fortune sticks

it’s been a while since i last had a yan-yan snack, and now they come with cute fortune lines! “black ink” does not sound like a fortune, tho.

a sorta eventful weekend

because i love indian and mediterranean cuisine, my friends and i decided to eat at a persian restaurant last sunday. we weren’t familiar with most of the things on the menu, so we got a bit adventurous and picked random dishes. one of us was on a diet, so she settled for the yummy green salad garnished with corn and grilled chicken. and an earthworm lol. she was through eating the whole salad when she saw an earthworm tap dancing on her empty plate. it’s a good thing that she’s not at all grossed out, so we were able to show the kitchen about it without causing scandal. a few minutes later, the restaurant owner himself came to our table and expressed his apologies. from the look on his face, it was clear that he was terribly embarrassed about the incident and even mentioned that even his apology could never fully express nor make up what has happened. he was lucky because we’re not the sort who make it a big public scandal; besides, it was sort of an assurance that their vegetables are organic hehehe.. anyway, the meal worth around 2 thousand pesos was on the house (yey!) and we even got complimentary dessert. we weren’t planning on pressing charges or anything, it was no biggie. in fact, we were even willing to pay for the “undamaged” food. what surprised me that night, aside from the free meal, was the owner’s guts to claim responsibility. we admired how he dealt with it and showed some class. you can’t find that in most restaurants in manila, you know. the best you can get, if you’re lucky, is a free replacement soup and a kthxbai.

we sorta felt bad for them because these things do happen, but on the other hand we can’t deny being happy for having a free delicious meal lol. and because they have good food and excellent service, we will still be going back for more. :)

i guess we had too much fun and blahaha that night that i got serious dyspepsia the following day. to top that, fever’s decided to boogie along as well. not even a bottle of 7-up did the trick, so i was stuck in bed the whole day feeling lousy and unusually full. sleeping only made it worse.

anyhoo, the free moo cards i got for renewing my flickr account arrived that day.

and eek were they small!

they make nice personalized call cards, tho.

this is the car audio cable extension we murdered. instead of buying a new one, we bought it to replace the missing parts of my brother’s hand-me-down belkin ipod player. so, yay! we got the thing working again lol.

lions for lambs

The story begins after two determined students at a West Coast University, Arian and Ernest, follow the inspiration of their idealistic professor, Dr. Malley, and attempt to do something important with their lives. But when the two make the bold decision to join the battle in Afghanistan, Malley is both moved and distraught. Now, as Arian and Ernest fight for survival in the field, they become the string that binds together two disparate stories on opposite sides of America. In California, an anguished Dr. Malley attempts to reach a privileged but disaffected student who is the very opposite of Arian and Ernest. Meanwhile, in Washington D.C. the charismatic Presidential hopeful, Senator Jasper Irving, is about to give a bombshell story to a probing TV journalist that may affect Arian and Ernest’s fates. As arguments, memories and bullets fly, the three stories are woven ever more tightly together, revealing how each of these Americans has a profound impact on each other and the world.

you just gotta love the verbal duel between meryl streep and tom cruise, politically correct vocabulary can be so manipulative and.. wrong. the plot is very thick and thought-provoking, obviously hinting it’s against the almost-meaningless hullabaloo born from the mistakes of selfish politicians and the greedy media. you don’t have to be american to be able to relate to this film. i’m pretty sure you’ll get what i mean after you watch this. human nature, after all, is universal.

yahoo messenger 9.1 beta

whenever yahoo releases a beta, i usually read the reviews first and wait until they release the final version. the last beta installation has wiped out my entire message archive, so yey me. but recently, out of curiosity, i’ve decided to install the damn thing anyway. after i backed up everything, of course.

i can’t say it looks better than the previous version, but it definitely has better options.

• you now have the option to view your contact list in compact or detailed mode. you will be able to see emoticons in your status messages and get a bigger preview of your friend’s avatar. now you don’t have to wonder what that :> in your friend’s status is hehe
• the address book below your contact list is very easy to access and edit, it’s pretty much like editing a contact detail in messenger.
• view video and photo links IN your chat window, there’s no need to click on the link. i don’t know if i should be happy about this feature. think about the annoying *Buzz!*, and this time it comes with video. now you watch it whether you like it or not, lol.
• new emoticons. nuff said.

it’ll take some time before i learn to like the new messenger’s look, but hey, the new options (and emoticons! ^^) are good enough for now. i’m still waiting for yahoo to improve their mac version, because all of them suck. (but then again, who’d want ym if you have adium? lol)

want to try the new yahoo messenger for pc? click here. still not convinced? view the video demo here.

why you should get applecare protection plan

yeah.. why should we get an applecare protection plan?

what could possibly go wrong with my sexy little—- WTF!!!

lol. if i paid for an extended warranty just for this one, i’d feel real stupid. i’m not saying i’d prefer an HD crash (lol and hopefully that won’t happen to me), but i want to be guaranteed that i’ve made a wise investment. unfortunately, i bought a warranty on impulse because i baby my mac a lot. so embarrassing, i’m starting to sound like an apple zealot.

oh noes, i’m in deep shit!

it’s never EVER a girl’s job to handle major troubleshooting around the house, like improving our residential compound’s screwed up sewerage system. i am not trying to be sexist here, of course girls can also do simple house repairs and stuff, but let’s face it, no girl would want to be bothered with a defective poso negro problem.

my parents left for the states without briefing me about the possible problems that may arise, i thought they had it all fixed and i’d be worry-free. i didn’t know i was in for a chunk of nasty surprises. when the problems started to surface (literally), i was forced to study the blueprints of the house, from the ground up, to familiarize myself and understand what the repair guys are talking about. i was planning to wait for my mom to come home, but if i do, i’d already be drowning in my tenants’ complaints. it was a mistake when i didn’t consult a contractor, an architect or an engineer. it’s important that you know the details of your home down to its dirty gut, but it’s still best to consult with a professional before you start hammering away.

it would be best if you let a guy oversee the repairs. again, i’m not being sexist, because i tried being in charge of a couple of major repair procedure and i was completely clueless no matter how they explained it. and because i was clueless (and uninterested), i just wanted the thing done as soon as possible even if it’s going to be expensive.

the ongoing repairs will be over soon, probably before november kicks in. i promised myself that i’d hire a contractor to do future dirty jobs, otherwise i’d bury myself in our oh-so-luxurious poso negro.

estrada pardoned

politicians are very good at reading between the lines, they’d never survive that sort of shit hole if they were stupid. they would want you to believe that what they say (and do) is what you’ll exactly get.

let’s say you bribe an mmda officer just to get yourself off the hook. would you tell him, “here’s the bribe sir, now let me off” ? of course not. you’d make it sound innocent by saying, “here, get yourself a snack”.

if an mmda officer knows how to read between the lines,  then i suppose you are capable of realizing that estrada’s pardon was a load of crap. i wouldn’t be surprised if erap rolls over and drools at arroyo’s command. philippine politics is full of theatrics, it may even be more creative than a bunch of executives behind big brother. it loves pulling rabbits out of the hat while people burn with false patriotism. she pleases the masses by pardoning their super masa icon, and hopefully her ratings would skyrocket.

and world peace.

firefox sucks on a mac

as a web designer, i can’t imagine life without firefox.

well… until i used it on a mac.

it’s annoyingly slow, does not display some applications properly and hangs for some weird reason. i can’t even surf friendster properly because my so-called incredible browser hangs whenever i encounter user profiles overloaded with multimedia stuff (like, multiple embedded music and videos playing simultaneously. annoyingly unappealing, but that’s another story). right-clicking on a page takes the drop-down menu a couple of minutes before it loads, and the sight of the mac’s beachball-like loader is starting to get into my nerves.

if it weren’t for firefox’s useful web development plugins, i would’ve preferred using safari instead. or camino. or flock. i hope mozilla will address this issue sooner, this is worse than using ie.

dumbledore is gay

before you poke me to death with your makeshift wands, i want to make it clear that it was rowling who said that. she casually reveals to readers about dumbledore’s sexuality when asked if he has ever loved somebody. here’s an excerpt of the news (if you can call it that):

In front of a full house of hardcore Potter fans at Carnegie Hall in New York, Rowling, sitting on the stage on a red velvet and carved wood throne, read from her seventh and final book, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” then took questions. One fan asked whether Albus Dumbledore, the head of the famed Hogwarts School of Wizardry and Witchcraft, had ever loved anyone. Rowling smiled. “Dumbledore is gay, actually,” replied Rowling as the audience errupted in surprise. She added that, in her mind, Dumbledore had an unrequited love affair with Gellert Grindelwald, Voldemort’s predecessor who appears in the seventh book. After several minutes of prolonged shouting and clapping from astonshed fans, Rowling added. “I would have told you earlier if I knew it would make you so happy.”

“Oh, come here Harry. I need you to reach in my robe and find the Elder Wand.” lol, sorry i can’t help it XD

read rowling’s full answer from the leaky cauldron.

keywords of the day

i love to post about my travels and stuff, and it gives me cute fuzzy feeling whenever people find my information helpful. today, it surprised me a bit because i learned that most of my hits for this week came from keywords i never thought would be associated with my blog.

really.

these are the top keywords of the week, they probably came from perverts sniffing used underwear in some dilapidated apartment, then puts it back in a crumpled ziplock for storage. sorry for bursting your bubbles, you pervs. the post you’re looking for does not sell used underwear. however, you can smell your unwashed and skid-marked underwear, if you wear any, that is.