Tuesday, November 30, 2004

Crazy Days are Ahead of Us

I tell you... Working in the photofinishing business is probably one of the worst experiences you can imagine. Chemical fumes hit you every hour. It's as toxic as working out next to a guy who has not changed his shirt for three months. Toxic as in smells that clears out your mucus while you are on a high of 103 degree fever.

The only thing worse that I can imagine is working with a manager who is out to get you. When I was a teen, I worked at a grocery store as a butcher. Well, it was a fish store, so I cleaned fish. The manager that I worked with had it in for me just because I could scale a milkfish in ten seconds and leave nary a scale. Can I help that? I grew up in the PHilippines, a land surrounded by the Pacific. I was swimming before I was even born. Let us not even mention that I literally grew up on the shores of the islands.

Anyways, the manager was an odd fellow. She wanted to be better than everyone else. But in a fish store? What? Fastest knifer in town? That was Cruz the other Pinoy who grew up in Lady Imelda's backyard. The stories he would tell about Imelda before she became the first lady of the Philippines! He said that she was like a star in a dark night. Hard to imagine I know.

But the manager was an odd fellow. Sometimes, her desire overwhelmed her good judgement. Thus, her irrational idea of chasing out every single butcher who worked for the store. Last I heard, the store was going under. I guess it's all that good vibe the store encouraged.

It's probably time to forget the manager. But sometimes, the pity overtakes me. This fellow was so odd, I can't imagine her having a good life. Hmm, maybe it's just the karma hitting her back.

Speaking of insane managers, today, the supervisor approached me and told me that I had a presentation for the other directors. I need to show them how the accident happened over thanksgiving weekend. All that in six hours. Thanks a lot Maude. I was so stressed out that my day became a 3 on a scale of 10 at 9AM! But then I settled down after talking to my fiancee. She is so blessed. Sometimes, I don't know what I would do without her. Well, I would have walked out of that little booth on a corner I tell ya!!!!

When I worked out yesterday, the day became a six. I was a little bit better than I was on Monday. I ate Pinoy food at Ongpin, and ordered bbq chicken. the chicken was kind of raw in the inside. but it was bbq.

Monday, November 29, 2004

It's a five kind of day

Well, today was a five. I heard that at another department, one of the managers had just about lost it. It's hard when you work in the photofinishing business. The pressure to perform sometimes just gets to you. You start at one of the machines as a newbie. And over a period of one month, you are the acknowledged experts.

One guy working on the weekend ended up changing the chemicals in the machines. He added the wrong type of developer and stop and regenerator. Next thing you know, about one thousand films from the Thanksgiving weekend is certifiable waste. Who wouldn't go out of his mind?

But that is another thing with the management that I have seen over time. They just want things to happen as if by magic. Does thinking about something really make it happen? Nope, not unless you are self-actualizing. There are only so many hours in a day. There are only so many days in a week. In between, you need to spend time with your friends and families.

Maybe that guy was just thinking about his wife and children. Maybe he was digesting the leftover turkey. Maybe he simply made a mistake. But how do you tell your customers that the company just lost the photos of little Jenny with the drumstick or of grandpa with the orange peel in his mouth?

On the bright side, I ate salad for lunch and dinner. Funny, with meat, I can eat through the meal in five minutes flat. With greens, it's a different matter. I eat slow. I am deliberate. I even contemplate. I prefer to dip the greens into the sauce or dressing as others would call it. My goal is to be 180 pounds. I want to live till 70.


Sunday, November 28, 2004

Today was a good day

My teacher told me that in order to understand life, I need to measure how each day passes. I am going to use a ten point scale. A 1 is a really bad day. A 5 is an average day. A 10 is phenomenal.

Today was a 6. Had lunch at Japantown with D and C and the fiancee to celebrate D's birthday. All the people I know are hitting their 30's. I myself am in the midst of 30.

After lunch, I dropped them off at Union Square in SF. I am beginning to be more familiar with the freeway system in downtown SF. Although, I must admit that I was taking the long way to work. At work, I had to revise some documents. Spent time from 3PM to 8PM.

Thanksgiving Thursday was a great day. That one was a 8. I worked out in anticipation of the foodfest. The fest was turkey, prime rib, turon, mousse cake, snap peas, and vegetables. Awesome.

Saturday, November 27, 2004

Fuck the South. Fuck 'em. We should have let them go when they wanted
to
leave. But no, we had to kill half a million people so they'd stay part
of
our special Union. Fighting for the right to keep slaves - yeah, those
are
states we want to keep.

And now what do we get? We're the fucking Arrogant Northeast Liberal
Elite? How about this for arrogant: the South is the Real America? The
Authentic America. Really?

Cause we fucking founded this country, assholes. Those [
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Founding_Fathers_of_the_United_States
]Founding Fathers you keep going on and on about? All that bullshit
about
what you think they meant by the Second Amendment giving you the right
to
keep your [
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/9644540.htm?1c
]assault weapons in the glove compartment because you didn't bother to
read the [
http://www.motherjones.com/news/special_reports/1994/01/nra.sidebar.html
]first half of the fucking sentence? Who do you think those wig-wearing
lacy-shirt sporting [
http://www.theology.edu/journal/volume2/ushistor.htm
]revolutionaries were? They were fucking blue-staters, dickhead.
Boston?
Philadelphia? New York? Hello? Think there might be a reason all the
fucking [
http://www.americanparknetwork.com/parkinfo/sl/history/liberty.html
]monuments are up here in our backyard?

No, No. Get the fuck out. We're not letting you visit the Liberty Bell
and
fucking Plymouth Rock anymore until you get over your real American
selves
and start respecting those other nine amendments. Who do you think
those
fucking stripes on the flag are for? Nine are for fucking blue states.
And
it would be 10 if those Vermonters had gotten their fucking Subarus
together and broken off from New York a little earlier. Get it? We sta
rted this shit, so don't get all uppity about how real you are you
Johnny-come-lately "Oooooh I've been a state for [
http://www.state.ok.us/osfdocs/stinfo2.html ]almost a hundred years"
dickheads. Fuck off.

Arrogant? You wanna talk about us Northeasterners being fucking
arrogant?
What's more American than arrogance? Hmmm? Maybe [
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0330-03.htm ]horsies? I don't think
so. Arrogance is the fucking cornerstone of what it means to be
American.
And I wouldn't be so fucking arrogant if I wasn't paying for your
fucking
bridges, bitch.

All those Federal taxes you love to hate? It all [
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2004/09/red_states_feed.html
]comes from us and goes to you, so shut up and enjoy your fucking [
http://newdeal.feri.org/tva/ ]Tennessee Valley Authority electricity
and
your fancy highways that we paid for. And the next time Florida gets h
it
by a hurricane you can come crying to us if you want to, but you're the
ones who built on a fucking swamp. "Let the Spanish keep it, it’s a
shithole," we said, but you had to have your fucking orange juice.

The next dickwad who says, "It’s your money, not the government's
money"
is gonna get their ass kicked. Nine of the ten states that get the most
federal fucking dollars and pay the least... can you guess? Go on,
guess.
That’s right, motherfucker, they're red states. And eight of the ten
states that receive the least and pay the most? It’s too easy, asshole,
they’re blue states. It’s not your money, assholes, it’s fucking our
money. What was that Real American Value you were spouting a minute
ago?
Self reliance? Try this for self reliance: buy your own fucking stop
signs, assholes.

Let’s talk about those values for a fucking minute. You and your
Southern
values can bite my ass because the blue states got the values over you
fucking Real Americans eve ry day of the goddamn week. Which state do
you
think has the lowest divorce rate you marriage-hyping dickwads? Well?
Can
you guess? It’s fucking [
http://toughenough.org/2004/10/massachusetts-liberal-pride.html
]Massachusetts, the fucking center of the gay marriage universe. Yes,
that’s right, the state you love to tie around the neck of anyone to
the
left of Strom Thurmond has the lowest divorce rate in the fucking
nation.
Think that’s just some [
http://www.divorcemag.com/statistics/statsUS2.shtml ]aberration? How
about
this: 9 of the 10 lowest divorce rates are fucking blue states,
asshole,
and most are in the Northeast, where our values suck so bad. And where
are
the highest divorce rates? Care to fucking guess? 10 of the top 10 are
fucking red-ass we're-so-fucking-moral states. And while Nevada is the
worst, the [ http://www.ncpa.org/pd/social/pd111999g.html ]Bible Belt
is
doing its fucking part.

But two guys m aking out is going to fucking ruin marriage for you?
Yeah?
Seems like you're ruining it pretty well on your own, you little
bastards.
Oh, but that's ok because you go to church, right? I mean you do,
right?
Cause we fucking get to hear about it every goddamn year at election
time.
Yes, we're fascinated by how you get up every Sunday morning and sing,
and
then you're fucking towers of moral superiority. Yeah, that's a
workable
formula. Maybe us fucking Northerners don't talk about religion asc
much
as you because we're not so busy sinning, hmmm? Ever think of that, you
self-righteous assholes? No, you're too busy [
http://slate.msn.com/id/2087621/ ]erecting giant stone tablets of the
Ten
Commandments in buildings paid for by the fucking Northeast Liberal
Elite.
And who has the [
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_n12_v94/ai_21020057
]highest murder rates in the nation? It ain't us up here in the North,
assholes.

Well this gravy train is fucking over. Take your liberal-bashing,
federal-tax-leaching, confederate-flag-waving, holier-than-thou,
hypocritical bullshit and shove it up your ass.

And no, you can't have your fucking convention in New York next time.
Fuck
off.

[ http://www.fuckthesouth.com/ ]http://www.fuckthesouth.com/

Thursday, November 25, 2004

Turkey Day!!!

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone out there in cyberspace. May you eat all the turkey meat that your stomach can digest.

We just had our Thanksgiving meal: turkey, roast beef, green peas with cream, pansit sotanghon, turon, paksiw na lechon, vegetables, and wine. It was a fine meal brought to us by Albertson's and by yours truly. The fiancee and I cooked the paksiw last night.

Saturday, November 20, 2004

Iran, You are Next!

Recently, outgoing Sec of State Colin Powell AKA bitch dog of George W. Bush has pointed out Iran is trying to get nuclear power. If I were the leaders of Iran, I would be careful. The US military is in Iraq. If they are not careful, Bush just might try to see if American nukes still tick and blow.

Don't fuck with a lame duck president. He's got some sort of mandate from those so called Christians from the Midwest and the South. God Help America and Nowhere Else!
The Big Game

Gina Merlone writes about how it feels to be a Cal fan and be in Berkeley.

Sunday, November 14, 2004

Evenings for the Engaged

Tonight was the last night for our required counseling from the Catholic Church. The counseling is in preparation for our upcoming nuptials. Initially, we had planned on doing the weekend bootcamp seminar. But, with a pricetag of $350, the bootcamp idea was expensive. You have to save some money when you are about to feed 300 people.

I had wanted to take the class with a Filipino couple as moderators, but that session was scheduled for Wednesdays at 7PM. Much as I want to, there is simply no way to get back to the East Bay on time. So we went to the Sunday evening couple A and N. They were immigrants from the Middle East. That suprised me because I had never met a Catholic from Lebanon before. But, Catholicism is a worldwide thing so I guess I should stop being surprised.

The whole experience was a very positive one. I thought that there would be a couple preaching the words of God and try to convert us even more to become more religious. However, that is not what I found. Instead, I saw how a couple used religion to the advantage of their lives. Religion was a source of faith and marriage. I can't say that I had ever seen that one before. At least, I had never seen it as an open book before.

I asked about the practical aspect of not going to bed mad at each other. A's suggestion was that one should not. Even if the other person is ignoring you, you should make the effort of going and saying goodnight. I like that. There is no problem that is going to be bigger than a marriage or will split the marriage.

Father R spoke to us tonight about the marriage. He played this country song whose title escapes me. But the story is about this guy's father and how he lives his life like he was dying. The music was very powerful. The song had struck me while I was in the car a few months ago. The melody was great, but the story was even better. The father ends up skydiving, rocky mountain climbing. He went 2.4 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu. He loved deeper. Became the father he was expected to be. The moral of the lesson is to live life as if you were dying.

Now, I see that the Catholic Church is not as uptight as I thought it was. I figured that with the Pope so aged and so conservative that I was going to get into trouble. In truth, it was quite fun.

Thursday, November 11, 2004

A Mover and a Shaker

I must have joined the group of elites who don't know which way the world turns. If you read Filipinas magazine, you will note that for this month's editorial, Monalisa Yuchengcho discusses the event that I wrote about on my Oct 3 entry.

What do you say? Do you think I move and shake?
There is Always a Price

A few years ago, my goal in life was to be famous. That was the goal. If it was something that would have made me famous, I wanted it. I wanted to cure cancer. I wanted to be a celebrity. I wanted to be a sports star. I wanted to be a celebrated author. You know, someone whose works mean something to the society that he lived in.

Of course, luckily for me, I always knew that you can have all the things in the universe if you are willing to pay the price. The greater that things you want, the steeper the price got. You see, that was the glitch with me. I was never one to want to pay the piper the price. It always seems too steep. It always seems so unfair. You want to cure cancer? Sure you can do that. But, you have to give up a family and children and a wife. You want to be a lawyer? Not a problem. The price is that your marriage will fall on the rocks. You want anything else? You know, your children will make you ruler of the world if you are willing to trade. Get the picture?

Today, I heard that Iris Chang committed suicide. Iris Chang is the author of the book The Rape of Nanking which is one of the first to tackle the brutality of the Japanese soldiers during World War II. The book was very controversial because it discussed the inhumanity which results from war. If there is a will, there is a way. Killing a human being is nothing if you look at them as animals.

I stood at Cody's bookstore in Berkeley and desired to write a book just like Iris Chang. What I did not realize six years ago is that what Iris Chang has to pay for to be that controversial and famous author is her life. She took a shotgun and pulled the trigger.

What type of depression would you have to be to actually take out and face the shotgun? Don't get me wrong. I plan to be a member of the NRA and buy rifles. The SO and I dream about clay shooting. But that is one thing that bothers me about guns. If you get to feeling the dumps, will it be so easy to just pull the trigger?

I mourn the loss of Iris Chang for this world. I believe that her demons just happened to get to her on a very bad day for her. If she could have just hanged on just one more day, perhaps she would have chosen happiness.

Iris, just like a flower, you bloom and pass away so quickly. I hope you find the peace you so desperate want.

Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Damn

Hmm, I guess my guessing needs work. I really thought Kerry was going to do it.

Damn

Hmm, I guess my guessing needs work. I really thought Kerry was going to do it.

Damn

Hmm, I guess my guessing needs work. I really thought Kerry was going to do it.

Monday, November 01, 2004

It's Kerry

I make a bold prediction. it's Kerry. Americans are sick and tired of a president who mangles everything he touches. As a fiscal conservative Republican, it makes me sick that Bush has basically demolished and destroyed the american economy through this war.

Hello America? Go elect Kerry. Amateur night at the White House is over.
Photos at Work

After much time, I have finally added a picture of the SO at work. Nothing special, just a 4x6 inch photo of her by the kulintang. After a while, folks at work were asking why I did not have any photos. I guess I really did not need photos. I just called up the SO and we were connected. I suppose that with time, that might also change. I hope not. I hope I can always find the time to give a call to wake up the SO.

The desk is a mess. I have lost 50% of deskspace. The windows are extremely bright from the sunlight that streams in. But, my plants are happy over the weekend because of the fabulous sun that allowed them to reduce carbon dioxide into sugars. Whoopee!!!

Trick or Treat! Happy Halloween!

Well, I finally went trick or treating around the neighborhood. It's always been a dream of mine.

Some of the houses actually go all out. There was one house with fog, and laser lights and all kinds of cool stuff. When our party went up to the door, there was eerie music. Then, the mannequin looking guy leapt up and scared a cousin of the fiancee! She must have jumped ten feet. And, her scream could be heard down the block. Bwahahha.

Another house had a graveyard, many pumpkins with lights and great decorations. I was telling the SO that when we have a house, we should do something like that. The SO had her hair spraypainted. I did not have any costume on, although with my flashlight, I was the beacon of light so that all could see the sidewalk. The niece was a Hobo, though she did not want to wear the hobo nose. My sister wore the hobo hat. The So's sister was a German minimalist with red hair. The SO's cousin was a 50's diner waitress with blue hair. The SO's sister's boyfriend was a physician prescribing pills.

There were a lot of kids doing Halloween. A group of kids had superman outfits. They had a milk cow with them and Latka of Taxi fame. I figured that we would be seeing those kids on the Castro in about two years. Well maybe five since I heard the Castro went over-21 years old now. Frankly I was surprised to see kids that were over 13 years old looking for candy. It seemed like they should have outgrown this. But then again, here I am excited over Halloween.

The SO's area was interesting because it was Piedmont, which is the high end neighborhood. Many of the people who answered the door were older retired folks. But what houses! Man, they were well decorated and very very rich. Some of the folks who had kids were actually older people. Maybe in their 40's.

Next year, I hope to get my monk outfit. Though in the Castro, it will get kind of cold. I should have bought that cape from Nordstroms two years ago! Oh well, when the Star Wars Episode 3 comes out, that's when I'll get the cape.
Any title here

Last night's topic in the weekly counseling for to be married Catholics was sex and images of God. Frankly, sex and images of God make me uncomfortable. Perhaps it was because God was taught to me as an all seeing being who watched every single move I made. Kind of like Santa Claus but with God does not bring presents. Or, if you are more practical, God is a voyeur who is really into watching what you do at night before you go to bed.

This has singularly led to the difficult task of praying after having had some unsavory thoughts. How do you speak to your deity after you just made the acquaintance of your favorite movie actress in your mind? The guilt is enough to make me reject God or as what usually happens, you don't pray.

It was explained to us why contraceptives are frowned upon by the Church. The sexual act is a sacred act that is not done for recreation. When having sex, the intent of the two parties is to create a child. It kind of explains how and why the church is so uptight. I always thought that the Church just wanted more and more Catholics on this land. But really, the last thing one needs in this world is an unwanted child. It seems more practical to just accept contraception and other forms of aid.