Oh yeah, I forgot... Youth Build is right around the corner! The launching's on Sunday, and I still have to find out a way how to get the Ampitheatre. But it's there, somewhere out there.

It's how the announcement got to me that kinda messed it for me. I was asleep, and he called and texted. Argh! And I was sooo tired then! So I had to get up and waited for him to call again. Admittedly, I can be a grouch like that. So Vinnie, sorry if I didn't sound too friendly on the phone, but that's just how I am.

And here I am again, doing my brother's research yet again. Blegh, who said having siblings were fun? Well, I did at one point, but now when they're taking advantage of one's good nature...! Okay so admittedly, I may not be in the running for the Best Sibling Award, but heck, I try!

This time, instead of looking for Renassaince paintings and some such, I'm into History. So what if this is a fascinating subject for me? Especially since he asked me to research about three generals involved in World War II -- Montgomery, Patton, and Rommel.

hehehe ^__^

It's a fascinating research, especially since these three are somewhat intertwined in the fighting... like Montgomery defeated Rommel in Alamein. Now I remember why I wanted to get a second degree in History. It's a fascinating subject matter.

Just ditch the brother who wants you to do research; it's more fun that way.

Anyway...

Had a marathon show of Witch Hunter Robin last Monday. Amon is soooo COOL!! hehehe What can I say? I seem to like that kind of man. Hopeless... But they gotta have this certain... I don't know, "oomph" to their personality? They can't just be all that brooding and quiet and stuff -- that can be boring. And I don't like boring.

But before that, watched another animé series at Galo's -- I forgot the title -- a very ditzy angel and an "incompetent" devil... both of the girls are quite cute by the way, and I don't mean cute in the same that Risky and Safety are cute, i.e. small just 3 inches or so tall. Mishia, that's the angel, is this very ditzy pink haired angel (that they want me to cosplay >__<) whose very first line in the animé was "Will you go out with me?" if I remember it right.

Then there's Shia, the quiet sort of devil, who as her cat-mentor pointed out, is a very incompetent devil, and who ended up having to stay with Mishia in her apartment. Go figure.

But it was a fun animé to watch, good for the kids.

Not to mention that there's this bishounen there -- Ten-chan and I can't remember his name!! Argh! He's cute though.

Now where was I...? Oh yeah... I don't know if I should be happy or not but that download of mine...? The one that's going haywire? Everytime it pauses, it jumps! Like when I last looked at it it was at 4% then it jumped to about 81% before going zero on me again!

Sheesh!

And onto the good news of the week...!

I PASSED THE CIVIL SERVICE EXAMS!! So I didn't perfect it as other people wanted me to do and expected me to do, so what?! I got a high enough mark... *grumble grumble* but apparently not high enough for brother dear. He's just ahead by a measly 0.93 points! It's not even a whole point!

My other brother said we should celebrate ^______^ hehehe Jolibee!! Heck, everyone know's I'm a Jobee kid. We're both turning the same age this year even! hehehe

But there was this one guy in the exams... my sister chatted with his mother, and she was all this proud and stuff for her son (he's 27 by the way >__< hehehe me bad). Anyway, so we waited for the results, and wouldn't you believe it, he failed. Eeep. And she was all this "I got up real early for him, etc. etc. etc." When he saw his grade, I think the world fell on him.

And me, when I got mine, I did a little jump and skip routine. Coz I saw mine had the blue seal -- that meant you passed -- the green one meant you failed.

Oh yeah and the computerized system was cool. Well, the room was anyway since we got to have all those surveillance cameras pointed at us. Remove those cameras and the room loses all the cool points.

And I had this seatmate, his name was Rommel something or the other... we didn't ask each other's names but then we got to see our names because of the seat plan they passed around. And all he brought was this mechanical pencil that went AWOL on him. hehehe The lead broke, so he had to borrow one of my pens. Being the good girl scout that I am, I had two pens, two pencils, an eraser, and a sharpener, all in my handy dandy black pencil case that doubled as the case for my black glasses.

The only thing I can remember about him right now, physically that is, is that he was tall and wore glasses and looked extremely different from his picture, never mind that he wasn't wearing glasses in the picture. And we had fun talking about the surveillance cameras, wondering if they could swivel to look around.

When I peeked into the control room, I could see that they did indeed work. Coz I wasn't that sure if they worked or not. I don't know, but I kinda expected that there be this blinking red light there. I saw the television monitors though, and the cameras basically could see the whole room.

The results came out pretty quick; the delay must have been the printing out of the results. Oh and a funny thing... So there were two lines to get the results -- the usual division, last names A-F here and G-Z there. So I went to my line, and I couldn't find my name! hehehe They found it in the other sheet of paper that got misplaced for the other pile. Sheesh!

Oh well...

Actually got to editing some of Illusion 5.3, shifted a scene to 5.4... I'm about to start on it again.

Argh! Forgot to save! Had a problem and lost what I was writing before...! Damn it!

Where the heck was I...? Oh yeah, APN is done, no more paper flowers to make. Event was good, food was good, decors were EXCELLENT (we made them ^___^)... foibles of the organizing group fairly expected to a point... people in costume... I liked what I wore ^________^ Gothicky mucho!

Oh yeah, there's this download that's been bugging me. One minute it's at zero percent, the next it's jumped to 36 percent. What's up with that? And "This server does not support resume" thing? And they're the one's who always disconnects!

Finally home after a long and tiring weekend. Mocha mudpie ice cream, yummy... had it at my brother's place, as well as a free lunch. Ain't I good? And I got to take a short nap, too. But the thing was I was watching something that I was really enjoying and then I fell asleep sometime during the last part. Damn.

Feifu finally managed to sleep over at my place -- not my MINE, but my other brother's, but that's not the point. We ended up talking about Illusion. I hope I can remember ALL of it though; there was a lot!

Hmm... maybe I should post Illusion here...

So anyway, she also came clean about this guy that she and Gem are trying to fix me up with. Said it was an okay match or something like that, since this guy wasn't intimidated. Am I that initimidating? I mean, I have a lot of guy friends and acquaintances and they don't seem to be intimidated.

What else happened...?

Hmm... I'm tired. I hate this download! Damn it, it was at 48% before and now it's at a measly 5%!

Somebody shoot that!

hehehe speaking of Illusion... naughty James...! You bad boy, she's gonna hurt you real bad if you go through with that... And I don't mean emotional hurt, but more of a physical and immediate hurt.

Then again I've been having this recurring... I can't say dream since I'm awake when it's happening... could be a daydream, maybe a fantasy...

Anyway, it goes something like meeting this guy through his kid who bumps into me in the mall or somewhere else where I'm supposed to meet with my friends. So this kid is all adorable and stuff but his Dad is so... not. But he's not the evil kind of not adorable, just... cautious I think. But I can see he's swamped with trying to take care of this precocious 5 or 6-year-old boy, never mind that he's got a nanny looking out for the kid.

The kid likes me and we talk as I wait for my friends... and he somehow convinces his Dad that I'm not Cruella de Ville. So we talk and I wait, and we become friends...

The story's kinda cute... the guy somehow reminds me of my James. But maybe that's just me...

17 February 2003

Another weekend, another sleep over with friends... It was quite fun, if only for this itty bitty detail -- a heavy bag. You want to sleep over, you gotta bring essential stuff, like clothes for one... And all that entails is a heavy bag for you to lug around. Anyhow, we saw Hero -- second time for me. I still can't get over how little screen time Sky got; I forgot his name, Donnie something but I kinda recognize him from other movies. He's a martial artist, much in the same vein that Jet Li and Jacky Chan are.

So anyway, it was okay -- the sleep over. Can't say they didn't try but heck, that's how it is. Can't say I was in a good mood the whole time since I almost always felt sleepy (or bored, whichever is more applicable).

Then went over to "Sleepy Hollow" again. I must say I almost fantasized about meeting those bloody hoodlums who supposedly behead people there. We passed by a group of young people on the road -- they were walking in the opposite direction -- and in my head I saw several scenarios involving them and us and a bloody fight. I haven't hefted a scythe in a long time -- the ones used when harvesting by hand, that small kind since we used it before in school to trim the grounds -- but it looked so easy to just lope off a limb or something. Anyway, we passed each other and that was that. We got to the house and it was a blessing that we decided before hand not to make any more of those blasted flowers because I was so sick of them that in that mood I was in I wouldn't have been of much use.

But we did get something done -- flyers and stuff. I don't know where all those things came from but I managed to make 5 kinds of flyers for the particular product that we're gonna be promoting for that event.

Maybe I should work in an advertising firm. Maybe...

Speaking of careers, a sister of mine found something for me, but when I thought about it, I don't want to go for it since it's one of those things that you gotta have the "good family name" and "good breeding" and "good ties" to be able to get in. But who knows, right?

Screw politics. It's everywhere, in every aspect of everything that everyone does. You gotta do politicking to be able to go where you want to be in your career, in your life. Blegh. Sell yourself why doncha ya. Get a pimp.

I want a new computer, a faster one. The one I'm using is practically a dinosaur!

The one good thing about this weekend? I dreamt of James. So it wasn't a total waste. He's as adorable as ever...

But then again, the cynical part of me wants to laugh at how other people are probably expecting me to say that the good thing about this weekend was that I spent time with my friends. Ha-ha.

It was a good time with them, but basically, I was just a teensy weensy anti-social that time so I much prefer the time with James in my dreams than the time with them in the conscious state.

Oh yeah, there was this addendum to the dream that I had, about my tooth getting all squiggly like it was about to come off. Maybe it was all that talk before with my friends, when they said that when they dream of that particular scene -- their teeth falling off -- that someone they know is about to die or suffer some misfortune or something. And that it's better if they tell people they know about it to prevent it from happening.

Am I making any sense?

Bottom line is if you dream of your tooth or teeth, falling off, then you better tell someone of it to prevent misfortune on someone. Or something like that.

I never thought I could be susceptible to that kind of suggestion. Or maybe I brought that on myself, since I told them I've never had that kind of dream before.

So what is goth?

That's the theme of this event that I'm going to next weekend, so I'm thinking of what to wear. I have this chiffon cloth that my sister made into a sort of a full body shawl that I'm gonna wear over something. What that something is something that I'm still thinking about. I tried on this ensemble and it's kinda... sexy I think is the word my sister said. I don't know if I could pull it off, so I'm still thinking...

Feifu mentioned the movie The Craft; maybe we can go as those four.

The make-up I'm pretty certain I'm gonna make my skin as pale as death without being white. Then it's all dark. I still have to get a tube of black lipstick and maybe some black liquid eyeliner or something.

About Death... I got the permission of my friend Gem who's crazy about Death -- a character in her favorite comic book Sandman -- so if I wanted I could go as her, Death. Not too sure about it though, she already cosplayed Death, though in a different costume or so I think.

As for my costume, it's still a big MAYBE on what I'm gonna wear.

12 February 2003

Independence... That's one of the topics that I wanted to explore. The other one's a bit light-hearted so I'll leave that for later. This is probably one of those times that I feel like I'm maintaining a journal of essays.

Anyway... Independence. That's a big word in and of itself. It connotes freedom and autonomy; being independent means one is turned loose from parental guardianship and can make one's own way. There's no one that can tell you what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. Freedom, independence, autonomy.

Such wonderful words.

What brought this on? Something that happened. The long and short of it is that I want to be on my own again, though for real this time. I know that's difficult to do but heck, I feel like I'm inside a jar here with the expiration date looming in, for all the things that I can do.

There are a lot of things that I want to do -- mainly to acquire things that may or may not be considered important but that's beside the point -- and I can't do that unless I can reclaim my independence. Well, the real kind anyway, since I can hardly call the time when I was away in University as true independence since I depended on the family for my finances.

Basically, I want a good paying job, somewhere in the Metropolis so I wouldn't have to be trapped here for the rest of my life. It's not that bad here... if you want the life that this place can offer... which isn't much in my point of view. But maybe if I didn't have the opportunity to explore the lands beyond the boundaries, I wouldn't be craving for that lands again. I had a taste of it and I want it again.

The problem is getting there again. While going the academic route would be ideal, I don't think it'll fly here. Then again there is that -- striking a balance between what is acceptable to both parties.

As I said before, there is no security in this world... but other than what you can provide for thineself.

For that matter, you can't depend on anyone else aside from yourself. That's one of the things that I want to live by -- don't depend on anyone else -- especially, don't trust what other people say they can and will do for you until you see the results. Like just this morning, I was supposed to go with someone to the dressmakers but no, that someone just upped and went with nary a hi-ho. Then again, I can always blame myself for not remembering that cardinal rule and for not remembering that promises aren't what they're used to be. Someone's word isn't as binding as it was before, when you can count on people to do as they said.

Gods, but I hate life.

...There I go again... But there ain't no Carlos this time to check up on me since I can't bloody well dump this on him after... well, after I did the same to him some time ago. I really miss those times with him and the rest of the block when everything seemed so simple even when I didn't really belong.

Hn. I need a break.

[said break is Illusion]


Need happy thoughts... hmm... oh yeah... hehehe ^___^

Finally had the chance to get the translations of this manga I've been reading for a while now; it's Inuyasha by the way. *Spoilers ahead* KIKYO'S REALLY DEAD!! I'm so happy over that. Never midn that she could have been a better person when she was really alive, but from what I'd seen in the manga and in the animé I don't particularly care for her. It's a good thing that she finally expired.

So, this particular chapter that I'm in now is when the Naraku "purified" himself of the remaining purity in him and turned into a baby that Kagura carried around and killed a lot of monks and priests looking for the place between this world and the next, or something like that. This baby then in turn got halved -- one half went to Kanna and the other went to Kagura, and this half "grew up" and is now a young boy calling himself Hakudoushi. Only now instead of killing monks and priests, this boy now went about lopping off youkai's heads.

Kinda reminded me of Sleepy Hollow, which in turn reminded me of this cult or group that's operating in the place where I recently spent the weekend in. That was funny.

While Hakudoushi was beheading youkai to look into their minds for that place between this world and the next to locate the last of the Shikon no kakera, the headless horseman beheads particular people as commanded by the one who holds his head... this cult or group, I have no idea what their motivation is. Why the heck are they doing that?

Hakudoushi has a purpose, no matter how macabre it is he has a definite purpose for doing that. The headless horseman in Sleepy Hollow was following orders -- he was played by Christopher Walken right? Brilliant actor!

Purpose is important in understanding. Purpose is key. Once you have discovered your "opponent's" intentions, you can very well emerge victorious.

hehehe very confrontational, ne?

But that's just how it is...

So it's back to the land of the living. I just spent the weekend with some friends making some decorations for a prom-like event, and I am telling you, after learning how to make paper flowers, I am also learning how to hate them. You have to struggle with the darned things to make them bloom properly!

Aside from that aggravation, we aren't going to get anything else from this event's organizers aside from a booth inside. I'm like, uh-huh... But here's the story from my point of view anyway.

One group decided that they'd like to have a party, of sorts, similar to the one they had last year. So they tapped my group to be the Logistics Committee, i.e., we're in charge of decorations and stuff like that. In exchange for which they'll let us have a booth for free in the event. Next question was whether our entrance could be waived or discounted; the answer was a flat no.

We were willing to do the work for them, and we get a free booth in exchange, but what the heck was that? Maybe that's the reason we couldn't get any more volunteers than the usual good hearted people to do the work! We get a booth so what? That's not a viable trade off, when we have to pay the entrance fee to get inside there to man the booth they so lovingly gave us for free!

What I'm getting at is that they should consider a more visible and more practical, in the volunteers' point of view, exchange for their efforts. Nothing is free in this world anymore, except the air that we breathe. I hesitate to say water since one buys water nowadays. There are even oxygen bars cropping up!

I won't get into the hassle with the location; that's not my call anymore. I'll let the Execs work it out among themselves. Then again, I saw the venue, and it was perfect... for a small to medium sized gathering of friends as welll as for us who were going to decorate it. ^____^ ain't I evil?

Then again, I always am.

Case in point, when we were making the (blasted) flowers -- I hesitate to say roses, never mind that that's what they're supposed to be since what we're coming up are just some of the different species of flowers -- one of the guys just hummed a song/sang one line of a particular song that I, among others, have hated since it was released. It's one of those, trying to be cute, insolent, toilet humor, songs. I told this guy who hummed/sang just a line that "I hurt people who sing that in my presence." or something along those lines. When the others asked what song that was, I waited for him to sing it, but he didn't and the topic was dropped.

It's only now that I thought of how I didn't consider how good his reflexes were or how bad mine were, in the event that it did actually happen. But barring that, I was quite sure of what I was going to do. I was going to lunge at him with my trusty toy (people who know me know what I'm talking about, but for other people, suffice it to say that it can be lethal any way you cut it) and probably cut his skin, either on his face or neck. But I'm kinda wary about the neck, the jugular and all that. It's difficult to get blood off clothes, you know.

Wonder what a shrink'll say about this...

I even imagined how it would feel to have my hand around his neck and squeezing it until he turned blue, but not until he expired. That's important.

Then there's this something... I'm not supposed to know anything about it, but they were talking about it when I was in the room and so I have a slight inkling what it's about. Nevertheless, I can't say anything about it but I just can't help it so I'm writing it here. After all, this is what a blog is for, right?

hehehe ^___^;;

I just realized that there are a number of movies that I wanna see... well, those already officially released in cd anyway... I just saw the movie Hero with a friend, and man, was it ever so COOL!! It's definitely a movie I can stand to see again and again... maybe not everyday in a week, but about twice a month is good. The colors were great, really vibrant and alive. Kudos to the cinematographer and the other people involved in the color schemes. Then there's the settings -- I liked the desert and the mountains, all those golden yellows and browns with the people in white. Great contrast.

I've always liked the Hong Kong style of movies, the martial arts anyway, so it was a treat to see this movie. I liked their moves, reminds me of the times when I would borrow tapes of all the martial arts movies the video house had at a time. Seems to me I still am a kid at heart.

WAI!!! hehehe me so happy!! That contact button on top? Been puzzling as to how to make it work. Good thing the Saint's here to help! hehehen So I asked the Saint how to do it, said something about html codes...

Oh yeah, one thing about the html codes... I have no previous experience with them, like in a "studied" way of things... so I think I got cross eyes at one point as I looked them over. Man, there are so many darned characters! But I have to say, they are kinda interesting... hmm... hehehe

So, there I was with my face nearly pressed against the monitor, and holy of holies, there's the line I was told to look out for! That was a major god-send... not that I don't believe in a god or anything... Reminds me of this conversation I had with this girl I met in College when we went with a couple of other people to this company for an exam... we were in the car going back to the campus, and we were talking about religion and stuff. About how those who profess to be atheists and how they don't know the first thing about being atheists. So we were kinda in agrrement that it's good that we were agnostic.

Dang damn hotmail! no offense meant to the wonderful people who maintain it and run it and everything but... grrr... it took me ALMOST TWO HOURS to attach those frigging research jpeg files and to send them to brother dearest!!

Two hours that I could have spent sleeping!

Did I mention that I didn't get to sleep last night until about 6 or so this morning when I finally finished the whole frigging thing?!

But I didn't actually write his paper, just gave him the data, so there! Hmph.

I just woke up earlier, about 2 in the afternoon or so, I'm not sure. And coz my phone woke me up, well, my other brother who was asking about something or the other... why is it that they always ask me?! It's not like I have the answer to everything...! Much as I'd like to think so... ^______^;; hehehe

So enough about that...

laterz!!

FINALLY!!

Well, maybe not a final finally... I'm done with the research, and all I'm doing now is sending all the files to brother dearest. Gods, I am TIRED!! It used to be that I could very well stay up most nights and not get this... tired. Man, I am out of practice! I think I got used to sleeping everynight, and getting a decent night's rest. Now I'm wondering how the heck am I going to be able to cope with work IF the work that I get entails staying up nights for whatever reason.

I'll cross that bridge when I get there. When else?

ehehehehe

Oh man, I am so sleepy... but I gotta do what I gotta do.. that being sending those darned files now. (evil snicker) He never did say that I should write his research; the way I understood it, I was just to send him the needed data. Besides, it's his paper, not mine.

^__^

And just when I thought I was free or research papers to do... (shake head) Here comes brother-mine with a simple text: research these topics for me and get it to me by tomorrow morning. I'm like huh? And it's bloody nearing midnight here!!

So what do I do? Guess...

Being the youngest sucks... that and knowing that you can bloody well do what they're asking you coz it's your forte, sort of.

Yup, that's me, researcher extraordinaire... bloody extraordinaire...

It's not like what he's asking me to do is difficult, neber mind that he gave me a loose set of parameters and a bloody deadline... I can do it -- hey, I survived college didn't I? -- but heck, it's the principle of the thing. It's HIS research, why the bloody hell can't he do it himself? Oh sure, throw the "I'm working." excuse at me... You could've given me a lot more time...!

And so on goes the life of one ana barton...

Story of my life.

Then there's this story that I'm writing. I know I have the basic plot line down, but the problem is how to get my characters to get there. I have this idea percolating in my head for one of the scenes that's about to be played out in the next few chapters, and I still can't get to what they're actually going to say. I mean, I know I can see the scene in my head but the words haven't come to me yet.

Oh well, it'll come to me... It always does. And often in dreams too.

It's not that strange... to me it ain't. I often get ideas for stories in dreams, as well as stuff to do at home... I'm like, I dream of what I'm supposed to do the next day. The question is often IF I'll do it or not. Well, if I'm in the mood for it, maybe yes.. but... (shrug)

Then there's this other thing that's been bothering me, well, since this morning. Coz I could have sworn I had this nice prepared 'spontaneous' speech in my head that I delivered to some people... well, actually to my sisters since they've been driving me to near heart burn (sometimes I feel like a heart attack's about to come on) everytime it's just us anywhere. They say they try not to grate at each other's nerves, but it sure don't look like it to me! Even the smallest things can probably set them off, and I don't think I like it anymore.

Well, it's not like I liked it before...! It's more of I'm grown up now and I basically don't like the hassle of having to play the referee and the adult between those two older people. Gods!

Anyway, about this speech... it went something like, "...won't you two grow up and be adults?" or something like that. It was a great speech, from how I remember the tone of it, something that was mainly designed to be a figurative anvil on their collective heads.

I was hoping to get a chance to deliver it but, I guess I beat myself to the punch, sort of, when I opened the discussion up with one of them about the other and how we're both in agreement that we didn't like her current attitude that much. It's like, what the heck? She wants to be more with that friend than her own family, and she's the one who's always so concerned about the family name? The heck's with that? It was like, just one phone call -- count that ONE -- from this friend exhorting her to go to this friend's place, and she's off early in the morning.

Sheesh!

So about this fic... damn, I'm jumping from one thing to the other...

It would seem at times that my life revolves around my stories and the characters that I make up. I'm no Tolkien who came up with that whole Universe when he was a kid to keep him company, but I do my share of communicating with my characters so I know how they want to proceed with the story line and I don't stumble along the way. Mor often than not, they're very vocal about what they want that it's all I can do to shut them up.

hehehe

But it's fun talking with them.

Now am I creeping you out? I hope not.

Speaking of books (was I?), I just finished Clancy's The Cardinal at the Kremlin, and man was it FUNNY!! I'm sure those who're readign this who're Clancy fans are just about ready to clobber me into next month, but hear me out people. Too bad I already gave the book back, but heck...

So the CIA just discovered from their mole in the Kremlin that there's a mole in their secret project Tea Clipper and the mole's been sending their plans to the Russian team at the Bright Star complex. One of the investigators bemoaned the fact that he'll be assigned to watch a group of scientists who more often than not existed in their own private little world that he had no prayer of ever understanding that he wished that he was back to investigating the mafioso and all the other criminals that he used to do.

hehehe I found that funny. Actually there was this other excerpt that I found funny as well but I can't remember it right now. Maybe next time. I still have to finish my brother's research and send it to him. Oh well, I guess it's an all nighter for me again. And here I thought I could finally school my system back to it's regular and normal schedule.

I just thought that it'd be nice to have one of this stuff as well. Ne, Feifu and Saint, guess I am following your examples.
So what'll today's topic be...? I wonder... It can be a number of things but let's stick to one that's as familiar to me as it is to anyone and everyone who has experienced it -- boredom.
I'm bored. There's nothing to do in the house except sleep, eat, watch TV, and Net surf.
So I should start looking for a job right?
Right.
Right.
Oh bloody hell...
It's not like I haven't been... but call it just waiting and taking it easy...?
Dang, I don't even make sense to myself.
I'm bored but I'm not actually actively looking for stuff to do?
Well, alright, writing my stories can be called "stuff to do" so what? It's ain't enough.
Bottom line of this, if I'm actually real honest with myself... it's called security.
But there ain't no such thing.
Go figure.