Last Tuesday, former ADDU HS 4Blue classmates gathered around for a drink or two at Greenbelt. Among the attendees were Sally, Janoah, Jeanny, Kate, Crystal, Rhea, Mikko, Dino and Charles. It was a fun night until the waitress informed us that bars in Greenbelt 3 closed at 12 MN. WTH?!?

Anyway, naisip ko, sobrang tagal na rin pala since kami nagkita-kita, about <10 years ago, sobbing moments. Imagine that! Then it dawned on me, I can’t anymore remember high school, maybe because I am a nerdox way back or maybe I just want to erase that memory. Anyway, back then all I ever had were school and home. You can’t blame me, my baon at that time was around PHP 20, yes PHP 20! But aha! It became PHP 40 when I was in 4th year, but PHP 40 at that time was next to nothingness. I remembered during my last years in high school that the only source of snacks I had were kikiam and mentos, imagine that, filling your stomach with air to alleviate the hunger. After snack time, I will still have around PHP 20. For lunch I will just buy a rice, a bar-be-que and a free soup for only… drum roll please… PHP 10!!! Hooray for province price! (So that must be the reason I am a walking skeletor back then!)

For non-nihonggo speakers (that includes me, oh the irony!) it means ‘long time no see’ and yes it’s been a very long time since I last blogged. Many things that connived to stop me (temporarily) from blogging.

1. Smartbro acted quite funny for a week. Seems like a little movement of the antenna causes significant drop in internet access. I learned it the hardway. Someone hardwired his Smartbro antenna on top of my antenna and accidentally mis-aligned my poor antenna from Smart’s base station and we thought Smartbro was the problem (whew!).

2. My poor hard disk drive died on me (RIP). Two weeks ago my trusty information ‘holder’ stopped working and frankly I panicked because all my data, I mean all, was in there and it just died, I could not even access it with my again trusty Ubuntu Live CD.

3. Busy at work. Times have changed. I could no longer browse Digg at the office and not because it was block but because I could not put surfing in my time record (grins).

4. LBM. Yes. I had that for four days and the friggin* doctor wanted me to undergo ‘labatiba’, endoscopy and colonoscopy. Well fortunately he checked my stomach (tummy) and diagnosed that I have plenty of air inside. F*** kabag lang pala at dinaan pa ako sa takot.

But here I am alive and well again. 

Last Tuesday, some guys and gals from our company went to grabbed some drinks. After a long debate - with Argie wanting to go to some oldies place in Malate, not that it is bad but it is freaking Tuesday! - we decided to settle at Grilla in Rockwell. Pretty cozy place I should say. After 3 buckets of mouth-watering beers and a chocolate fundu for pulutan - WTH! - we decided to transfer to another place and then it happened. Argie wanted to go to this Jeckyl and Hyde place and keeps on insisting it is just around the corner. John doubted Argie’s statement and reiterated that the place was in Taft and has been closed for 3 years now. But Argie was such a pain in the ass and kept on insisting that such place existed. After several arguments, we joked Argie that maybe he wanted to go to Ozone Disco - no offense to people with relatives that died in the horrifying accident. And we just laughed at Argie. Argie, now sober, said that he was time-warped. LOL. Afterwhich we decided to spent the next 30mins at Pier1 in the Fort ordering beer at the same time sipping some tuna belly soup, again courtesy of Argie. Pretty rough Tuesday night.

Last Friday night, Chester invited me for a night out. I was hesitant at first because the place is in QC which WTF a million miles away from Makati. But I still went along because I was in Trinoma that time. Earlier that evening, I had dinner with Rheena and Shelie, err call that a despidida for Rheena (she will be working in Singapore) and destressing activity for Shelie (she hasn’t slept for 3 days because of her masteral). So after dinner we went to Starbucks to -obviously- drink beers, err coffee and tea. There I met up with Chester. After, we went to Guillys Island which is right besides ABS-CBN building. It was my first time there, it was actually a nice place, reminiscent of the Embassy bar, and the music was cool too, a lot of house and lots of R&Beh midway. After a drink or two or three or four or hell I forgot to count, we decided to dropped by Barrakz to have one last drink for the road. Ironic as it may seems but it will be our last drink at that fateful place. You see, Chester parked his car right besides the establishment, and after that one last drinking spree, we found out that one of tires were deflated and teared. Like WTF! No single guard ever noticed it happened. Good thing a gas station was nearby and we temporarily fixed it, and off we go. When we were almost halfway from his place the tire simply gave up, it was like a scene straight from the movies only this time we weren’t chased by either cops or hoodlums. Everyone in the street was looking at the car and some were concerned while others were laughing, hell, we didn’t even have a choice that time, we can stop and let the car be towed but that would be a HUGE hassle so Chester decided to let it ‘crawl’ up to the vulcanizing shop. Fortunately the tire wasn’t completely busted when we arrived there or else that would be another HUGE problem. Imagine driving around EDSA with a busted tire and screeching mag! Whooah (in Keanu Reeves style). Anyway, after that I rode a taxi and went home, but just before I called out one I step on this HUGE dog poopoo. Like ecky thump! Did we just opened a pandora of misfortunes?

Last Thursday, the whole Perl team, as well as the QA and the Graphics team went to Elbow Room at Metrowalk, Ortigas for their team building. I was the only one that wasn’t part of either the three teams or with the HR, so in effect I was just a gate crasher, but never a party pooper.

That was the first time I went to Elbow Room and good thing they reserved a VIP room. The VIP room is quite big, with 2 tv sets dedicated for videoke, a long table for the foods, and a billiard table smacked in the center. If you have no plans on renting the VIP room, one can still play billiards on their public area however you lose the videoke and swap it for a live band instead - which is not a bad idea afterall.

The price, as I can recall, is PHP 4,000 for the VIP room from 8PM - 12MN (not bad ehh). However food is not yet part of the package. Compared that to Redbox’s PHP 399 (exclusive of tax) + PHP 99 for buffet per person which is good for 7PM - 12MN.

It was a fun night and we wrapped it up with a final drinking round at Jay-Js.

Nep and I were eating at North Park when he saw this group of yuppies (Young Professional), who are incidentally consisted of couples dining. Before that I told Nep I read an article about the reason why thin girls especially Asian girls love fat guys. Then he interrupted me by saying, that behind me was a great example of that theory or let’s just say law. And lo’ and behold, right before my eyes, there is this girl - well she looked common, well ok, she’s white - being embraced by a fat guy.

And then I realized that maybe just maybe thin girls love fat guys because fat guys symbolize happiness, jolliness and a carefree attitude; and you don’t even need to look further than the mighty Buddha himself! Or maybe they want fat guys because they are as adorable and as cute - here fuzzy wuzzy - as polar bears? Well ok, panda bears, oh geez teddy bear it is. Or maybe fat means more money?

Another theory that I cultivated in my mind is that thin girls think that their fat bfs will put them in the pedestal, honestly girls value total submissiveness and undying loyalty. Think about this for a second, fat = lower self-esteem, beautiful gf = higher self-esteem, beautiful gf will leave you = suicide, so fat = undying love.

Yesterday I went to Shopwise to buy some oranges. And I did. I bought 4 of those vitamin C enhancers.

And when I’m about to pay for the said merchandise I tried to look for that cashier lane that says "10 or 15 or less items". They always have those lanes. And they did.

Waiting in line I noticed that the girl in front of me has gazillions of items in her basket. Man! This girl has the nerve to even line up. Her sister (or so I thought) noticed the board and told her that this line was only for 12 items or less. But the other girl insisted that, drum roll!, she will only "put" 12 items at a time until all her items have been accounted for! That way the cashier will not be hassled. What twisted reasoning is that!

Well, last night, we went to Banana Leaf in Chimes Sales.

We are the only customers in that food establishment and my gf asked me amusingly if I rented the place. I said ‘yeah!, for you!’ (charing). Even the waitress responded ‘yes maam, your bf called us to rent the place’. Such perky people.

We ordered, pad thai, tilapia fillet, and negori something rice. Hearty meal shall I say. Yummy! 

I went home to Davao today. I was praying hardly that the heavy rain will stop cause I’m very very afraid of air pockets - how much more coming from a typhoon!

My flight was scheduled at 1pm. I didn’t eat lunch cause I thought hell Cebu Pacific will have free snacks, might as well grab it. I was wrong. Dead wrong.

I thought snacks were free, just like it was always been. But this time, I was really hungry and was relieved to see the flight attendants with their snacks. And then, "Sir, what do you want?", "Uhmm, water please", "Ok, sir, that would be 50 bucks", WHAT?!?!??! My inner jan2x said. But the hell, I don’t want to cause a scandal, so I paid up. That sucks. Really.

No. More. Snacks. 

Yesterday we went to - forget the name of the place - a bar right in front of Gwellos in Palanca.

The place is much cozier compared to Gwellos, but the latter stands out in its musical choices. Well I’m not really a fan of R&Beh music.

Anyway, after the R&Beh music, a band performed. The singer asked our group if someone is celebrating something. Well Argie pointed at me and shouted, "It’s Jan2x’s birthday!" Oh shucks. Then the singer greeted me and asked me if I want to request a song. Argie requested Linger by Cranberries. He said that he is a fan of Irish bands and it fits that rainy night. Good thing the band obliged.