Just dropping by to say I am ridiculously in love with this girl.
♥

There is no sense in loving someone you can never wake up to except by chance. -Jeanette Winterson, The Passion

The girlfriend cooked everything on Valentine's Day; we stayed in and ate heart-shaped pancakes with yogurt and hashbrowns for breakfast, and fusili pasta with bacon, caramelized onions, mushrooms and basil leaves for lunch, and leafy salad in strawberry vinaigrette and sandwiches for dinner, and glasses of really good sparkling red grape juice cocktail from Welch's which is just like wine but better because it's actually carbonated grape juice, which means -- hello, non-alcoholic and ♥

Have I mentioned the heart-shaped brownies made of my favorite chocolates specially baked by an officemate friend? Clearly, I have been pwned this Valentine's Day -- as I have been continuously pwned over and over every single day since Day 1 of this lovely quiet life we've been living.

I love you; I can't stress it enough, and these words are all I have, sometimes.

♥

On Saturday, I went to the 15th Philippine International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta with the girls ♥ (Still, it's Almi's month-long birthday celeb, ho-yay!)

Predictably, we saw... HOT AIR BALLOONS *gasp* \o/


There were... flying beers! (Sino me sabi sa langit, walang beer? Eh ayan o:)

And flying eggs! (This one says, An egg a day is now okay -- um, yeah, because it wasn't before? What?)

Flying cows in barns! (personal favorite, haha)

Eto hindi lumipad, pero nakakaligaya pa rin:

Thanks to these two, our sponsors (hehe):


(I therefore conclude: PIHABF is the new UP Fair.)

My parents agreed to come for me yesterday, but then our pickup truck chose that moment for its yearly breakdown. Last year, I remember the engine conking out on Skyway, while we were paying the toll. So, definitely luckier this year that we were still in the Inquirer parking lot when it happened. LOL. Ended up taking the 16-year-old (!!!) Lite Ace from somewhere along C-5, where my uncle and his family were spending Christmas. Ah, family.

Speaking of that, this was what I got them for Christmas (yes, all of them):



LOL. My family = adorbs, GOD. I left around noontime and by the time I was in the office, this was already up at Krista's tumblr. LOL FOREVER. Don't you just love family?

Anyway, spent most of last night hanging out with the sibs, playing uno stacko (27 LEVELS! WTF CRAZY!) and cards until about 4 a.m., while playing an assortment of Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga and Katy Perry songs; Party in the USA was also on loop for some time. Heh. I was drinking Dad's red wine, for the lack of anything resembling alcohol in the house (Maybe New Year's, then.)

All in all, Christmas well-spent. :)

This morning, I woke around 6 a.m. to the sound of howling winds; as expected, Typhoon Santi passed over Metro Manila quickly, but not without its promised strong winds (we were under Signal No. 3 as of last night) and some rain. A few minutes later, power went out. We assumed the winds had toppled some important electric posts.

Opening the window around 10 a.m., we saw a curious sight: The neighbor's roof was full of styrofoam boxes. We're still wondering where they came from.

Right now it's still quite cloudy, and we're still on our toes re: strong rains tonight. Since Ondoy last September, it feels like we're on eternal storm watch. You know something's up when you connect to the Internet for the purpose of getting weather updates on Twitter, the latest satellite map from Pagasa and a status update for dams in Luzon - in that order.

*

On other news, I'm looking forward to visiting my mother's grave tomorrow; will be praying for good weather.

Also, all this news calling for Comelec to extend voters' registration -- I think, on the upside, at least A LOT of people are looking forward to voting on May 2010? Just a thought.

1) last thursday, we marked 25 months together, and thinking it should be a milestone, i sent flowers and cake to her office address, in conspiracy with her immediate supervisor and other officemates.

i must say, for somebody who absolutely sucks when it comes to surprises, that one went pretty well. to wit:



(photos taken from Becky's facebook. thank you so much!)

2) plants vs zombies. enough said.

3) onslaught of typhoons, floods, natural calamities. at the work front, it's been pretty hectic since ondoy hit the country on sept. 26. fact: i've spent the past few weeks dreaming about maps of rivers and dams. once, i dreamt someone was asking me about the location of the ambuklao dam, and i woke up with "itogon, benguet" on my lips. i kid you not. sometimes, i take my job way too seriously.

4) glee. gossip girl.

i miss my words. a lot. lately it's been all about relief drives and dams and the Read-Along (incidentally -- another Quill award this year. yeah.) i wish i had more time to sit down for fiction, but lately, idk. words and i are just NOT friends.

and i've been spending far too much time singing an old song by the backstreet boys with my workmates. not that *that*'s a bad thing, but, you know. i mean, just this evening, in the aftermath of a rather splendid night out with them, we were operating on very little sleep that we ended up just laughing ENDLESSLY over, um, virtually nothing. idk, but what's up with that? :) it's awesome, really.

as for other things. wait, there are no other things. unless of course we're referring to pandas. in which case: PANDAS ARE AWESOME, OK?

♥

that was perhaps one of my longer weekends with the parentals and the siblings. by the grace of my boss's leave-granting powers (hehe) i found myself with four straight days off from work, which began on friday and ended yesterday. and yes, were those four jampacked days or what.

destination: iloilo

we left manila onboard a philippine airlines (PAL) flight that left around 4:30 on friday and arrived around an hour later in iloilo's new airport.

i've never really been to iloilo via plane in recent memory, much less ride planes and be in airports that often; in fact, the last time i was in iloilo was four years ago and we took the pick-up truck all the way from cavite to guimaras via the nautical highway (read: ro-ro). and i think that was the year i also last used an airport haha (in a flight to cebu and from tacloban). go figure, that was the year i also graduated, and let's just say it was one of those blissful (unemployed) in-betweens. hahaha.

so imagine my glee to find the airport relatively not congested and those trolleys really nifty. haha. and also, a(h1n1) what? i expected more people to don masks, and yet there were none. i also looked for a thermal scanner btw... also none. but i guess depende sa airport? anyway i think that was the centennial airport. i was lugging along my all-purpose backpack that contained this laptop and it was effin heavy, btw.

note: the airport has free wifi for 30 minutes. other than that, you have to load something. and oh, i saw CHR chair leila de lima, i think she was boarding a plane to cagayan de oro. and at the risk of inappropriateness, she was *hot*.

anyway (clears throat)

auntie had a reservation in a small inn in downtown iloilo called city corporate inn. the place was nice and clean, nothing too fancy, though it had tv and hot water (a must if you're traveling with my dad) and there's wifi in the lobby, which the siblings took advantage of to keep their mafia wars activities in check even during the vacation (DORKY I KNOW).

we had difficulty finding something that was still open for dinner at past 8; it was a friday night and yet the streets were unbelievably empty (i'd find out why the following night). anyway we settled for jollibee -- oo nagpunta ng iloilo para mag-jollibee hahahah.

we checked out the following morning to have breakfast in nearby mang inasal (oo nag-iloilo din para mag-mang inasal HAHAHA) and then headed off to delgado st. where my auntie digay, my dad's cousin, lives. (a wifi hotspot too, since her husband uncle nonong is practically the tech-savviest person i know hahaha) and they have CATS! TWO OF THEM! hihi.

then hied off by cousins to walk through downtown. at 2 effin pm hahahah oh sun i missed you! have i mentioned how the weather was lovely and how it was so unexpected since originally we were expecting the weekend to be rather rainy? anyway, thanks universe!

so the cousins and us siblings with auntie headed to the provincial capitol by foot, then entered museo iloilo.





and then we rode public transport to gaisano to have (drumroll) la paz batchoy in, well, la paz. HAHAHAHA we are such cliches.



which was, really, awesome. Deco's = awesome. and if the photos are awesome too, it's because they were taken by kuya arnel, ate tintin's husband. his cam is awesome and so is he heheheh :)

anyway.

we checked into nearby Four Seasons hotel right behind their house on Delgado for the night. a bit more flourish here, if i may say, with really heavy curtains and fluffy colourful comforter and a nice spacious bathroom which sadly did not have hot water come morning BOOOOO i swear it was 5 a.m. and auntie was furious AND freezing.

but before that, that night, while i was taking advantage of the awesome wifi at the Deco's branch at the ground floor of the hotel (i think i saw more Deco's branches than jollibee and mcdo combined), we received word that the espanolas were coming right over in full force to take us out on a "night out" - wy included. hahaha.

we headed to a place they called "Smallville", which really reminded me of Eastwood, even larger than, i think. and i was like, So this is why the streets are empty at night - everybody's here! :) we had coffee and cakes at Coffee Break, which is cheaper than Starbucks by a mile, which does make it more awesome. actually, i didn't see starbucks anywhere, and needless to say, i did not really miss it with coffee break around hehehe.

this one was on ate lala (espanola, the same one behind the calayan rail? awesome birdwatcher, the girl is) and the conversation = awesome. just how much? to wit: there's that's entertainment talk c/o ate tintin, short wave talk c/o ate lala, scorpio nights 2 interviews c/o indaycel, whose brand new hubby kuya ronnie looks like yul servo but more gwapo, and banats from ninya and kuya pabs and everyone else. nyahahaha. oh wylo's poor innocent twelve-year-old ears. (scanning database hahaha)

anyway, we turned ourselves in at past 11, anticipating a loooong day ahead - and it was a REALLY long day, mingling with about a hundred people who share, at one point or another, a surname. seriously.

to wit:



i'm telling you, that really old man in the foreground is 97 years old. in three years, we're having a centennial and it would be AWESOME. anyway.

for more camwhorage, see:




we headed to auntie gingging and uncle cyrus in tigbauan that night, 19 people in four families aboard a rented jeep, and everybody went for a swim in a nearby beach while we got lost hahahah anyway. le fam and i spent the night at le mer mar (i have no idea how to spell this) and we went for a swim very early the following morning. as in 6 a.m. early hahaha compliments of my father, who all woke us up at 5:30. the sun was gorgeous and the water was so still. we were planning to go to guimaras, but then, collective tanders-ing commenced and we stayed put instead.

our flight back to manila was due at 8 pm and so we headed out to iloilo city early from tigbauan, detouring for a bit to uncle glenn's for dinner before going to the airport. when we got there, we were informed by a PAL official that the flight we had booked had been rescheduled to two hours earlier and that they had sent an email last April 15 to inform us about it.

wtf.

you don't go changing people's itineraries via email, for crying out loud.

we explained that it must have been a mistake, that it was our manila-iloilo flight on friday that had been rescheduled to two hours earlier - someone called home on May 7 to tell us that our manila to iloilo flight the following day had been rescheduled from 6 pm to 4 pm. it was krista who got that phone call. curiously, the person from PAL also told her to check dad's email because they had sent word re: resched of manila-iloilo flight.

the email never came. so good thing then that someone had bothered to call, right?

so anyway, out of prudence, auntie had checked and double checked for a possible resked of the return flight as well - this was a day before the flight out of manila, four days before the flight out of iloilo and MORE THAN 20 DAYS AFTER THEY HAD REPORTEDLY SENT THE EMAIL NOTICE. so yeah no info provided, everything was in its right course, ho-yay yada-yada...

up until that moment we were supposed to check in the luggage, which was when they told us, "Ah, we sent an email. Didn't you get it?"

HELLO. I SENT AN EMAIL DIDN'T YOU GET IT. that's professional and efficient.

but yeah, all things taken into consideration, the PAL guys found us five seats on the 8 pm flight, which was the last flight out of iloilo, btw. we sat in separate seats, but it was okay. thank universe for small mercies.

so anyway i'm back in one piece and returning to the real world in 3...2...

(scouring for more photos in a bit.)

come home! :)

photo taken last month in zambales, c/o ruthie ♥

or, alternatively, the third and last of a series

this one here's for the graduates. :) 2009 being dual-grad time for krista and wy, i dragged le familia to laiya for some sun, sea and sand on black saturday, capping off holy week's three-part beachineering tryst all over the place. hehe. this was also drea's first beach outing with my family (yay!).


saturday's outing was in balai sa laiya in san juan, batangas. the drive was surprisingly short and relatively unmarred by holiday traffic, much unlike our six-hour bataan trip on thursday. we left the cavite house at quarter to 6 and arrived at the beach around 9, with auntie on the wheel and i navigating from the backseat with dad on the passenger seat. krista and drea were dozing off; wy was listening to taylor swift on his psp (seriously).

the place was surprisingly deserted on a black saturday when we got there, much unexpected really. i had prepared myself for jampacked beach resorts in nearby batangas, since i figured this was where everybody else would be trooping, what with its proximity to the metro, but lo and behold the shore was clear and quiet.

and so, we camwhore.




krista and wy wanted to rent snorkels and life vests, and so we did. actually, the life vest rental was a good idea because the waters got deep not too far out. the snorkel mask was good for small fishy viewing (ika nga ni wy, "minnows" - whatever).





as previously mentioned, the beach was unusually unpopulated, and the resort had only a few people in it aside from us. we actually got to play billiards for a few rounds - this was how un-peopled the place was. and we loved it.

around noontime, drea remembered that she brought her zips with her, so she showed us a few moves:


as expected, type ni wy ang zips:


here he is pictured trying to play zips under the shade. ka-arte. heheh. anyway, drea says wy is a fast learner - much faster than i am, at least. hehe.


anyway, buffet lunch served by the place was awesome - we had grilled tuna, caldereta, stew, rice and singkamas with bagoong and mangoes for dessert (yum). their dining area was located on the second floor, amidst trees. dining was al fresco, and the summer breeze went perfectly with their mangoes and the drying salt on our skins. teehee.

let it also be noted here that you could come up anytime and fix yourself coffee or tea here and drink it while lounging in their rattan recliners or their egg-shaped duyan. double teehee.

by noon, we'd almost had our fill of the sea, it was time for some tanders timeout by our cabana:


regaining our strengths in the afternoon, we figured, maybe it was time for jumpshots:


but then, some jumpshots are not meant to be:


(sorry, natawa talaga ako dito hehehehe)


(buti pag anino lang pinipicturean parang magkaka-body size lang kami nina krista at drea. WAHAHAHAHA.)

we went home around 5:30p.m. but by then we'd already been caught into the outpour of vacationers into manila. we had dinner on slex and reached metropolis alabang around 9-ish. drea and i boarded a bus home to makati since auntie was too tired to drive all the way to makati then back to cavite hehehe.

all in all, a good beach trip. actually, a good series of beach trips, at that. hehehe. my shoulders hurt from sunburn and sleeves are currently some form of punishment, but hey, it's all good.

summary of expenses: P750/pax daytrip rate in balai sa laiya. covers entrance, welcome drinks (we had mango juice), the cabana, buffet lunch, one light snack (they delivered sandwiches, fish chips and juice to our cabana and we ate them by the beach - pwede na rin) and of course, the bottomless coffee. covers as well free use of junior billiards table - which wy enjoyed immensely. rental of life vest, P100/day. rental of snorkel mask, P100/day. pwede na rin. if you're not really looking for a pool (kasi sadly they don't have one) this resort deserves two thumbs up. :)

or, alternatively, bataan tryst 2009

for a while there, i thought this trip would not happen at all, but after several last minute arrangements, from reservations for the trip to recruitment of participants to surfing sulit.com for van rentals, we got there anyway. it was Maundy Thursday.

so now, presenting...


hahaha. actually, this picture lacks two beachineers, but i couldn't resist putting the title on the sand space. it was begging for it! hahaha. the beach we headed to was bataan white corals in morong (P300/head entrance fee, cabana for 10 @ P1,500), but this photo was shot on the opposite shore.

after much haggling, the final number of beachineers reached 10 on d-day, and we left makati at 5 a.m. holiday traffic doubled our estimated travel time, so we reached the resort around 11:30 a.m. the sun was already high, we were already starving, and sorry to say their restaurant service was a disappointment, but no matter. we wanted to get sunburnt so we hit the water as soon as possible, appendicitis be damned.

we rented a banca (P100/head) to get to the opposite shore. it was supposedly better for beaching, since the shore we left was full of jellyfish, but after a bit we started feeling stings anyway. ah, jellyfish, what to do with you. anyway, when the water starts stinging, you know what to do:


jumping shots, of course. (props to fran k for this one) hehehe. actually, i am in this picture - i'm the left-most one, and yes, i didn't know i could jump this high before this shot, either.




pardon the ridiculous camwhorage, minsan lang naman, wag nang pumalag, oki?


(really, this photo's filename is "woohoo-nakuha-sa-anggulo.jpg")

that trip to the other shore had time limit, sadly, so we had to head back to the resort after an hour. tumambay na lang at dumalife sa kanilang seawater pool. and yes, the water was salty. very.



and then somebody suggested beers by the seawater, and so i said, what the hell, why not?


and then the sun started its descent, hence the golden hour when everything the sun falls on just looks golden:



i know they look exactly the same, but then again, minsan lang, pagbigyan na please.


we left the resort after sunset, after wrestling with their clogged communal shower and then we trooped to SBMA to have dinner. we were hoping for Gerry's but then it was full and the waitlist had at least 14 sets of people ahead of us. so we went somewhere else, and their service was thankfully quick.

we reached makati around midnight. all in all, everybody pitched in P1,000 each for the resort, the van (P4,500 with gas), the toll fees and the driver's food. not bad, eh? anyway, that certainly deserves a repeat. so ano guys, next week ulit? hehe.

endnote. some photos taken by drea. postcrossprocessing mine. drea's attempts (as seen on facebook) do look better. ahehehe.

or, alternatively, of course the title of this post deserves an exclamation point

My legs still feel like lead today and there’s a healing gash on my left knee to remind me of where I was on Sunday.


Believe what everybody else is saying - the Pinatubo crater *is* breathtaking – on both the literal and literary senses, but clearly, this is getting ahead of myself. This photo was taken at around half-past 7 in the morning of Sunday, and that morning started five hours earlier, at 2:30 a.m., which was the time we left Parañaque for Pinatubo.

Being a novice trekker, I was quite nervous of the whole climb-thing, what with rumors that some people trekked for THREE HOURS to get to the crater. Add this to the fact that I am naturally afraid of heights, I figured the worst that could happen is that the guide would have to carry me through half the trip. Oh dear.

We got to the starting point Pinatubo Spa Town around 5:30 a.m., proving how Ate Maricar’s driving and direction skills could never really be underestimated. But if you think that’s early, consider that when we got there a van full of people had already arrived there first.

We boarded a 4x4 jeep around 6 a.m. We paid the package price of P1,250/head, which included the jeep, the guide and shower time after. We had water, we had trail food (oh Growers Nutribar, why had I met you only now?), we had cameras (easy-to-carry digicam ones, I think, would be far more practical than the bulky DSLRs). I wore my worn Mojos with socks – yes I knew they were bound to get wet in the several streams along the way, but if you’re pretty prone to injuring yourself on rough surfaces (more on this later), you’d be better off with covered feet.

Anyway, the 4x4 ride took about an hour. I think it was really supposed to take an hour and a half, but boy did our driver really cut half an hour from that trip with those mad driving skillz hahaha.


Anyway, when they said the hiking trail would be full of rocks, they weren’t joking. As previously mentioned, I was a novice hiker, and when I looked at the trail, I was like, if I were to walk for three hours in this I would *die*. Or have to be carried for half the trip. Whichever comes first.

But then, it turns out the hike would only take about 20 to 30 minutes. Apparently, they had shortened it for the summer, since this path we took, aptly named Skyway for the speed with which you could course through it, was accessible due to the nice weather. A good thing, generally.


Because if it were any more traumatic I’d swear I’d never go back EVER, but then, it wasn’t so bad, so really, I’d do it again. =) Anyway, this was what greeted us when we got there:


Movie-scenic, I thought. Like something snatched out of Lord of the Rings or something. Thanks to the Ates for dragging us along:



Sulit na sulit ang pagod. Actually, the hike through the rocks, negotiating with the streams was easier than getting through the steep stairs. Oh god, the steep stairs were what got me, really. Laglag talaga ang baga ko, damang-dama ko ang bigat ko, etc.

Anyway, happier times on the way down to the crater: (this flight of steep stairs would be such a bitch later, when it was time to climb it on the way home)


Pagkababa dun, sa sobrang ganda parang tinatawag ka na ni Lord: (haha)



Eto mga kasama ko, unaware:


And of course, we swam:



(Me: Nay bakit me bubbles?
Naychona: Nak, kasi bulkan ata yung ilalim eh.)

We were first on the crater, and we left when people started pouring in like crazy. The shore was pretty short, and things were bound to get pretty crowded so we decided it was time to hike back to square one.



As I’ve said the hike back up the steep stairs earlier was such a bitch; we had to stop three times along the way to catch our breaths. (Actually, kami lang pala ni Ate Chona. Go figure) While I was busy fixing my lungs, Andrea was busy taking splendid pictures:



Sabi ko nga, parang Lord of the Rings lang.

On the way back, my knees were already relatively weaker than when we began hiking that morning, and during one of them moments of weakness I accidentally brushed my left knee forcefully against one the bigger rocks. Hence, a gash. Which hurt, really. Hehe. Parang bata lang eh, umuuwing may galos. Napansin na nga ng mga nakasalubong naming hikers who were only on their way up at 10 a.m. (ang init na nito, we could only imagine) na my knee was bleeding. But no matter.


Anyway, ito pala yung sinakyan naming 4x4 with kuya and our guide:


Sa pagod, we actually managed to doze off in the 4x4 kahit super tagtag. Haha. Ako nagigising pag nauuntog so I figured, to hell with trying to sleep. By this time I was already hungry anyway so I thought of that instead.

I’d like to note here that the shower facility at the Spa was pleasantly surprising. The fee for the shower, turns out, includes locker use and use of other stuff like plastic bags (simple but really convenient), alcohol and swabs (for wounds like mine), soaps and fresh towels. Plus points talaga na hindi nabasa yung towel na dinala namin from home.

Anyway, we ate at SM City Clark because it was convenient and we were starving. I think it was only a little past noontime, and we were not really too keen on going home and so we headed to:


Oo me ganito pa, panalo!


The place was pretty much still under construction, and the entrance fee was in the form of a “donation” (to be determined by visitors, of course).

Wala pang chocolate hills, etc. pero meron nang Rice Terraces. Meron ding mga huge rock formations tulad nito:


They bullied me into climbing. It was really scary. Hahaha. Panalo me band-aid eh. We left and visited Ate Maricar’s relatives. Kapampangans are really awesome cooks, btw. Thank you thank you!

We arrived back in Casa at midnight, after having crepes for late night dessert at Rockwell and buying the latest Maxim issue at 7-11. Ho-hum. Hahaha. Talagang in passing lang eh.

It was a long day, tiring but we’d do it again in a heartbeat!

Summary of expenses: P2,5k all-in with transpo, gas, toll, food, etc. But only because we had the best financial managers ever. =)