A celebration and a lament over the weekend.  The former pertains to Kris’ happy birthday celebration with family; the latter, my cousin David in Aussie had a terrible car accident (his vehicle was totally wrecked). 

Happy birthday, Kris!!!

friends have been talking about engagements and/or engagement rings.  quite a number kasi have tied the knot na that couples in relationships for a long time, like us, get teased often when will we follow suit or at least be engaged. 

nah, before you get any other ideas, let me stop your train of thought — this is not an announcement whatsoever.  haha J.  to begin with, i’m not envious of my friends who got married already, nor are we hurrying to change our civil status asap.

this is just me being flabbergasted over what friends say are the standard cost of engagement rings!  are they for real?! gosh, too much!  imagine, with such amount, you only get one piece of jewelry!  but if you think practical about it, you can actually do so many other things/save a lot of money for the future/make a number of charities happy with the same amount!  then the thought of misplacing an expensive engagement ring — yikes, so much money down the drain! 

thank goodness, i’m not a guy who’s obliged to give an engagement ring.  but, wawa naman my guy friends!  who started this craze anyway?!

the  moment the door of the airplane opened, we already smelled durian!  i tasted a sliver of the real thing…for experience. i died!  dang, i may have acquired a liking for its scent throughout the three days we were in davao; but the taste is a world different.  despite drowing so with lots of water, my subsequent burps an hour after still "tastes" like durian! oh, when i unpacked my bag back in manila, the smell of durian lingered amongst my stuff inside. gosh, the strength of that fruit!

first stop, see the Philippine Eagle (alive!)

ate at The Venue (thanks for correction, kris) courtyard with Jill and Lady; followed by coffee at Jack’s Ridge.

the next day, a tour around crocodile farm; then rafting along Davao River. super fun! yep, i did not get thrown off the raft.  but i did fall off the jeepney that took us to the drop off point — my bad; but i still can’t figure out how it happened (betty’s theory is i might have been put off balance due to the gear strapped on me).

last stop, Eden Nature Park. everyone suggested that we visit this over samal island.  maybe kris and i expected too much.  oh well, atleast we can say we’ve been there. it did not help that it rained while we were there though.

saying our thanks and goodbyes to jill at marco polo lounge.  super thanks for the pencils din, jill.  ang happy nung isa with the rock collection!!! apat of the similar kind from different places.

really broke now [(despite kris' usual subsidy --- private practice v. government salary of a non-lawyer; yup, very big diff!) thanks, hon! owe you much!]; but very happy.  finally, i’m done with my "wow philippines" goal this year. 

now, back to reality with a way past deadline to boot. oh well, gotta earn some bucks for the usuals and another leg of KRIAmazing Race.

rafting in davao (i’m the one with the yellow helmet):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1UWQPkxASU

the latest addition to my room’s "fleet" — cebu pacific’s mini-yellow inflatable plane. ang happy ng mga airplanes ko; tatlo na floating about.

shhhh, pupuslit from the office on monday (really finishing off my leaves and the plane tickets have been bought months ago kasi) and fly later for another leg of the Kris and Ria’s Amazing Weekend Race — DAVAO for three days! i truly hope everything will go well when we go white water rafting along davao river — translation: no freak accidents for me!  i hope the weather will be good as well.  jill said it has been sunny…but a lot can change ’til i get there. ha-ha, funny (semi-sarcastic)!  see you soon, jill!

Animo ATENEO…
ONE BIG FIGHT!!!

On typhoon Milenyo…

Dang, the hurricane documentaries we watch in National Geographic/Discovery channels are true!  We totally felt the ‘eye of the storm’ in Parañaque. 

Since our house faces a street, nothing blocked the impact of the winds. In the morning of September 28, the front of our house took massive beatings.  I was praying that no flying objects would hit our windows and xwind; and that the electric post beside our perimeter fence would be sturdy to withstand the storm.  Electricity died; ditto with Maynilad Water Services, PLDT, Globe signal, and SunCellular signal.  At least, there was not much rain along with the winds.

By noon, everything went calm.

But after an hour, the winds shifted to the back of our house.  Damn, the scary the trees and water tank towers of our neighbors.  Heck, the cap of our water tank, which was securedly fastened, even flew over our neighbor’s fence.  Sadly though, our back gutters cracked with the “hagupit” of milenyo. 

Then Milenyo was gone as quickly as it came.

Betty and I played McGyvers again and retrieved the water tank cap across fences.  We also did some ‘remedyo’ at the back.  Surveying the village until Market! Market! (Kris had a craving for pizza — ah, yeah, hello?!); grabe the destruction.  Many fallen trees and billboards — our village was na-isolate nga ‘coz a massive tree fell across moonwalk access road (squashing a passing car at that!), and an electrical post cracked and hung precariously across merville access road. Magallanes village did not fare better either.  Worse, one house even caught fire.  But, amazingly, Luk Yuen (the place of my ‘deadly’ heart burn) was the sole establishment open that night.

Yes, we ended up having a four-day weekend; but it was no picnic — no electricity, no water, no communication devices.  I had to ‘igib’ gallon-containers of water from Amatista and it was nastily hot when sleeping at night.  A.M. radio got to be irritating to listen to as days go by (my gosh, the misinformation and non-sequitur arguments a lot of radio commentators dish out!).  But, we’re thankful we just had these “inconveniences;” it really could have been much worse.

            Aside… Friday the 13^th ngayon ah!

• Thumb is back to normal now.  Whew. Great timing as well, ‘coz I intend to type a lot today. J

• While researching last week, I came across a book in the library called, Dactyloscopy: The science of fingerprint classification and identification. Science pala yun. Hehehe, sa CSI kasi, scan and search for a match lang using a machine/computer, di ba? J 

• Ah yes, I want to share xwind’s 2006 registration.  For the first time, it is fast and hassle-free.  Uh-huh, fast and hassle-free and we are talking about our xwind here! J Since I missed the satellite smoke emission testing (SET) and registration service near our village, I’ve been scouring Manila for a SET center near our office so I can just rush to it after office hours.  I want to at least have the SET ‘coz I already had the oil changed and the muffler de-carbonized a week before (go na before the system gets dirty again esp. xwind runs on diesel). Thank goodness Atty. Gwyn informed me about the one in Escoda — it does smoke emission test, sells TPL insurance, and registers your vehicle for you (just like the one in near our village which I availed for wudju).  And so over my hour-long lunch break, I was done with the SET and was even able to eat my baon back in the office.  Then, come 5pm, I went back and claimed my O.R., TPL, and 2006 stickers.  Tahdah!  Now, xwind is off my October checklist and I did not waste sweaty hours in LTO pa! Ang happy J.   

• In re Faye’s wedding:  Our (Aze, Maj and Arvin, Vanny and Junar, Faye and Roy, Mildz, and JdL) mini-reunion was so fun!  Dami kwento, tawanan, photo-ops, and fru-fru fashion J. Aze, super nakaka-miss ka talagang kasama!  Mildz, thanks for putting us in a conspiracy for malversation and theft! Majah and Junar, thanks for the help with the technicals.  JdL, goodluck sa xwind mo! Faye and Roy, Congratulations!