On happiness and leopard print flats

Today, Chica Villarta, Daniel Velasco, Rae Esteban, Adrian Bernardo and I reported on The Peaceful Sea, the third chapter of Timothy Radcliffe's book, What Is The Point of Being A Christian?. We did really well and I think everyone enjoyed the report, at least if we base it on Prof. Rosana's comments and our classmates' feedback, especially the activity we had which involved having everyone write down what makes them happy on slips of paper and picking out two between report segments. We chose six and they each received a bar of chocolate (I bought them hurriedly on my way to the bathroom after I presented my segment. Haha!) .I'm incredibly proud of my groupmates! Everyone really stepped up during last night's brainstorming session and they held the crowd's attention well. We were all in yellow because the report's on happiness (and everyone knows how I feel about yellow).

We got really interesting answers on the slips of paper: trance music, vanilla ice cream, parental approval, shopping, shoes, video games, anime, lollipops, rain, fencing. The best answer had to be Nick Padilla's: surfing, photography, skateboarding, film making and seeing his parents smile because they're proud of him. When we picked out his answer, Chica and I were going, "Who is he? He's into everything!" Good job!

There was a bit of light-hearted teasing after the class that made us all laugh, thanks to Prof. Rosana, so we ended the class on a really high note. We were all...happy--which was the point of the discussion anyway!

I have no class tomorrow so this was a good way to jumpstart my (long) weekend!

Slow Me Down

Apparently, Slow Me Down by Emmy Rossum best describes my (love)life. I'm not sure if I should be flattered by this. :)) A very disturbing part of the song (that I hope to hell does not apply to me): Save me / Somebody take my hand and lead me.

Rushing and racing and running in circles
Moving so fast I'm forgetting my purpose
Blur of the traffic is sending me spinning
Getting nowhere

My head and my heart are colliding, chaotic
Pace of the world, I just wish I could stop it
Try to appear like I've got it together
I'm falling apart

Save me
Somebody take my hand and lead me
Slow me down
Don't let love pass me by
Just show me how
Cause I'm ready to fall
Slow me down

Don't let me live a lie
Before my life flies by
I need you to slow me down

Sometimes I fear that I might disappear
In the blur of fast forward I falter again
Forgetting to breathe
I need to sleep
I'm getting nowhere

All that I've missed I see in the reflection
Pass me while I wasn't paying attention
Tired of rushing, racing and running
I'm falling apart

Tell me
Oh won't you take my hand and lead me
Slow me down
Don't let love pass me by
Just show me how
Cause I'm ready to fall
Slow me down

Don't let me live a lie
Before my life flies by
I need you to slow me down

Just show me
Slow me down
Slow me down

The noise of the world is getting me caught up
Chasing the clock and I wish I could stop it
Just need to breathe
Somebody please
Slow me down

Stocky, short Iron Man

Gio M.'s Iron Man USB best represents him. He's geeky, boyish and, most of all, short. I kid, I kid! Rio S. and I have always been amused by Gio's USB. There's just something ridiculously funny about seeing a short, stocky Iron Man's decapitated body stuck to your laptop's USB port. During our last PoS 138 class, we ended up playing with his USB...again. This time though, I remembered to take a video!

Video of Gio making his Iron Man USB walk:

Yes, we were bored little children. Tee-hee!

Close-ups of the legen--wait for it--dary USB:

There's something spooky and sinister about it too. You have to take its head off to use it. Haha!

Cups

I couldn't sleep and my PoS 180.25 readings weren't making sense to me anymore (I kept reading one paragraph again and again--not because I couldn't understand what Claude Lefort was saying, but because my mind was wandering and I was drawing ducks on the margins) so I decided to do a 7-11 run at 3 AM to buy Gatorade and a pack of M&Ms. I was so amused when I saw that I could get my Gatorade in a special commemorative cup:

Inauguration cups! Haha! During the campaign period, 7-11 sold their drinks in cups featuring presidential candidates. People could show their support for their candidate by buying their drinks in their favored candidate's cup. I'd buy Gatorade in the Noynoy Aquino cup every other night because, at one point, Manny Villar was leading in the cup count. I like this commemorative cup better though.

Good company

I had dinner last night at Sweet Inspirations with Brian M., Martin L. and Gio M. I think we all realized just how unprepared we all are for "real life" when Martin talked about how he should have taken a year off after high school to think about what he really wants to do in life (He's a History major--and that's not a common course choice because there are very few things you can do with a history degree, I'm told). I think I should have done that--taken a year off to travel, take on internships in fields I'm interested in, sign up for random, short, quirky classes (maybe a jewelry design class in SOFA, or Art Appreciation in CSB or a fiction writing class in UP or Great Books in Ateneo), learn how to bake and sew, etc. I think they should mandate high school graduates to take a year off before going to college. We'd have less shiftees/jobless graduates that way. Apart from that, we teased Brian about his all-white ensembles, swapped tales about two of our more interesting professors and discussed horror films. Fun, fun.

Tonight, I had dinner with Brian M. and Karlo D. at Flaming Wings, during which I got oppressed for preferring to eat with a knife and a fork and for being a (neo)feminist. Haha! I also got oppressed for my "socialist tendencies"--and, because I didn't finish half my food, I ended up having it wrapped so we could find a street kid to hand it to, just so I didn't have to renege on a bet I made with Karlo. I really should learn to be less stubborn. Haha.

Choco Mallows!

I didn't have dinner last night and I was rushing to get to class so I didn't have breakfast either. I couldn't concentrate on what Prof. Rosana was saying because my stomach was growling so I ran down to the Bellarmine caf to get something to munch on. I got this:

Fibisco's Choco Mallows! I haven't had this in a really long time! The last time was...fourth grade, I think. I remember how I'd find this in my lunch box at recess with a tumbler of cold milk and sneak in bites even while in class (Ma'am Lily Rodriguez's math class, in particular) . Good times. I ate three in five minutes and left Theology happy. I was even cheerfully discussing the Heckscher-Ohlin model in my International Eco class!

Chinese food cravings

In International Eco yesterday, I started craving Chinese food. Gio M. and I realized that, apart from Chowking (and that doesn't really count), there are no Chinese restaurants in the Katipunan/Katipunan Ext. area. We both started thinking about salted fish fried rice and salt-and-pepper spare ribs--and that effectively meant we spent the rest of the session talking about finding a way to get our hands (and mouths) on Chinese food without venturing too far from the area (It was raining and I had to be back by 7). After his thesis consultation and my PoS 160 class, we decided to go to the North Park in the Ortigas Home Depot compound then, just so the impromptu trip's worth it, hoard DVDs in Metrowalk.

We had jaded salted fish fried rice and salt-and-pepper spare ribs, as expected (My phone ran out of battery so the pictures are with Gio). We couldn't finish our food though. Revelations galore about common friends, Gio's girls (and boys!), his stud of a grandfather, my weird habits (I'm surprised he didn't run out on me, screaming in horror) and how we were like in high school. As usual, I made fun of his protein shake intake and he made fun of how "intense" I am as a person. He's kind of like my brother, I realized--but with freaky (flirty, his thesis adviser says) eyebrows, a crazily strong desire to be all buff and Jude Law-ish by October and murderous intentions (He keeps on cracking jokes at all the wrong moments--I choked in Prof. Tolosa's class laughing at one his jokes and trying not to show it because I didn't want Sir to notice so bad I couldn't breathe right for about five minutes and then, another time, he cracked a joke just as I was drinking water and taking my medicines). I went home with the first season of Modern Family and the third season of Chuck. Yay.

Today, I was craving Chinese food again so, when PJ and I went to MPen to meet up with Daddy (who just arrived from Palawan where he, apparently, learned the art of fire-eating :|), I begged to go to Man Yann for dinner. Yang chow fried rice + salt-and-pepper spare ribs + taosi fish fillet + crab and corn soup + chopsuey = happy Pau! (Uh-huh, I'm shallow like that.)

Not a lot of people order this but I love their taosi fish fillet! I rarely order seafood in restaurants (I grew up in Zamboanga so I'm used to fresh seafood (huuuge prawns, crabs the size of a dinner plate, mussels by the truckload) so seafood in Manila, unless it's at a really good restaurant, disappoints me. :( ) but I never hesitate ordering Mann Yann's taosi fish fillet.

My other Mann Yann staple: salt-and-pepper spare ribs

I hope I don't start craving Chinese food again anytime soon. I've been steadily losing weight and I really want to keep that up. OH CRAP, HERE IT GOES AGAIN.

They shoot, they score!

I reported in PoS 138 today with Gio M. and Rio S. on Stiglitz's Globalization and Its Discontents. The report went really well and Sir Tolosa told us we did a good job. I love working with these boys because they're really smart so they really got the material (and helped me understand that bit I couldn't get on the East Asian Crisis) and helped me frame the post-report discussions, but they're fun and defnitely not ultra-nerdy and obsessive the way some PolSci/Econ majors can get, so the report was informative but still upbeat. We were even contemplating showing a Keynes rap after the report! :D I'm looking forward to working some more with the two of them this sem--they understand how obsessive I can get and keep me relaxed. Haha.

Congratulations, guys! At least we're done with one major 138 requirement!

One more for the road!

Another impromptu Cantina bonding session with Migs T., Frances B., and Brian M.! Some of Brian's friends joined us too so we had to move to a bigger table. Super fun. We've decided to 'adopt' one of Brian's friends, Anika, even if she's an EU major (Well, Migs isn't a PolSci major, so we had a precedent! Haha.)!

Oddly enough, we spent most of the night talking about our (very sad, practically empty) love lives after Brian revealed how he broke up with a girlfriend just three days back. Frances and I weren't elaborating on ours too much but we sure did learn a lot about Migs'! And, oh, because Migs is a football varsity star, we've decided to start calling him Superstar. I kind of feel bad for Migs--he's my seatmate in PoS 160 and, when I pick on him (I get really crabby in class because it's right around lunch), his comebacks just don't quite cut it because I have Luigi R. and Fran backing me up. Haha! Brian's leaving for Hongkong tomorrow so we made him promise to get us something (otherwise, he'd get kicked out of the group. JK!). Also, I just found out Fran's an ROTC officer! Now that's my kind of girl! Haha!

Migs had immersion the next day so he drove me and Fran back to school so we could pick up stuff from our lockers before heading home. I realized I'm sort of dreading my immersion. A weekend in Batangas helping out fishermen is a good deal, but a weekend in a hut with no plumbing on a mountain is...scary. But I suppose the experience will be eye-opening.

Fun night. More to come!

Paulino

I was having an incredibly horrible day yesterday. I won't elaborate on what made me crabby and irritable the whole day but my love goes out to Team Rio (Rio Delos Santos, Brian Manalac, Migs Tuazon and Frances Buendia) and Thea G. for cheering me up at Cantina last night. What was just supposed to be a meeting for Team Rio turned out to be a hilarious night, with Thea and Brian's cousin joining in the fun. More on last night later.

I lost my voice! When I do manage to rasp out a few words, I sound like a frog. Or a man. Haha. Time for charades, boys and girls! The timing's awful too--I've no free time from 10:30 to 7:30 tonight. Yayness. :|