strauss decided to expand their posthumous career towards the oldies but also other composers and musicians from Straub, Vivaldi and Schubert just to name a few. I was hoping for a Saint-Saens or a Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninoff CD for babies but there were none. There were also CDs for different occasions such as for waking up, sleeping time and pasta time, the last of which really interested me. I mean, what better way to gorge off pasta while rocking to the music of dead composers? Anyway just merely foraging around the peewee Music One had me totally tuckered. Despite the blistering sun with a whopping 32 centigrade temp, I decided to go home and have my well deserved rest.

Apparently, while I was trolling around Ortigas that noon, PES had their new manager by a person who was a former point of contact from FADV. When B mentioned it through chat I had to laugh at the simplicity of the company's solution. Perhaps E had a had in pirating the new manager who was as soft spoken as a lamb. My officemates mentioned pointedly that my voice is decibels louder than his. Oh well, he would probably exhaust his lungs by 3 months' time from the pain in the arse resuscitation of our department in the hands of a nitwit and their psychotic superior.

I got a call this early evening regarding a part-time position for training at Pharmanex, a company which has a rather not-so clean reputation from what I have gathered on the internet. The girl on the other line is either in a hurry that she has to screech every damn line she is saying or she's just plain nettling. I wouldn't mind doing another interview in Ortigas by Friday since I'm off for a celebration at MOA (fucking far for a goddamn dinner) by the evening. The problem is I have to dress up formally for the interview but I need casual clothes for the dinner. Something has got to give, then.

On the brighter side of the day, I'm already done downloading Eddie Izzard's Glorious show. Bravo. I should've downloaded Definite Article first since I believe I've watched 9 out of the 10 chopped parts of Glorious on YouTube, nonetheless it would be worth guffawing over Izzard's wackiness again. I rather miss Dress to Kill, the very first show I downloaded back then. Too sad it got erased when I reformatted my laptop when I thought I transferred the file to my iPod.

Big fish, little pond

The only other complete Coldplay album I have is X&Y, the record that preceded Viva La Vida. As much as I have hated the first few songs of X&Y, there is something in the new album that leaned towards the signature Coldplay style: solemn, haunting, heartfelt with enough nuisance here and there that would somehow make the album work out.

From the opening instrumental Life in Technicolor (which is part of The Escapist), it already suggests a mile-wide leap from what I think was a colossal mistake of X&Y. Coldplay had stripped their latest songs of the techno mad dash from X&Y and delved more into the baser tunes which initially made the band rise up to the mainstream: the impressive heavy organ music and Chris Martin's lucid and wavering voice. Halfway through the album I can definitely say that the intros are well established for each song to push through with the subtle peremptory force to make you finish it until the last note fades away.

It's one of those albums you can sleep through while listening; not entirely said in a dismissive and insulting manner, the album works out if you want it to work out. It's a good thing I did not bringing a cent of expectation before conditioning myself to at least listen to half of the songs or this would have been a slap-on-the-counter review. It means it would've been ten leaps more rotten than the one I have right now.

On another note, it seems that Chris Martin seriously took up Matt Bellamy's tripe regarding his voice. In this latest album, his voice is surprisingly clear-cut and unruffled unlike in X&Y where he sounded like he had just come from a funeral and was goaded into recording the songs halfway through his lugubrious day.

Nugatory ramblings

Nothing new at all. My dog pissed on my bed. Again. What in the seven hells is going on with Cenko? I don't know what it is he can smell on my goddamn bed. I mean, it's not majestically nice and comfy; it's old, a tad smelly, lumpy and heavy. Sure, he was born in my bed when Chewy had decidedly gone into labour surrounded by my pillows. Throwing a tantrum was my specialty but mom was adamant back then that it would be difficult to transfer the dog so with the authority of primogeniture I ousted my sister's right on her bed atop mine and slept on it. That's the often situation for the past days whenever I had to vacate my bed because of dog piss. Anyway the sun obviously has not been shining throughout the archipelago for several days and it's making me barmy. I have yet to grill my bed under the smouldering heat so with a pathetic sense of scientific eureka, I turned my octogenarian laptop on and had it simmered atop the piss spot with the hard drive's heat eventually drying the wetness. Poor replacement for the sun's natural heat, I know, but it's the best alternative I can think of so there.

Before the internet went down I was able to check my email and saw that I was called up for an interview in a call center cum english online tutorial center for Monday in Ortigas. I'm not sure if I'm going to show up but I might as well since it has been a week and despite continuous online applications, job opportunities are still dried up. It's going to be a double purpose too since I have to buy a baptism gift for Ate Gigi and Kuya Ferdi's son for next Saturday's party. Richard and I agreed to share a gift with his ingenious nicking of a French kiddie book partnered with a For Babies CD. Banters thrown about, we could also choose Kris Aquino and her son's We Are One collection. Richard and I won't probably be invited to the reception if ever. Imagine having a Buddhist for a godmother. Come to think of it, I am a godmother to 4 baby boys, Ate Gigi's son accounted for; is it fate giving me the golden finger that I shall only guide snivelling prats into adulthood? Perhaps, seeing as I'd rather join a rough and tumble episode with those kids at any rate than play dollhouse.

Mysteriously or not, Stevenson's Kidnapped is, well, kidnapped. It has been missing for several days already and it's not as if our house is a piano nobile to be unable to find it. I'm just practising my right to indolence. That declared, I've decided to read John Berendt's The City of Falling Angels. Review or what decent prose I can justify about the book shall be published after I'm done with it. It won't be long enough I assure you, I started reading seriously just this afternoon and I'm already halfway through. Considering my very active book reading libido, I shall say that I am proud of myself for eating half of the book in a short period of time. Back then in college, I can finish even a thick book in one sitting, nonetheless it's futile to stack what-ifs.

With the lack of internet, I've decided to explore Ubuntu out of ennui. It has been my running OS for several months already and this would be the first time that I have to sniff around for something exciting since if you know me personally, even the most trivial of novelties can make me happy. Anyway, all I ever did was customize the appearance of my overall theme using black and add and edit some widgets on my panel. I have to say though that the Fish widget is the ace of them all; pointless accessoire without a doubt from its About tab to the simple animation; clicking on Wanda, the animated swimming fish, would present you with a fortune cookie surprise from bad puns to quotable quotes. It's lovely, you can change the animation from a goat to a monkey or even a clock but I prefer the original Wanda the Fish. I would've named her Horace but her eyelashes are too feminine looking to be renamed as a male.

Go home

My dog fucking pissed on my bed, only realizing it too late to strangle him to asphyxiation. I had to sleep in my sister's bed and suffer a night long nose irritation with continuous sneezes and sniffing. It was hell; I kept twisting and turning for two hours despite listening to Muse. Even Matt Bellamy cannot save me sometimes.

Right, so yesterday came the not so surprising news of Xabi Alonso transferring to Real Madrid after too much drama and grief. Liverpool fans are already consigning Real to the nth level of perdition for nicking their precious midfielder; the question often posed of why would Alonso choose Real amongst other Spanish clubs run abound. For one, I don't think other Spanish clubs are interested in buying Alonso, they would've joined the bidding otherwise or at least proclaimed an interest. Secondly, Real Madrid under Perez's new era is establishing itself with enough pelf to incite anger and injustice in the football world by purchasing almost a new squad this season. Granted, it would not guarantee a golden ticket to the CL finals nor the La Liga title nonetheless, that's what coaching and continuous training are for. If Cristiano Ronaldo and Sergio Ramos could not agree on what hair products to use or if Paris Hilton got enough technique for a one night stand, then so be it. But I'm obviously digressing. The bottom line is, Xabi wants to leave the club for whatever reasons he may have. Real Madrid has the money Liverpool needs so emotional outbursts aside, I think it's fair that he goes to a good club instead of being dumped in some corner like Deportivo.

From what I've read most, football fans consider Real Madrid as the Manchester United of Spain, something that is too criminal to be even taken seriously. Real Madrid is not a jerry-built team nor does it buy fugly players. They got tons of accolades throughout their years and like it or not, no other club has yet to make that kind of mind blowing history. And no, my mouth is not uneducated enough to sprout curses.

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I'm having a Serbisyong Pilipino campaign where I edit and organize the blogs of my friends. That's how bored I am. It rained the whole day and my bed has yet to get acquainted with the sun. That means I'll sleep in my sister's bed again. Oh, the horror.

ndebvyahu2

Pass on, move on

With the La Liga and the football season starting in a few weeks, everybody's on their toes with the last trickle of transfer rumours. Apparently, Real Madrid's overwhelming signings for this upcoming season seem to be the root of the gossip mill for this summer. From Cristiano Ronaldo's highest paid transfer to the volleying negotiations Real Madrid is having for Liverpool's midfielder, Xabi Alonso. Personally, from Xabi's reluctance to stay at the red club and Real's unrelenting bids, I would let the player go instead of forcing him to play again for Liverpool for another season and have an eternal tiff with Rafa Benitez. Florentino Perez's stand on not meeting up with Liverpool's offer is making everything complicated. Adam's take on the Xabi Alonso Transfer Issue has a more accurate take on it. Not to mention the rather vitriolic response some Liverpool fans are throwing at my club with the final offer proposed.

Nothing but the good

In a little more than two decades of living, I have had witnessed enough tragedies and accomplishments this world has ever known. A dead pope, 2 dead Philippine presidents, 2 People Revolutions, a black man in the White House, Michael Jackson dying too young and Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie producing children. Waking up to the news of Cory Aquino dying is as surprising as a wet pavement on an August day. She's been suffering from cancer for almost a year and I think she, or anyone else, would have been better off dead than be confined in a hospital relying on an arsenal of machines with your family on the brink of tears every time you open your eyes. I might be a bit short of compassion but it was a tad depressing that people on the streets don't seem to project some empathy for a dead former president. I was never born to delve in Philippine politics and I may not know enough to exalt Aquino but I think we owe her some prayer or two for the people revolution. It's as bad as that hydrocephalic kid being pimped at MRT stations. I've seen him (or it might've been a her) for like two years already and I wish for nothing more than him/her to die than to be pandered around for alms. It's pathetic and it's a moot point to even question adults' alibis for such; that kid does not deserve that treatment and it would've been better if that guardian died somewhere in a gutter right about now.

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My last day in the office consisted of boredom, boredom and boredom. I obediently passed my work to my colleagues, left enough emails to clients to ensure a suave transition of correspondence and cleared my clearance before 6pm. I'd like to attest that I am pretty much well loved with the card B gave me and the box carrot cup cakes that I simply adore that L promised me. The boss joked a "good riddance" comment the day before and I cannot agree more on my side of the world. She would've been a good riddance too if not for the Powers That Be that bargained her now demoted tenure for an innocent bystander. Changes will be implemented and gossip will flourish. I can't say I was not saddened by my departure but the future of being free from the company's clutches surpassed my doubts.

Work is still far from the reach of my grubby hands. I'm thinking of enrolling for a master's degree if my financial instability can support me. I am simply burned out. I don't know where to apply to despite reiterating that I would enjoy wreaking havoc in a money producing government agency. It's like being a fresh graduate all over again. Undecided and in limbo.