a whole lotta food, a whole lotta lovin' and more sleeping time to go
*ooh, and a tiny but visible dent on my bumper!

merry christmas!

i know we agreed to have a miserable christmas together but i think the gods conspired to make this christmas a wee bit more special for both of us. there's the christmas dinner with very sweet friends of the boyfriend who braved the south luzon expressway traffic so that we can all have noche buena together. there's the day-after-christmas drive to cabanatuan where i've spend the last four days being pampered by my grandmother and favorite aunt. there's the bonding time with the boyfriend at a shell gas station where we caught up on each other's christmas stories. there's the let's-be-friends-again moment with a friend who i thought i've lost already.

-oOo-

watched mano po 2 yesterday, due to aunt's proddings. if i had my way, it would've definitely been crying ladies, especially since i am a closet sharonian at heart. still, she was paying, and since i had been slumming at her home for the last couple of days, i had no choice but to watch a movie pretending to be a filmfest entry.

it was a stupid movie really. for one, there was no story. patriarch dies, three wives fight, there's a pregnant girl, there's a wuss boyfriend, there's a criple, a kind-hearted sister, and a whole lot of shouting and crying. so what's new in all that, right?

and what were they thinking casting susan roces as the older kris aquino. i mean, if i were kris, i wouldn't want to be as old as susan roces 23 years later, especially if zsazsa just aged a bit and lorna actually looked hotter after 23 years. the kris-susan casting was so bad that the people behind us were actually confused

girl 1: sino si susan roces? lola nila?
girl 2: at ano na ang nangyari kay kris?
girl 1: patay na kaya si kris?

and so it went.

they tried to fit in so many story lines that even i got confused.

waste of money. i should've insisted on watching mega. then maybe i could've supported another bout of lipo, right?

-oOo-

i got this digital camera.

it made me happy.

i was so happy i took a lot of pictures of myself. i had so many pictures it was embarassing already.

i was so excited i wanted to take a picture of the traffic in sta. ana pampanga. i whipped it out, even if it said in the manual NOT to take pictures while driving. i reasoned out that it was traffic, and we weren't moving.

except that the car was. slightly. around 5kph.

and the tricycle in front of me wasn't.

so i smashed into it. and it smashed into the tricycle in front of it.

my helpless look worked. i bet he was thinking "stupid girl driver, and she drives that way cause she's a girl."

on a normal day i would've minded. but on a day when i was clearly at fault, i'm glad i got away with an evil look.

an evil look from him and two teeny tiny dents on my bumper.

early returns

i've been putting off posting the last couple of days because, well, i'm slowly becoming a christmas humbug. however, the fingers typing this post are now nicely manicured owing to the fact that the christmas revelry has sort of begun for me already. since law school ended tuesday, my blockmates and i capped off the year with a kiddie party at mcdonald's that same night. the following evening was the educ christmas party, then thursday was my office friends' party, and friday was the birthday party of three of my favorite students.

staying in on a saturday night with a microphone and no one to listen to me sing init sa magdamag and bituing walang ningning was actually fun after all the late nights i've been indulging on since tuesday.

moving on ...

christmas parties = christmas gifts and this year's small pile is turning out to be one of the best piles yet. i know i'm being such a kid for not waiting until christmas eve but i'm filipino and for us, christmas starts in septemBER, right?

for one, my ultra-amazing ultra-fabulous ultra-talented ultra-everything comm2 teacher from way way back sent me an autographed copy of his book, jolography. i was so excited that i actually read this and poetry to my brother on the drive home to cabanatuan.

another amazing gift was a check made out to my name so that my brother and i can purchase a not-so-expensive-but-still-quite-pricey digital camera. i had managed to cajole my favorite aunt (who happens to be my ninang too!) to buy me and my brother one, saying that the camera will be our christamas/birthday gifts already. so what if the parking later is horrible and traffic will virtually be on a standstill. i WILL go to the mall, i WILL look at digital cameras till my feet hurt, and i WILL buy one. ha ha.

third on my list is an epass. now, i know that might seem quite corny and all but for anyone who lives in the south and has waited for more than a couple of minutes while inching his way up sucat or the C5 exit will know why an epass is an absolutely amazing gift.

i still have one or two gifts left unopened. and i'm keeping my fingers crossed that since it's not christmas yet, i'll have a few more come my way.

sometimes, when you pray hard enough and wish long enough, santa does hear you.

rosa, humbug no more.

p.s. gosh, i am so materialistic for equating christmas with gifts, but if you really think about it, a favorite teacher sending you a copy of his book, an aunt fulfilling your dreams of digital camera glory, and a good friend giving you an epass actually shows that (1) there are people who care enough to find out what you really want for christmas and (2) they care enough to get it for you. right?

my thighs are killing me but ...

i finally got around to doing my entire (well, almost) program in the gym last tuesday. bummed with the thought of waking up at half past five to make it to the office by seven, i stayed in bed until i found the energy courage willpower to go back to the gym after a five day rest for my aching body.

i started with the 25-minute warm-up at the treadmill which became a bore after five minutes of watching a cinemax movie i can't hear and another two minutes of craning my neck to get a better glimpse of the other television whose sound was actually audible. it was really tiring to walk and not go anywhere so after less than ten minutes i hauled my still-jiggly ass to the bikes where i did the entire fifteen minutes required of me (yay!yay!) and burned -- don't be shocked -- a grand total of 35 calories.

yes, you read that right, 35 calories. i get more calories eating a piece of mentos.

i went through all of the machines, none of the free weights, indicated in the program. i huffed and puffed and sweated like a pig. i stretched and pulled and twisted like there was no tomorrow.

i woke up wednesday in pain. if you came across a girl driving whose car kept stopping, that might've been me. see, my thighs hurt so much i couldn't even properly step on the gas and the clutch pedals.

i was ready to swear off the gym and forget that i ever thought of giving a damn to two-piece bikinis, until i noticed that hey, my pantleg was somewhat kind of loose.

and my thighs weren't exactly rubbing against each other.

wow.

take me back to the gym, let me suffer all that pain again. sexy thighs are worth all the pain in the world, if you ask me.

now, if only i could get myself to do my crunches.

isn't it ironic?

the christmas season has started and in spite of the downturn in the economy, a couple of gifts have trickled in.

so far, the best has been a pirated version of the lex libris.

ironic though that it came from a classmate in law school.

we're breaking the very laws we're trying to learn.

boyfriend selection, much like buying a pair of shoes, can be hits or misses. for one, there are times in your life, like when you're depressed that you convince yourself that you just gotta have one. another thing is that sometimes, after the first couple of weeks of happily being together almost all the time, you hit a plateau and you begin searching for the same thrill that you got, say, when you first wore the shoe or, in the case of the boyfriend, first held his hand.

misses would be those pairs of shoes you fall in love with, you wear while in bed just looking at how nice your foot is while clad in that particular pair, but stop liking when they immediately stop being promising after you realize how painful they could be to wear on a daily basis, or how something about the insole makes your toes icky-black after a day of wearing them. misses would be those boyfriends who, absent the usual rose colored glasses one usually sports at the start of the relationship, reveal themselves to be losers beyond belief.

the problem with both a pair of shoes and boyfriends is that sometimes, you have to make the "purchase" before you really find out their true colors.

but once in a while you get lucky, really lucky, and here are five reasons why, MY BOYFRIEND is a hit:

1. he brings pasalubong: siopao from ongpin, pastillas from nueva ecija, inipit from bulacan.
2. he appreciates gifts. the other day, i gave him christmas lights for the gasoline station. around four in the afternoon, he calls just to tell me that he's had his employees put the lights up and that they're nice cause they're twinkly.
3. he doesn't pick fights. after a particularly bratty monologue (via SMS) about how he's been too busy to make time for me, he tells me, "i know you really miss me cause i'm just so 'missable' but ganun talaga honey, eh" which made me smile real wide and without me even saying anything he goes on to say, "nakangiti ka na, no? yung hindi plastic ha!"
4. he's hot. there's just something about the way he carries himself that makes everyone sit up and take notice. sometimes, i want to put a sign on him that says "mine, mine, mine."
5. and yesterday, when i was depressed for some unknown reason, and when my self-proclaimed "good friend" told me to just sleep it off, the boyfriend, after finding out, makes a detour to UP on his way home to nueva ecija to plant a big kiss and to tell me "honey, i love you."

now, tell me you don't think this one's a hit.

man eater

while veevee was happily gorging on a fat, juicy hotshots burger yesterday afternoon, she innocently asked if i dated someone who was student council president, or at least someone "famous" while in college.

no, i replied, the most "famous" one would have to be someone who actually joined mr. educ*

oh maybe that would be him, she said.

*quizzical look on rosa's face*

it turns out that in pre-rosa and veevee friendship days, she was a great repository of rosa man-eater chismis.

rosa dated this guy to get a job in university. rosa dumped him when she finally got the job.
rosa dated this guy to get through her MA. rosa dumped him when she went to law school ... and so
rosa dated this guy to get through law school.

oh, and according to urban legend, rosa dumped famous up guy because she was already dating this guy to get job in university.

then veevee went on to proclaim, rosa, you were the crazy party girl man eater who used her feminine wiles to lure men.

now, anyone who really knew me would know i absolutely have zilch feminine wiles. i didn't learn how to put on a lipstick until i was 25. i still trip a lot when wearing heels. and god forbid that the fat i have to burn are actually men-magnets.

but in a weird, twisted way, it's actually kinda cute. i mean, wow, i was a famous teacher after all.

and at least i didn't get "pregnant" in their stories. another friend's man-eater story has something to do with her getting it on with another teacher, becoming pregnant in the process and when she found out that he was getting married, she went to the states, had the baby aborted, and in the end, became good friends with the guy.

what the?

i know.

*disclaimer: when he joined abovementioned contest, we weren't dating yet. heck, we didn't even know each other at that time!

burn baby burn

two weeks ago, my boyfriend took me to centro. the sight of scantily clad teens (i'm so lola, i know!) was enough to drive me to a fitness regimen that was so un-me.

yesterday, i took the weight loss program a step further. i finally made good my year-long promise to enroll in a gym and lost the flabs, sags, and everything else that's standing between me and a two-piece suit.

letting go of my hard-earned money, i thought at first, would be the difficult part. how come no one told me that the measurements would be emotionally traumatic? or that finding out that your bmi is higher than your age will send a couple of tsk-tsks from the trainer?

still raw from the trauma, i had to deal next with burning 200 calories on the treadmill. i finished game knb and judy ann's lousy soap before i finally managed to burn 200 effing calories (and to think that's just a small can of piknik!). i was almost dying from exhaustion. halfway through the routine they had planned for me i was cursing fruits in ice cream raspberry and the yummy fried rice and siomai and the NY fries and dips -- all of which i had consumed within the day.

ten machines, two hours, and a couple of free weights later, they finally let me free. i think they thought that it was enought that they'd made me burn the lunch i ate that day -- and only lunch -- but before they finally let me free from the torture chamber gym, they just had a couple of reminders:
no rice
yoghurt for breakfast
non-fat milk for dinner

can i die now?

alone again, naturally

the gods of twenty-somethings-in-a-relationship all conspired against me and decided to make me misrable by taking my boyfriend away from me this weekend. maybe it wasn't enough that he's all the way there and i'm all the way here. maybe it would be so much better if they didn't see each other the entire weekend.

saturday was a bit manageable. two things that helped were the fact that i barely had two hours of sleep (not to mention the couple of minutes of sleep i accidentaly got while listening to my banking teacher) and my aunt invited us over to spend the night at dusit with her. feather pillows + king sized bed + airconditioning + no boyfriend = sleeping in on saturday night.

sunday was a bit tougher. after i had dealt with my laundry, i had the entire day to myself. of course i could always check journals or prepare for my class or work on thesis revisions but that would be no good, right? so i settled myself in bed with a bowl of instant pancit canton and a bottle of water and started channel surfing. i got my dose of meteor garden II rewind, fell asleep while watching csi miami, and satisfied my inner jologs with berks and the buzz. it should've been okay until the urge to go out bit me.

maybe i enjoyed being alone too much. i went around southmall thinking, hey, this is one thing i can do when the boy isn't around. i wandered aimlessly. i tried on shoes and clothes and modeled bags slung on my shoulders or arms and enjoyed NOT having to buy christmas gifts (at least not yet). i had a fat slice of brazo de mercedes while leafing through magazines. then i contemplated on watching a movie alone.


i SMSd asking for permission. i got an almost furious call in return telling me:
(1) what the hell was i thinking.
(2) what the hell was i thinking.
(3) what the hell was i thinking.

clearly the answer was NO.

so i did what any self-respecting girl would do.

i got a pedicure. i tried on shoes. i bought shoes. i bought jeans. i bought another pair of jeans and a top. i bought another top. and i ate pizza.

it was so legally blonde. the only thing missing was a dog.

i realized i enjoyed MY company. i liked the fact that i didn't have to talk when i didn't want to, and if i did, there's always the phone. i liked the fact that i had to trust my own taste and judgment in selecting stuff. i liked that i could leave whenever i wanted to leave and stay as late as i wanted (as long as the mall didn't close yet).

so alone isn't so bad, once in a while.

just don't let it be all the time.

instant mami

after finally attempting to run around the academic oval instead of simply brisk walking, i sent an SMS to jay telling him that why couldn't there be an instant way to lose weight.

lipo, he replied.

but really, i insisted. i want something instant. my legs were groaning. i fell into bed grassy jogging pants and all, and for the life of me, couldn't force myself to get out of it.

skin white promises whiter underarms in three weeks.
dove promises better skin in ten days.
rebonding promises straight locks within the day.
lucky me promises instant pancit canton within three minutes.
mini-stop promises a complete breakfast in thirty seconds.

why not instant weight loss?

of course, there's always kankunis but i couldn't bear the thought of me running to the washroom in the middle of a lecture just to do number 2. and even if i could afford lipo, the thought of becoming as massive as sharon cuneta (yes i'm a sharonian at heart but me wanting to become her ends with the weight issue) even after several trips to a doctor is enough to make me want to keep my money in the bank.

and besides, although the boyfriend is as tall as joey marquez, i don't think i need vicky belo's touch to keep him faithful.

really.

but when you're huffing, and puffing, and tripping all over the academic oval, putting one foot in front of the other just to get the evening run done, you start wishing for a friend like boy abunda who'd make a pronouncement that he'd be willing to cover your lipo expenses if you'll be strong enough to undergo the operation.

since i don't, i guess i'd have to just continue running every night, day in day out, in the hope that before i know it, i'd be in fighting form.

and if i stop obsessing about it and just concentrate on doing it, it might happen, in an instant.

fear of death

not my death, but the death of a parent.

sometime at 1030 last night, i received an SMS from my mom informing me that one of my uncles has passed away. could we kindly make time to attend his wake please?

i quickly sent an SMS to the other side of the family and told them of his passing. my paternal grandmother and i might drop by tomorrow to pay our respects.

i don't feel bad for my uncle who passed away. he's lived a full life. he has been battling cancer for the last five or so years and last year decided, to hell with it, i will jet back and forth between the US and manila instead of spending my hard-earned money on chemotherapy. he has bought his family a home and cars, sent four children to college, and has passed on the "baton" of his accounting practice to his eldest daughter. i pray that his passing was peaceful.

i feel bad though for my cousins. three daughters, and no one will ever have the privilege of being walked down the aisle by their dad. one son, and he has yet to prove to his father that the family name will be carried on for generations. and what about christmas? will the ham taste the same if daddy wasn't there to cut thick slices for everyone? what about the gifts they've hidden under their beds as a surprise for their dad to open on christmas day? will they just keep it wrapped, never to be opened? their future kids will never feel the joy of being spoiled by their lolo, or to spend sleepy nights listening to a never ending story of juan tamad or "when i was young" guilt trips?

they say that the worse thing that can ever happen to a parent is to lose a child. but to lose a parent so soon, for a child, is equally tragic.

in search of the perfect gift

i've always been a big fan of christmas and shopping malls and the holiday rush. i used to start with my christmas shopping as early as semestral break, buying tons of gifts along with christmas wrappers and ribbons and little knick-knacks to make the gift a little more special for the receiver. i'd make sure that everyone i cared to buy a gift for would find the gift tailor-bought (is there such a word?) for him or her.

over the years, the list got shorter, eventually including only the closest friends, family members, and of course, the boyfriend.

and believe me, the boyfriend is the toughest one to buy a gift for.

as it is, it's difficult to buy him a gift for any old occasion, much less christmas. i remember the first booboo of sorts i made - i bought a week-old boyfriend a watch. now, it was only a timex watch, not a very expensive one at that. a hardbound book would cost just a little less than what i spent for the watch, but the look on the now-ex boyfriend's face said it all: too much, too soon.

so now i'm faced with a dilemma. christmas, a two-month old boyfriend (two months today!!), and no idea what to buy him.

watch? gym membership? a year's subscription to fhm? a kenneth cole belt? shoes?

but he doesn't wear a watch, and he's in nueva ecija so i doubt if they have gold's or fitness first over there, and his mom might not appreciate seeing fhm in the mail every month, and he already has a kenneth cole belt, and his shoes, well, i can't afford the shoes he wears.

not even oprah's favorite things has anything for him.

help.

post a suggestion in the comments box please.

thank you.

i've gotten flowers and chocolates and teddy bears and a cornucopia of what-nots from boyfriends and suitors and boys pretending to be simply of the friendly sort. there have likewise been bags or shirts or shoes when practicality kicks in.

but i've never received three pieces of siopao. that is, until today.

yesterday, jay called saying that yes, he was still in manila but he was on his way to ongpin to buy a couple of things. as an afterthought, he asked me if i wanted anything.

no thanks, i said.

until i remembered the really huge but really yummy siopao he brought around a month ago. i ate one, and since i was so full, foolishly gave the other one to my brother. i've really got nothing against sharing, but when you're hungry at ten in the evening, you remember yummy siopao you gave away, right?

so i SMSd him and told him that i now know what i want. i want huge siopao. huge yummy siopao from ongpin.

he didn't reply and i forgot all about it until he called sometime in the middle of the night and i was fast asleep and i mumbled a sleepy "siopao ko".

tomorrow, he said. right before you go to work.

yeah right. men, i've figured, will say anything sometimes to make you just shut up. wednesdays are coding days, meaning i really have to leave way too early.

but no, he didn't forget. he didn't only have one, or two. he had three pieces, one of which he'd heated up and sliced into quarters for my breakfast.

and why three?

cause "honey, it's our second month anniversary tomorrow. i love you."

from a less amazing man, i would've cringed.

but not this man.

of course a good friend who called me up last sunday and filled in on the boy-stories commented that i always believe the one i'm currently with is the one so this may not be any different. but still. i'm a hopeless romantic <3

meeting his mother

technically, you can say that i met his mother only last night. but i've come across his mother a million of times since we got together.

from him you'd hear stories abot this amazing woman who'd be up and about really early but never steps outside of her unprepared to meet people. she's a voracious reader, not of sappy paperback novels that i'm so fond of, but of business books which presumably teach the rich on how they could be even richer. she's a strong woman who has kept the family intact, intact enough that even if all of them are above the age of 25 and 2 of her children live with her in nueva ecija and one lives in qc and the other in paranaque they all still meet up for lunch every sunday to catch up and have their weekly family meeting. she's the godly woman who has ingrained in her children fear of god and the necessity of sunday mass no matter how smashed you've been the night before and have every plans of getting smashed again.

from my favorite aunt (and ninang!) you'd hear stories of this matriarch who controls her kingdom with an iron fist. she's a woman who knows her cars and drives around a mean cefiro. they're quite rich and moneyed, my aunt told me once, and so don't come running to me when they start looking down on you. basically it's the picture of a monster she's painted and i got really scared.

from common friends i've heard the mommy stories: the woman who'd accommodate you in her house in a heartbeat and prepare fresh towels for everyone after they've braved the north expressway traffic. she's a simple woman, very generous and very kind. she's soft-spoken but when she speaks, everyone listens.

and, oh a warning -- they all said -- if she doesn't like you at all, then you'd better kiss jay goodbye.

so yesterday, with barely an hour's worth of sleep (and that's after you've put together the naps i've managed to have throughout the day) i got to meet his mother.

yup, surprise meeting. a meeting i was totally unprepared for.

he SMSd saying that he'll be going over at his sister's house for early dinner. can he hitch a ride back to UP with me?

sure, no problem.

at quarter to six he called and asked if i was awake. was i ready to pick him up?

sure, no problem.

five minutes later he SMSd again asking if i'd want to eat dinner.

sure, no problem. i'm on my way. where are we eating?

the car flew over the hump when i read his next message: "d2. d2 lahat cla. d2 mami"

i was five minutes away from his sister's house, my hands were clammy, my deodorant threatened NOT to work, and there was no way i could turn back. i presumed he's told everyone i was coming so there was no way for me the make up an excuse like "my brother borrowed the car" or "there was a family emergency".

i barely remember anything from the twenty or so minutes we were there. i do remember shaking her hand and kissing her cheek. i remember peppering my sentences with "po" and "opo" and smiling a whole lot. i remember we talked about her having married young and how she loves the silence in nueva ecija. i don't remember how i managed to eat alone in front of his entire family with people sending a curious glance or two along my away every so often. i don't remember whether i remembered to sit up straight or be polite or not to rush through my dinner.

but what else could i say? i had hurdled the last obstacle. i met the mom.