Holidays are moved

I saw in the news last week that the law to move all holidays falling on non-Monday weekdays, with the exemption of immovable holidays, to Monday has been approved. This is to allow everyone to have a longer weekend, especially for those who have plans of traveling. Several reactions were received. Some are in favor because it would mean lesser cost for them. What’s important is the essence of what we do to celebrate the holoidays. Others however don't agree because to them, the essence of the holiday is already lost when celebrated on another day.

My stand? I can't say yet. At a glance, it's good because you get to have longer weekends. but based on my personal experience, I’m not yet used to going to work on a day that I know is a holiday (even if I know for a fact that it has just been moved to another day). Maybe because for years now, holidays have been celebrated on the holiday dates and not on another day and I am not used to the movements.

It has its pros and cons. Maybe we should just give it a try.

Introducing Sayote in the corporate world

We are to attend a presentation skills workshop later this week and one requirement is to prepare a ten minute presentation of any topic. The first topic that came to mind was about planting and harvesting sayote. The next topic was about Igorot culture. But since the later is a broad topic, aside from it being more complicated and lack of experience on my part, I just decided to go with sayote. So to add spice to my presentation, I took some actual pictures at home hehe. (di ko naman to kinakarir) I guess it's a good choice since it's easier and it's what my family is doing until now so it's easier for me to discuss. Will my co-trainees appreciate it? We'll see. But whether they will be bored or not, that will be my final topic hehe.

Short break

I am on my way back o Manila right now. I took a two day leave from work and went home last Saturday. I had no set agenda and since I’ll be arriving in town at noon, I just asked my sister to meet me in town. We had a quick trip to the ukay shops and a little grocery then headed straight home. The rest of the days, I was a bum hehe. And until now, I’m not yet conditioned to go back to work huhu. This is bad.

Jo & Gil, Sana masaya kayo sa naging desisyon nyo :)

Yesterday was Jo and Gil's last day in Sykes huhu. So as a tribute to them, we prepared something for their despidida. We created a video presentation and a scrapbook which contains our messages and some printed pictures. We also treated them to a sumptuous dinner last night. We ordered food from Kowloon. We chose a package with the following: soup, pork mandarin, lumpiang shanghai, chiken, pancit canton, and yang chow rice. We also ordered siomai from Goldilocks, bought some ice cream from The Ice Cream House, and cake from Red Ribbon. Since we didn't like the conventional messages when someone leaves, our cake message read "Jo & Gil, Sana masaya kayo sa naging desisyon nyo. Luv u! IS APAC" hehe.

After office hours, ICOF girls minus Fides went to Promenade Starbucks for coffee. I'm glad that Jonathan allowed Jo to go home late. It was just a short time to catch up with each other' lives and jut spend time with one another. When it was time for Jo to go home, we all decided to accompany her home so we can still continue our bonding in the car. With Jo having a family now, any rare bonding moments with her is precious and we have to make the most of it.

Die Hard 4

Die Hard 4 is to die for! The actions were great. The storyline is also good in my opinion. I haven’t watched the other Die Hard movies but this one’s really great. Buti na lang sinipag akong manood hehe. Di sayang ang bayad. Sulit talaga. Ok lang na panoorin sa big screen!

Calendar Widget

I have included a calendar widget for my blog archive. I have been searching for this for a long time now. Good thing I was able to find one. It’s not yet what I really want but it can do for now. I’ll try to play with the codes later to see if I will be able to format the calendar in the layout that I want. Thanks to this author for sharing the codes.

Hanging out at Coffee Shops

For the past months, it has become our (office friends) habit to hang out at Starbucks or some other coffee shop after work. The good thing about it, aside from the yummy cakes and pastries and calorie-loaded and sinfully good drinks, is that we get to read magazines for free! Yipee!

Tonight was one of those nights. While browsing the April 2007 issue of Seventeen magazine, I saw some featured websites which are quite interesting. There are some on travel, photo journal, music, and more on blogging. Here are some of the sites. I haven’t checked them out yet though.

• http://www.vox.com/
• http://www.tristancafe.com/
• http://www.lulu.com/
• http://www.100words.com/
• http://www.pon.josti.nl/
• http://www.43things.com/

I’ll try to write a little about the sites when I get the chance to visit those sites.

My niece (sa pinsan) is getting married!

Yep! My niece, J, is getting married! I was actually surprised when my brother told me about it. The last time she was here in February 2007, she was very much single but now she’s getting married this December! Lucky girl. She already found her Gilbert Blithe. I am happy for her. They will be wed in Canada though, so we won’t be able to attend it. I really wish I could hehe.

Best wishes to you and whoever my new nephew is (haven’t met him yet), please take care of my niece, take care of each other. God bless you both!

Certified couch potato

Ako yan! At yuck talaga haha. Ewan ko ba. Tamad talaga ako ngayon. Hay I know it’s wrong but I’m not doing something about it tsk tsk. Bad bad me. Anyway, here are some proofs.

• Natatambakan ako ng labada at weekday na nakakapaglaba kahit wala naman akong ginagawa ng weekend
• Di ko na natuloy yung cross-stitch project ko. Years ago ko pa yun nasimulan
  I haven’t even read a book in ages. I started reading one book pero di ko pa rin tapos til now, to think na manipis lang yun. Sus talaga!
• Tamad akong mag-aral hehe
• Laging nagmamadali sa pagpasok sa work. Palibhasa don pa lang magpa-plantsa. Pwede namang ginawa kasi nung weekend or the night before.
• Puro TV or internet na lang inaatupag (like right now, habang ginagawa ko to, nagloload din ang mga bina-browse ko hehe).

See? Bad talaga. I should start doing something about it! And it has to start now!

What goes around comes around

Yan ang sagot ni Kumareng A sa binalita ko sa kanya. Ganito kasi yun. Years ago, nanghiram sya sa akin ng money. Nung binalik nya, nagtext naman Mama ko na may nanghihiram nga raw sa kanya and kung pwede kong pahiramin. So since meron naman and gusto ko talagang tumulong, nagdecide ako na ipahiram uli ung kakabayad sa akin. Sabi ko sa sarili ko, yun na lang ang ipapautang ko sa mga umuutang sa akin. Yun na ang bahagi ng aking kawang-gawa. Tapos kanina, nagtext naman kuya ko kung pwede raw sya manghiram. Di ko muna sya sinagot. Iniisip ko pa kasi kung san ko kukunin yung budget. Iniisip kong ipatanong na sa Mama ko yung umutang dati kung makakabayad na kahit konti lang. Akalain mong naunahan ako ng Mama ko sa pagtetext at binalita na nga sa akin na nagbayad na ng kalahati ung umutang. Yifee! Kakatuwa. At least ngayon kung kulang man yun sa hihiramin ng kuya ko, dadagdagan ko na lang. Ang galing talaga ni Lord. Perfect timing lagi. :) Kaya nga ba love ko Sya eh!

I luv Bumblebee!

I just got home from watching Transformers! J The movie was awesome! Michael Bay and all the staff made a really great movie. It was action packed. The autobots are funny in their fights haha! The transformation from car to robot to car was just so amazing. I love Bumblebee! Better watch it in the big screen. It’s all worth it. Not a waste of money. On my way home, I was imagining that all the cars I saw were all turning into robots hahaha.

There’s Really Something about Something about 1%

Finally I was able to finish watching this series. Yipee! It’s a Korean drama series about family, love, relationships and social status.

The story started with Dada, a school teacher, who let grandpa occupy her supposedly seat in the subway, and later on helping him carry his things. It turns out that grandpa is the retired chairman of his corporation. Because of Dada’s good deed, grandpa decided that this girl is best suited for his grandson Jaey in. That’s where Dada and Jaey in’s (and other family members from both sides) story unfolds.

Here are some of the morals I learned from the series.

Love between family members (whether related by blood or not) is very important in a child’s growth and development. Good moral values are basically learned first in the family. A person showered with love should feel blessed and in most cases, this inspires him/her to also share his/her blessings. Also, no matter what happens, our family is there to readily accept us when things outside our home do not work in our favor.

Money is not the only important thing in this world. With Dada joining the Chairman’s family, she was able to let them realize that no matter how busy they all are, it is still important for them to share a meal together.

Happiness is not brought about by the material things you own. It’s being at peace with yourself and with others, being able to share your blessings with the less fortunate, being able to make friends with people who are not in the same social status where you are, being able to accept your shortcomings and doing something to overcome these, and being able to lower your pride, accept defeat and embrace humility.

Here’s a gist of the Grandpa’s message during his book launch. There’s 1% in us that makes us very unique and special. Let’s focus knowing the 1% in people. It’s a small percentage but this 1% may be something that can change our lives, it may be something that we may learn from, or something that can influence and inspire us to do better.
Overall, it is a feel good series, and it can be a source of inspiration to spread love and share blessings.