"Day of Rest," My @$$

Vancouver weather is funny. Funny strange, not funny "haha." After 3 days of straight chilly rain, now it's bright and sunny. And warm. Don't need the jacket now. I'm actually sweating. Then again maybe it's because Emark and I just finished lugging 4 cartons of bottled water up 5-Kim's parent's apartment. Ten minutes after we got home I went out with Erson and Delwin to work out at the gym for about an hour. Afterwards we raked leaves. NorthAm "Tour" Week 1 is done.

Just When Ya Thought It Was Safe to Go Out...

Rained in again. News reports say the downpour's a record. I couldn't care less. Just stop #$*ing raining already!

NorthAm "Tour" Day 4

Heavier rains today. Stuck in house all day. Spent it researching Ebay auctions.

Okay, went out for a while with Delwin to the local gym... and again for dinner out with 5-Kim's family friends.

NorthAm "Tour" Day 3

Day 2: Me and Mark took a trip to the train station to check out the schedules for the impeding trek around America. After getting forms we headed downtown for and window-shopping (okay, got a couple of issues of Wizard at 99 Canadian cents each) and lunch .

Today, it's freezing and drizzling. Still decided if we're going to check out the Metrotown Mall.

(....)

Okay, we hitched a ride with 5-Kim to Metro Mall. Walked around for an hour before taking the train home. Freezing drizzle on the subsequent walk (4 blocks) didn't help. About 90 minutes later all of us (sans Erson who had an exam) went out again for dinner at 5-Kim's folk's apartment.

NorthAm "Tour" Day 1

Past 6pm in Vancouver (about 9am back home) and I am feeling tired. Turns out to be Thanksgiving today in Canada. After so many meals on the plane (w/c I almost threw up due to damn turbulence) and fried rice for a late lunch I'm not sure I'm up for more eating. First time I had pasta on a plane, though (courtesy of Cathay Pacific).

Goal: get rid of my 70+lbs. box full of comics. Avoid: getting fatter and heavier.

"Hey, That Bloopers Show is On."

Just finished watching the new local comedy(?)/drama(?) Single Girls, and I use the term watching lightly, or, conversely, with effort. Show about 3 single girls living it up in the city, (specifically Manila, though with the aerial shots you get the impression it's Makati) along with their obligatory single gay male friend. Sex & The City without the sex, natch. Also without the wit, feel, humor, production value... A for effort, and this is a "pity A."

Can't really comment on the script too much because the sound was soo bad (either get better microphones or loop the damn dialogue) I couldn't hear what the characters were saying.

That dating show Match TV is one of the sponsors/ producers of SG, and the "actors" of the latter look like they came from the former. Won't be surprised if I'm right.Bad pacing, blocking, editing, directing... wow, I feel like a COMARTS professor. Just tearing this show apart. Not that it doesn't deserve it. It this was a thesis, I'd fail 'em.

BUT, being a pilot episode, if they follow the American formula for pilot episodes (hell, they've been attmepting to follow the American formula for everything else) the future installments of Single Girls have the opportunity to improve. Not holding my breath on that, though.

Prize is Right

The crowd for this year's Moon Cake dice-throwing Thingie for Ma's hight school Alumni was bigger, the prizes better and the table...stickier than last year. In addition to the door prize (300 bucks), I got a bottle of orange juice, two 4-packs of Hello (choco wafer), instant shoe polish (like the kind you get in hotels, though if I knew that instead of thinking that it was actual shoe polish I would've chosen something else), gum, a trash can, and 200 bucks.

While things went well there, things went @%# all with my personal belongings. My old shoes (which I'm trying to salvage) are crumbling, I'm having trouble with the silicone sealant and liquid caulk (i.e. Elmer's glue with water) and I just cut my finger.

'Slong as I'm Here, Might as Well Update...

Strangely relaxing dream about my niece Mia being able to talk (more). Felt like an after-school special. Borrowed Boit's CD/RW drive so I can move my movie files outta the office. Two days we received the notice of termination of our services for Touch Mobile by year's end. Ah, well...

About 10 days to go before I go abroad. I keep telling everyone I don't know how long I'd be gone. Part of me would want to stay if I receive the job opportunity of a lifetime there... whatever it is. Part of me wouldn't want to stay because I'd miss Mia growing up. Career versus family ties. Sometimes you can't trade pragmatism with sentimentality. Gaaahhh...why oh WHY hasn't economical teleportation technology been perfected?!?

Had nothing but carbo as the main course of my meals today ('cept for breakfast which was oats). For the office party I had noodles (both pansit and bihon) and for the Moon Cake party at the See Compound it was spaghetti with watery meat sauce. My prizes included lens cloth cleaner (3M), salad dressing shaker (looks like a plastic milk bottle) and skin moisterizer (Jergens). Ogie won the top prize (again) of 5K.

Road Trip From Hell

All because of an errand. Wilson needed some papers delivered to certain office in Makati. Because he wrote the wrong address Boit and I had more than a little trouble finding it. At one point we ended up in Pasay. While attempting to return to Makati I texted Lala for directions to Rufino Tower. Turns out it was the building next to the one Ma sends me to sometimes...nowhere near the address Wilson wrote. Worse, when Boit tried to get in the security guard said the office didn't exist and moved to Pasig. Got to work by eleven, not that I would've spent the time any better (probably would've just dozed off). Still, I hate missing my Tofu Vendor.

Poor Prince Indeed

Using the Hi-Ace and accompanied by Mom, I met up with Rachelle at UN Avenue (after a convulted lost 'n' found over which McDonald's restaurant to meet in) and then proceeded to the office of Syncmaster, the company that dubs foreign shows like GMA 7's Chinese teen drama The Poor Prince and animes, among other things. The office was in Intramuros, and with none of having been there before we had a little trouble finding it.

Their operations (set-up) was a lot smaller than I thought, and the talent fee they offered seemed to confirm it. (Five hundred bucks an episode?!? Chirst, college kids pay me more than that.) Still, we were already there and auditioned, anyway. The lack of a script had me flubbing my lines, and they commented on my supposed lack of fluency in Tagalog. (I would've argued otherwise but they didn't have a script for me to back it up with.)

In the end it was a "Call us 'coz we won't call you," not that they offered much of an incentive for that to happen. Rache and I killed time waiting for Ma (to come back from Cash & Carry, then fetch Dad) at Starbucks.