Liv in a Life Well-Lived

I'm chatting with my best friend right now and I kind of told her about a weird incident that occured the last few days. Not weird because it's the first time to happen, but you know, weird, because it baffles me. . When you're in my line of work, scouring the plains and valleys of the Luzon provinces, you do meet the most interesting people. Being a single girl from Manila has it's disadvantages though. You get the weirdest propositions from people. . Just today, a mother approached me and said I should think about marrying soon, and if I was interested, her son is single too. She was referring to a giant of a boy whose face turns red everytime anyone, anything looks at him. Maybe even passing dogs make him blush. I'm sure it was a joke. It always is. Or is it? But you know, I'm not likely to accept. Everyone in that room knew that, of course. . I did get asked out too by another man and the pick-up line went, "Ma'm, nainom ba kayo? Eh, kung pwede kayo...

So... contradictory to my worst suspicions, there is internet access in Quezon, and I didn't even have to walk through valleys to get to an internet shop. One is situated right beside our hotel, and weird enough, the shop isn't full of kids playing games although it is already dismissal. What the kids are doing instead is: playing games. yes! It is confirmed, I am in the province. Children are still engaged in outdoors sports and not chained to the computer desk. :) What's here in Quezon? Lots of coconut trees. Lots of unpaved roads (my butt doth protested much). Beautiful mix between rampant cocount filled hills and the sea. Beautiful. Quiet. Boring. Oh, and it seems people here have the knack for standing or sitting still for hours on end. Honestly. It seems they can stand for long periods of time doing nothin, or maybe smoking ciggies or talking to other tambays. I am amazed. Anyhow, just checking in because I miss civvies. I miss my laptop. I miss the convenience of DVD...

I'll be gone for more than a week... I'll be facilitating Organizational Dev't Trainings in the Quezon province and I don't expect to blog until October hits me in the face. You all have a nice week!

For some reason, Ryan contracted dengue fever over the week. How the hell did it happen? What irks me and scares me is that he probably got it somewhere around our house. So on top of everything else, I have to do a major survey of places where water accumulates. A stupid person told us to cut off all the trees and plants... obviously not knowing the dang insect breeds in water. Oh well. We're understaffed as a family right now, and I find myself stepping up to the role of primary care giver while Ryan's in the hospital. When we lost our parents, we also lost people who made a lot of sense. There's just a lack of grounding, you know? Life can suck. Worse, Ryan is not on my medical plan because we're not directly related. So we're back to mobilizing resources (read borrowing from people) because the hospital bill will probably go deep. We're hitting 20K as of yesterday and we still have how many days to go. Sometimes I have wondered why can't people just have...

If there's one good thing about being infirmed, it's this: you have an excuse to watch all the movies you want while lying flat on your back. I did send and envoy (my cousin) to get me all sorts of videos I can watch while in pain. And I was pretty satisfied with the list. Last King of Scotland I didn't watch the LKS when it was shown in theaters because: a) I have no idea who James McAvoy is yet, and b) I have no idea who Idi Amin of Uganda was. Yeah, sometimes I wonder too why I consider myself smart at all. But since I considered myself having all the time in the world the past few days, I figured might as well get myself educated. As it turns out, Amin is like the Ferdinand Marcos of Uganda. Enigmatic, charismatic but also allowed cruelty to rule in government. Amin had thousands of people killed, political prisoners abducted, and millions duped by his powerful presence. The movie advertised itself as about Amin, but honestly, I think it was really about Amin's Scot...

Sent an email to my girlfriends about my marrying James McAvoy someday (even if he is already married). But it seems long-standing friendships may crumble if that future becomes apparent because Petit said, and I quote, "Not if I find him first..." . And Mariel seems to have been harboring the same sentiments since she sent her version of Jame's hot pictures by sending photos of his naked chest way back during Children of Dune (and that's like at the onset of 2000). Oh well... it's a good thing then he's not likely to cross our paths or friendships will become moot point. :) There is a God.

As opposed to my usual practice, I have decided to forego reading Ian McEwan's Atonement before watching the movie. I don't know if it's a mistake yet since I currently don't have a copy of the novel. But the movie is saved as a file in my laptop hard drive (legit: borrowed from Video City then copied) and one thing I know: I am NOT going to delete it anytime soon. I rather like having James McAvoy's hotness available to me in just one click. Oh of course, the movie was good. Not a rollickin' good fun type of film, no. It's the story of Briony Tallis - thirteen and in the throes of her puppy love for their gardener/right hand man Robbie Turner. As it happens though, Robbie is very much in love with Briony's older sister Cecilia. R & C has a brief courtship, supported by the many years they grew up together and finally professes love for each other in the heat of, aherm, passion. Brione wallks in on them, saw their uncompromising position and broke he...

Vampires : a) the undead; b) often times gorgeously irresistable but in other times ugly and as reprehensible as sin, c) often bored to tears of their immortal life; d) they're not nice when they're bored. versus Werewolves : a) some are born with a curse while some were bitten with the poison, b) always portrayed as tortured souls torn between their animal instincts and their human morality, c) rarely handsome, often hairy, d) with aversion to poodles (honestly, who wouldn't?). For some reason or another, I find myself rooting for the "Go Werewolves" Team. They just make more interesting story focal points. With vampires you could only read so much about the sexual tension and the boredom and the blood. When it comes down to it all, they are dead. And the dead could only get any more deader. With werewolves though, you get melodrama, you get guilt, you get insanity. Werewolves aren't dead, they're still very much alive... and sometimes their souls are sti...