Talking to Myself

Moved

2006-05-23T07:44:00.000+08:00

Finished, ... well, almost. All that's left are the content, news, blog & tutorial extensions (hopefully at least one).

http://elijah.pinoguin.com

Forward!

2006-05-09T08:19:00.000+08:00

I didn't expect us to be together again, I guess somehow both of us got jealous seeing each other with other ppl. I'm not single again :-)

Well, I'm here at the office now, it's back to work again. No new projects lined up today so I guess I'll spend the rest of the day browsing the internet, maybe implement a few server stuff & tech support.

Server Implements

2006-05-03T10:46:00.000+08:00

The bookmarks on my firefox browser contains links to sites on server stuff, I open one everyday to implement 'em, as per request. Last week I've just implemented a jabber server (ejabberd) for our local IM (think yahoo messenger). I've chosen Coccinella as client of choice, works on both windows & linux ... It's an awesome app, had a few uncaught bugs & weird issues but it works great. The best feature our project manager could use is the whiteboard feature. She could just send out whiteboards to everyone with scribbles & all, think ms paint being sent via ym in real-time. It's been a rave at the office for awhile, it also had a chess game & cards feature we played around in.

Not all server features are being taken that seriously, my boss wanted this feature & that... but when it's finally implemented he hardly uses it. I don't have that much of a voice & weight to carry around so actually telling everyone to use this application from now on is kinda difficult. It's a bit annoying but, what they hey... everything I've done here is documented, noted in my palm for future use. They'd look great in my future resume.

Plot Twists

2006-05-03T00:01:00.000+08:00

Sorry, I had to step back. The relationship has been a great experience for both of us but in the end some spark had to flicker out on my side. It was before that I started to like her, she's been so nice to me ( I mean very ). It's been 'us' before we knew it, I gave it a try anyway to see how it goes ... it didn't go well in the end. I may have some faults in the first place, maybe I felt pressured. Or maybe I was just confused with my feelings, everything's not 100%. She apologized to me too.

The story here isn't full, it's a bit complicated to think about. And I hate complicated relationships, to think this isn't my level of expertise. What's menacing are the courses that change in the middle of it ... cool. We had a great time.

We're just friends now. But we still meet. The next day we had a little movie marathon, watched the Sentinel & Silent Hill =) both are very nice (loved that pyramid head). We still go to church together like we used to. We could watch MI:3 next, but she didn't like Tom Cruise for some reason.

Edit: Ow! she bit me!

Need to step back

2006-04-21T22:53:00.000+08:00

Something's eating me up inside ... I know having relationships with a girl can be quite nice and all but ... you get your own share of problems too. I had a bad start with her brother .. and other issues I'd like to close down quick.

I need a break, it's only been almost 2 weeks now ... why is it that I get tired so quickly? ... I know how I handle these things ... I get depleted so soon. Introversion was my gift. I've been shifting in-between, it doesn't feel healthy to me...

In other news ... I'm still in this blog ... the new host is giving me new problems .. I'll stick here for awhile & build up that site some other time ... elijah.hostcubix.com/ my last host... the site's been built with a simple template I downloaded somewhere... it's free & quick to setup, I just don't have the time right now to build my own designs. Maybe later.

Office relations are good, but they've all noticed a big change in me. I've matured in a big way.

Not that late

2006-04-09T09:33:00.000+08:00

Friday, another free dinner from one of our Danish clients, had a very good dinner ... one thick slice of beef roast, veggies, a chop of lamb ... and some very nice char broiled lobster. MMmmmMMM.

Satuday, just had a date with someone, the longest one I've had ... we talked the whole day, whew. One hot date.

Sunday, got to go to Taytay again, just got a note that someone's interested in my bike ... but is offering a much lower price than I posted ... darnit, I needed the money to purchase a laptop so ... I just might sell it to that guy. If we could meet today, he's supposed to be there lunchtime.

My new host: I've got zoomcities for hosting my new typo3 site, not much storage 50mb but just enough. It's got imagemagick but I'm still waiting for the official 4.0 release of typo3. It looks real cool from what I've tested so far.

Finally

2006-04-04T22:36:00.000+08:00

Salary Increase! yey, I've been waiting for this after the 6 month period, I think they're late for like a month or two ... or three. I deserved it anyway, just the last few weeks I've noticed a surge of too many technical support requests, especially from our new project manager who is just fresh from Windows to Linux.

It's not like I could'nt keep up with that many requests & side tasks, I mean I'm being paid extra for it. But having that much requests & implementing new server features for like 15 people in the company could very much delay my main tasks a bit. I had to train a few people too, then there's ym of other people asking for some linux support too. Busy, busy, busy, if you see me at the office I'm the one who's always walking around being called on to for help (it's exercise anyway) ... The new increase could boost up my morale a bit.

I've switched hosts again for my new site, I'm not fond of that posting for hosting scheme ... exec() for my imagemagick is disabled too. At the time I don't have much time to squeeze up for personal site making... I don't even have much time to practice with my new guitar! sheesh, I really needed to buy up some lessons instead... I don't think online lessons are helping ...

Mixed.

2006-04-03T23:23:00.000+08:00

I am disappointed ... it kinda feels like being in a rut .. but no, pieces are moving here, but slowly ... too slowly. I can't see the top of the hill I'm climbing ... a bit lost I guess. What is it I wanted to do anyway? I dropped my map somewhere.

This week I feel a mixed sense of emotions bottled up, gotta pop up the lid somewhere ... maybe it'll help me feel better. Like talking to a wall. Thank you.

The work is fine, I'm learning at a faster pace now ... but outside work? I feel solitary. I've been invited to dinners, drinking fests, bars & clubs ... I've joined in, got a feel of the night life ... but ... nothing. This must be the same feeling I had when I first got this urge of riding a motorcycle ... alone. To nowhere. It wasn't some girl after all, there's a lone wolf inside me. I haven't been feeding him awhile ...

That solitary stranger kept me apart from deciding what I really wanted to be ... I don't know if this is a good thing or not. Who's typing all this? ... hah, he took over ... hello ...

... enough.

Blog Transfer

2006-03-25T11:07:00.000+08:00

http://elijah.hostcubix.com

My new personal site.

GAS

2006-03-01T21:56:00.000+08:00

Pic(3)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I kept hearing / reading that term on those guitar sites ... Gear Aquisition Syndrome, or Guitar Aquisition Syndrome. Very common sickness for guitarists. Also a very expensive sickness /swt , I got hit by this and made me purchase the behringer. It's such a shiny & cool sounding guitar ...

Probably because when someone gets tired of the same ol' sound, they wanted to sound like someone else, or create their own sound but with different gear. Hence, they buy more.

I read a very good article on suppressing this erm, syndrome at guitarnoise.com , it really doesn't matter if you've got the crappiest gear you can afford, it really relies on the player skilled enough for it. Give a different guitar to the same guitarist and it'll still sound like one of his own.

This made me think to prioritize learning & improve my skills first before purchasing new gear like that acoustic effect pedal, and sound card attachments.

I heard Yupangco & Yamaha has that course on guitar playing ... maybe I'll devote my weekends on lessons & tutorials. I'm wondering how much that could cost me ... Those online tutorials & even the beginners pamphlet I acquired from the purchase doesn't teach me much.

Oh well, at least today I figured out how to use the knobs & switches on my amp & guitar. Neat.

Behringer V-Tone

2006-02-28T20:04:00.000+08:00

Pic(2)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I've been posting about guitars before ... that was some Yamaha midi guitar I think that I couldn't get ... This year, while seeing how much I've saved up in the bank ... I've treated myself to a new hobby. Guitar & Harp playing. Hopefully, within the year(or two) I could be able to solo the guitar & my harmonica. I love blues & country, I just might be playing those genres most often. I like rock too ... buuut, maybe I'll just let my mp3/ogg player do that job, I don't intend to join a band. Just the ol' lonewolf.

It's an electric guitar ... rather than an acoustic. They say, an acoustic is most ideal for a beginner, but a bit difficult cause you really had to press hard on those frets(?). It's easier on an electric. I've been thinking of getting that acoustic effect too on my behringer, but that little gadget could cost 1.8k, add to that another cord for 699php. I was adviced to wait for the free gift cheque that I might receive for purchasing Yupangco's guitars. Yep, it's that building right beside us =) maybe I could try & sign up for tutorial sessions too ... I wonder how much that costs... maybe I'll teach myself for awhile, there are a lot of resources out there on the net. I mean here.

It's a package set for beginners, it's actually the cheapest one they had ... I've been meaning for a Squier or an Ibanez starter pack but ... the Squier costs 10k (it's even on sale), Ibanez is not available right now.
I've researched this behringer, they say the guitar is crap, but the amp is awesome. I dunno about the reviews ... some are good, then bad ... but most are rating 7.8-8.5. Compared to my 2nd choice, an acoustic Squier starter pack 1k less cheaper than Behringer... but it's an acoustic. I wanted a guitar that could play lots of sounds, I don't want to get stuck with acoustic forever. I don't plan to buy lots of guitars either. This is not my career.

The guy salesman tested it for me, man ... he's really good at playing. Said he started playing at 14 or 16(?) up 'till now, 30's?? ... At least I now know what I could sound like with this guitar, it's pretty damn good!. It makes me even feel I don't even need that effect pedal. But that guy is a little strange ... his hands are shaky, a bit nervous-y ... other salesmen watched too. Instead of me trying to analyze the sounds whether the guitar is right for me ... I'm actually a bit nervous for the guy. I don't know why, his jerkiness is contagious.

Last thing to figure out right now, find a way to plug this baby onto my sound card & yes, my headphones ... I'd get kicked out of this house by the landlady if ever I get into such a state of making too much noise (or music).

For Sale

2006-02-25T22:57:00.000+08:00

forsale
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Just setted up the ad at motorcyclephilippines dot com. It's a really nice bike ... the looks & style of it is as gorgeous as always. And it still looks brand new ... mm... I took good care of it. But this machine hasn't been used for quite awhile now ... I live really close to work & have only been using it on grocery shopping. And that happens just once a month.

I've been re-thinking of upgrading to a big bike too ... but ... I dunno, will it stay in the garage again? it's great on utility but it'd only break down & rust when not used too often .. A laptop is a fine choice too .. but the prices of high end laptops are still too pricey ...

I'll set all this bike sale thinking aside for awhile. *shove*

Yesterday it took everyone by surprise when GMA announced that emergency thing on tv. Supposed to be some pre-emptive move. Well, ok.

Hopefully everything will be in order after all this ... why is it that I get this weird feeling that those who protested & joined in on that Edsa march could have just been paid to be there? Look at those people, they are @#%! smiling & laughing whilst running away from law enforcements. Is this a game? are they enjoying a game of tag with the police? they throw rocks & stuff afterwards. This is sick. I really hate it ... this weird notion that those people were just being used, I'd love to get their names, I mean those who are really behind it.

Last night while walking to get my laundry I saw this cute dog walking around with a protester's sign on it's neck. I didn't have the time to read what it says, but it's cute anyway. The guy right behind the mutt looks just like those who were on tv at Edsa. This guy, ... looks mindless, glittered with political designs & anti-government stuff, and yet there's not a single spark of enthusiasm on his face. Binayaran ka ba?? (Are you being paid to do this?). I mean real people who complain & had the guts to march towards Edsa should be with great vigor & high spirits for what they believe in ...

Something is really wrong here ...

MC for SALE

2006-02-20T06:51:00.000+08:00

forsale
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Last few rides from Makati to the 'pleasant-enough' Taytay country side makes it something like my bike's 'last meal' as it's original owner (myself) will finally sell.

I rode off from Belair with my jacket sides flapping happily against the wind up front. The wind whistle sounds the same, but feels slightly stronger than before. My leathery grip to the handlebars makes me feel more 'buffed' up, a feeling like 'superman' gets whilst flying against the wind. Up, up, horizontalllyyyy. No we don't want to fly here right now. A flying motorcycle creates a horrible image when someone imagines how it lands.

I've parked my mc to my home base at Taytay. Awaiting repairs to the former guys who sold it to me.

I'm still planning of ways of what to do with the money, maybe a small entrepreneurial job to setup ... The rest I treat myself to a low-end laptop, or a phone/pda replacement.

Wow. After that bike wash it still looks new...

Firewall

2006-02-18T19:42:00.000+08:00

Pic(3)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Another movie with 2 friends. Watched 'Firewall' ... it was ok, no comment about how they hacked into stuff ... some attempts too unbelievable, but good anyway.

Before getting there I felt a bit paranoid by this Australian-Indian-Arab whatever kind of guy that keeps on following me, I think he's gay. I took a right turn to wherever just to get off the scent. Sheesh. Ugh.

Common talks on dating & girls & stuff ... while I'm still enjoying this single life, it gives me this kind of ... 'yearning'? or ... 'wanting'? some kind of female partner. I wanna ask someone out again ...

On another topic, I'm selling my bike. Can't get enough use for it anymore .. only for getting groceries & that's it. Today I rode off to Glorietta but the main intention was to find a repair shop to take care of whatever things that need fixing... then sell it. I was hoping to get enough to buy a laptop but ... hmm.... I dunno, can't buy good quality laptops for just one bike. Maybe I'll hold the money for awhile & maybe it'll help setup my dream business.

Goodnight.

The little things ...

2006-02-14T23:11:00.000+08:00

Pic(4)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

My spellings, grammar and my usual blog schedule ... I've been neglecting. Before I check twice before posting. Now I lack something to even care about it. I haven't been taking much pictures too. Things have slowed.

I was thinking that a new change in behavior could somehow mess up my habits ... those little things like regular backups of my files, writing down every little thought & idea to my palm ... have all been ... what's that word? tsk, even looking up a dictionary ... well, whatever comes to mind I could post up here ... this poor blog.

Pic, another lamp post ... it's valentines and I have no date. Even my lady boss jokingly asks me out.... I told her to meet me at the fishball stand.

Thinking

2006-02-14T23:04:00.000+08:00

Pic(5)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Quite a times I see businesses, shops and thought to myself "Hey, that was my idea before..." ... and it's not doing very well. That's good! I didn't have to go through all that trouble to see if it will work or not! Nyahhahahha.

But that's also bad 'cause ... that's one more experience I lack. That's also understandable 'cause ... I don't have the funds yet. Oh well.

Here's a pic of a lamppost(sp?), newly installed by the generous belair management. I still don't like the guards though, they still don't know me ... I've been here for months now and they still ask me who I am ... everyone is paranoid here.

Korean Candy

2006-02-14T22:59:00.000+08:00

Pic(1)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Or was it thai?? I'm not sure what my landlady told me where she was ... I think it's Korea where she bought these candies ... She has travelled to lots of countries now I think, last time was in Thailand where she got that elephant & tiger pic. Now she gets to take home these candies (tastes very much like our local cloud9 chocolates).

After tasting those candies makes me feel I've never missed a thing :P

I'm still blogging?

2006-01-29T18:20:00.000+08:00

Pic(24)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Just checked out itzamatch again, what in holy h@#l!~ 4 males have visited my profile, get outta there you!!! checked out other profiles too, few are scary, a few I liked ... winked and messaged them but were ignored.

It's tough finding a girl with similar preferences, I'm not that typical guy next door ... I could be sporty and sometimes geeky, I like technology & sports at the same time, quiet & talkative ... maybe I'm still confused. Buying that motorcycle may not just be for that depressing day, I do remember doing something to clear out all that fog in my brain, yet still confused. Lots of reasons popping up and I can't decide.

February, would've been ideal to get a girlfriend ... I'm not taking girls up on a pedestal anymore, I'm willing to find ones that could be just like a 'bestfriend' and much more. If I finally setup that business she'd be there with me, not just helping but alongside ... like in war she'd be a comrade, the closest the ties so noone/nothing could break it, not even ourselves. I big whoop at the office, some misunderstandings, I just lost respect to our lead programmer and stuff have quieted down instead of the usual lively one. These kinds of social things I'm not a major in, hoping that the very relationship to come would not come to this. I am very careful now.

Motorcycling didn't cure me, the rush of almost getting bumped by tailgaters didn't help. I can't find myself.

There's that walk again near the house I'm boarding in, I've taken up jogging =) I plan to sign up for gym only on weekends, saturday mornings only. On Sundays they're closed. I only jog in the evenings, it's quieter and cooler. The village is well lighted too, very well safe. Junk foods are now taken lightly, fruits & veggies have filled my fridge.

Really really old music ...

2006-01-23T19:46:00.000+08:00

Really really old music ...
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Music of my Dad's generation ... it's their giant Cd's called vinyl records that plays by scratching some diamond tipped arm of the hifi my Dad owns.

It's still there, barely worked when I last heard it. Years before he simply loved playing really old records like "Tie a Yellow Ribbon", "Kingston Town" and "It all seems to fall into line" by Perry Como, Orlando Tony, etc ...

Those old hits seem to have hit my head and echoed some age old music syndrome and decided to reminisce (I'm not sure this last sentence makes sense).

After hearing it over and over and over it began to grow on me ... I've decided to download some mp3's for it ... just what I could remember.

Here is a little lyric from Kingston Town, a favorite of mine when I was a kid, sigh memories:

Down the way, where the nights are gay,
and the sun shines daily on the mountain top,
I took a trip on a sailing ship,
nd when I reach Jamaica I made a stop.

But I'm sad to say,
I'm on my way,
won't be back for many a day.
My heart is down,
my head is turning around,
I had to leave a little girl in Kingston Town.

Sounds of laughter everywhere,
and the dancing girls swing to and through.
I must declare my heart is there,
thou I've been from Maine to Mexico.

But I'm sad to say,
I'm on my way,
won't be back for many a day.
My heart is down,
my head is turning around,
I had to leave a little girl in Kingston Town.

At the market you can hear,
ladies cry out while on their heads they bear,
acky rice, salt, fish are nice
and the rum is fine any time a year.

But I'm sad to say,
I'm on my way,
won't be back for many a day.
My heart is down,
my head is turning around,
I had to leave a little girl in Kingston Town.

Down the way, where the nights are gay,
and the sun shines daily on the mountain top,
I took a trip on a sailing ship,
and when I reach Jamaica I made a stop.

But I'm sad to say,
I'm on my way,
won't be back for many a day.
My heart is down,
my head is turning around,
I had to leave a little girl in Kingston Town.

Sad to say,
I'm on my way,
won't be back for many a day.
My heart is down,
my head is turning around,
I had to leave a little girl in Kingston Town.

Blog

2006-01-17T10:31:00.000+08:00

Pic(10)_2
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Sometimes whenever I get in a such a mood I say things I never thought I'd say ... I've just cleaned up a few blog posts that I thought were not really 'me'. I was like "why the @#$ did I say that? " ... Edited.

But then again things change ... my beliefs, including myself ... I'd might as well delete my entire blog If I don't even agree with myself. Hayyz ...

More blogging ... I'm looking into some free hosting to put up my new typo3 site ... I could just setup a news plugin for my blogs, upload my notes of work.... mmm... the possibilities ... some ads would be fine for a free site I guess.

Back to RO

2006-01-13T10:46:00.000+08:00

screenUrdr030
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I am doing well ... got a fine job, learning & livin' it. I been trying to live healthier now, taking up gym, walking to and from the office ... with my poor bike in storage =( It's 'rectifier' or something is not performing very well. I'd like a second opinion on that one. It's not a battery problem after all. Tsk, wasted 1.4k on that one.

Bike stats: for 1 1/2 year of riding I got a broken clutch cable and a weird rectifier.

RO: I won an event for the first time around, won 30m zennies, 30opb and 30 candies. Went right to prontera for some shopping ^-^

Gym

2006-01-10T22:46:00.000+08:00

Pic(24)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I'm running out of things to post ... hmm... anyways, like the title says, I've just signed up for gym training =) I'll be working out more often.

Lucky me to spot this one, it's near JP Rizal, not too crowded, has it's own shower, sauna ... jacuzzi isn't working but that's fine ... 50php for just one session, 700php for a whole month. The price is fine I guess ...

Qemu installs WinME

2006-01-04T23:59:00.000+08:00

qemu_winmeinstalled
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Techblog, I'm not sure I liked techrepublic's blog posting ... I'm more comfortable posting here at flickr / blogger.

The screen is from an ubuntu breezy install, common stuff like gkrellm on the right ... xterm on the left, firefox on the background ... what's in the middle is qemu hosting a windows ME install. I just figured it out a few hours ago.

Some of the programmers who use linux wanted to use Internet Explorer of Windows to test their design if it works well on IE. For some reason what looks good on mozilla or firefox looks bad on Internet Explorer and vise versa. And so the need for IE keeps bumping up my todo list.

First choice was Vmware, a commercial product ... I managed to run a Unix variant called 'minix' from it ... but for working on windows I had to purchase a copy. Win4lin, I didn't get anywhere with this one ... I signed up for an evaluation version but didn't really get an email reply. Bochs, forget this one, it's much too difficult and time consuming to configure. Finally I found qemu and a guide on how to use it, it's pretty simple. You just need to setup a harddisk image and install whatever OS from there, after completing the install you may want to bridge the network from the host linux box to windows.

http://applications.linux.com/applications/05/10/24/1845248.shtml?tid=13

Things Change ...

2006-01-01T11:48:00.000+08:00

Last night I'm all by my lonesome in this tiny little room, my family isn't such a normal 'family' to even celebrate any form of holiday anymore. So I only visited home before New Year's eve. It was midnight and everyone was lighting up their firecrackers ... I didn't bother to watch the display I've seen 'em before, what I hate about the traditional new years celebration is the using of cheap firecrackers ... they're all over the place, everyone's buying and using them ... which means by midnight the streets become fogged up with smoke from those cheapies. I only wish for a normal new year where the only firecrackers allowed are those that can only reach the sky. I worry for my Dad 'cause he's asthmatic.

Last night I had a dream, like being back in time I saw my old classmates again from highschool. Guess who's also there? the very same girl I admired for years. The rest of the dream were just fillers of weird stuff, I forgot what they were ... in the end, having sick of regrets I approached her and tried asking her out. She said no. Is that your final answer? I asked again ... She said yes. Then tears fell out of her eyes ... I wanted to cry too ... Then I woke up, it was raining ...

Only in dreams stuff like this could happen ... in reality all is just rotten fruitcake. But that's just how we make it I guess ... and even in dreams you can't change anything ... This year my resolution is time management, I'll do my best squeezing up all that is productive. I'll take up gym and pursue career some more.

Last year was the time I bought myself some freedom, that was a rebellious year ... this time the keyword is learning ... and searching. Stuff about myself I didn't really understand, I'm pursuing my own meaning ... I'm changing goals for new ones. A lot more maturity will have to set in ... and yeah, I'll have to kill my demons now ...

New Server Install

2005-12-28T13:46:00.000+08:00

eriavy2
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Replaced our old Fedora linux OS to CentOS ... I don't really approve of it but ... what the heck, it's what they wanted, I've never tried this thing anyway ...

The clutch cable for my bike has been replaced, it snapped right near the clutch lever. I had to ferry my mechanic to and from Kymco branches looking for a clutch cable, cause their own branch is always out of it. Can't find good parts for my pulsar anymore ... The Dink model is more popular. I really don't like that name ... 'dink' ... ugh.

Here's a pic of some japanese maid being humorously abused. Gif file.

Merry Christmas?

2005-12-25T18:20:00.000+08:00

Pic(2)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

This is an unusual Christmas ... just this morning as I was riding across the fort area to get to Taytay my bike's clutch cable snapped!! that leaves me stuck there as the traffic light went green, I quickly switched to neutral forcefully and tried to push my bike out of the way. I tried to fix it but I couldn't, I've thought of workarounds but it's too risky. So I spent the rest of my Christmas morning pushing my bike along Fort looking for some police person or a gas station. A few blocks later I found a Shell gas station .... the guard there noticed my bad luck and cheerfully greeted me with a merry Christmas. I just nodded and tried asking for an overnight stay for my bike there, they agreed anyway ... so it looks like I'll have to be back there tomorrow with my mechanic, this sucks.

I brought my laundry then too, about 7 kilos of baggage, luckily I spotted a taxi to ferry me back to Belair and unload. I was planning to use the washing machine at Taytay today, arrgh. I'll have nothing to wear at the office next week.

To end my bad luck I had to ride yet another expensive taxi to Shaw Boulevard to ride an fx and it was HOT!, the air conditioning wasn't functioning properly ... Of course something else should happen to make things interesting ... like heavy traffic. I don't believe this ... last Christmas there wasn't much traffic around, and people are gathered almost every waiting shed looking for a taxi.

I arrived finally and gave the last batch of my gifts. I had to fix my Dad's cellphone later on, he doesn't know how to use it too so I had to teach him.

All day long I was scratching like crazy cause of that allergic reaction to some alcholic drink!

bah, humbug!

All was not a loss though, I shouldn't forget what made this day "Christ"mas. I may not be as religiously inclined anymore, but always trying to.

Alcohol again

2005-12-24T22:10:00.000+08:00

Pic(16)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Our Christmas office party ended with a few shots of vodka, wine & beer ... our lead programmer just loves getting drunk ... If you ask me I don't know why people would get much too drunk. I got a little hazy for awhile, I didn't like one bit of it. The beer and vodka wasn't that tolerable, it hits pretty hard. The white wine was ok, pretty tasty, it's peach flavoured I think. I should buy one of those bottles. If I had some money with me I might try some of those Bailey's stuff.

The next few hours I feel itchy again ... one of those drinks may have been causing me some allergic reaction ... bah. Getting drunk is not my idea of a good party, some light wine is fine enough, you don't have to get drunk to enjoy yourself.

Just a few more hours and it's Christmas again ... didn't I just say I loved Christmas? ... this year it's strange ... I'm not one bit in a christmassy glow. I'm not even going home to Taytay cause we never had one of those 'Noche Buena' anymore ... it's been a long time since we had one. We stopped a few years ago, my family isn't really a family anymore ... my Mom lives in Antipolo now. We could only communicate via cellphone.

I'm not myself today ...

Christmas = No money

2005-12-22T14:26:00.000+08:00

Pic(8)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Well, tomorrow's our little Christmas party .. it ends most of my gift giving frenzy. I don't know exactly how much I've spent on gifts ... so now I have no cash left ... I was expecting some spending cash but ... that @%@@#^* submeter just quit on me, I had to pay our electrician some bits too. That leaves me with nothing but canned goods and frozen pork cutlets on the fridge.

My bike is hardly used now ... gasoline costs, I could just walk to our office. I only use it now for groceries & stuff. It's battery is like drained up ... I don't believe this ... it's as if it's not a battery problem after all. Something must've been grounded or something in it's electrics. With the financial situation that I'm in today I don't think I'll be able to repair this thing 'till next year ... I could kickstart it but.. damn, it's too rough. I miss my electric start.

Pic: Our little Christmas bonus ... wish it would've been just cash. It's a pack of groceries with a note "Salary Deduction 1k" hehehe, they always kid around with a salary deduction threat, those guys ;-) We also received a large sack of rice! @_@ my goodness, how can I carry that?!. That sack will probably last me half a year or so.

Another week

2005-12-18T14:46:00.000+08:00

Pic(10)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Almost Christmas time ... I've posted like 3 blogs today ... just making use of my unlimited connection =)

Pic: A side shot with my helm on Marketx2 parking lot, I was about to leave then. Hmmm... that was the time I bought those gifts I guess ... or was that groceries? ... maybe the submeter ... ? I forgot.

The submeter is finally installed now. It's faster than ever ... yikes. But that's better than the last one ... it simply stopped and moved strangely slow ... if the landlady ever finds out about that with me not replacing it, I'm in for a series of sermons and probably get kicked out of the house.

The landlady is kind enough sometimes, she gave me a girbaud wallet for this Christmas =) but can be a bit harsh ... especially on the maid here, sometimes I caught her crying with her eyes red and all. The rest of the dormers notice that too. She's bossy sometimes and once I've been called out "Hoy" ... I simply didn't appreciate that call. But ... well, she owns the place ... she has every right to throw some weight around here. I will not complain.

Next week my bike is up for another session of repairs ... this time I pinpointed the problem to the electricals of the bike, not the battery ... maybe the battery was alright in the first place! tsk, wasted 1.4k on that one. Maybe a tune-up and oil change can be done as well ...

Before Wrapping ...

2005-12-18T14:36:00.000+08:00

Pic(4)_3
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

The two lady friends will receive a sad puppy dog plushie and a penguin puppet that has a little dog inside heehee, the penguin gave birth to an ugly dog. I wanna see the look of our secretary's face when she sees this. The pup is for my lady boss, I always go like *sad puppy look* at her ym =)

A motorcycle Ducati999 model for my friend's birthday ... I've seen another model which is bigger ... that's a Suzuki Hayabuza 1200cc I think ... so ... very ... tempting ... took me 15 minutes staring at the fully detailed model of a big bike ... I finally came to my senses and bought just one for the gift instead, none for me =)

The rest of the gifts are chocolates =)

That's a wrap ..

2005-12-18T14:31:00.000+08:00

Pic(12)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Been wrapping up gifts this season ... a few for my lady friends at the office, 2 for my parents ... one for our office exchange gift and the last for a bday gift.

What I find annoying in wrapping up is taking off the price tag stickers ... they just won't come off! if they do they rip up half of the sticker and I had to use my nails to pull them off. SM is notorious for making super sticky stickers, arrgh.

Sinigang

2005-12-18T12:21:00.000+08:00

Pic(13)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I did it! I boiled some stuff =) This is from a friend's own recipe of spicy sinigang, it's my favorite and from what I made yesterday ... it's very good =) it only needs a bit more okra to add some more thickness to the broth.

Aileen's Spicy Sinigang Recipe: (makes 1-2 servings)
1/4kl pork cuts, cubed
7 pieces of gabi
1 fish sauce(patis)
1 piece tomato (cut into pieces)
3 pcs. okra (or more, I could've added more on this one, oh well, next time)
2 pieces sili sinigang (I think 1 will do, just chop it down to pieces)
1 small pack tamarind soup base (sampaloc mix)
1 pechay (or kangkong?)

Steps:
1. Boil water in pot
2. put in pork to make it soft
3. put some gabi, then some pieces of tomato
4. if the pork is soft enough, add some okra
6. mix, put in some fish sauce (2 tbsp.) and sampaloc mix (just half a pouch)
7. put in some pechay or kangkong
8. eat =)

Then came Saturday evening I visited a Christmas B-day party of a college mate who's also into biking. I didn't take my mc to get there, the service road there is enough to wear me down ... to think I have another appointment early next morning.

Today is Sunday, noontime ... I just finished attending that 'binyag' at San Antonio Church at that Forbes place ... just a quicky session of baptism for my cousin's baby girl. They wanted me to join in for lunch but ... I couldn't, my electric submeter just quitted on me... and the only available time of my electrician is this noontime. I'm waiting for him now ... got everything ready ... the new submeter here costed me another 840php =(

December

2005-12-13T21:16:00.000+08:00

Pic was from a couple of weeks ago ... our danish boss went to visit and train us again ... more sessions os grueling typo3 ... The next visitor will be their Sys admin ... I might be his apprentice soon ... lots to learn by then ...

The next few weeks became a bit more busy, but slightly more relaxed now 'cause our main boss isn't around anymore. We all got some gifts from our lady boss I hardly call 'mommy' anymore ... I think it's getting a bit ridiculous now ;-)

Last week I had a zpdee broadband internet installed ... broadband connection nowadays are getting cheaper and cheaper ... the only thing expensive for this connection is the modem rent .... a painful 2k. But they'd return my money anyway when I cancel my account.

I had a few lineup of events this week ... birthday parties, baptismal stuff, drawing of the exchange gift thingy .... hmmm... what else ....

So far I've received some gift groceries and a huge sack of rice from the company ... plus a girbaud wallet from my landlady.

Tuesdays with Morrie

2005-12-05T09:42:00.000+08:00

Tuesdays with Morrie
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Last night I thought to myself why am I sweating bullets trying to earn more than I have right now ... It's nice to have but ... Maybe something's missing. I needed to renew my goals & direction in life.

The next morning I did all the scheduled tasks that I made on my palm. Did the groceries, bought a new gas stove ... I was looking for some masking tape at the stationery store but they ran out of it ... As I was leaving I spotted this little paperback tagged as "Tuesdays with Morrie" ... hmm ok, I was about to turn around when ... "10% off" hey now ... I've heard so much about this, I said. So I bought it, thinking maybe it could help out on all this uneasiness and the emotional state that I'm in. finished all my business at the mall and went on home.

I cooked the beef the same way for lunch today, fried ... Had some mushrooms on the side ... It was ok. Then later I began to read that book ... After several pages my face looked sad ... This is too dreary, it's all about dying ... It's touching at that ... But it's too much for a couple of minutes of reading ... So decided to take a break, opened up a packet of M&M's(they have a promo, 1st prize is a Honda Jazz!) and played a game of starfighter (linux game). My fighter jet died =( ... the batteries on my palm keyboard died too :-( Maybe I'll read up again sometime ... I'm much too depressed right now.

Catching up

2005-11-30T10:30:00.000+08:00

Late with movies
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Movies are ok ... Going to the movies with friends ... I've even gone most of the time with myself ... Most people may find that odd for someone going alone in the movies. I've got little problems with it, it can get lonely sometimes. So most often I prefer to catch up on rented videos instead.

Last night I rented that Batman Beyond thing ... Arahan, and a Series of Unfortunate Events. Arahan disappointed me, it feels like some kung-fu version of Sassy girl ... or maybe it's just me ... There's some humorous points at the beginning, and lots of shouting in the end, sheesh. I wish that policeman would've been just an extra in the beginning.

Batman's fine. What I really like is that Unfortunate Events movie. Emily Browning looks very cute in that flick ;-) maybe it's that hairstyle, or those nice full lips, or that dress or something, I wish I could date her. I liked the movie setting too, it's just sooo dark it's tasty. Strangely funny. The production people of that movie is so very imaginative. I like it. I just might buy an original copy of it. That elf from the beginning almost tricked me though, I was like ... "Ugh! Those jerks from video city switched my cd's!". I was sitting with my microwaved popcorn staring at the sickening singing birds & That elf ... As if hypnotized. @__@

Anyways ... Doom and Harry Potter I think was the latest I have watched ... Which was fine too. I just didn't appreciate the wands ...

Living in a Box

2005-11-30T10:18:00.000+08:00

Pic(18).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

[Another Late Post]

So I showed a mini video of my room at Belair to my officemates ... "You live in a box then" humorously blurted by our lead programmer. It's kinda like a basement actually ... I just furnished it a bit with white wallpapers kindly donated by my landlady to me, I setup some white blinds to my only window and a greeny rug on the floor where I sit infront of my computer.

Living in a box is ok, it's fine .. It's just ... Ok. Living independently certainly changes my persona for the better. There are some annoyances though. Like for example my air bed ... It's a steal for only 600+php, but small enough to fit a camper's tent. what's annoying are the noises that it makes. All that rubbery squeaking & rubbery rubbing sounds are enough to keep me awake late at night ... But if I just be careful of my every move it would'nt make a sound, but that's very difficult. The sides of the bed are touching the top & right wall, and the constant rubbing of it whenever the bed is sat on or slept on to will make a sound. A bit of a disturbance but I can be able to forget about especially when I am really tired. I can sleep like a rock & the bed can't complain audibly.

The door ... My only door ... Cannot fully open ... It's crowded enough that my bed is touching it half-open. So the trick here is to open it half-way, walk towards the left side near the fridge and squeeze through, then close it. Behold, welcome to my box. that's all there is to it ... I can only accomodate one guest ... If they fit in the door ...

Intoxicated

2005-11-30T10:05:00.000+08:00

Blinds
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

My officemates & our danish guest all went to a bar at Metrowalk Ortigas. Had a couple of drinks ... They made me order a ladies drink! ... Ugh, had a few shots of whatever & finally a few bottles of that strong ice beer. Every bathroom break I had has it's transitional phase, it's like my vision gets slowed down every visit. After the last few glasses of that strong ice I've felt I had enough ... Any more and I'll be stumbling across the seats. After our lady friends broke a few glasses (that was 3 glasses I think) while being slightly dazed we felt it's time to go home.

I escorted our secretary to her home in marikina. Nearly 200php for a taxi cab =( ... I had to stay at her house cause it's much too late, it's too dangerous out there at that hour.

The next morning I felt hot .. I had a fever after getting home ... Must've been that shower of rain that caught me before getting to the bar. And the after-effects of all that alcohol made me nauseous even in the morning. I simply hated beer ... But I was being pressured there ... I wanted to try out one of those wines but they were a bit too expensive, our danish guy is paying.

Today I'm slowly recovering from that fever ... Thank goodness it's not some flu or something. And why does my neck look reddish?? ... Itchy too.

Radeon 9250

2005-11-25T17:00:00.000+08:00

Radeon 9250
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Just replaced my old video card ... it's acting up. There goes my jacket money ... :`-(

I'm almost at the peak of where I could catch up on my savings ... just had to fix up my bike's electricals & buy some spices & stuff for my cooking purposes (yes, I can now cook! (frying only ;-) )).

I thought I had things good to go ... but my boss just told me of a raise next year ... a raise for my tax =( my 301php tax would rise up to 1400+ ... add to that some other deductions like SSS, PhilHealth, etc, *sob*.

My calculated savings each month are now a tiny spec of dust in my financial world. There are just too many expenses to count ... and my assets doesn't give out enough.

I had setup 170php for my everyday meals ... my officemates thought it was too much for just 1 day ... hehe. I'll make it a point from now on to cook everyday, all evenings. The rest are free anyway from the office.

I ran out breakfast today ... what I had is a can of tuna and some Mr. Chips :P

If my calculations are correct in deducting the expenses on meals and replacing it with just cooking my own food from now on ... I'll save a huge bundle. Y'know, just yesterday I cooked some nice tender pork cutlets, marinated in adobo sauce, maggi savor and some salt+pepper ... tastes good =) I'm doing well. Maybe next month I'll try cooking broths & boiling stuff, I only know how to fry at the moment ;-)

I'm out of cooking oil ... hmmm...

'Till your face turn blue

2005-11-16T17:38:00.000+08:00

screen_nordictypo
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

This morning it's all Typo3, typo3, typo3 ... there's this one extension(realurl) that almost drove me nuts trying to configure it. I've been reading oodles & oodles of documentation & mailing lists on how to get this plugin working correctly. One comment I've read that most typo3 docs are so un-userfriendly, his face almost turned blue. I think mine almost did.

Took me the whole morning non-stop 'till 3:00pm ... I let out a "...whew" after finally getting it working, It's a job well done today.

Of course I expect Sune & the others to let me configure this thing deep enough, Arrgh!. This is just a basic configuration.

My only rant for this CMS is the documentation I guess ... there's just not enough examples, it totally heads straight through the technical stuff for development. I had to rely on wiki's & mailing lists rather than the official documentation.

Suzuki Bandit

2005-11-16T16:57:00.000+08:00

Pic(3)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Spotted on Market2x ... with a "Club Bandit" sticker at it's tail. I may have read a thread on that Bandit club at the MCP forums ..

A Bandit 400cc is cool, but they say the carbs are sensitive ... I wonder why is that? and how could that affect riding? This thing is loud, I've heard one such monster screaming at the stretch near Katipunan ... *broom!* *broom!* nasty.

Anyway this is my 2nd choice for a big bike, my 1st is a Honda CB400 or Super Four.

Fenrir

2005-11-15T09:57:00.000+08:00

fenrir7
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Fenrir (or Fenris) is a gigantic and terrible monster in the shape of a wolf. He is the eldest child of Loki and the giantess Angrboda. The gods learned of a prophecy which stated that the wolf and his family would one day be responsible for the destruction of the world. They caught the wolf and locked him in a cage. Only the god of war, Tyr, dared to feed and take care of the wolf.

When he was still a pup they had nothing to fear, but when the gods saw one day how he had grown, they decided to render him harmless. However, none of the gods had enough courage to face the gigantic wolf. Instead, they tried to trick him. They said the wolf was weak and could never break free when he was chained. Fenrir accepted the challenge and let the gods chain him. Unfortunately, he was so immensely strong that he managed to break the strongest fetters as if they were cobwebs.

After that, the gods saw only one alternative left: a magic chain. They ordered the dwarves to make something so strong that it could hold the wolf. The result was a soft, thin ribbon: Gleipnir. It was incredibly strong, despite what its size and appearance might suggest. The ribbon was fashioned of six strange elements: the footstep of a cat; the roots of a mountain; a woman's beard; the breath of fishes; the sinews of a bear; and a bird's spittle.

The gods tried to trick the wolf again, only this time Fenrir was less eager to show his strength. He saw how thin the chain was, and said that was no pride in breaking such a weak chain. Eventually, though, he agreed, thinking that otherwise his strength and courage would be doubted. Suspecting treachery however, he in turn asked the gods for a token of good will: one of them had to put a hand between his jaws. The gods were not overly eager to do this, knowing what they could expect. Finally, only Tyr agreed, and the gods chained the wolf with Gleipnir. No matter how hard Fenrir struggled, he could not break free from this thin ribbon. In revenge, he bit off Tyr's hand.

Being very pleased with themselves, the gods carried Fenrir off and chained him to a rock (called Gioll) a mile down into the earth. They put a sword between his jaws to prevent him from biting. On the day of Ragnarok, Fenrir will break his chains and join the giants in their battle against the gods. He will seek out Odin and devour him. Vidar, Odin's son, will avenge his father by killing the wolf.

That was the name of Cloud's bike, from FF7 Advent Children. I don't care for the name, sure it's a stylish name but ... I care more for the bike itself ... it's really the MOST! It's gorgeous, shiny & musculine. I sure wish they had one of these monsters roaming around our fair roads. I'd buy one if I had the money.

But of course ... it's just a fantasy bike ... it ignores most of all natural physics & gravity. Seen the movie? this bike could slide a lot ... it has some really cool bike stand at the bottom that automatically drops down when the rider wants to unmount. I don't care for the sword slots, we'll never use 'em. I simply wish for a similar monster like this, doesn't have to be 1000cc's and up, maybe a 400cc+ will do. Being below that would be a shame, stylish and nowhere to go.

Slow down ...

2005-11-14T18:21:00.001+08:00

Pic(4)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

My mind wanders again ... Maybe it's time to reflect? No. I've done enough of that ... Something's bothering me ... It's probably nothing ...

The ride to home today was crazy ... I was not myself. It's as if it's something inside my head who's doing the driving ... I've got something in mind ... Gum, girls & toothpaste.

what am I saying anyway ...

Is that really a good deal?

2005-11-14T18:21:00.000+08:00

Pic(5)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Well, you really do get what you pay for ... my 1gig PQI SD card is clunking up, acts weird most of the time. My mouse shifts it's cursor to the extreme left & right ... Killed my character in most of my pc games :-( , created a lot of untitled folders, made a mess of my desktop ... Stupid CDR King mouse.

CDR King's items are cheap, but I the quality is bad. They won't last long, that's why I don't trust our office backups ... Sure I made them, automated each one of 'em via rsync & scp, good enough on it's own at a certain directory ... But with those cheap CDR King cdr's?? I don't trust those things! I'd rather bring my own branded cdr's than use those cheap coasters & cup holders. A lot of those cd's didn't burn right, grrr,..

But sometimes I just can't help myself, I really am in a financial slump these past few weeks. It'll take me about two months to recover from that submeter charge & maintenance repairs for my bike.

Maybe I should return that optical mouse from the office to here and use a track ball mouse there at my cubicle instead...

Those tiny things ...

2005-11-14T18:18:00.000+08:00

Set638_01
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Those tiny things ...

Those tiny things I own ... It's all built for a single bachelor like myself. Looks like I'll be creating quite a mess from all that future cooking I plan to do. I could'nt keep up with the expenses from all that 'take-out' from fast food. I just had to cook my own food from now on to save a few pesos.

Even coins I gathered, costed around 800php from all the 5-10peso coins alone, I'll get started with the 1peso coins soon. Why am I doing this ... My bike's electric start is failing again, the problem must've not been the battery ... My submeter is faulty, if my landlady finds out ... Well, I'll need to replace it.

I hate these expenses, I thought I could save again for next month ... But no.

Mohicans Quotes

2005-11-14T18:17:00.000+08:00

Set639_01
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Mohicans Quotes

DANCING IN YOUR SOUL
"Every one of my thoughts, my smiles & my tears, all my dreams ... Are really mine. The beat of this heart, the sky in my eyes, the rainbow in my words ... Are really mine and only mine. Nobody could steal or buy them and my sould will be their guardian till the end of time."

WORLD INSIDE MY HEART
"You Created rules for a better world, but then you found a way to break them, 'cause they made you suffer. But you keep on being not free but youu still keep on suffering. In our hearts we find our pain, our freedom, our rules. "

BEAUTIFUL WAVES IN THE SKY
"They never stop ... It's constant movement everywhere. If my thoughts were the sky, they would kiss the moon."

RIDING STORM
"Give me a horse for riding and embracing all the hidden wind in the air"

Indians

2005-11-08T13:16:00.000+08:00

SMECD029
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Native Americans ... They've started to grow some interest in me ... After hearing some chants & music from that 'Mohicans' CD ... I hear a few chants on Enigma's & Enya's too ...

Looking at those native's pictures, they seem to have a huge amount of dignity & self-respect to themselves ... It's like the japanese samurai who value 'honor'.

"Beautiful Waves in the Sky" ... One of the song titles, I wonder if they ever saw the ocean? I've never seen or heard of native americans being around large bodies of water ...

I could skip the parts where the indians get too violent ... Y'know ... The scalping & all. The rest are cool in my book. They're tough too, my Dad told me a story of a surgeon friend who operated on a native american without anesthetics, they ran out of those pain killers & stuff, but the indian decided to go with it anyway. Yeowch.

Tough & Wise ...

Sunday

2005-11-07T11:49:00.000+08:00

No, I don't know what I'm doing ... The wallpaper hanging job was terrible! ... It's so tiring to do and the result looks obviously from a novice wallpaper hanger ...

Saturday

2005-11-07T11:36:00.000+08:00

Today I went bowling out with my colleagues(sp?) near that Walter Mart place ... Then a movie at Glorietta.

Before getting home I bought some healthy vegetarian dinner at Bodhi's ... Then a short walk around Glorietta.

Earlier I noticed my submeter isn't turning anymore ... I turned on my microwave to make sure and it really is not moving. I'm getting free electricity at this time but that'd be cheating ... And if my landlady noticed my incredibly low electricy use I'd be kicked out of this house. So I contacted my electrician and he said he'll be able to fix it next week ... But 'fixing' it means replacing the faulty submeter ... And that'd cost me a small fortune :-( why can't I save anymore?

After getting home from the walk & bike ride I knocked on my submeter ... And it turned! It's working nicely now ... But my electrician told me then that if that would happen again, I'd really have to replace it.

I thought things would work out fine ... But when I opened up my pc .. I get all gibberish colours & texts on my monitor ... I tried fixing it but .. No go. I dunno if it's the video card or my monitor ... But it's probably my vid card :-( that would cost me a bundle too. Then it rained and got some of my clothes in the hanger wet, I did my laundry this morning myself.

Today I learned a few things ... I'm not good at bowling, I could actually do coding in my cellphone (my boss txted me awhile ago and asked for some sample php code).

Tomorrow I'll try using that wallpaper given to me by the landlady, I hope I know what I'm doing ...

Late Post3

2005-11-04T18:07:00.000+08:00

Pic(22).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Catchy Commercials

"Hug-a-Mom-Attack!" ... Nice rythm to it ... It's that Vaseline commercial. It's one of those commercial jingles that keeps popping in your head out of nowhere. It's stuck there somewhat. Hug-a-Mom-Attack~ ... Hugamomattack! Everydaaayy, lalala.

So I bought one yesterday, but there's no music to it ... Awwww :P

Everydaaayyy~ ... Hug-mom-attack~ ^___^ ... Mm... So when will I shut up .. ? :P

Pic: a Honda Super Four I saw on Market Market, hope it's real ... it looks awesome ... *drools*

Late Post2

2005-11-04T18:05:00.001+08:00

Pic(6).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Halloween

I've been thinking ... All the things I've been doing right now are ... Routine ... Nothing different, hardly productive. I've been thinking up new goals or improve the ones I have ...

In my spare time I should read more books about entreneurship, successful businesses, self-employment, open source, etc. Hopefully mixing them up together to form something that will get me to retire before my 30's. Too big a goal ne? When I can't even earn enough each month cause of the rental bills I pay ... I need to tighten up my belt a bit.

At times I feel another form of change, I feel like fasting to recover some spiritual sense in me ... I know I've been losing something very important in my life. I should'nt get too much of a good thing ... Or it'll eat me up and leave me empty. The new man before feels old enough already ... I want to become a 'new' man again. The old one took a nasty detour that doesn't lead to the road of life. I'm not as strong as I though I was, but always trying to be ... And that's good.

I should keep in mind my nightly exercise too ... (I can't exercise in the mornings, too sleepy) ... Feeling tired & sleepy will not be an excuse anymore. Tightening up my belt and putting on my gloves too ...

Pic: Belair2 walk.

Late Post

2005-11-04T18:05:00.000+08:00

Pic(27).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Last Weekend

Birthday of one of our officemates ,.. I saw a beer can in front of me :P ... I didn't finish it, drank only half of it I guess ... Awful taste.

The next day & Sunday I went shopping for groceries & stuff .. Replaced some of my posters with a giant map of manila. I saw the movie Doom, it's pretty good ... The climax turns out to be some realistic doom game demo thing, real nice ... This is probably the first movie I ever saw using third-person perspective ... With a gun. I'm a bit disappointed not being able to see the other doom bad guys ... I remember that giant ball of demon face that fires some stuff ... I wish I could've seen that instead of those ugly mutated humanoids. And why is it the theme of most horror movies nowadays? There's always something about a virus, genetics, etc, bio weapons, blah ... C'mon ... Resident evil? Those zombie movies? And now doom? ... Ah... Yeah ... It's halloween.

Anyways I'm dead tired right now, those groceries are a tad bit heavy. Loading 'em on my motorcycle in a light shower is quite a challenge too.

Oh, well ... I've spent quite a bit this week ... It's time to fast a bit ;-) night, night.

Pic: Ancient Konoha ninja scrolls ... ;-) but it's just wallpaper ... my landlady gave 'em to me ... maybe I could set it up this weekend ...

Snooze is evil

2005-10-28T16:53:00.000+08:00

Pic(10).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

That snooze button! ... I feel like a zombie every morning pressing that snooz button everytime my 2 alarms does it's stuff. "I needed 9 more minutes of sleep .. zzz" *click* . Later I find myself hurrying to get to work ... waking up almost 30 minutes before being late. For this month's salary I got a 1.25 peso deduction for my lates ... I live almost next to work now ;-)

Next few days I won't be having any internet connection ... so I guess the only entertainment I could get are local games & videos from my pc ... of course I could ride around my mc if I feel like it ... I have no plans next few days, probably visit the house in Taytay, manage some of my stuff ...

See you next week.

Tech Replublic Blog

2005-10-27T09:39:00.000+08:00

A link to my tech republic blog ... This'll keep my blog organized, who wants to read techy stuff on a personal blog site anyway ... This blog is also linked there, so that page has both content.

Deadly Stupidity

2005-10-27T09:32:00.000+08:00

Pic(2)
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

The fort area ... I can't believe most of my close calls happen near the Fort ... probably all those intersections.

I was just heading straight when this wild jeepney driver crossed the intersection trying to get ahead of another jeepney. I thought he'd slow down because he must've seen me approaching and I had the right of way anyway (he's the one crossing) but NOOO! he still went on racing against that other puj and almost blocked my target road. I had to swerve to the right on the crown of the road to avoid being hit. As I was swerving it felt nothing, my brain took over and made all the necessary decisions & maneuvers ... then after the 'stunt' my feet and hands started to lose feeling, damn it. That was so damn close, I don't even have time to push my horn to express my rage to this guy.

As I went past I looked back and decided to stop and confront the guy ... guess what? he slowed down ... so slow I had no choice but to move on. He doesn't want confrontation. I hate these guys, whenever they do something wrong on the road they pretend nothing happened ... you try to look at them and say something and they look the other way. For once I'd like them to feel a fistful of leather ... in their throat.

I wish all the rich motorcycle owners lend these guys a bike (seriously) ... and let them run down Edsa or the intersections of the Fort and C5 ... no brakes. I'd pay good money to see the looks of their faces facing their own kind, but in a smaller vehicle.

Stand-Up Comedy

2005-10-25T16:39:00.000+08:00

seinfeld-cast
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Spent some time watching downloaded stand-up comedy mp3's & videos last night. Funny stuff, but some are just too dumb and I must not be the target audience. The time I hear "sh*t", "f**k", "black people", "racism", "sex/dirty jokes", "religous insults", "a**ho*e's" and piles of cr*p, plus a variety of cheap shots in a stand-up comedy ... it's as good as deleted.

I prefer the more wholesome, well thought-out materials for comedy. Ones that sometimes require you to use your brain a little, or ones for the refined crowd. Not one of those cheap humor with all that screaming and acting stupid on stage ... I dunno why the heck the audience is laughing with that one ... c'mon, what's up with niggers, blacks, whites ... show me something more creative than insulting another race. And cursing out loud in front of a live audience is NOT funny, I was just sitting last night figuring out what made that one funny.

Seinfeld is a good one, nice show on tv too ... he's one of my favorites ... Also Stephen Lynch & Mitch Hedberg I just downloaded this week. Lynch mixed in guitar playing + singing with humor. Mitch feels like a regular comic but there's something about that 'cool' casual style of talking on stage, add some of that coolness with those glasses & long hair. Lesse what more they have to offer the next few downloads ...

Edit: Shoot, Lynch has some stupid shots. Sex-related jokes, that spanish curse word tutorial. *Deleted*, what a waste of talent on dirty humor.

Renovations ... yet again ...

2005-10-24T13:12:00.000+08:00

Pic(12).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I don't believe this ... wait ... I do!. The workers cancelled the supposed ceiling repair and decided to do it TODAY! that's so annoying ... I would've wanted to keep watch of my stuff while they wreck up the ceiling plywoods and put in a new one.

Awhile ago after lunch I visited my room again, the plywoods are there ... all new and all. But it's not painted yet. They will be painting it sometime this week. I asked "Why not now??", they wanted to paint up everything 'till all the ceiling work around the house is done. Darn it. My room is open to those workers ... the same workers that asked the landlady to buy up 24 more floor tiles when it only needs 8. It's like the same guy who asked me to buy up a whole box of wires for the submeter where it only needed a few meters.

The landlady is furious about this, so am I ... all this renovations is keeping my room wide-open to those opportunists. I brought all my valuables here with me in my office just to be safe. My pc and all other stuff are protected by a thin layer of newspapers ... what criminal mind could penetrate this fortress of security ... newspapers ... bah!.

Pic: Part of our office ... I think it looks nice with that Christmas tree on the right.

Renovations

2005-10-21T15:06:00.000+08:00

Pic(7).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Great, now my room is being renovated ... they had to change the tiles & fix the screenings & cabinets. Now my stuff is stuck outside again, I hope it doesn't rain today. I hope nothing gets broken/stolen too, I can't afford a single loss today ... now that my budget can't handle anymore repairs & replacements.

Gotta admire some parts of my landlady's garden, some are ok ... except the ones near that mini pond, I don't like the idea of putting little dwarf statues & giant butterfly & dragonfly statues in there ... I would've prefered something like bonsai's, artsy rocks & stuff ... maybe I should grow my own bonsai sometime ... they're cool plants.

Dreams

2005-10-19T08:59:00.000+08:00

Good dreams, bad dreams ... I always get one when I sleep face-up & arms around my head. The last few days I had 3 consecutive bad dreams ... no they're not nightmares, thinking about it ... hardly anything scares me anymore ... hmmm ... when I was a kid I had plenty to worry about.

First bad dream is about me doing some kind of escort service in a ... tryke ... ugh. A motorcycle with a sidecar crap ... after delivery I fell out of a volcano that popped out of nowhere ... "...." what the hell was that all about ... @__@

Second bad dream is me going back in school ... (horrors!) .. I failed to submit some kind of paper requirement and failed class ... the next morning I thought for a second if I'm still in school or not .. hmm :P ok, I'm not anymore .. thank goodness ...

The last one was bizzarrrre, I'm in some kind of third dimension ... everthing is dark, then later I find myself in a room with this weird looking black jellyfish with rusty black flexible-spikes as it's tentacles, rusty chains & all ... of course the end had to be those spikes piercing me, no biggie. Not a sweat or anything after waking up ... but my back hurts...

Before buying that air-bed I've been having bad dreams .... probably cause of that 5-pillow + portable *hard* bed mixture. I needed good comfort if I wanted some pleasant dreams.

Last night I had a good dream .. but ... darnit, I forgot what it was ... @__@ it's easy to remember bad dreams neh?

Pic: The belair cross ... that's the house I dorm in, and right behind it is the Church. It's comforting to see that glowing blue cross everytime I get home ... It's a great reminder to spend some time thinking of more important things than the busy city life ... too many distractions can leave you empty real quick.

Renovations

2005-10-18T09:21:00.000+08:00

The bathroom & kitchen from my dorm house is being renovated ... I won't be able to use it for three days I'm told ... oh well, they allowed me to use the owner's private bathrooms anyway. Having a shared bathroom ain't that bad ... I never have to clean it ;-) it's my most hated chore, the maid cleans it up for us every week. Buuut ... there are times having no private bathroom can be quite a hassle, just today I came up to the bathroom twice just to find someone else using it. I hope those renovated bathroom tiles gets to dry soon ...

My laundry is at the cleaners, 25php per kilo. I could only pick it up wednesday evening :-( I guess I'm stuck with my least favorite clothes. Sometimes I had to do my own laundry, scrubbing soap with a pail & 'all ... I have no washing machine. Why do I have to do that? Our main cleaners' office is getting renovated too :-\ ... it's a nice month to renovate I guess ...

Pic: I just bought my own air-bed ... the foldable bed + 5 pillows can't provide enough lumbar support ... my back hurts every morning with it. The air bed is fine now ... cheap 600php from Market2x. You'll notice I frequent Market2x than other malls ne? their parking is cheaper, 10php for the whole day. Minimum for Glorietta is 25php, no thanks, I'm under budget here. Anyways my back doesn't hurt anymore. The only problem I had with it is the air pump, it's built in the bed itself ... a pain to inflate. And since that bed is made of that rubbery thing, it makes squeeky noises whenever I try to make a move. But that's fine, it's the only air-bed small enough to fit my quarters.

Roadblocks

2005-10-17T09:39:00.000+08:00

I couldn't edit our samba configs as some of our developers are complaining of not being able to connect ... we don't have a test server yet so I couldn't do enough to make my tasks work. Our 'Roaming Profile' setup & automounts will not be deployed for awhile.

Anyway, I Just read the foreword by Kasper Skarhoj (creator of Typo3) from the book "Typo3, Enterprise Content Mangement" which was bought by one of our Denmark bosses for us (Amazon.com) $59.99 US (yeoch!) ... During his early years he loved art and hated programming ... but eventually loved programming thinking of it as an artform itself =) He is also religious, I guess that explains the picture of Christ on one of the config pages of typo3, he used it as a test image for graphic rendering.

Believing in Jesus also made him share his code to the opensource community, "you got it for nothing, give it for nothing", "feed the hungry", "love your neighbor". "Goodbye World, Hello GPL". He would've earned lots of EUROs selling them to companies but he shared it anyway.

Life in the Bazaar led to annual snowboarding events for those friends he acquired after sharing typo3.

Y'know I'm beginning to like typo3 ... sure it's powerful but ... it's complexity is kinda overwhelming (development side) ... it's like re-learning an ever more cryptic Perl language, probably even more complex than that in my experience ... it's fun learning new things anyway, and it's probably rewarding seeing what magic it could do. Arrgh! those templates & Typoscript @_@ ... for a professional/enterprise level cms, all this headache better pay off soon ...

Edit: Hey!! it's tops in the user ratings http://opensourcecms.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=388&Itemid=143

Edit: Today I bought the girls at the office two packs of chocolate mallows :P

Typo3

2005-10-14T15:56:00.000+08:00

We now have a new task of converting our php spam reporting project to a typo3 project. We had to redo most of our work so it would run on typo3 ... sigh, this is the most difficult part. I hardly knew when to start awhile ago, but I got it to display something anyway. The tables are all renamed, then our includes are missing ...

What's so different about Typo3 from the rest of the other CMS's is the learning curve ... it is definitely a programmer's CMS! We're still learning the basics here ... climbing up that steep hill ... hopefully all this is worth it. How much do they pay for typo3 specialists here anyway? I dunno ...

The samba server is running fine afterall ... I've received reports of it not working, turned out to be some other problem instead. The ldap+samba pdc implementation I've been knocking myself out with is draining my patience ... sure I could authenticate users across the network but ... my boss wanted something like a 'Roaming Profile' thing ... and that automount of user home directories ... I've read a gazillion of tutorials already, none of them worked in full. I'm still reading IBM's way of doing it ... hopefully at the end of this month I could make it work. For now someone suggested to use autofs for automounting each client, it sorta froze our development server :P "Ooops , Sorry!".

That's the problem of having no test servers & clients ... I had to use our own servers for testing and if something goes wrong ... all I could say is "Ooops, Sorry!". I could hardly deploy anything on time without my own playground of networks ...

At least I did something useful for our servers so far ... I had subversion, cronned auto backup scripts, samba printer shares using cups, nfs, samba, a half working samba pdc, ldap auth ... but would've been great with that automount thingy, whatever they call it.

I hate roadblocks, every Admin hated roadblocks ... I had to face one big one which is that automount thing ... the idea of reading almost every documentation and eventually failing is a nightmare! ...

Speaking of nightmares ... hmm.. I'll blog that next time. Haaay ... roadblocks & typo3 ...

Not so close

2005-10-13T10:16:00.000+08:00

Yesterday I heard the most crunchiest thunder in my life, it sounded as if it hit something in the neighbor's house, the sound even went through the loud headphones I'm listening to. The crack is not like the whip sound but kinda feels like some ball of electricity hit something till it burns. Kinda like a fireball or something. Coolness.

Today I found this shortcut from Buendia to Fort ... I went past this flyover ... Saw the famed 'alligator' steel-like zippers that connects the flyover to some part of it ... So many accidents on that spot, when it rains the metal rails become too slippery, lots of bikers & even cars fall victim to this. I took the initiative to spot it first as I climb the wet flyover ... I leaned on the rightmost lane to be safe. I found the death trap in the middle.

I got to Marketx2 safely and had my dinner, fastfood as always. Makes me wish I could cook, I would've saved a lot of money.

Upon leaving I geared up, balaclava, helm, leather gloves ... Kickstarted away to Buendia again. On the way there's this road with a small intersection to the right. A car signalled to to make a left and cross on my opposite direction. Ok, fine go ahead ... Then I proceeded to go on ahead after my yield ... Another car followed without regard to my light signals as I proceed to go through ... Thinking he could make it by following the first one. Damn it, I hit the brakes so hard it screeched as I slowed down. I gave an angry stare to the driver as he still proceeded to move towards the next road. He's talking on the phone. HE should be the one giving way not me!! I wonder if they still catch those drivers making calls while on the road with one hand in the side of their heads, and failing to give the right of way. They're so comfy on those cages they feel invincible enough to forget they're like carrying a weapon on the road.

BLUE

2005-10-13T09:55:00.000+08:00

Song Title: BLUE
Performed by: Mai Yamane
Featuring: Soichiro Otsuka and Gabriela Robin (Soprano Voice)
Lyrics by: Tim Jensen
This song is the ED theme to the final session of Cowboy Bebop, The Real Folk Blues Part II.

Blue
Never seen a bluer sky
Yeah I can feel it reaching out
and moving closer
There's something 'bout blue

Asked myself what it's all for
You know the funny thing about it
I couldn't answer
No, I couldn't answer

Things have turned a deeper shade of blue
and images that might be real
maybe illusion
Keep flashing off and on

Free . . .
Wanna be free . . . Gonna be free . . .
and move among the stars
You know they really aren't so far

Feels so free . . .
Gotta know free . . . Please . . .
Don't wake me from the dream
It's really everything it seemed

I'm so free . . .
No black and white in the blue

Everything is clearer now
Life is just a dream, you know
that's never ending
I'm ascending

Trust

2005-10-11T17:20:00.000+08:00

Pic(kymco_xciting).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Third post for the day? was it second? I dunno... I've got quite a few to blog on my 'to-blog' list ...

Why the title? earlier I posted about that St. Paul Church ... the time the Lord's Prayer came in the people didn't seem to touch hands, they only hold the ones they know and hardly on strangers ...

Should I expect that from people living in an executive village? even the guards ... they STILL ask me where I come from, What?! they must've known me by now ...

The village is fine and all, but if everyone is just that stuck-up as I see so far ... well ... what can I do ...

Pic: Kymco Xciting (I don't care much for the name), 500cc monster. It's huge, bigger than the dink (I don't care for it's name either). Awfully pricey ... 300k I think ... I wish they'd change the name at least ... it doesn't look exciting to me ...

Memento Mori

2005-10-11T16:45:00.000+08:00

The St. Paul Church I now regularly frequent in provides some relaxation ... the Church is air-conditioned, they have fine music & choirs, their psalms, announcements, etc. are all displayed in a projector connected to a laptop using powerpoint. Some announcements include their financial status taken from all the donations (with my 5-20 pesos included ;-) ).

The priests gives out interesting sermons ... the last sermon story is about this great sinner who wanted to change, he visited the Pope for his very first confession. The Pope then asked him to perform some small tasks for his penance. All of them the sinner said he could'nt do for several reasons (didn't have the time, health wouldn't permit it, etc). The Pope then finally told him to wear a ring, with an inscription "Memento Mori" ... he's supposed to read the inscription everyday. That changed the sinner's life ;-)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Memento mori is a Latin phrase that may be freely translated as "Remember that you are mortal" or "Remember your death" (literally "remember mortality"). It names a genre of artistic creations that vary widely from one another, but which all share the same purpose, which is to remind people of their own mortality.

Treat each day as if it's your last ...

Breakfast

2005-10-11T16:34:00.000+08:00

Pic(5)_1.jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I usually have a slop of frosted corn flakes or honeyed rice, a glass of orange juice & a piece of fruit ... usually pears. I kinda wished for some pancakes sometimes ... but I don't have a pan for cooking one yet ... and where can I cook one? I just don't have the space :`-(

Hmm.. I think I saw one of those portable pan things for frying & stuff ... kinda like George Foreman's Lean-mean fat reducing grilling machine ... that's a long name.

Daily morning routines include the incredible effort of trying to wake up, ironing my clothes ... sometimes I had to do some small laundry, dishwashing, then some bathroom showery stuff, dress up and leave.

Laundry & dishwashing are probably my most hated chores ... I never liked getting my hands wet when I work.

Guard's fave & my life update

2005-10-10T08:46:00.000+08:00

Pic(pda_bfast).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I've been asked so many times by policemen, guards & some marine guy what kind of bike I'm using ... They are quite impressed on the 'look' and unusual design a Pulsar has. They also noticed the spark plug being on the top-most part of the engine, which makes it quite capable of slushing through flooded areas ... I've done that once and I didn't get a single stall.

The bike's repaired & had it's battery, oil & filter replaced. Runs fine when I test ridden it towards Market2x for some groceries ... I made a mistake getting there ... Since my ATM card is loaded I completely forgot about my budget! I came zooming past aisles of yummy goodies thinking "ooh, I need some that", "mmm... Maybe next time, no wait ... Why not ... *grabs*", "wow, that's Chip ;-)". *grab-grab-grab*, *purchase* *purchase*. Then I took a look at my PDA shop list after the long trek .. "... ? I don't remember needing some of this stuff ... Huh? Where'd this come from?" ... Shame on me! I should've opened up my shop list to keep my purchases within budget! Window shopping is a no-no too, especially if you've got cash/cards in your pocket =(

Yeah, my budget is screwed up ... I've made a bunch of emergency purchases, bike repairs, shopping fever ... I even have a pc repair pending ... I can't afford anything anymore till my next salary =( I was looking forward to buying a new guitar ... It's something I could play along with my harmonica .. I also needed a pair of really nice business-casual jackets I found at greenhills. Till next month I guess ...

How's the executive village living? Rockin'! I see the church right beside us, KFC, Red Ribbon, Mcdo, chowking, hospitals, municipal office, IPO & a bunch of fancy restaurants nearby. I also visited YMCA Makati to check out their gym & pool setup, maybe sometime this year I'll begin working out after getting a membership. And my work! Walking distance! 5-10 min. Walk ^__^ ... I'm lovin' this independent life, makes me not want to go back to Taytay again ahehe, oh well but I had to ... My parents worry too much.

Transformation ... !!

2005-10-07T15:25:00.000+08:00

Transformed that tiny little piece of junky room to a work of art ;-) my art. Not bad I think, I've bought some small cabinets & drawers to hold some unused stuff, lots of double adhesive tape to hold my mirror, wall holders ... some hooks for clothes. I've put in some posters and transferred my laundry hamper outside, nobody takes clothes there ... and there's always some laundry hanging out.

All seems well, except for my bike ... it's electric start is still having it's troubles, the culprit is a battery problem ... and it still hasn't arrived!

Not everything happening to me in Belair is perfect ... when I was cleaning up and organizing my room I heard this loud *pop* ... it didn't seem to give me too much of a worry at first. I checked my pda, good it's not it ... then my cellphone, ok ... that's good. I decided to forget about it thinking it must've been something that fell down the wall or something. Later I turned on my pc ... *click* ... " ... ?emh?" ... *click* ... "crap". Something blew up inside my pc ... could be the power supply ... processor, motherboard ... or all, ... let your imagination run wild! I was like ... "ok ... whatever" ... there's nothing I could do anyway, I'll just pick it up sometime this month for repairs ... and it'll probably cost me a small fortune. Sigh.

I transferred my harddisks & other peripherals to my office pc ... and since I won't be using my home pc for a long time I'll be saving money on electric bills ... that's nice to think about ... I guess ...

Oh well, programming time .. =)

Rider Kick!

2005-10-05T10:30:00.000+08:00

Pic(14).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

The day started just like any other day ... I woke up 4-5 times in the morning (*alarm*, wake, *press snooze button*, sleep, *alarm*, Repeatedly). Hurried up to work from my mini dorm in my mc ... did some admin, programming tasks, etc.

Lunch time, I went out to visit Kymco Makati again in Palanan to buy that battery & air filter. My bike is losing power each electric start so I really needed one if I ever wanted to get anywhere with my bike. Kick starting is very difficult, since I rarely use it ... it kicks like it's still brand new ... very rough & could sometimes take up to 4-5 times of kicking just for it to work.

Kymco ran out of batteries for my Pulsar so they ordered one from their branch in Mandaluyong ... ok, fine I left & headed to KFC for lunch. After ordering take-out I mounted on my ride.

*Electric Start* *wheezz* "Arrgh" *click*
*Kick* .... *click* "OOfff"
*Kick* ... *click*
*Kick* .... /swt
*Kick*
*Kick-Kick-Kick!!!* ... *click* "Hrumpph!!"
*Electric Start!* ............ *click* "WAAaa"
*KICK!!* *KICKK!!* "grrr!"
....
*Kick!!" *brrrrmmm!!!* "Whew"

I dunno how many kicks I did just to make one bite, all I know is that my right leg started to lose it's feeling >__<

I'm waiting for Kymco to send me a message if my battery has arrived. For now it's back to work walking ... Bel-Air2 is very close to my work .... thank goodness for that, a 5-10 minute walk is good enough.

Our LDAP server is having it's hiccups ... it's strange how nicely it worked the other day I set it up ... then the next day to find it malfunctioning ... hmm.... stuff on my to-fix list... my todo-list is filled up too. Address book is piling up, txt msgs are always filling up ... phone calls everywhere ... busy, busy, busy.

Colours

2005-10-04T10:29:00.000+08:00

Pic(22).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

I'm just thinking random thoughts again ... whenever I turn back to my past I see things in 'yellow' color ... I dunno, maybe it's the pictures of old that's yellow ... kinda faded yellowish, rather than black & white.

Many people kinda view the past as black & white, or fully colored ... depends on the kind of tv at their time I guess ;-) for me it's same golden sunshine taint.

A few months ago I reminisced when I last visited our old farm house in Taytay before it's being sold. When I was a little tyke I loved to play around that big tree, I dunno what fruit it bears ... all I know is at times it's littered with caterpillars ... yecch ... especially those big fat light-green ones with tiny hairy spikes. Cute little fellas ... but it's fun squashing them at times ... it's both a thrill & disgust >_< What's even more annoying are those brown furry ones! ugh! I hunt them down with a large slipper in hand >: | ... Then those slugs!! ugh, I poured ketchup, mayonaisse, salt & fireworks on it and it's still alive! stepping on 'em won't work, they're kinda rubbery. I thought they were leeches back then, whew.

Wait a minute ... I'm supposed to be blogging about those good old memories right now ... what's up with the bugs? ... anyways ... yeah, yellow. Whenever those bugs aren't around I run around the dry-leaf covered ground down the viranda(sp?) ... it's play, play, play beneath that fuzzy warm sun, underneath that golden yellow light filtered by the branches of that big tree (no bugs, thank you). It sometimes give this wonderful effect in the afternoon, you see the bright sun rays underneath the shades of leaves bundled up. The leaves are plentiful at that time, so it's like a tiny forest penetrated by nice yellow sunlight. (Then out comes my magnifying glass ... I'm out to burn the leaves hahahhahHAaahah! ... then the sun fades ... awwww! ... back to playing with whatever again)

And that's how I color history ... Yellow =) The rest are colored, & pixelated... yeah, thousands of colours ;-)

Naked Naked Bike

2005-10-03T13:00:00.000+08:00

Kymco Pulsar
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

From what I know so far ... a naked bike is a classic ride without any fairings. My ride last Saturday opened up to be a naked 'naked' bike :D ... We had to open it up to fix that strange noise in the engine. It's a good thing Kymco Makati is nearby Gil Puyat ... and they had home service so I won't be pushing this heavy thing across.

The mechanic took out it's gas tank, the seats, the back covers & sides. That revealed the carbs, batteries & the top of the engine. He had to clean up the carbs, some kind of air filter in the back, engine pistons, gas filters, etc.

That took care of the starting trouble, cause I can now use the kick start again. But the electric starter is still having difficulty starting up ... I was told the battery could be the problem .. it's either I replace the battery or have it charged and see what happens in a week or so ... I feel like replacing the battery instead ... hmmm ...

Yesterday I had my submeter installed by my Mom's nephew electrician. He used to work in buildings like the Pacific Star, etc. So I guess it's safe to work on my room then ... We all had to inspect the room, cablings, then did all the wire/equipment shopping together at Ace Hardware SM Makati. That 94php/m(?) wiring was quite expensive, also hard to find ... we needed around 54 meters of that pricey thing ... plus a few other cablings & breakers & stuff. I purchased a submeter at 'Kuryente' ... only 834php. The rest of the supplies were taken from 3 different hardware stores in Glorietta/SM/Greenbelt. Whew, after an exhausting shopping trip I took the liberty of ferrying everyone to a taxi wherever they need to go. I could'nt count how many taxi trips I made that day ... it's a very expensive chore.

Finally the submeter is installed, in just around 3-4 hours I think. I couldn't believe that first electrician that charged me 23k for labor & supplies, add to that about a week of labor that can be done in 3 hours ... tsk, tsk. I showed my bill to my landlady, who told me it's "Very Chip".

She should know that last electrician guy is ripping her off, for just a small room he expects to use up a box of wires(!!) and a few other fuse whatevers that are really unnecessary ... we only used 54 meters and there's still about 10-20 meters left over.

Shocking

2005-09-29T10:12:00.000+08:00

Today I just received my submeter install estimate ... hmmm... so it totals a measly 23k ... WHATT??! 23k?? and 7.5k for some easy labor? What! are they kidding me? I'm not an idiot to fall for that, just because my landlady is a doctor from Bel-Air doesn't mean they can pull that off easily on one of her tenants. It's like installing it for the whole house!

Enough of that electrician guy, I'm looking for someone else to set one up. My mum is helping me find a better one(and cheaper). My bosses also suggested another electrician from Taytay. Yes, they are shocked too. At least I got the price for a simple submeter, only 900php.

I made arrangements for that saturday bike repair/maintenance, I expect to have it tuned up, oil changed & cleaned up it's carbs, etc. Whatever that needs maintenance, give rootbeer that. That bike hasn't got a tune up for like a year now. The only maintenance I know of is changing it's oil :P ... I guess it's my fault my bike is acting up this way. It still won't start. The engine or whatever is filled with blackie carbon or something :P

Sunday I'll be visiting my parents back home again, to settle some lot issues or something.

I've been getting a lot of calls & txt's this week, I'm out of load :-(

Pic: Jetti Macapagal, the trip there to meet up a friend of mine is interesting ... the field on the side road is littered with those strange white plant things, it lifts out some white pollen thingy, like horizontal snow. It's an interesting feeling cruising around that long macapagal stretch with those pollen flying out to your side as it gets blown by the wind. I tried to break a hundred again at that time but the needle won't reach it, I only made a ninety and that's that ... maybe really does need a tuneup cause it won't reach a hundred anymore :-\

Emergency Expenses ...

2005-09-28T09:24:00.000+08:00

My budget is ruined! Too many emergency expenses this week. I had to shell out some cash for bike repairs, electric submeter charges, bel-air car pass stickers, etc, etc.

My bike could'nt start today, I tried to push-button start it but it wouldn't go, even kick-starting won't help.

I called a Kymco Service Branch near Palanan and had a home service ... It turned out that my spark plug is all burned out. The technician fixed up some cabling near the gas tank too. I thought all went well and all that taxi spending was worth it ... Later my bike would'nt start again. This never happened to me before ... And why now? Darn it, my batteries could be the culprit?

And that sticker! it costed me 1k for just one lousy sticky-paper design that expires in a year.

I'll call the service again today, it'll be another 250php for a home service ... I really hope this'll be the last time I called them up.

I have used up all the alloted spare cash for these kinds of expenses, and it's exceeding it's limit =(

Update: Whew, my bike is finally fixed ... I hope. The filter that connects to the carbs is clogged, the technician had to replace it for 60php, 100php for the labor. Normally it's 250php for that home service but I didn't have enough change with me so at the moment it's 100. I'll be coming back to that shop again Saturday to have a tune-up and oil change. And maybe fix whatever it is that needs maintaining so I won't be having trouble again with the starting.

Tiny World

2005-09-26T07:46:00.000+08:00

My tiny room, tiny bed, tiny living room, tiny kitchen ... tiny soap, tiny ... etc.

I finally finished unpacking and ... man, my arms hurt a bit ... after carrying all that boxes of stuff .. whew.

The place is just ... tiny. But around the village? it's Great!, there are at least 3 guards on each gate, I see some cute rich girls in the church last sunday, the place is very quiet ... except in the mornings, the house I'm currently boarding in is beside the same church I'm now frequenting in. Church bells now serve as my mini alarm clock and time keeper ;-) but it's cool anyway, better than loud screeching tricycles & inconsiderate motorists outside our old house. It rings every hour, it's like my own personal grandfather clock. Sometimes at saturday evenings I get a free church choir tune.

The sermon last sunday is very good, the church is air-conditioned, there's even some security people hanging around too. I had no problem parking there ... duh, it's a motorcycle, even if the church is covered in luxury cars I could still park somewhere ... and right beside it is the Bel-Air gate... the guard there could watch it for me.

Today is the day the electrician will check out my place to setup a submeter, Meralco disapproved the new meter request, but a submeter is possible. I'm worried about the extra expenses on this ... I hope I have enough to get by until the 30th. But I guess I will, I have enough extra funds for emergency spending. After all the mad purchasing last weekend, (mini cabinets, rugs, misc room stuffs) I managed to squeeze enough within my budget.

Yey, I now have enough time for personal stuffs, last time I didn't have any ... all I did back then is to plop down in bed from exhaustion. Now I could cruise around in my bike ... maybe go to a gym ... or continue pursuing the dating scene ;-) , erm, I should allocate enough cash for my dates ... uh-oh ...

Bel-Air 2

2005-09-23T10:20:00.000+08:00

This is the house of that doctor ... the place is littered with her cute assistants, mostly doctors I think. I finally got the key and I can now create a duplicate for my own use. But first I needed to fix up that Meralco meter, I have lots of places to visit today :-/ like Meralco, Bel-Air and the Makati Municipal building ... to settle some legal stuff.

As I said, the room is tiiinnnyyy ... but suitable, I intend to stay alone anyway ... I dunno if I could have visitors around ... having two people inside makes it a bit cramped up.

The parking is fine, the village is quiet ... the guards seem to know me now after so many visits to that 161 numbered house ... they call me 'Kymco Boy' ... :-/ ... how about 'Kymco Man'? or 'Kymco Guy' ... do I still look that young? maybe a little ...

Update: Rats, the electric company disapproved my application for a new meter ... said the room was too small and it must have it's own bathroom or something. I need a submeter instead ... I asked the customer rep from Meralco and she told me that it's ok to setup a submeter. Now I needed an electrician ... mmm... I don't know any electrician ... maybe the landlady knows one ...

Update: The week is turning up and down ... up and down ... Just this week I found out it's actually free to park in our own building in my motorcycle, thanks to my boss who helped me clear out the parking fee issue there with the building management. Then the meter was disapproved ... but a submeter was possible ... but later on I found out a submeter could be a wee bit pricey.

Busy Week

2005-09-22T10:37:00.000+08:00

Monday ... Tuesday ... been very busy with Typo3. Sune, our instructor have taught us how to develop our own sites using typoscripts & templates. Tuesday we all received our little certificate of completion, good stuff for resumes =). That's also the same day he left the Philippines and back again to Lego Land ... erm, Denmark :D I loved those legos as a kid ...

I've been going back & forth from Meralco during my spare time to setup my own electric meter in that tiny little room I rented. I needed a copy of a monthly bill & a certificate of lease from the owner. Maybe this lunchtime I'll be able to sneak out again, I'll have my lunch somewhere else. The owner btw is an Orthodontist(sp?)(dentist?) ... I've seen a dental chair setup in one of the rooms in that house ... maybe I could get a discount for fixing up my dentures? ;-)

Everything seems to go downhill now, we've all learned typo3, some advanced php programming ... I've installed a bunch of apps on our servers ... like bug tracking tools (mantis), etc.

Yesterday I bought this roll-up bed-mat thingy from Market2x, it's worth 600php ... comes with a tiny pillow. I've been buying 'portable' stuff for my new tiny room so I didn't have to bring that huge cabinet I have right now in my room. I'm still looking for some clothing organizers ... Everything should be tiny or else it would'nt fit ... it is really a tiny little room, I'll take a picture soon ...

Found one!

2005-09-19T09:38:00.000+08:00

Picture(jetti_2).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Finally got my own room! at 2.8k per month =) Coming this weekend I'll be living the independent life at Bel-Air Village Makati City. I'm lucky to have found the ad first at that last Buy&Sell I bought last week.

After asking for the price and all other inquiries I immediately visited the site this morning 7am. I left our house 5:45 just to grab this chance. I might lose the room again like last time if I didn't hurry over there, getting there this afternoon is out of the question ... the company will have dinner with Sune at that time.

The room isn't exactly some luxury quarters you'd normally find in Bel-Air ... it's cramped & all my stuff may not fit in there. The bathroom is shared, but looks fine. They have parking for my bike and the place is secure ... very secure =) It's quiet too, I'd finally get some sleep and no more lates for me =)

Pic. Just another pic from saturday at the Jetti, that's my friend's bike being checked out by the club.

Interesting Camouflage

2005-09-18T13:36:00.000+08:00

Picture(jetti_1).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Yesterday I visited Macapagal Road to park near the Jetti Gas Station, A friend of mine who has taken up motorcycling invited me for a ride with her new bike. It's some kind of Chinese make bike, a XinXiang or something.

I came in too early, our meeting was supposed to be around 5pm ... but all the others arrived at around 6:00pm. I grabbed a little bite to eat in that small convenience store beside the station. I had a hotdog & an iced tea while waiting. The pic is a one I've taken of my bike(left) and another Kymco bike(right) owned by one of the staff in that convenience store.

Later on I find bikers parking one-by-one almost every 15 minutes. These guys are from a club named 'Explorers', who seems to have all big bikes. At first I saw a big bike having a 'Suzuki' label on a loud machine. Then later a 'Ducati' monster came approaching minutes after. My friend hasn't arrived yet so I waited still. I was impressed on how these bikes looked & sounded. Much later I saw her arrive, backriding her own bike with one of the members of the club.

I was introduced to the other members, and managed to ride a bit on that Ducati, I found it too heavy so I didn't bother to actually test drive it, I might drop it or something :P. The bikers are friendly and nice, they all meet there every saturday and sometimes go on long rides on Sundays. Tomorrow they are going to Tarlac ... I was invited by my friend to go but ... I thought I really needed to find that apartment first, sunday is the only time I had for the hunt, so I declined and told them I had plans.

Much, much later one of the guys there told me they are actually China-made bikes ... a Motorstar Z200(sp?), I was like "Whaaat??". Y'mean that Ducati I tested isn't actually a Ducati? and that Suzuki earlier is a China make? it seems that all these bikes are heavily modified to look like the famed big bikes. For 200-250cc's it'll be hard to get through SLEX, they only allow 400cc's and above to get through, mine is only 125cc :-\ ... I guess I can understand how they managed to do all that ... maybe to get by the expressways where all sub 400cc's are banned. It'd be nice if my bike sounded like a 400cc would do ... but I'm not that into extreme modifications at the moment ... all I needed to know is just simply how to do a tune-up and all the basic maintenance.

The ride with my friend got cancelled as it got much too late in the evening, I expected the ride to be at around 5pm as agreed on ... but took around until 8pm after chatting with all the other bikers.

I left soon and took a ride with a guy named 'Rage' instead for home, he's headed towards Buendia anyway so we rode on together ... I'm headed to Market2x for a movie & grocery stuffs. Macapagal is a great road ... we did a hundred twice on that long stretch ... now I understand how some bikers loved these roads and made the jetti their hangout. Rage had to stop and signalled me to go on ahead, it's probably his destination already so I continued to the mall.

I didn't get to watch a movie afterall, I thought they had showings 'till 11pm like Robinson's does. I loved those late movies, not much people around and when you leave the mall is almost all dark and the road is clear. I missed those days of my internship where I frequent Sta. Lucia and Robinson for a late movie using my bike.

Today, I'd like to hunt again for that tiny little room that has been eluding me for weeks now ....

My Job ...

2005-09-17T13:24:00.000+08:00

Picture(1).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

My main job is a programmer / Web Development type, my sort of a 'side' task is admin and systems & network support ... as I recall ... but why is my job position listed in the company hierarchy a 'Programmer & Tech Support'? ... yeah I do some linux/windows tech support but most of what I do is programming & admin work. I've already setup Samba, NFS, Subversion, Apache, MySQL ... among other things. They expect me to setup our own LDAP directory, firewall iptables and fix up some DNS ... quite a handfull of tasks ... The amount added to my salary is generous enough to do all those side tasks, it won't be even taxed because it's noted as some sort of 'Bonus'. But that bonus won't last too long as we hire some kind of net/tech people to do all that work. If that happens then that'll lighten my load on maintaining the system ... but it'll take away that yummy bonus, awww... of course, after getting the 'GO' signal from main we'll all have our salaries upgraded ... the bonus would be a nice to have though ... They should take away that 'Tech Support' thingy and name me to some kind of Admin Support instead ... I like the word 'Admin' instead of 'Tech'.

Daily office routines include programming ... a lot of programming, server-side tasks for me. Some backups everyday. Then being called lolo, daddy, myloves, kambing, aso, penguin, ... plus a bunch of other aliases I could'nt keep track of ... I would've preferred to be called 'Peng'(short for penguin) or Elij, as I've been accustomed to be called in my College days. 'myloves'?? nyak! I've got 'pseudo' girlfriends there ... I think :P my other girl boss calls me 'daddy' sometimes ... in return I call her 'mommy'. I feel like a baby in there.

The pic is one I've taken of 'Sune' Vestergaard from typoconsult.dk ... he's our main instructor for typo3 ... some content management system. They've got really cool surnames in Denmark ... 'Vestergaard', kinda sounds a bit like names found in Norse Mythology. He's a good instructor ... but at times you really had to pay attention to his English, sometimes their slangs could get you lost in the training. Sometimes we even had a tough time asking our own questions ... I ran out of English words to use sometimes, some of our other developers didn't bother to ask, some did ask questions but had trouble mixing in some English :P Our Danish instructor doesn't understand Tagalog.

Beer

2005-09-16T08:43:00.000+08:00

Set627_01.jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Late post ... been busy with Typo3 & our spam mail system. I've setup our non-working email server :P the problem could possibly be in the DNS setup, I didn't work on that one ... The subversion repository is setup fine ... our Typo3 install is working almost 100%, except for the image features ... Sune, our Danish guest is teaching us how to use Typo3, we're getting a free 'seminar' here for about a week. Cool Stuff =)

Anyway, the beer part ... before ending the first day of Sune's Visit, our Bosses suggested to have dinner at Dencio's right behind our building. I had this oriental chicken bbq skewer thingy, while everyone else had Crispy Pata, Kare-Kare & other Filipino Dishes ... the Danish guy had a taste of Kare-Kare. Everyone had beer ... except for me and the other girls ... who ordered iced tea, mine is lemonade ... Then later I find a glass in front of me ... it's beer! why'd they put that in there?

Bikers & beer seem to go together, except when actually riding. But not me, I hated the taste of beer, can't I have some other alcoholic drink? something sweet perhaps? I'm not fond of that strange beery taste. I don't think I like the idea of getting a 'ladie's' drink ... something wrong about what they call that ... maybe I'll try uhmm... brandy or something, is that sweet?

I had to drink at least a glass so as not to be rude, I really wanted to go home at the time so I drank half a glass ... bottoms up. I saw their surprised faces on me drinking that San Mig Super Dry straight up.

I had a good free dinner, but that beer kinda ruins everything. Later when going home I find myself a bit warm and the next morning I had a headache. Maybe next time I'd refuse another drink, I don't drink beer.

Still Nothing

2005-09-14T11:36:00.000+08:00

Picture(18).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Wasted yet another 25php on a Buy&Sell ad paper ... there's just nothing good in the lease page anymore. If I wanted one good room that badly I'd have to leave some of my appliance & possibly my motorcycle behind. Some apartments doesn't have parking ... and leaving my bike outside is like dumping it near some squat area with my keys still in it.

There are also some apartments that doesn't have it's own electric meters. I have a PC, a microwave & a miniref ... they'll need it for sure.

I didn't bring my bike out today ... it's raining, the last time(yesterday) I went out my boots got all muddied and had the lower part of my pants wet.

I made it early to work, 30 mins early. That's bad time for me, I could've made it 'till 8:00 or so. But 8:30?? hmm... something's wrong, must be the traffic. I just ran out of Vacation Leaves ... sigh, I had to convert all my lates to leaves. I really needed a place to stay ASAP. I ran out of places to ride around to, I've visited Palanan, Sta. Cruz, Olympia, Pio Del Pilar, San Isidro, some parts of Guadalupe and San Antonio ... out of all that I only found 1 or two suitable ... but someone else beat me to it! grrrr!

The pic is where I ate dinner yesterday, Yellow Cab Pizza ... since they're not serving single slices in Market2x, I had a ham & cheese Calzone, I ate one half with root beer and the rest to go. I ate the remaining for breakfast this morning, together with my usual cereal :D

Chilling!

2005-09-12T23:28:00.000+08:00

Picture(35).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

It's one wet evening for me. Right after finishing up on my work I left the 60 pesos parking lot on the way to Market2x to return a portable hotsync cable for my PalmZire. On the way it started to rain really hard, to make things worse I got stuck in traffic ... with not much space to filter into. I was able to make it to a gas station but upon arriving I'm already wet in my feet, hands & even my balaclava became kinda soggy. The raincoat I wore didn't protect me enough, it's as if the rain went right through it, I should use my thicker & full length coat next time.

After the stop-over from the station I was able to cruise across Edsa & towards the Fort. Market2x isn't that far so I made it at around 8pm, had dinner there, replaced my cable and bought some cereal & chocolate kisses :P

The ride today is interesting, since my arms, feet are wet ... I could feel the biting cold wind whenever I cruise around 50kph+. Chilling. I felt like a human sponge ... er, spongebob or something. When the rain lets out a little it still feels cold, those tiny drops are like cold needles dropping from the sky, I could feel the intensity of each drop ... that was some rain last night.

Here is a photo of me using the flash thingy of my SE K700i in action.

Btw. the hotsync cable didn't work, it resetted my palm and by tomorrow I'll return/have it replaced it again >:(

Am I independent?

2005-09-11T06:55:00.000+08:00

Picture(apt_hunt).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Lessee ... I eat from what I earn, I do my own laundry, wash my own dishes (my least favorite chores) but no pad yet. Where is that room anyway??! Most of the good ones require a 'lady', why not a 'guy'? it's a room, not a bedspace.

I can't get the feel of true freedom without my own pad =( ...

I've bought yet another Buy&Sell paper, nothing good in the lease ads. That's my second paper this week.

The only spot in the map I haven't scanned through is the place in Pio Del Pilar, I'm still thinking whether I should visit that area sometime this week or not ... I'm getting tired of all this room for rent hunt.

Our project deadline got extended up until Monday, whew ... that's a relief. Around Wed or Thursday one of them danish people will visit the office to provide some training using Typo3.

Open Source

2005-09-08T22:55:00.000+08:00

Picture(ubuntu-cds).jpg
Originally uploaded by Elijah_A.

Well ... we got it cleared out from main that it's not exactly a spam filtering app we're developing ... it's some sort of an email archiving system for forwarded danish spam. That lightened up our load ... but still, deadline is tomorrow and we're still not finished! one week for an application like that is not enough time for a start-up with a small development team.

My Ubuntu CD's finally arrived yesterday, it's packed in a white bubble-wrap envelope. 15 Hoary the hedgehog cd's in all plus 15 live cd's. Took about a month & a half of waiting. Very nice ... once breezy(new version) comes out, I guess I'm expected to upgrade our ubuntu server :P

The cd's could be ordered for 'FREE' at www.ubuntulinux.org , all you need to do is fill up a form and they'll send you copies of every release (any number of cd's you want)

I'm starting to get used to this 'employed' status, I render my service to this company and they pay me in return. It's not that bad after all. When you're in the lower part of the hierarchy your responsibilities are minimal, lesser things to think about. Just do what you can and the others will do their part. Finish off and head back home without worrying about anything.

All seemed well except for the deadline tomorrow, and of course the room for rent. I still couldn't find a place to stay in Makati. I bought another Buy&Sell paper today, maybe it has some good ads I could use ...

Busy

2005-09-06T21:37:00.000+08:00

Hmm... I haven't been blogging in awhile now ... been very busy lately after our group received the first project from main. And for the first project we've got a ... SPAM reporting system O__O. We're expected to finish in 120 hours ... about a week O__o. That's why we're all so busy coding whatever we could think of. Tackling this spam filtering is very tricky, those spammers have become very elusive and their emails change every time >:| grrr.

It seems that spam has been illegal in Denmark ... hmm... we've still got 3 days to finish all this. If this finishes then I'm continuing the apartment hunt, else, the company may fail and we'll all be packing our stuff :D Or maybe not ...

Delays

2005-09-01T08:25:00.000+08:00

Last Tuesday I went back to San Isidro in my bike. It's around 6:20pm, getting dark, I haven't familiarized myself with the place in a darker setting ... so I got lost. For some reason I couldn't find the right apartment. I circled numerous streets that looked the same, I asked for directions later on to corner Marconi. Finally I found the right place, I've got my deposit & initial monthly payments with me, I was just about to make the final check to the room for rent when the owner interrupted my attempt with a message that the room has already been taken last Sunday. Darn it, I called them up last Saturday and it was taken the next day. Looks like the hunt will go on again.

This is getting tiresome ... almost every weekend I go out and ride to Makati on the lookout for stupid signs. I'm getting sick of this, I can't believe looking for the right room for rent is much more difficult than landing a job!

Boxing

2005-08-29T16:11:00.000+08:00

I've taken up the manly art of 'Boxing' ... boxing my stuff that is :P I may have chosen that 4k apartment room or that 3.5k one nearby San Isidro. I'll only be bringing in my frequently used stuff ... shirts, office clothes, my pc, my mini ref & microwave (I can't cook!). This won't be a "Lipat Bahay" ... it'll only be a "Lipat Stuff" :P

I've done some budgeting and probably be saving up only a few measly sum a month =( I hope that'll rise up soon when I get a position upgrade ... Now should the company go down, there are still a few companies needing my skills. But I have a good feeling about this company anyway. All the while I'm learning how a start-up grows, and having systems built from scratch.

Sure I'm not earning enough to buy myself lots of new stuff every month ... it's just enough to get by. And all this is just for 'experience', I'd like some independence too.

I'm still having commute problems, there are just some pay parking areas that won't allow 'whole day' motorcycle parking =( ... I guess I'll be taking the jeepney or fx should I run out of options. The building admin requires a fee for any type of vehicle to park in the building =( I think I'll ask them again how much for an mc ...

Hit by a Car

2005-08-27T23:46:00.000+08:00

Another trip to Makati to look for more 'room for rent', not much traffic today. I circled with my mc around Palanan, Guadalupe, Sta. Cruz, San Antonio & San Isidro. I found a few numbers and visited a few sites. Most of what I've found are worth 4k, sometimes 3.5k ... that's the lowest. I've found two likely choices, one is 4k which is in San Isidro ... the place looks clean and nice, it has it's own electric meter but there's no garage for parking my bike ... The other one is worth 3.5k, much cheaper ... with garage, no meter but the place is kinda .. erm.

I took notes of each number I could gather. It rained a bit but that didn't stop me, I kept zooming past curves of street corners trying to look for signs.

The owners are easy to talk to, they gave me their terms, prices and their 'come-ons'. One interesting owner is I think from San Antonio ... a woman with some speaking problem. How do you say 'ngongo' in English? Man, I had a tough time conversing with this fella:

Owner: "Et o p ung rum, por key ... meron hin s ba"
Me: (trying to translate) ...
Me: 4k?
Owner: "uu"
[Later]
Owner: "danda d2, ah um tmik [insert blah's nobody could understand]"
Me: uh-huh (whatever she said :P )
Owner: (speaks some sort of Klingon language or something)
Me: ahh (I gotta get outta here)
Owner: "d o ets nmae mu, rang porgn"
Me: (name ko daw? ewan) uh-huh...
Owner: "?"
Me: "?"
Me: "Umm.. tawag na lang po ako =) "
Owner: "o ey, lik a let [insert some other things I couldn'nt translate]"

Whew, ok 4k for the room but the parking there could be a problem. She doesn't have to say anything else, I'm getting tired trying to figure out whatever it is she's telling me.

After awhile I got tired of looking, it's already 5pm or so when I've decided to go rest a bit at some mall nearby. So I went to Glorieta for a break. I tried looking for an SD card there but there wasn't any 1gig in stock. So I thought of the cyberzone area in SM North, they have lots of cool gadgets there and most are cheap. I must be crazy to have even thought of that ... because that means travelling for a few miles in EDSA(horrors!).

It rained again during the trip to North, it's a good thing there are emergency stop-overs along the road so I could wear my raincoat. Soon after filtering & weaving across traffic I found myself at the bright lights of SM North. Even in Saturdays the traffic is still there.

I immediately headed towards cyberzone to purchase my card, in a few minutes .. done. Great, now to purchase an air pump & some cables for my mc ... done. Alrighty, now for some dinner ... kaching*, mini pizza, Done.

I got out finally to head for home ... it's still raining a bit. Up in front about 7 car spaces ahead is a white car that stopped at traffic ... I was slowly approaching the traffic to get out of the SM driveway when all of a sudden this white car reversed it's acceleration & is now headed towards me. "huh? damn it..." I uttered as I tried to swerve and avoid it's backing up ... a bit late, the tail of my bike bumped against the rear end of the car. I felt the sharp bump and switched my direction slightly off-course, I knew I could fall down and crash but I still maintained hand positions, switched my line of sight against the crash path & switched some weight to the right. That was a good job I did, I didn't crash. I maintained balance. I've got a tough bike to be able to withstand and absorb that shock. No wonder MRC loved these for their training bikes.

I gave the driver a 'wtf??!!' look ... turned out to be a girl. A female driver with a few female friends tagging along. I stopped my bike to check for damages ... and her's. Good thing there's not even a scratch. The girls apologized afterwards for mindlessly backing up and not looking where they are going. Oh well... I wouldn't have left right away if I crashed instead. So I went on my way, loaded up on gas and went on home.

Here I am still back in one piece to blog all this, Edsa totally means back luck for us motorcycle riders. I should be careful of female drivers too :P you know I could not understand women much. Hard to predict what they're trying to do, the incident awhile ago really caught me by surprise.

Ride the Train ...

2005-08-26T21:58:00.000+08:00

MRT ... took one after work, guess who I saw in that crowd of train commuters ... damn it, I got into one of those moods again. She's with this tall guy, I'm not surprised, she'll never be alone. While I took myself as the only company I had. I walked with myself again to Shang, .... had a looong walk circling the mall while cooling off and of course, in deep thought. She's as beautiful as always =) I can't deny myself always remembering, it's like her image is tatooed to my brain. I must have the worst case of infatuation in the whole world. Strangely I felt inspired to do better ... I've been in a slump lately and had nothing to 'push' myself into.

It's just what I needed. Some sort of 'inspiration', what's the use of being of the best and rising up when you've got no one to share it to ...

I didn't take my bike out today, the guys at the parking area are not very fond of motorcycles, I can't even get good cheap parking nowadays =(

Good night, I didn't have one.

Conundrum

2005-08-25T16:36:00.000+08:00

Commute is starting to become a full-time chore, I wonder how many productive hours are wasted sitting around my bike or maybe a commuter fx? I used to take the bus to UE before ... 3 hours max to get there, sometimes 4. To Makati it's like 2-3 hours too, depends on the traffic. I could cut the time to like an hour or so if I take my bike ... but then the parking guys in front of our building does not like motorcycles parked in there >:( It costs around 20-30 pesos for a whole day park. They seem to have banned motorcycle parking to some lots in Ortigas, I wonder if it's also in effect here?

I'm late again, just because I took the fx to get here ...

I bought a new copy of Buy&Sell ... I'm still looking for better rooms to rent ...

Try, Try Again

2005-08-23T22:06:00.000+08:00

I've got the advance payments & deposit ready when all of a sudden I received the policies that slowly changed my mind the whole day.

1. If I bring my PC there, it'll cost me an extra 1k per month (WHATTT!!??)
2. Microwaves are not allowed
3. Mini Refs are not allowed

That'll be 3.5k + 500 for utilities + 1k for using my pc and I'll be eating cold food & warm water. Sheesshh ... rats. And to think there were so many cute lady bedspacers in there :'-( , good parking and friendly neighborhood ... sigh.

I changed my mind, good thing I tried to contact the owner first and received the policies ... looks like I'll need to keep looking again and delay my independence.

Ride again, Baby

2005-08-21T22:41:00.001+08:00

This'll probably be my last apartment hunt. Because I've found a very nice one in San Antonio Makati ... the village is clean, no suspicious loiterers wandering around. During the search on all the different 'baranggay's' and villages I criss-crossed each street in a zig-zag direction, it's probably the best way I could spot all 'for rent' signs. I've visited the San Antonio Area, Buendia, some parts of La Paz .. Sta. Cruz, Valenzuela and circled around Poblacion & Olympia near the Makati City Hall. The best offer I could get was the one in San Antonio. 3.5k + 500 for utilities, inclusive electricity & water. But my pc & microwave could be a problem ... I've yet to talk to the owner about that matter and settle some agreements.

The trip was fine ... I've made a few snack stops at Cash & Carry (same tofu shrimp again), bought some cereal & chunky corned beef. I've also stopped by 7-eleven for a chilidog and pepsi fire. My last stopover is at MarketMarket, where I bought some engine oil, new undergarments & shirts for work. The pic is an Aprilia I found at the ground floor ... doesn't look good in white if you ask me ...

The last task is already done ... and that is the calling for all those numbers I've collected. Some are a bit rude, some are nice and very advertising ... but most of them are pricey, the best I found is ... like I said, in that San Antonio area.

My trip started at around 1:00pm, ended in the evening ... I've circled & criss-crossed almost 50% of the upper parts of Makati, wow ... I'm barely tired. Hmmm... I feel like doing a bit of exercising today ...

Bad trip

2005-08-19T21:57:00.000+08:00

I came across one of the most vilest personalities during commute today. I was having such a fine day ... all seemed well until the time I'm about to ride this fx taxi for home. A woman is just right behind me in line and a guy up front, I'm second in line. The taxi came in after a short wait, then suddenly while approaching the taxi this woman behind me tried to overtake me to the front seats, I noticed the attempt and sped up my steps. I cut her off near the front door and confronted her, I didn't say anything ... I just gave her a look. I am disgusted with what she did. Then she angrily told me to go on ahead and go first ... as if she's the one ahead of me. That has got to be one of the most disgusting people I've ever come across, haven't they heard of 'first come, first serve'? don't they know the concept of falling in line? she's impatient and bullheaded. We both sat together in front while I'm heating up in angst. She maintained her casual posture as if nothing happened during the whole trip.

After the ride home I shook my head to the woman who couldn't admit her own wrong doing. Just because she's older doesn't mean she doesn't have to apologize, her own pride ate her up. Damn, I hate that. There are just some people out there who cannot admit their mistakes.

Worn out

2005-08-16T21:12:00.000+08:00

Getting tired ... to and from Makati to Taytay everyday is rough. I badly needed someplace to stay near Makati ...

Too tired to blog right now ...

Update: Hmm... makes me wonder how I survived daily rides to Magallanes Makati (during college)... that's farther than Ayala & Buendia .... must be the traffic that's wearing me out.

Back Rub

2005-08-12T21:28:00.000+08:00

One wet day ... it's windy & raining. I came in late, there goes my transport allowance .. ouch. The inner projects are almost done, just a little polishing & bug removal. I'm getting used to all this now ... but I gotta do something about my coding habits, I'm still in the transition phase of switching to the OOP way.

I left work late, it's 6pm so I headed straight to the MRT Ayala station. The line to the tickets are as long as usual, there's a girl right behind me ... probably my age, maybe a bit older ... who's trying to peek across the line and checking how long the human file is. I was chewing gum when all of a sudden I stopped the momentum of gnawing the rubbery substance, there's something curiously soft repeatedly rubbing up my back ... happened to be the girl's erm, bosoms. I peeked behind me to see why the heck would someone provoke me like this ... this girl must either be careless or really wanted to catch my attention. I checked and looked back ... nothing, no reaction. She's busy looking forward while humming some kind of lullaby tune "mmmm~ mmMMMMmmm~ mmm~" ... All the while I almost swallowed my gum. I guess that's one of the best ways to attract a guy's attention .... hmmm ... they're softer than I thought.

The search for an apartment has been delayed ... it's been raining and I can't use my ride, add up the lack of free time for it. Man, I wish I could find one before the month ends ...

Getting used to it

2005-08-11T21:26:00.000+08:00

The first set of programming problems was quite a brain teaser for me. But it's fixed now anyway. Combining admin & developer tasks doesn't seem to blend in well when starting up, It's tough enough reviewing & developing ... how much more if there's some admin jobs that I haven't figured out yet? oh lots of admin jobs ... but I think I can do it. It's only tough at the beginning.

Enough of the work progress, the trip on the way home is sometimes interesting. I think about two days ago I'm in a line at the Glorieta mall entrance approaching SM, this guard who checks bags just kept on tapping & looking mindlessly at the belongings of those entering. I was a bit behind when I saw this same guard inspected a bag of corn chips being munched on by some lady, the girl was surprised at this seemingly enthusiastic and motivated (sarcasm) personnel. This guard must be really bored to be able to inspect a bag of junk food with that little drum stick he's using ... he must've poked around a few pieces. I got a little chuckle there.

The other day I spotted something else that's weird ... this guy, musculine, hanging out with some friends and wearing a tight-fit pink t-shirt with a message up front "Tough guys wear pink". I was like O__O?? huH?? I was thinking it's like one of those 'joke' shirts but that one still left me scratching my head. "How could pink be manly?? I don't get it". I never liked pink.

Workload

2005-08-10T21:55:00.000+08:00

My position at PHP Dev. ApS is something like a cross between developer & sys/net admin, there's a bundle of workload waiting for the net/sys admin job like dns, dhcp, firewall, ldap, cvs etc. I am expected to have configured each one properly. Whew, if that wasn't heavy enough I've been given a variety of programming tasks, usually on web development.

I forgot to look for an apartment today, it took me until a quarter before seven to fix up the server. For some reason the network card isn't working properly ... my coworkers & even my boss are having a hard time figuring out what went wrong. I thought of insmodding the card module since it already exists but after plugging in the card, reboot ... blink, an [ok] message from the card. It turned out it wasn't placed in the board properly or something :P sheesh, and to think I've downloaded a few docs & sources for it. Oh, well ... that's better than running out of options trying to fix it.

Lots to research today, I"ve been downloading docs & tutorials here cause there's no internet from the office yet.

Hey, we've got free snacks & lunch now =) great. Here's a pic of my desk, currently enjoying a cup of free coffee and free noodles. Had a packet of free crackers after lunch :P

Mission: Accomplished

2005-08-08T15:36:00.000+08:00

My motorcycle renewal went smoothly, took probably around an hour or two. I gave the guy there a copy of my OR/CR and emission tests, he had it processed and before I knew it I was walking towards my bike to apply the 2005 sticker. It costed me about 1.2k for the emission, insurance & miscellaneous fees. I had my bike tested first of course.

The pic shows the road towards the exit, I sure wish all roads looked like that ... that was a very refreshing ride, the wind has this soft & cool texture like a breeze after a storm.

Drained

2005-08-07T21:38:00.000+08:00

I went out today to Makati. Checked out some apartment locations .... first one is somewhere near the Makati City Hall, it looked really good with the parking space, secure, clean environment and all, but after the call I received a price tag of 17k a month. Yeesh. The next one is my main target, a 3.7k a month room. Entered the town house only to be shown to their claustrophobic-styled basement. You can barely move there, it's unfurnished and the bed is right beside the water pump, which makes loud noises whenever used. It's also right next to the washing machine. But it has it's own bathroom anyway ... it's advertised as a 2-person room. Bah. All their 'come-ons' didn't work on me, they failed to make it sound more attractive after I saw that dump. That should've been at least 1.5-2k only. Oh, and the place smelled like dog poop & urine :P ugh.

Disappointed I went out to look for some more 'for rent' signs. It rained a little so I stopped over at 7-eleven for a hotdog ... y'know it's strange to find 2 24 hour stores almost located side-by-side, I found a mini-stop right across the small street.

After the snack break I found 2 more apartments, I'll make the call & visit this week, I've got other apartments to visit. The next stop is somewhere in J. Victor St., Near Makati Medical Center. The spot is fine ... but the neighborhood is not something I had in mind. I could get mugged in there if I'm not careful.

I took a taxi out of there to visit Cash & Carry, there are two apartments near that grocery shopping area. I went inside the grocery store first, at first I saw an ugly looking establishment that badly needs maintenance & renovation. But when I got inside I saw crowds of people shopping around. It's like a smaller version of UniMart from Greenhills because of the French Baker & wine store right outside the counter. I love the blueberry danish & pizzas from the French Baker. I found a 'Mr. Bean' stand oddly situated in front of a small restaurant near the bakery. They sell tofu's & soy products. I bought some prawn tofu + light soy sauce for a snack. Tofu is probably the only Japanese food I could stomach, all their other raw meals changes the color of my face :P

I went out finally from the grocery, then find myself somewhere in Batangas Village ... this place is familiar as this is where the guys from MRC stores their Kymco bikes, they also have a stock of Teknic(sp?) leatherwear for bikers. Very expensive. I didn't continue looking around as the place started to feel like Manila ... it's unsafe, smells awful and there are odd, suspicious groups of people walking around.

Rode on a bus to Ayala, had my second snack(shakey's) and took a taxi to Shangri-La Ortigas (I'm exhausted). I don't want to ride the MRT at that time, my legs have starting to hurt. My last stop is from Shang, there's a mass being held there so I joined in. After the mass (very good homily) I grabbed a bite to eat and finally headed for home in an fx taxi.

I'm drained, exhausted, bushed ... what other words can I use? I don't feel like checking for grammar & spelling today. G'night. I'll keep looking for some more apartments this week.

Getting Better

2005-08-05T23:02:00.000+08:00

I just signed my contract today and am informed of the additional monthly bonuses. Looks like they've recognized my talents =) I'm getting more than an entry level could actually get, In addition to my so-so newbie salary I get a +$$$$$ for doing all the SysAdmin & NetAdmin work (confidential, so I'm not posting the amount), also add to that the meal & transport allowances. Things are getting better.

Tomorrow I will hunt for that apartment, I've gathered several phone numbers & addresses already ... too bad I can't use my motorcycle, I failed to renew it's registration this week. I'll do it Monday.