watering the frog

i was watering the plants this morning when i saw this guy.

we have a lot of those tree frogs in san pablo but i think this is the first time i've seen one here in the yard. its been really hot lately which makes seeing this guy really unusual.

i want to go to the beach

i want to go to the beach. its been a while.

i don't want to go to boracay anymore. i've been there so many times before. the place holds so many memories for me. the first time i went there, the island didn't have electricity and that little inconvenience greatly added to the romance of the place.

its different now. there's so many people there. there's so many people wanting to go there. although the beach is still fantastic, its a bit too developed for me.

other places i can think of is bantayan island just north of cebu. or maybe camiguin but that's a bit far already.

i want to go to the beach.

waking up

i'm tired.

i've been up late for the past two days working on some web stuff.

i've had a full day today messing with some computers.

and i'm still up putting proposals together.

it is good to know that i will not be waking up tomorrow to an alarm clock at 4:30 in the morning.

i saw mars tonight. or was it venus? not really sure.

holy week break

cherry, robin and i went on a holy week break of sorts. we went out of manila to san pablo city, 87 kilometers south of manila to visit my folks.

it was definitely cooler there since there's an abundance of trees and we're about five minutes walk from the city's biggest lake — sampaloc lake.

we also went to visita iglesya or church visit. we went to the underground cemetary in nagcarlan, laguna (there's a chapel there that used to be the town's church)

and to liliw, laguna.

in liliw, my girlfriend treated me to a lunch in this nice and very cosy restaurant called arabela. the food was great and the place is full of character. you guys should visit if you're in the area.

i am a

i am a romantic. a helplessly hopeless one at that. i've known for quite some time now and i'm comfortable with it so relax those eyebrows. every once in a while i just get reminded of it.

this afternoon as i was channel surfing i saw this movie that i haven't seen for years. its one of a handful of cheesy, romantic movies that i liked. its one of those movies that cradles me, envelopes me in its stories and makes me remember my own cheesy, romantic story.

it was the eyes. her eyes. and her smile. it always is.

v, the comic book

i was in san pablo for a couple of days and i got a chance to borrow the comic book where the movie was based on. thanks gerry. the general storyline was there but there are differences. there always are whenever the book gets transferred to film. the comic book is certainly not your run of the mill superhero thing that most everyone is used to. this is one of those comic books that are meant to be read my mature readers. the comic is dark as is the film. some parts of the the ending was a little different as well and it was nice to see evey don the mask...

you have to read the comic book.

cover to v for vendetta. art is by david lloyd.

new forehead

some of the regular visitors (if any) may have noticed that i did a bit of redecorating and changed the forehead of this blog a bit. its a little bit of javascript that i've been meaning to write for some time now. i'll probably change a few more graphic items but that comes later.

so how do you like the new "forehead"?

a conversation with robin

over a week ago while robin and i were walking from school we had this interesting conversation.

"dad, do you know i have a girlfriend?"

blink. blink.

ok. that stopped me. literally. right there. on my tracks. the mind goes blank for a moment.

robin just kept on walking, stops, looks back to me and says, "what?"

"nothing." i said, catching up to him.

my mind goes from a standstill to a fast series of images, videoscapes, sounds and finally i was able to blurt out, "you have a girlfriend?"

"yup."

" do i know her? is she one of your classmates?"

"yup."

"who."

"secret."

grrrr... well, the thing is, at that time, he was just seven and will be turning eight in a few days. i opted not to pursue the "who?" anymore and just concentrate on being the "cool" father. although to be honest i was excited for him.

"well, that's great! really! so how is it? having a girlfriend, i mean."

"its ok," robin said with a smile starting to break.

what the...? he's not excited about it?!?! but he was smiling while we were walking so i guess there's a bit of excitement there.

i'm also excited about the fact that he's comfortable enough with me as a father and maybe as an older friend to confide in me.

uuuaaagghh

its been a cloudy day so far. it rained hard last night although only for a while. time enough to make sleeping comfy and cool. and as expected, the following day would be frigging humid. and it is. ugh.

there are dark heavy clouds above and i think they're still deciding whether to release the rain or not. i wish they would though. the city certainly needs some cooling down. i know i do.

agustin's rc stuff

a friend of mine — agustin v — sent me some pictures of his new ride. he told me he sold all his gas powered cars and an electric car and got himself a competition level electric car. for those who are a bit in the dark, i'm talking about radio controlled cars. the serious ones. these are not the double a powered thingies that you see being sold in department stores.


the one that gus got is a hot bodies cyclone. wow. speed controler is lrp quantum competition 2, katana 23-turn stock motor made by top, tires are by sorex (type 40 for day racing and type 36 for night) with hara hard inserts, batteries are nimh 4200 mah (already?!?!) and the stratus 3 body is by protoform. this is seriously wicked stuff. he didn't mention the radio he uses but i'm sure its pretty much serious stuff as well.


yup. the chassis is made from carbon fiber. and i'm almost sure that there's a sprinkling of titanium somewhere there. its 4-wheel drive complete with differentials. the suspension is totally adjustable with shocks and springs. camber, caster and some other thing that i forget are adjustable. sometimes i think that eventhough these things are about 190 mm x 395 mm in size they're almost as complicated as the real car!

i was and still am, although in a low profile kind of thing, into this hobby for quite some time. i have a race car and two trucks. all electric. my stuff is not really for competition like what gus has but they're still complicated enough for an enthusiast. all of my trucks and car are still in pretty good condition although i do have to get tires for one of the trucks when i get some extra cash (which is pretty rare these days). i'm cleaning the race car so i can play with them a bit in mendiola. i don't get to race because i'm not really into it but gus does and i heard he's pretty good at it too.

now, back to cleaning...

robin's 8th

24th of march. robin's 8th year on the planet. we think he's having fun. we had a small gathering of cousins. nothing fancy really. just a handful of balloons in light and dark blue, a chocolate fudge cake, chocolate ice cream, some spagetti, chicken, siopao, a square pizza, dalandan and orange juice.

the kids played first with go kart, bicycle with guide wheels, b-daman, whatever. they're kids and kids play. the chaos started at around 3:00 pm and everything was cleaned up my 9:30. the adults were all bushed but he keeps saying. "but i'm not sleepy yet!" well, with all that chocolate stuff he ate he wouldn't be!

if you want to see more pictures click over to my flickr collection.

v for vendetta

the wife and i watched v the other day. very good movie. i'd buy the dvd if i can. i don't know why but the movie had this "crisp" feeling to it and it made the whole movie very involving, in a matter of speaking. you guys have to go and see it on the big screen. its no fun watching the thing with a squanky pirated dvd (a bad thing) on a tv screen even if you do have those 6.1 surround-sound thingies. go to the movies and watch it.

i do have to read up on the comic book though. its been a while since i re-read the thing. my brother, gerry, has the complete collection i think. so i'd probably get the chance to go through the story again during holy week.

1 more day

one more day and finals will be over. i find it really hard for me to tutor robin. he's very hardheaded for a 7-year old. so i will be glad when final exams are finished and we can move on the summer vacation!

yes!

before finals

this is the week before finals and i have this weird panicky feeling that i should be the one doing the studying for robin. uaauuggh! i hate that feeling. and all robin wants to do is play with his cousins or play with his new b-daman with dhb gear. dhb is short for direct hit battle. pictures are coming.

the japanese have gone and created a totally complicated fun way of playing with marbles. complete with products, product upgrades, marketing and a cartoon show! amazing.

i wish i had these toys when i was a kid.

where i grew up

san pablo city is the place where i grew up. its a nice small town about 85 kilometers south of manila known for its seven lakes. the city of seven lakes as it is often called. i like the city because it is a lot more quiet than manila, there are more trees so the air is definitely cleaner. and most of the time i find comfort just by being in it.

my brother, gerry, made a video about san pablo city and, with his permission, posting it here.

bida fire!

today i was a doting father to my son. robin entered a battle b-daman tournament with his cousin david. there was also a side event they called "king of direct hit battle (dhb)" where they get a chance to win raffle entries. win three dhb events and your name gets included in the raffle. robin lost in the first round of the tournament and david finished in the top 16. both entered the king of dhb also. david won raffle tickets twice. robin lost again and again. and again.

i found out something about my son which shall stay with me for a long while. robin does not give up. he just didn't. the chance for a prize didn't really matter to him. he enoys playing and he enjoys playing with other kids. oh yes, he gets sad when he looses. who wouldn't? but when he did lose and got sad he just shrugged it off and kept signing up again. and again. and again. and again.

and that already makes him a winner.

magnitude 5.5

there was an earthquake around 7pm. i was in sm manila with cherry and robin having dinner. it was a "slow wave" quake and it was short so no worries. i later found out that the epicenter was in mindoro. wow. cherry was just there last weekend. i hope no one got hurt.

a landslide, a coup plot and an earthquake. in a span of a few weeks.

ugh.

buzzed

i can't believe it. i've just been buzzed by a couple of bats! i think they went as close as two feet from my head! you'll feel the wind from their leathery wings and that high-pitched screech they make becomes really loud. ugh.

well, at least, bats are still in the city which means there's food enough for them to stick around.

oh. and i was able to have my chowking halo-halo. at last.

sarap.

quiet national emergency day

it is! no noisy vehicles outside. no pesky jeeps. but its sooo freaking hot! uuuuaaagghh. what i would do for a halo-halo right about now.

and chowking is about a five-minute lazy walk from here. hmmm. two scoops of ice cream with a handful of finely crushed ice, topped with leche flan, ube, sliced bananas, sweet beans... i think they said they have 15 sweet toppings in all.

yum!

sige mamaya...

fiesta season

did i ever mention that the first five months of the year is what i call the "fiesta season"? lots of things happening. well, officially, may is the fiesta month but it sort of spreads its wings ang infect the rest of the surrounding months.

there are lots of school fairs with lots of rides, booths selling lots of different and colorful stuff and, of course, music. lots of music. from the given "piped in" music while the fairs and fiestas are going on to the almost nightly concerts at each school. and let's not forget the ati-atihan bands with their thundering drums. stay too long and too near them and your ears will be ringing soon enough.

and if that's not enough there's the coup attempts. how can this be included in the fiesta season? well, the children usually doesn't have classes which means they can play or watch tv or play with the computer all day, the offices (except sm malls) are either closed or closing early which means people can go to malling early or the movies or go home to sleep early. either way its an incidental "unwanted" vacation time. ha! and you thought coups are all bad. ;-)

dreams

i had this dream a couple of weeks ago that i couldn't shake off.

it was late afternoon, the skies was a bit cloudly. i was over a cafe adriatico, seated outside on an antique chair and table by myself. i was reading the comic section of a newspaper which was particularly thick that day. suddenly, without warning, a japanese guy, in a coat and tie, pulled the newspaper down, crumpling it. he was shouting at me in japanese, which, i cannot quite understand and pointing frantically behind him. i looked over his shoulder and i saw other people, in formal attire, all japanese, running away in a state of panic. the japanese man started to shout at me again and, as if on cue, english subtitles of what he was shouting appeared above his chest.

"godzilla is here! run while you still can! run!!"

weird dream.

godzilla is copyrighted. someone else owns it.

valentine 2006

it feels like a holiday today except that people still go to work (but i don't think they will do any), students go to school (study? today? nah.). the only one's oblivious to valentine's day are children below six years old who are too busy playing. happy thought.

so have a great valentine's day! if you can't be good then at least be careful.

feb eighty-six

that was the time i got my left ear pierced. just my left with a simple gold stud. at that time it was a rarity for males to wear earrings. my mom said she wouldn't talk to me anymore. "anymore" took about a day. people on the street looked twice. they sometimes stared. people i talk to gets distracted by it. most folks thought i was gay. word spread that i wear an earring and... that i was gay.

i didn't care. i know what i'm not. i know who i am. and i'm straight. it took a couple of years for the rumors to die down and the mongers are eating their words until now. they can't even look at me straight in the eye.

people are people.

i still wear an earring every now and then. people don't stare as much. sometimes they even smile. once every blue moon, i get to borrow an earring from my mom or my girlfriend.

long time friends and stars

last night my girlfriend and i went to an exhibit opening entitled "hubog sa apoy" (shaped in fire) in sm megamall. its a one-man exhibit by carlito ortega, a metal sculptor who uses steel and brass in his pieces. the sculptures on exhibit were fantastic with each one showing a lot of emotion. my favorite was about a father and son. beautiful piece. you have got to visit if you're in the neighborhood. the exhibit is in gallery genesis on the 4th level of sm megamall.

anyway, while i was at megamall, i also saw plenty of stars enough to last me a couple of years or so. lucy torres and richard gomez, senator loren legarda, malang, jaime zobel (yes, in megamall) and i think patis tesoro. sorry, no pictures.

but the real news was that i saw a really old friend of mine — boots and his wife ann. it's been more than a year since i saw them last and seeing them there in good health and spirits was simply great.

fun night.

rainy afternoon

it been raining on and off. i like the rain.

the other red chick passed away this morning. i feel sad for robin. no more pets. and he so wanted one. he actually prefers cats. he told us so. maybe when he reaches eight.

the other one is ok

yes, the other red chick is still ok. happily chirping away. i've been giving it muesli. i don't know if that's really good for the chick but he seems to like it.

hey! blog*spot's up again. it's been whacked over the weekend. ah, c'est la vie.

one red chick

yesterday afternoon, when robin was out with his cousins, one of the red chicks passed away. its the one on the right. i was even able to take the two out in the morning, hunting for food on the yard. i think it hasn't been feeling all that good for the past two days. it finally took its last nap in the afternoon.

gifts and wraps

my son went to a triple birthday party yesterday — his uncle, aunt and cousin. cherry wrapped the gifts because she's always had a knack for it. the photos doesn't do the wrapped gifts justice. i really should learn how to take better pictures.

next blog?

does anyone use this button? i mean, i do but does anyone else? just curious because some blogspot blogs completely renovates the template and leaves it out. and when i'm browsing and the button disappears i kind of miss a step.

nothing. just an idle thought.

mother hen

do you folks remember those two red chicks? well, i think its official. after a week, i am considered to be their mother hen.

ugh.

i get to feed them, take them for strolls in the yard, clean up their basket (we don't have a cage or kennel or whatever you call those things), i tuck them in their basket during the night. and how about the little boy who bought them as pets? he's currently taking a nap.

sigh.

lola and i were talking about what we're going to do when the chicks grow up to be chickens. robin was listening intently. there was a suggestion to sell them to either jollibee or kfc (kentucky fried chicken). robin got really mad. but we all got to laugh at the joke.

i wonder how much they buy chickens at kfc...

peace

tired

sometimes i really get tired of things and i just want to stop and sleep or lose myself in a good book or daydream. its been raining on and off. bed weather. hot coffee, bread and conversation weather. i miss boracay. i'm glad that the week is closing but i'm not really looking forward to the weekend. i feel spaced out and low. maybe i just need some caffein. or chocolates.

ps. my father's pandesal, my mug of coffee.

feeling lazy

i feel really lazy today. after six days of waking up at 4:30 in the morning i finally get to get out of bed at 8:30 (still in the morning! 8D). but then again i slept really late last night at around 1:30 (also in the morning) so i still got the same number of sleep hours.

the point is i got to get out of the bed after the sunrise. ha!

peace

red chicks in the house

my son bought two chicks from school today. and they're red! its college week and they have rides set up in the grounds, booths selling food and drinks and trinkets and apparently red chicks. i sent my wife an sms message, "you wouldn't believe what he brought home today. chicks!" and she sends me back, "Whaaat?".

i'll put more pictures later in the week both here and in flickr.

peace

i got scrubs

a friend of mine gave me scrubs as a christmas present. cool!

now i can pretend to be an orderly. or a nurse. or a doctor. a mad doctor. a psycho doctor. a paranoid schizophrenic doctor.

or not.

but it does look pretty cool on a tech guy. ha!

peace

lake yambo, san pablo city

lake yambo is the twin of lake pandin. they call them twins because of they are very, very close to each other as you can see from the google sat photo.

the raft was taken to a point where its was nearest lake yambo. after a steep and slippery climb and a very short hike, a glimpse of yambo. the locals made a trail going down to lake yambo already through the thick foliage.








once through the foliage you'll see lake yambo. there are bamboo rafts there already. there is no road around the lakes so these rafts are used to go around.

i have more photos over at my photostream if you're interested.

time at lake pandin

life takes its time at pandin. the people living around the area use horses and carabaos to transport coconuts and other produce from the mountains to the roadside where they are picked up to be sold at the local market.

the women cooked lunch and delivered it via this bamboo raft. these were the same women who cooked our lunch for us when we visited last year. this time, lunch was served and taken by the visitors on another raft. floating lunch. yum!

on one side of the lake there's a sheer wall overgrown with plants. ferns adorn the lower part of the wall near the water. the locals would sometimes pick snails there to be cooked with coconut milk.

lake pandin, san pablo city

i visited lake pandin last christmas. i wasn't able to take photos though so i borrowed some of the photos my girlfriend took when she and her friends visited last week.

pandin is one of the twin lakes, yambo being the other. in the picture is architect jojo mata, a restoration architect and a professor in up diliman, architect nonoy ozaeta, a professor in architectural history also from up diliman, and architect lex luague, a student assistant from up diliman.

the bamboo raft behind is being readied to take them around the lake. yes, its safe for 10 people.

seven lakes in one city

san pablo city, the city of seven lakes. i don't think any other city in the planet can say that.


i was born there and lived there for around 15 years. the city proper is on the lower left hand corner of the picture covered with clouds.

what i heard about the lakes is that around 600 years ago the area was simply flatlands. hills started to bulge out like pimples and eventually erupted. craters left behind by the eruptions got filled up with rain and ground water forming the lakes.

there are legends attributed to each lake and maybe i'll get to post some of them as soon as i dig them out.

the names of the lakes are sampaloc (the largest), palakpakin, bunot, kalibato, mohicap, yambo and pandin (the twin lakes).

funny text message

text message i sent to a friend at 1 in the morning:

what are you doing reading this message? it's late. go back to sleep.

old and new things to try

this year i want to travel. either for work or play or both. it doesn't matter. i want to visit someplace new. i want to get a regular paying job. maybe. but i want to have some creative time too. an 8 to 5 sort of kills that. i want to read a good book. several good books. and i want a chance to sleep for 16 hours straight once every month. or is that a bad thing? i want my own home. not a big one. that's harder to clean. i want to take more photographs. with a 5d. but its freaking expensive. i want a glass of wine. and some bread. in france. is that too far? i'd like to drink coffee in that place in the photo. watch people pass by. watch them watching me let time dance by. i want to walk on cobbled roads and think. i like walking. and cycling. i miss the wind when i bike. i miss my bike. kikay is her name. i should get her a new set of wheels when i get that job. or when i win the lotto. which ever comes first. maybe some tea after dinner? or would that make me sleep? i want to drive the new mclaren formula 1 car. maybe a few minutes before i wake up.

san pablo fiesta

we drove to san pablo city over the weekend to sample the fiesta there. we arrived early evening and i heard we just missed the buko pie parade. 1,700+ buko pies, around 700 meters in length. i heard it was a dry run for something bigger (and longer) next year. after the event they gave the buko pies to the people celebrating the fiesta.

we went out the next day to look around. we couldn't go near the street dancing because there we sooo many people but by night time...

here's robin enjoying the grilled hotdog.


he really likes the hotdog. take my word for it.


possessed by the hotdog spirit


i wasn't able to take good photos of the fiesta but here are some of them taken saturday night. tables were lined along the streets and stalls selling food and snacks and trinkets.


and this goes on for a good 200 meters on both sides of the road.


it was a fun visit.

the king finally kongs

we finally got to watch king kong (the latest version). good thing we went to the washroom before starting the 3 hour, 15-minute movie.

this is good one. i know i saw the second version with jessica lang but i couldn't remember much of it. this new version has plenty of effects and it makes for an entertaining movie. go see it.

i was thinking about the island where they found kong and i have a theory. it used to be the island of doctor moreau. abandoned and forgotten. another theory is: do you remember the two jurassic park movies? well, this was the site of the supposed prequel to the first jurassic park movie. the shooting just got stopped because the animals were getting wilder and unmanageable so the producers built a wall around the island, installed fog machines all around to hide it. it was decided they will come back to the island when they have enough firepower for it. so there. j/k.

small decisions

"i've decided i want a sister."

my son said that in between bites of bacon and pasta and sentences about battle b-daman.

i bat two eye balls. my wifey looking at me, to my son then back to me.

a minute of silence. i continue taking bites at my sandwich.

two minutes. take a drink of soda.

going on 3 minutes when i said, "wha...?"

(i'm in big trouble...)

black nazarene

today, 09 january, is the feast day of the black nazarene. long to short story, thousands of devotees flock to quiapo most of them on barefoot to join the procession where the life-size statue of Christ on a wheel-less carriage is pulled through the streets of quiapo. there is usually a huge number of people who join the procession in the hopes of touching the statue or at least have their towels rubbed agaist the statue. it has been reported that some people get cured of their disease or illness if they get to touch the statue or anything that has touched the statue.

no i didn't join the procession. i had work and it was traffic along the way. even if i didn't have work, i still wouldn't go. if you're not a black nazarene devotee, the huge mass of people would scare you. i mean the streets are filled to the brim by people.

i did get to join one procession, involuntarily, many years ago. i was on my way home and i have to go through quiapo to get there. and here i am oblivious to the world, not noticing the growing number of people around me. i just thought that they, like me, were waiting for a ride home.

then there were some people shouting and before i knew it i was pressed tight against a wall by this mass of people in a semi-organized stampede/procession dragging the wheel-less carriage of the black nazarene. i couldn't hear anything but the shouts and prayers of the participants. i couldn't see anything except the maroon shirts the devotees were wearing. and it was hard to breath.

and as quickly as it came, it was gone. barefooted devotees who got what they wanted started walking for home wherever that may be. i started walking for home too.

narnia day

we watched narnia today. pretty good movie. it was entertaining which is what a movie is suppose to be. i'd go and recommend it to everyone with or without kids.

a window

a window in the house

my grade 2 assignments

i don't remember how i did my grade 2 assignments. i don't remember if my teachers gave me any. today, i'm helping my son do one of his assignments in subika at kultura (civic and culture) and i'm having a hard time. ugh. some of the tagalog words used in their text book are not even used in day to day conversations.

for example:

• kaminero (street sweeper)
• pinangangasiwaan (oversee, supervise)
• nakapagpapagamot (get cured)

i understand the argument that students should study the filipino/tagalog language and i agree with that point but do you think an 8-year old grade 2 student will "get" those words?

maybe its just me but i would suggest making the book easier to read and learn though the use of tagalog words that we normally use from day to day.

less tech stuff

i'll post less tech stuff here from now on. most of the tech stuff that i encounter will be in my own site blog.

i'm trying to reorganize things so management is somewhat easier. this is one of the things i normally do at a start of a new year but things usually get messier at the end of it.

and 2006 starts

it was a busy first week.

• smoothwall released a patch 21 december 2005 and i wanted to see first what comes up in the smoothwall forums for any quirks the patch would bring. so far none of my installations would break if i installed the patch so i tried it first on my smoothie. its still up and working so i'll patch my other installations within the week.
• the water pump of the house has been screeching like a banshee in heat since last year. and it was leaking too. the noise was worse when i came back from christmas "vacation". repairing the thing would take about a week so we bought a smaller pump and i volunteered to replace it to save on the cost of a plumber. replacing the pump took about five hours but went well with a couple of small problems that are easily solved. the noise went down to a muted hum and the house is quiet again. i do have a lot of aches and pains and some scratches from the excersie and the thought that remains is "now i know why i didn't aspire to be a plumber".
• there is simply too much ham after christmas. i think i ate a couple of slices that were sitting in the refrigerator too long and expired on me so the toilet was a friend of mine for a couple of days.
• its back to school for the kid which means i also wake up before the sun rises. its a little tough because i work late on the computer and the mornings are soo frigging cold that it takes a huge amount of energy just to get up and out from under a warm blanket.

i'm already looking forward to the narnia weekend.

happy new year

best wishes for the new year to everyone. i hope none of my friends got their fingers blown off from the firecrackers.

you guys wouldn't believe how strong those crackers are. to give you an idea, one of the bigger crackers shook the walls of the house. and to think you can get these things on the street!


anyway, have a good 2006 everyone!

soda prices up next year

i just heard from the neighborhood store that coke lite will increase in price by 4 pesos. ugh. they already increased by 3 or 4 pesos just recently.

sooo.... diet pepsi anyone?

or pepsi max? "don't worry. no sugar."

note: i couldn't find "pepsi max" in the pepsi web site and i couldn't find "coke lite" in the coke usa web site. they have have rebranded it here.

the king kong that wasn't

my girlfriend and i went out last night on a movie date. something we haven't done for quite some time. we wanted to watch king kong which i heard was three hours long. its christmas week so i knew traffic is crazier than usual with the last minute shopping and all. what the hey, its king kong. most of the schools are on vacation already so i was hoping that getting to megamall would be relatively easy.

nope.

it took me almost an hour and a half to get there and it was hard to find parking. after a restful and sumptuous japanese dinner we went to the row of movie houses. sm megamall had 12 movie houses in all and they usually show big movies in at least two or three of them. i didn't think they'd run out of seats even if its the christmas season.

and since it is the christmas season, the movie houses — all 12 of them — were closed. for this particular night only.

the movie staff were out having their christmas party.

life really throws a pretty good loop and this is one of its biggies.

we couldn't help but just laugh about it.

then we had coffee and a dessert — a chocolate cake named oblivion. yum!

p.s. pictured is pandesal ni gerry. thanks dude! and the dog's name is eugene (i think)

feeling unwell

i've been feeling unwell for the past few days. nose is running. can't sleep well and generally feel tired and sleepy right about now. i guess i should be because i started the day at 3:30 in the morning.

moving complete (i think)

i think that the dns changes have propagated already and the move is pretty much complete. i can tell because of the amount of spam i'm getting in my junk folder. ha! at least this time, junk mail gets filtered out and automagically trashed by the server so i don't have to.

it is now time to put new site designs on paper. i also have been reading up on the current xhtml/html/css standards. there are a handful of changes that i have to hurdle (did you know that the table tag has been deprecated?) and maybe its time to update or change my html editor.

ps. broas and coffee. mine. dip broas in coffee. put broas in mouth. yum!

moving to another host

its been long in coming but i eventually transferred my website (not this one) to another host. the old one felt like it was getting tired and outdated. technology really gets old real fast these days. i'm paying a little more but i think i can hack it (hoping and praying).

the funny thing is that the most difficult part of moving is backing up the data to my hard disk and uploading it to the new site. those chores took a good part of the afternoon. all i have to do now is to wait for the dns changes to propagate through the internet which should be between 2 to 3 days.

i should redesign the site as well to commemorate its new home. its getting old and tired also. i already have ideas bouncing about in my head. i wish i could finish the redesign before the year ends. i would have to rework the content as well to better reflect what we do.

at least my brain and fingers will not be idle within the next few weeks.

web hosting by google?

this spoofing made me think about moving my site to another hosting service. yahoo provides pretty good web hosting packages at reasonable rates. and i read somewhere that they're turning a profit on those services. so i was wondering why google isn't in the web hosting scene.

they certainly have the technical and financial resources to create the service. so why not?

i actually wrote them about it a few hours ago but time zones have a way of making you wait especially if you're in the opposite side of the planet. i hope they respond soon.

i want your pandesal!

this is a call for people to send over a picture of their pandesal to me. it doesn't have to a a super duper high quality photo. just a simple photo will do. if i like it, i'll post it in my blug (smirk here), credit you for it and link back to your blug if you send to me your blug address.

you can send the photo to headlessspider at gmail dot com.

thank you!

spoofed! part 2

well, i got a handful of bounced messages again. the weird thing is that my workstation is off. grrrr...

time to get nasty. i turned off access to sending out mails from the server. like i said, its no biggie since i rarely use the address and i can still receive mails.

let's see what happens next.

spoofed!

i do believe that one of my e-mail addresses (i have several like most geeks) has been spoofed.

first i got a whole bunch of returned mails in a short span of time which got me edgy. i checked the mail headers and the from: line says its from my mail account and the to: line said it was for another address in the same domain.

hmmmm....

i checked my system and everything checks out. i'm pretty sure i don't have any worms sending out spam on my behalf. i also checked the message queue and there's several zero-byte entries. that shouldn't be a problem but i deleted them anyway. it's been clean for the past few hours.

next i got an e-mail from a postmaster to my postmaster which said that i've been spamming someone and that any mail from the domain will be blocked for 24 hours. that's no biggie because i've been using another e-mail address for quite some time. but what concerns me is what if i've been hacked.

so just to be safe, i changed my password to an even longer one.

let's see what happens in the next 48 hours.

what is pandesal?

pandesal or pan de sal is spanish for bread of salt. it was really salty when they made it before but it has evolved and now tastes a little on the sweet side.

it is a staple on a filipino breakfast table and best served hot. you can stuff it with corned beef (my personal favorite) or plain cheese, or pour sweeteded condensed milk in it. by itself, its great with coffee (kape) especially the barako blends of batangas.

prices range from php 1.00 to php 5.00 with size getting bigger as it gets more expensive.

ps. pictured is pandesal ni marien. of course, you can take it with wine

blogspot hack #2: random images in the header

i wanted to have a picture right beside the blog title (up there). not a big one, just a small teeny tiny one to "complement" the title. so i put one using hack #1. but that got tiring after 2 days. so i was looking around and found a hack that changes the subheader randomly. what if i change the code to change my header image ramdomly...? hmmmm...

hack #2 is the result. refresh the page a few times and you'll get what i mean.

this hack may or may not work for your blog depending on the design template you are using.

how
in your template, look for:

<div id="header"><div>

right after the code above, insert the code given below. change the images to the ones you like, please don't use mine.

to simplify things, i used the same dimensions for my images (80px by 55px @ 72dpi). i uploaded all five images to blogger, taking note of their addresses and plugging them into the code:

<script language="javascript">
var starttxt='<img width="80" height="55" 
  alt="revolving header picture" 
  style="margin: 10px 10px 10px 10px; 
  float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="';
var endtxt='" alt="" border="0" />';
var midtxt=new Array(
  'http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/537/1682/1600/header1.jpg',
  'http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/537/1682/1600/header2.jpg',
  'http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/537/1682/1600/header3.jpg',
  'http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/537/1682/1600/header4.jpg',
  'http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/537/1682/1600/header5.jpg'
);
document.write(
  starttxt + 
  midtxt[Math.round(Math.random()*(midtxt.length-1))] + 
  endtxt);
</script>
<noscript>
  <img width="80" height="55" 
  alt="My Photo" 
  style="margin: 10px 10px 10px 10px; 
  float: left; cursor: pointer;" 
  src="<$BlogOwnerPhotoUrl$>" alt="" border="0" />
</noscript>

if you want to use the code please change the images and use the dimensions that would work for you.

enjoy. i hope you like.

just thinking

wala
never bite the hand that feeds you. bad things happen after if you do. most dogs know this. some people just don't get it.