hiatus pix

Here are the pix from my hiatus. Nothing much, actually. Just passing the time away and going through the day to day motions:

I’ve taken up brisk walking at night for the past weeks. I’m enjoying it immensely.  Good thing it’s safe to walk around my home at dusk.  Can’t say I’ve lost weight yet but I do have noticed that some of parts of me are indeed getting firmer and tighter. Yay! (2b continued)

Can’t say for my diet though.  A friend told me how to make glazed brie. This one was topped with a mixture of nuts, brown sugar, and brandy; then, baked slightly. Great with red wine and crackers! And besides, Sis has a brand new oven.  So…

And of course, when there’s an oven, baked mac can’t be too far behind. Just loved it! Pawie made this with ground beef, pepperoni, two kinds of melted cheeses, rigatoni, and some secret ingredients.  Yum!

Reunions: Family and relatives on my father’s side got together some weekends ago.  Two of my balikbayan uncles came and we celebrated the way we know best–eat! (2b continued)

At work, we had some celebrations, too.  We gave one of our staff, Lin, a baby shower before she had a maternity leave while two of us celebrated birthdays.  So many people celebrated birthdays in March!

Sign of the times: News of the recession can really be a bummer. This is the reason why I need to contemplate and reflect on some of my plans and life’s issues.  But I pray that we can all bounce back from this… as we often do. Kaya natin ‘yan! (b^ｰﾟ)

My room is still a mess. But it is a work in progress. I mean, I’m getting there… Really I am.  <(￣.￣*)> hmp!

Well, at least, I’m starting on my grad paper. So far so good.  In the pic above is my student and the case study that I’m working on. A good kid, love him to bits.

Kite-flying with another student of mine.  I’m proud of this girl. She has come a long way…

Family Day at EK: We visited a place called Enchanted Kingdom. Not really a kingdom, not really enchanting.  But it’s all we got so far (2b continued)…

Summer! Ahhh!  Fruits and ice cream… We’re all craving for iced fruity desserts these super humid days. Oh, God, I could use one right now…* drools* (2b continued, too)

And also, I’ve discovered the power of Japanese emoticons… sometimes they can say what you really mean when words are just not enough. Til then… (*ゝω・)ﾉ♥♥♥ ･ﾟ:*:ﾟ toodle-loo!

 

goodbye for now?

Time to put the holiday decors down, store them away, and clean up what needs to be cleaned up.  I don’t normally do NYRs (new year’s resolutions) but this time I need to do some thinking and make some changes.

Packing away the decors and back to the same way it was?… Not if I can help it.

Like…I love blogging (and facebooking).  But I feel there are times, that I’m finding myself spending way too much time on it–time I can’t afford right now.  So stumbling upon this site and reading about it helped me break away from being obligated to blog… (and rethinking about doing away with other addicting internet habits):

1.  I will be busy for my written comprehensive exams. I have a month to prepare for it.  So that means, I will not be blogging and facebooking much until that part of my life is over.  Just thinking about the exams is making me hyperventilate.  Oh, God!

2. Preparing also means cleaning up and organizing my notes… my files… my room… my life. I am such a pack rat, I hate throwing away bits of inane fluff and pieces of scribbled paper, too afraid to part with them for I might somehow need them in the future (which never happens).  This crazy habit has got to end!

To finally get on top of the situation: To borrow (and to butcher) a quote from Sir Edmund Hillary, it is not these  stacks and stacks of notes and documents we should conquer but ourselves (Left)

3. And of course, the mother of all NYR cliches… Maybe… just maybe… lose some weight.  I will not add anything more regarding this.  That’s just that.

So there… I don’t know how to end this. Maybe a little goodbye-be-blogging-whenever-I-can will suffice…

So…Bye! Be blogging soon…if I can! And wish me luck….

 

it’s the holidays…

…and food seems to be everywhere.

This post is all about the holiday food I took pictures of–food served for the Christmas and birthdays parties (apparently, a lot of people were or are celebrating their birthdays in Dec.).  It’s ironic how your waist grows thicker while your wallet gets thinner during the holidays, huh?

As you can see by now, I like taking pictures of food.  I just want to document the glorious sight of food and give respect to people who take time, money and effort to cook and feed us by posting the fruits of their labors for posterity’s sake…and before they get gobbled up and flushed down into the sewers of oblivion…

Here are some of them…

My company’s QC Christmas Party Dec. 19, 2008: The program was short and just right… and the food was superb, especially the hot salsa for the nachos–kudos to the Manang who solely conjured these up with her magic wand!

Gone in 5 minutes: The Before and After shots of Mister Dan’s Christmas gift for us at work– home-cooked pancit bihon sa bilao which the A Girls and I literally devoured in minutes… sarap! The picture on the right is what we Pinoys call ’sus-nagkahiyaan-pa!’ leftovers.

The A Girls’ Christmas Eat-Out at TGI Friday’s, Dec. 18, 2008: The place was packed, tears were shed as we surprised each other with gifts, and the identities of our secret Monito-Monitas were revealed. But where’s the food? Funny how we forgot to take pictures of the food we ordered…we gobbled them all up as soon as the waiters set them on the table…

Egg custards from Hong Kong courtesy of our jet-stter friend, bpc! Thanks… they were delish!

Dec. 13 Birthday feast prepared by Sis for Levic… Busog! Burp!

So… time to shed those pounds gained, I guess… starting um, tomorrow… or the next day after that…or next year…hehe.

 

Final Writing Tips: Nos. 5 and 6

(This is a continuation from previous post: The 4th Muse Tip)

5. BE FOCUSED. I have already discussed in a post why I am not a big fan of multi-tasking. Studies have shown that multi-tasking and multi-focusing are proven to be detrimental to work quality and task performance.  However, how can one be focused on writing when one is busy juggling a job, family and other important personal concerns?

Again, the answer is in the planning. Structure and discipline also play major parts in the creative process for the ‘weekends only’ artist.  Planning may well be the most difficult part of the process but once you are able to go over this hurdle, then the rest is smooth sailing.  Offer your Mondays to Saturdays for work and family while setting aside time every Sunday for yourself and your creative pursuits.  Do this in a quiet room in your house with no distractions.  Explain to your spouse and kids about your need for ‘creativity time.’

The disadvantage of doing this for only once a week though is that the narration or your story flow is continually being put on hold since you have to stop and sleep so you can wake up early tomorrow to go back to your regular work.  In my experience, this was usually accompanied with feelings of irritation and impatience (due to yearnings to go back to your writing) especially when you are already ‘in the zone,’ sometimes even bitterly blaming ‘work’ for temporarily impeding this creative output.  The best that you can do is to post your story plan or timeline next to you while you write so you can track where you were or where you left off.

Don’t overdo or go beyond your ‘creativity time.’ Creativity requires extreme concentration and there is a danger that you may shut out everything else, become oblivious to the time and may overlook things and other details in your life that also matter.  Relationships and job performance may suffer as a result.  In order to efficiently balance it all out (day job, family, and creative work), it would be a good idea to use a planner or a day to day schedule to make sure you won’t forget everything else and so that you can effectively assume your roles and carry out your responsibilities as a full-time worker, full-time parent/spouse, and part-time artist.  Use an alarm clock and set it beforehand so you can be conscious of the time.  Make sure to include in your schedule enough rest–both physically and mentally, as well.

6. BE PATIENT. I mentioned already once that one of my life’s mottoes is “One step at a time.”   If you have your goal in mind and know where you’re going, then rest assured that you will accomplish each step in the story flow until finally, you have reached the very end.  However, as expected, the writing pace will be much slower especially for the ‘weekends only’ writer compared to the one who does this for a living.  As I said, you tend to blame work or familial responsibilities from taking time away from your creative pursuits.  You become snappy and cantankerous. Be careful not to fall prey to this cliché–that artists naturally have this ‘artistic temperament.’  I have personally encountered how these s0-called artists justify their selfish, angry outbursts and childish tantrums with excuses pertaining to this so-called ‘temperament.’  Artist or not–it is unfair for people around you to see you like this because definitely they are also affected by your behavior and may even resent it.  You have to check yourself when this happens.  I advise you to be a human being first before you start considering yourself an artist.

Despite everything that I said, and even if I follow all these tips, I still expect that things may not go as planned.  But definitely, the chance of finishing a novel this way is far greater than someone who did not plan ahead.

For the aspiring writer, good luck! You don’t have to wait for next year’s NaNoMo to start writing that novel.  Why not start now?  Through visualizing, observing, reflecting, planning, discipline, structure, and lots and lots of patience, there may be no need to search for your personal Muse.  She will just show up in the sidelines, cheering you on…