7.31.2009

gentler's yoga report

an update to the last entry the sweat, oh the sweat :

if ever you were wondering dear gentle reader if gentle was able to finish one full session of yoga last night as has been intimated by master gentle himself, i'm here to report in all honesty that he did not. but not to worry, because the master himself is not worried. in fact he told me in all honesty that he kind of expected it, since he has quite bulked up.. but he was quick to dispel any and all speculations on the contrary that the bulking up meant becoming a large barrel of margarine--in fact, he quite honestly appraised his physique as the yummiest incarnation of gentle in recent years.

now, for the details :

the master was able to finish only about half of the poses before deciding to sleep for the night. he noticed that the execution of the poses were still the same; that he did not loose any of the flexibility he has prided himself over the years of practice. but one thing he noticed as he was executing his favorite royal pigeon pose--halfway through the set of poses for the full pose, he looked back over his shoulders and noticed that his legs were a lot more muscular than what he remembers them to be. hence, the "bulk" referred to in the earlier statement. he stopped right about in the middle of his routine, after executing upward bow pose with aplomb. his message, before heading to gym this afternoon was:

i'm gonna try to execute the remaining poses in my routine, tonight.

it is his wish that this message be conveyed to the gentle followers all over the world.

truly yours,
gentler
(gentle's butler)

7.30.2009

the sweat, oh the sweat.

i miss the stretch. The sweat freely flowing out of my pores, drenching my skin; flooding me with an inexplicable euphoria. I miss feeling the arch of my back, in upward facing dog; my breath resounding in my ears as I go into a deep fold. I miss the four corners of my mat.

After nearly two months of going to the gym, feeling my muscles bulk-up, I’m gonna be having a session tonight. I’m excited, yet I feel like I’m a newbie all over again. I’m hoping and praying I’d be able to finish a session and not just collapse with tiredness on the floor after a few poses.

Oh well. We’ll see what happens. As they say, once a yogi, always a yogi. Or did I just made that up? Or, as Anne Rice said, “let the body instruct the mind”; or did I made that up, as well? Hehehe.

7.27.2009

lazy afternoon scribblings continued

The faint glimmer of the early evening stars just come out to play by the horizon, threw specks of dull starlight at Theo; instantly fading on skin contact, as the entire place, now reflecting the muted colors of a twilight sky, slowly succumbs to the enveloping dark.

He has been absent-mindedly sitting on the sands by the beach for what seemed an eternity, watching the billow of soft waves curl gently at his feet, soaking them and the underside of his trousers wet. The shrieking gulls that have glided over the immense blue of the sea that afternoon as he was walking along the rugged shoreline, have now fallen silent and gathered themselves like some priests in congregation, huddled at the rocks some short distance away from the shack—now barely a shadow against the swirling blue and black evening sky.

As his mind continued to swim with the somber images of the gathering dusk, Theo slowly made his way up the steep terrain leading to the shack; little by little it emerged from the shadows, luminous in his vision, for the moon had already risen from the sea like some magnificent dream, bathing the landscape in sparkling silver.

He had just arrived that afternoon by small boat from the main island with a couple of other tourists, who, like himself, have chosen an obscure hideaway as their adventurer’s paradise to pass the weekend by.

The island’s share of tourists these days are trifling, dwindling figures compared to the past seasons; leaving some of the shop owners and inn-keepers with no choice but to temporarily close shop amidst the heat, and the dust, and the flies whirring incessantly over rotten mangoes and carabao dungs lying in the dirt. Children—who use to approach tourists drinking in makeshift bars during the peak seasons to sell them necklaces strung from shells and pebbles—are regular children once more, marching in packs towards their respective houses and shouting inaudible, exhausted goodbyes to their comrades after a day's worth of climbing trees and soaking in the surf. He trailed this ragtag band’s ascent, sluggishly walking a few steps behind, until he reached his own address : this rundown, wind-battered shack, just a few meters above the sea smacking at the cliffs.

With a lingering glance and a wry smile at the little gang slowly breaking up for the night, he proceeded to close the door, shutting himself in darkness as palpable as his sorrow.

7.25.2009

happy birthday nanay!



love you very much. thank you for being the caring mom i've known all my life. :)

7.23.2009

lunch-less, sleepless | an afternoon nightmare

Today has yet again been one emotional thriller ride (its always like this when i’m dealing with the ugly sick pig story arc of my life--what else is new?) and it definitely left me emotionally drained at the end of the day; well, that, plus the sad fact that i missed my lunch and my afternoon siesta, dealing with it—which is probably partly why i’m like this right now.. grumpy and unbearably out of sync with the world. in the end its still a mix up of emotions that left me here in the middle—unable to assess where i am, in this seemingly never-ending fight. On the one hand i’m happy that i was able to accomplish one crucial step to having a resolution to all this mess. I’m secretly commending myself for mustering the courage to take a firm stand in all this (well i’ve taken my stand before, but this one, this singular action i took this afternoon of seeing the powers that be and speaking to them, seemed to be the final straw that have sealed-in all that i’ve done so far, previous to this action); but on the other hand i’m also at a loss knowing that i’m still in the middle of this long tedious process, and that taking this step has eventually sealed in my fate too, to be in this predicament for an extended period, in transit it seems, until all these knots would have been eventually untangled. Help me, God. i feel so small and helpless right now, ready to cry and fall apart..

7.20.2009

lazy afternoon scribblings

i don't know what to make of this. it seems like a good introduction to a novel or some work along that magnitude; but i've never really written one so this might be my debut if ever. hehehe. i know there's great research and preparation involved into writing such things so i'm just posting this to inspire me to go on. if no inspiration comes, its ok too. just consider it an exercise in character study. if something develops from hereon, i'd welcome it graciously. here goes some late afternoon scribbling. more to come, if inspiration further strikes.

the faint glimmer of the early evening stars just come out to play by the horizon, threw specks of dull starlight at theo, instantly fading on contact, as the entire place, now in muted colors of purple and gold, slowly succumbs to the enveloping dusk. He has been absent-mindedly sitting on the sands by the beach for what seemed an eternity, watching the waves crash gently by his feet, soaking them and the underside of his trousers wet. The shrieking gulls that have taken most of his attention as he was walking along the rugged shoreline that afternoon have now fallen silent and have gathered themselves like some priests in congregation at the rocks some short distance away from the shack. Their shack.

7.15.2009

just like frogs in the june rains

Just when you thought the thing has already died down, then you hear talk of it again; and you go “oh puhlease, will you cut it out already? All of you!”

It was the subject of an overheard conversation between two women, while i was out for a bite, one early evening, at earl’s sandwiches, nearly a month ago—makati office girls, i presume. Demure on the outside, full of kink on the inside. It was the subject of hushed conversations at the office too, when the thing just came out, between officemates one would not think of as people who would dare talk about such things, even in hushed tones. I just kept all observations to myself, not wanting to fan the flames of prejudice that’s been spreading and engulfing the country like wild fire. Yet again, late this afternoon, an officemate said “pinakagrabe daw itong lalabas ngayon.. mas mahaba at mas maliwanag”; the tabloids too, upon scanning a handful from my post at the monitoring desk late this afternoon, apparently seem like frogs enjoying the first drench of June rains.. except, its not June, anymore. Sigh. Ever heard of the word, enough?

7.14.2009

short and sweet | the pastry chef monologues

i like this. these short bursts of consciousness and ideas that get themselves molded into words; into streams of thought that make up this blog. its not like me at all. i usually build on a single idea, embellish it to the point of no return and make out a very ornate, layered cake in the end. i'm not a "little sweets" pastry chef. i'm an ostentatious cake maker. but not now. it's a welcome change, actually. adds up nicely to a shattershards observation of late that my blog seems to be all-sugary sweet, and spare, and uhm.. white? hehehe. with these short bursts of ideas, i get to single-out one and make an entry bout it. it's particularly useful now, as my head nowadays swims in a myriad of thoughts (maybe partly because the office is doing its annual inventory of books--on top of my regular load of indexing proclamations and republic acts--that my tendency to cram things in my head gets doubled, around this time of the year; hence the overflow of ideas). like when i had this thought that most towns usually gravitate to declaring a town holiday at the eighth of december of every year. its an observation that just cries to be taken note of, in this blog. interesting..but is it a necessity? nope. its just an icing on the cake that can easily be discarded, anytime. so i'm not gonna be expounding on that and waste a precious paragraph or two, theorizing on the whys; instead, i'll stop this very second.

see? short and sweet.

money money money...

i want a new cellphone. its been years since i've had a tech fone thats worth brandishing in the streets (to the oohs and aahs of potential cellphone snatchers, hehe). i want to build a new wardrobe ; re-awaken my inner madonna. (she is after all, the mother of re-invention, don't you think?) i want those shiny professional cameras i see on display at tech stores. i want new books to line my shelves, regardless if i do read them at all, given those other things i busy myself with. i want, i want, i want. yes, this was gentle in his most material incarnation, as he was parading himself at serendra with the bulldog, shattershards and eyvicat 2 sundays ago. so many shiny things to stare at, and drool at, throw myself at, and bowl over. but heck, i passed them all, eyes closed, with the gentle resolve not to give in to temptation. can you imagine? its like gentle in a religious procession, reciting "oh no, please, no. keep away from me, you shiny thing you".

the start of the year has been good. the office has never been this attentive, in recent memory, to the financial needs of its employees. so i'm saving up. saving up for the big spend? hehe. nope, oh please, God... no. there will be a time for that, but not today.

luffy and the concept of nakama

"Nakama" is a new word I am very pleased to add to my vocabulary. It is a Japanese word that generally means “friend” or “circle of friends”, and can have varying degrees of meaning, depending on its usage. In One Piece, the anime that I am currently head over heals with, Luffy (the main character) makes mention of the word several times, especially during moments of high drama, when circumstances require that he stand up for the friendships he has made along the way. Yes, it’s a shonen (anime that caters to boys mostly because of its action-packed, over-the-top fight scenes), and one would most often than not conclude that all that kicking and sword-fighting done in the name of friendship is an exaggeration of the concept. But it really feels good, after watching an episode or two. Walking one evening with shattershards, the bulldog and eyvicat in serendra, on the way to the bulldog’s condo unit at the Fort for a late-night dvd viewing, I’ve wished in my heart to replicate the closeness of luffy’s nakama to that of my own nakama. I know, you might say I’m reverting back to a high school-ish way of thinking (though "high school-ish" nowadays can easily be contested; kids these days don't think in simple terms anymore, hehe; so a more accurate phrasing would be : "highschool-ish" 12 years ago). but truth to tell, that’s how I really feel right now; and happy bout it nonetheless.

on ryan and friendships

I consider myself lucky with the friendships I have formed over the years. Even during my elementary and high school days, I haven’t been one who will easily end up in big groups. I’ve always been someone who’s more inclined to forming one or two close-knit associations with a classmate, a dorm mate, or an officemate, at specific points in my life; the luck there, I suppose, is that those friendships remained, even after years of not seeing the other. I guess it’s partly because when I choose to reveal myself to a person, its usually a no-holds-barred session that will always end in that person knowing me from head to foot, even, as they say, in the tiny moist crevices (an advice to you, dear gentle reader : don't take this literally, ok? hehehe). Thank you, ryan for the gift of friendship. I’ve said this through text, and in facebook; but I somehow feel the urge to thank you here, too. thanks friend.

7.05.2009

possible stalker in da haws.

paranoid lang siguro ako but i think i am being stalked.

nope, scratch that. make it

paranoid na siguro ako kaya i think i am being stalked.

to those privileged few who knew the backstory concerning ugly-sick-pig, no, this is not an ugly-sick-pig related incident.

having had so many things happen to me in just a year's time, at first glance, ugly-sick-pig could easily be the most probable creature-candidate to stalk me. but judging from the cunning way this thing has been done, i doubt ugly-sick-pig's hooves are the marks i'm currently investigating on. from the evidence gathered, this stalker has far more cunning than ugly sick pig will ever have or ever possess. and it just sickens me that this creature just won't leave me be.

ganun na ba sya kamiserable, if ever my theory slash hunch proves to be right? well i guess if you're old, ugly and unloved, its THAT easy to be miserable, di ba? i'm praying though, that i go wrong with this. i just have my hands full with so many things right now, that the last thing i need is to be followed around by this creature from hell.

...not that i resent being followed. i thank you, and love you guys for following me! ;)

this entry is intentionally cryptic. decrypt at your own risk.

7.04.2009

camwhore reprised

a good friend of mine from a previous job and i have recently gotten together after a long time of no communication. the silence is not deliberate, we just got busy, i guess.

we kept each other's numbers in our respective lists though, checking on each other's being once in a while, at friendster or on facebook; but nevertheless went on living our own lives, not knowing when we'll ever be meeting again. indeed, prior to our meet-up last wednesday at the megamall, it has been 2 years since we last saw each other; and it has been six years since that emotional farewell party from my first job where she was one of the well-wishers; and sometime along that period i reckon, preceeding by just a mere month, of course figures my long, intimate conversations with her before breaking the news that i'm leaving for another job. yes, we were close. and its a bit saddening that we haven't maintained regular communication over the years except for a trickle of "hello, musta?" once in a while. so when out of the blue or by a freak accident of nature in which we got to truly engage each other up again over facebook's messaging system last wednesday, we decided to meet up that very night.

*** (yes, lets call her "***" for the time being) was her usual beaming self when i saw her from the corner of my eyes, standing up from her station in a villman net shop at cyberzone. she has been waiting for me for over an hour already, i guess--though i have apologized early on in our short messaging conversations that i cannot, try as i might, leave early from work to meet her. all my previous worries dissipated when i saw her familiar, out-of-this-world smile greeting me. she was wearing a pink shawl made of slightly shimmering fabric that i don't remember to jive with her taste of clothing accessories back when we were still officemates; it suited her fine features perfectly though. after an unexpected warm hug from her (wow, she really did miss me, hehehe) and exchanging the requisite pleasantries, i soon learned that the shawl in contention was indeed not hers, but another officemate's. whew. good to know that i still know her afterall.

we had our dinner at amici's. we ordered their fruti di mare pizza which effortlessly ranked 10 in gentle's levels of scrumptiousness. at the onset we agreed to divide the pizza equally for two but she wove her magic over the course of dinner conversation that i ended up eating around five or six slices. shit. all those hours at the gym going down the drain as easy as one-two-three. she laughed again. while spooning her vegetable soup, she casually put forth a subject i've been meaning to avoid ever since the first "hello" was uttered: so, are you willing now to pose nude for me? (for the backstory click here)

gulp.

7.03.2009

this is not a goldilocks-paid writeup

i'm at sm megamall now. i just payed for my monthly electricity consumption at the bills payment section of the mall, and later proceeded to have my lunch at goldilocks. i ordered beef caldereta and fried rice like i always do, whenever i find myself dining here. looking at the attractive pictures of their menu displayed before the counter, i was tempted to try one of the combo meals which looked tempting enough (pork barbeque, laing, pancit and rice), but decided to opt for my first choice instead.

my love affair with the goldilocks caldereta goes back some fifteen years ago, when CSI Mall (yep, after the famous tv series, but obviously its predecessor), the first big mall in pangasinan opened its doors at dagupan city. i was around twelve then, i think; and i thought to myself "wow, such a huge mall with nice airconditioning!" hahaha. promdi talaga. well, we go to manila every now and then (refer to previous posts) but dagupan is the closest thing to a bustling metro that's well within reach whenever tatay needs to buy stuff, see sights or just go check on whats new. so there i was, with tatay; and i think nanay and ate were there too, but my mind is a bit hazy on this bit of detail. it was already noontime when we've already finished making the rounds of the newly-opened shops. we soon found ourselves at goldilocks with its clear floor-to-ceiling glass panels, so people outside the mall can be all the more enticed with whats being had by its hungry patrons.

tatay being the foodie expert started pointing at this and that dish, and soon enough he had the perfect pairing ready for us to feast on : beef caldereta, fried rice and lumpiang shanghai. just imagine--tender beef slices in a spicy-creamy tomato sauce concoction topped with green peas, potatoes and grated cheese. pair that with the steaming, multi-textured goodness of their fried rice with sliced ham, carrots, garlic and onions... lovely. of course, lumpiang shanghai perfectly complimented the fried rice and provided a good contrast with the saucy caldereta. yum. i think i had two orders of fried rice then. hehehe.

that was my first goldilocks experience; and to a young promdi boy of twelve years or so, it was a sumptuous one. i remember the late afternoon sun warming my skin as we traveled back to urdaneta after a day of scouring the streets of dagupan; but moreso, i remember the caldereta, the shanghai and the fried rice.

so whenever i find myself in a goldilocks restaurant, i always have this pairing in my mind's catalog, ready for easy pick-up. its like having a little part of tatay with me wherever i go. uy, its been an hour na, since lunch. maybe that part of tatay is being digested na as we speak. hehehe.

when i was in first year college and still learning the ropes of living by myself (and SM City North Edsa was the only SM City known to me), i remember how the caldereta i used to order there being so much closer to the caldereta of years passed. that one was much bigger in serving, too, than the one i just had (and is currently digesting in my stomach). the taste is still close to the caldereta of CSI Mall's opening day, but the serving is an itty-bitty version of the glorified caldereta in my mind. even the size of the fried rice was halved. i didn't order shanghai btw, as i'm a bit on a tight budget (and shanghai is far too common nowadays--even our canteen in the office has a similar-tasting dish offering). well, what am i really saying? all i'm saying is that i'm just a bit disappointed with the experience. and that's the whole point of this blog, really.

well, ang nagagawa nga naman ng isang buwang pagkawala. hehehe.

7.02.2009

ow-em-ji.

o-m-g. i really have to clean up the room. and not just walis the floor ya know. it has to be major. like punas and stuff. (whoah, why am i talkin in a freakin kolehiyala way all so suddenly???)

last night i had major coughing scenes, one after another; something that just happened on the spot. like michael jackson's death. or david carradine's. (more on david's, later). i think it has something to do with the dust sticking to almost anything and everything inside that little abode i have been occupying for almost a year now. and when i inhale, ya know, like when the lungs expand to take in a fresh gust of air, its those sticky particles of dust that get through. and so the coughing scenes.

if memory serves me right, the last time i did a major clean-up, like arrangin things and stuff, was when shattershards and eyvicat slept-over around december of last year, after spending a day touring the metro and its obscure, out of the way eating places together with chyncha and the rabbit. hehehe. i'm so freakin clean and organized ya know! waaaiit! before those eardrum-shattering reactions, hear my alibi first wil ya? puhleaase??!

well... arrivin rather late from work, as i get off by around seven in the evening.. i have to wait for yet another twenty minutes for the shuttlebus to leave and take us directly to the mrt; takin the train and arrivin at boni / shaw by eight pm, eating my dinner then goin straight to gym for my evening workout. arriving home i barely have enough energy to do anything but to watch my anime! it ain't fair!! and what? you still expect me to dust things and be the freakin maid?? no way!! i've to sleep, ya know. i'm onto my sixty-second episode for one piece, btw. hehehe.

i'm in a net shop at boni right now, my precious globe visibility kit (now repackaged by globe as "tatoo") having left my care some two weeks ago. by leaving i meant, slipping from one's pockets unbeknownst to the gentle one. adik kasi eh, pati ba naman kasi sa bus papunta ng manila nag-iinternet; ayan tuloy, nahulog sa bulsa. i should'av just waited to arrive at boni and just surfed to my heart's content there! but nope! it just can't be! five hours sitting and doing nothing but staring at endless stretches of fields and houses (and occasional cuties along the way) is just not the way to go. i'm a type A personality; i've to always have something filling up my time, else i go bonkers. boinnng!!

so why am i here at the netshop? well, aside from the obvious (typing away, dear gentle reader), i had to check my email for an e-ticket and print it for tomorrow's seminar i am to attend, with shattershards at SM City North Edsa. the seminar's on blogging and how to make money out of what you babble about. sounds interesting? i hope. for myself and shat's sake hehehe. well, i really don't know what the particulars are of the said seminar, as i am just working on the overview eyvicat gave me, when he got ourselves registered for the event through mother zephyr. eyvicat's at cebu now, so its gonna be me and shats tomorrow, sitting it out for a 9-5 session that, i hope won't spell itself as b-o-r-i-n-g! welwelwel. pray its not, dear gentle reader.

about the david carradine item i babbled in my intro, well its this news article that came out at Time (i think) not one week ago saying that "Bill" from Tarantino's fourth opus Kill Bill, was found dead in a hotel room somewhere in Asia, his cause of death being "auto erotic self asphyxation" or something like that. its not as big an item like jacko's death but having read the item somewhat sent shivers down my spine. an officemate asked me what i make out of the clinical term the magazine printed as cause of carradine's death. i said to her its just another way of saying he died from "sobrang sarap". Time is just decent enough not to treat his death as tabloid fare; had it happened here and not in other parts of Asia, i bet our tabloids will have had a grand time feasting on poor David.

oh well.