a friend just lost someone dear.

it's a sad day.

i sort of remembered what point i was trying to make two days ago. ... in my last post, i mean. and then i put off writing about it. now, i kind of don't know how to get my point across.

this is a real problem for me since i'm a writer. i'm supposed to be a writer. and i'm supposed to not believe in writer's block. so why can't i get to the point i want to get across?

here's the gist anyway:

lately, a lot of shitty things have been happening in my life. some i could've prevented--some just happen. and yet, i continue on with working. regardless of how i'm feeling, regardless of what had just happened.

i sweep everything under the happy-go-lucky rug.

it works for me. i mean, i get the job done, and then i deal with whatever it is i have to deal with. alone. at home. i haven't gotten to the point of crying in my sleep yet, but i feel as if i'm headed in that direction.

there are times i want to snap. heck, i've been complaining a lot lately. again. but i'm trying to be more zen. i'm trying to let all these shitty things just pass.

if i let myself get affected, i'll only be worse off it. i know and understand that some people are just born bitches and bastards. no amount of good will or happiness will lessen their hate of life.

that doesn't mean i don't get hurt. i do. a lot. but i smile and move on. because once you stop smiling, once you can't smile anymore--what is there left to live for?

what is left to fight for?

the one thing i learned about in show business is that no one really cares about your personal life. that is, unless you're a celebrity. then even the most mundane things like going to the toilet is headlines news.

but i'm not a celebrity. i work in the background. so no one cares about me. and in a way, i'm happy about that. you can go on with your work without pitying glances, and the likes. especially when you're having a bad day.

what has brought this about to my blogging attention? the best and worst day that was yesterday.

( long-ish diary-like recounts of november 14 )

we arrived home past 10. i head up to my room, crashed on my bed--and nine ours later, here i am.

it took me an hour to type this. and i've lost the point i was trying to make.

new episode this week! can't wait!

too many meetings, too many early mornings--is it really only tuesday?

i've gotten caught up in updating my horror stories blog lately. on one hand, it's my respite from work. where i get to access the one part of my brain that i really do not get to use at work. and on the other hand, i just really want a place online where i can read horror stories based in the philippines.

yes, i read my own work. i am a little vain, i never denied that.

i have work this weekend. and that's pretty much all i have definite for this week. unlike next week wherein i know all the days i have to go to work. and when i can sneak in some alone time, some family time--and maybe some friends time.

i've heard people say stress causes nightmares. but what do you get when you have stress--and you've been writing horror stories for the past two weeks?

a dream with spies, ninjas, relief efforts--and a budding serial killer.

i don't actually remember what happened in the dream, just the part before i woke up. i was talking to a spy (who wasn't much of a spy, since i knew she was a spy), and then a guy lumbered towards me. he told me that he needed a place where he could put his things, and i asked him what happened to his last place.

he told me that the nurse was asking him to move his things somewhere else.

i accompany him to where he had placed his things, which was an emergency-room like place where a nurse is busy taking down the names of the people coming in.

guy points out his things to me, and i walk towards it. before i could reach it, a couple of military men cross my path carrying a corpse without a face. and then i reach guy's "things".

they were embalmed faces of people. stitched together where had probably teared when he was cutting them off people.

i look at the nurse, asking how long we have before guy goes berserk--

and that's when i wake up. wow.

good morning, world.

let's do this the old way;

first. i totally got addicted to survivor: glee and spent four days straight voting and campaigning. my favorite glee character, mike chang, lost in the last round. so i'm not caring about the game so much anymore.

just enough.

second. the boring stuff: i got a haircut last friday and i bought a new t-shirt then too. i finished reading the first two books of the dreamhouse kings, and now i'm on the lookout for books 3 and 4. we went to three cemeteries, as is customary, last saturday and sunday. and then...

three. i went to divisoria today. and tutuban too, but mostly divisoria. i found the turtles! i bought seven for gifts, and i'll be taking them to their new homes tomorrow! ... i'm excited. of course, this is me preempting christmas--again. wait, i actually might wait until the first week of december to give them to their new families.

... i am, of course, talking about stuffed turtles. as in, toys. not real turtles, nor real turtles that were killed and then stuffed. just stuffed toy turtles.

back to the programming; it was a hot, humid day at divisoria. and if i wasn't with my folks (and older sister) i might have explored more--and bought more--but in the end, i got tired of keeping track of my family and just asked if we could go home. after buying the stuffed turtles first, of course.

we ended up going to ersao for a snack and then to ongpin for ma-hu and my older sister's dvds.

four. i got caught up with eastwick and i love how it reminds me of the first three seasons of charmed. i'm way behind on supernatural though, and i'm contemplating whether or not i still want to watch heroes. i'm an episode behind flash forward, and pretty much up-to-date with everything else i watch.

i can't wait for a new glee.

five. i'm wanting to buy these shoes for a while--but can't find them. what shoes? plimsolls. apparently, that's what they're called. from the online prices i've seen, my guestimate is they'd cost me around a thousand pesos. if i find them, that is.

i'd settle for these, if i find them first:

slightly big photo
slightly big photo #2

and that's pretty much my life in the last four days.

meme from ctorres, who voted off mike chang in the fifth round of survivor: glee;

the problem with livejournal: we all think we are so close, but really, we know nothing about each other. so ask me something you want to know about me. something that should be obvious, but you have no idea about. ask away. then post this in your livejournal and find out what people don't know about you.

sleepy. body hasn't recovered from work weekend. *sad*

i'm going to try something out this week: going back to full-time blogging. i've noticed that lately, i've updated my micro-blogs more, and i've been holding back on my thoughts because i don't want to keep ranting in my blog. so i blog less.

at the same time though, i don't want to just rant and rant everyday. but i do want to bring back my livejournal to life.

so i'm going to try something this week. see if it works out.

xoxo

for the longest time, we've been planning and canceling shoots due to emergencies and other commitments. but because i know that i won't be able to find another schedule this year for another shoot, when ichihachi told me last night that she wouldn't be able to come with us today--i had to do something.

so i asked alula and miyo if they were willing to push through with the shoot, even without a make-up artist in the team. they were both game.

i am a little rusty as a photographer though. at the same time, i'm more experimental now when it comes to lighting. i need more practice. and since i will be giving a lot of my free time to starstruck in the next four months--i might as well practice on them.

in the meantime, here's the first set from my last 2009 shoot for jslphotos.

what's been keeping me busy? television. i work for a television network, i cover television assignments, and when i go home: i watch television shows.

what's on my playlist this season?

survivor philippines: palau is the only local television show i enjoy watching daily. cool center i watch every saturday night, and that's pretty much it for the local shows.

my must-watch consists of glee, how i met your mother, castle, flash forward, ugly betty, dollhouse and supernatural. in that order of importance.

i'm still waiting for v, day one and the last season of lost.

and that's what's been keeping me busy. those shows--and books. i'm reading jerk, california right now.

friday: i try to go home early and end up getting home at past 8. i left the office at 5:30, got a cab at around 6, got into a traffic mess, decided to walk the rest of the way home at 7:30. arrived at home past 8.

the time between 6 to 7:30 was spent in a traffic mess that barely moved. if i had decided to walk from the get go--and by that i mean from the office to mcu, i probably would've arrived home before 8. because the ground i covered in thirty minutes was more than double the length of what the cab covered in the one and a half hour i was in it.

*sigh*

saturday: spring awakening! that's mainly the only thing i had done yesterday. met up with yumipitz at the mrt, pretended to be david cook through texts with tiang while having a late lunch and waiting for her, and then watched spring awakening.

the production was good. way better than hairspray, which was also from the same production. and i don't actually have any words for the production right now. it's not that i don't want to talk about it--i'm just too lazy to write right now.

after watching the musical, we hung out for an hour more at starbucks. to which, by the way, i apologize to yumipitz and tiang for ranting about work.

sunday: well, nothing has happened yet. i have managed, so far, to finish two books this morning. yay!

oh wait, something did happen. i dreamed a dream that was a bit of a nightmare. it started with ichihachi and i executing a photo shoot--where we both got left out. because there were too many people involved. and i kept telling ichihachi that it wasn't what we had planned. and that the chaos that was happening was the reason i was pushing for a small shoot.

and then, suddenly, i was at the office. we were all standing facing the windows, watching in horror as three cyclones (not sure if they were actually cyclones--they looked like tornadoes with water instead of wind) made their way to us.

the scary thing was that we could see people in the cyclones/water tornadoes. some of them were still alive, trying desperately to get out. some of them were dead. and the cyclones/water tornadoes were moving fast.

in the dream, i crouched on the ground, bracing myself against the wall when it hit our building. i could hear the impact--but nothing happened. the last thing i heard was one of my office mates saying, "the glass didn't break" before i woke up.

in the last four days, i've written five stories. all of them of the scary sort. and the last three of them, i wrote at around midnight.

what is it about midnight and scary stories?

...the people you think are your friends, your allies, are also having problems with you.

...the things you do, but say you don't do, start to affect other people who are trying to just do their job right.

...the things you say don't always match up to what you do, and you get caught.

...the only one who still believes the lies you tell is you yourself.

that's the question on today's writer's block here at livejournal. am i? do i really want to open that can of worms--again? *sigh*

let's just say that things at work could be better. loads better. and it could still get worse. so i'll just count my blessings for now. and if by february things don't change--i'm going to start looking for work elsewhere.

so, again, the question is: am i happy with my current job?

i could be happier.

i still haven't been able to make good with my promise to keep a nine-hour schedule at the office. but with our graphic artist on leave, i'll have to postpone my nine-hour limit for one more day. i will assert myself on wednesday.

i am completely exhausted. seriously, completely exhausted. and i am completely pissed off that a co-worker managed to go a fucking salon to have a haircut while i (two of us actually) slaved away at the office.

and two co-workers actually.

this is partly my fault, i know. yes, our boss is having trouble controlling them--but i'm also enabling them. i've gone and done stuff for them that i really shouldn't. because of the website.

if only we're a little bit more appreciated. but even then, appreciation is not enough reason to overwork someone.

i'm really hoping things turn out for the better tomorrow. i don't mind the going to work part--as long as the storm won't hit us again. please, please, please.

earlier today, someone wondered out loud why we give storms ugly names. ondoy, pepeng, we used to call them uring, rosing, etcetera. and i think it, at least, something to do with how we view storms.

we don't see the beauty of storms here in the philippines. because for us, while we band together in times of need, storms also show our ugly side. the side we rarely let anyone see: how we deal with our baggage, our garbage; the blame game that eventually follows; true colors that emerge once we don't get what we want--that are not necessarily what we need.

we see our fellow countrymen relying completely on other people's help and not doing anything for themselves.

yes, the bayanihan among us is beautiful. empowering even. but how many of us are actually helping? how many of us actually need help? and how many of us are just waiting, always waiting for what other people will give us?

relief goods are still needed around the metro. so many people are still relying on donations from good samaritans. but, at the same time, we need to start clearing things up too.

this morning, i went to marikina and cainta to cover unang hirit's first day of clean-up drive. while i didn't actually do any cleaning, it felt good to see people were beginning to take charge of their lives again. i wish it were happening everywhere, but at least it has started to happen somewhere.

the main point of the clean-up was to teach people how to go about cleaning up after the flood. that garbage needs to be segregated into biodegradable and non-biodegradable, and that soaping the streets can help to (at the least) clear up the smell of the mud and disinfect the roads.

hopefully, more dried-up communities would start their own clean-ups too. and, of course, hopefully more places would dry up so more people could start going back to their normal lives.

everyone's blogging about ondoy, the storm that hit the metro from saturday to sunday morning. everyone's talking about the flood. almost everyone is helping out someone.

i have my own stories to tell, but i won't tell anymore. it's late, and would only depress people who will read my blog. not that information is not key, but the people in need of rescue in our area have been rescued. now comes the hard part: change.

we keep talking about change. politicians keep promising change. now, with another storm looming in the horizon, we need to change. and this time, we can't take our time.

we'll have to start small. while some people are volunteering to help out the victims of ondoy, those who do not have the time can start helping out differently.

keep watch. one of the main reasons for the flood is pollution, and all of us have contributed one way or another. a small cigarette butt, multiplied by the dozens of people who throw "just a tiny one" can clog drains--drains that could help in keeping the water flowing. water may be fluid, but it can still be blocked. especially by solid things.

aside from throwing your trash properly, keep watch that other people are doing the same. don't get into fights; just remind people that they have to throw their trash properly too. if they don't, then be the one to throw their trash properly. it's better if they see you do it.

of course, this doesn't not include spit. you wouldn't be able to pick it up--and it would just be gross.

if you're a germophobe like me, it helps to have a wad of tissue paper all the time. and maybe a paper bag for the trash you pick up--if there are no garbage bins nearby.

use plastic sparingly. especially the volunteers. yes, it's easy to access, cheaper than paper bags--and we really need plastic bags to segregate the goods we have to distribute to those in need. but once you give them a plastic bag of goods, what next? what happens after they get the goods inside?

yes, we can't avoid using plastic. but remind people to dispose of the bags properly, if they don't plan on reusing them. plastic bags are one of the main causes of drain clogging. on the road, saturday night, after getting stuck for almost 12 hours on a journey that takes us less than 25 minutes on a normal day, plastic bags, plastic bottles and plastic wrappers littered the roads that were covered by flood a mere hour ago.

this morning, on my way to work, the river that overflowed last saturday was covered in muck: mud and non-biodegradable human waste.

and for the victims; clean your house. yes, you're already cleaning your house--but how are you disposing the dregs brought to your house?

i actually only have one suggestion for this: make sure you put the dregs somewhere that flood wouldn't be able to get to it. a storm is looming, putting the dregs outside the house and hoping for pick up will not help you later on, after another flood, when it's back in your houses.

keep watch. use plastic sparingly. dispose properly.

let's not let this happen again.