new tea concoction

i decided to try out something new because i was getting tired of the ceylon tea's taste.

i bought this...

Lipton Russian Earl Grey Tea

and blended it with this...

Lipton Cranberry Raspberry & Strawberry Tea

the result is a sweet smelling, citrus-y type of tea.  it tastes like the sugar-coated orange jelly candies that i used to eat when i was a kid, except that this one is not that sweet.  and it's smell?  for me, it smells like the sea.  i don't know why, but it does for me.  you know, the smell of the saltiness of the sea during the early hours of the morning or late at night.  weird, because while there may be a hint of saltiness in the drink, it's not overpowering.

anyway, the label on the russian earl grey tea says it has citrus peels (blueberry and orange and something else).  knowing this, i still decided to blend it with the berries because i thought it might still be as strong as the ceylon tea (the lipton ceylon tea is supposedly mild, but there are times that it almost becomes bitter, especially when i leave the tea bag in the cup for more than a couple of minutes).  but surprisingly, the taste of the two blended teas is refreshing to the palate.  there's no after taste or anything like that.  so yeah, there, i have a new favorite.  yay!

freedom in sepia

it's funny that the first word i thought of as soon as i stepped into our new "home" is liberating.  because it is.

when pia and i were waiting for the owner to finish checking the unit and our room, and also waiting for ross, mac, jason and kuya to return to the unit, i felt like something was prolonging my agony to finally leave that place.  probably that was also the reason i snapped when they spoke/discussed in chinese in front of my face again.  sobrang bastusan na to a.  i wanted so much to get it over with that when they talked in chinese and i felt like some problem was going to arise again, my mind said no.  no.  this isn't going to happen again.

good thing the people around me were somewhat cool-headed and they sorted the matter out.  my smile only came back after i boarded the bus.  i thought, "finally, i'm out of that hell."

unpacking, for me, is more tedious as it entails organization and moving of things and what have you.  but unpacking here in our new room, while it was very very tiring, was more fulfilling in a way.  i actually like our new room more.  it is smaller, but cozier.  the curtain provided by the owner is light brownish in color that when the sun reflects on it (as it is doing now), everything in the room is in sepia.  our bed is back on the floor (it has always been on the floor because we don't have a bed frame; it just felt different in queenstown because we had another queen-size mattress to use as a makeshift bed frame).  but it feels more comfortable now.  haha.  i guess it's because of our new pillows.  (i love ikea!).  we also have a makeshift dresser now!  the owner has this three-drawer low cabinet of sorts with a table top, and i just placed our mirror on top of it.  then all of our daily toiletries on the side, voila!  (i think this would have been much better if there were pictures, but i don't have a camera.)  i also got the owner's  two-layer shelves and made it something like our bedside table/headboard.  ang galing!

this actually looks more of a real bedroom in a real house, compared to the one and queenstown and choa chu kang.  now, i believe we didn't make a mistake taking this room.

where have all the cowboys gone?

what happened to you guys?  i miss your crazy antics...
 

Shawn and Gus

and you?  i don't even like science-y stuff, but i've learned to like you...

Jack Carter

and you?!?  i spent several days catching up with your story, and now i heard that you've been sacked!

Cal Lightman

good thing i still have these guys to help me pass the time...

Chuck

and of course, these nerdy guys even though i couldn't understand half of what they say...

Sheldon and Raj

...okay, uwian na.

danbo has arrived...

i took her home and she started looking around...
 

like a curious toddler with those puss-in-boots-kind of eyes...

and then, she started playing on zombie mode like this...

and this...

then, she got tired.  maybe if she had a tongue, we would have seen her panting like a dog :) because she gulped half a glass of water...

okay, ayun lang :)

TBS Tea Tree Oil: Miracle Worker

The Body Shop Tea Tree Oil

Oh, yes it is.

Not only on my pimples, but also on wounds.  Yes, wounds.  You know, bloody scrapes and abrasions and all that.

Two weeks ago, I tripped and got my knees scraped on a half-way cemented ground.  Yes, I'm a klutz like that.  Anyway, I've been trying to find a way to make the wound dry faster because I'm also an impatient klutz.  Ross suggested that I try applying Tea Tree Oil on the wound.  Thinking it wouldn't hurt anyway, I did try it.  The following day, my wound itself and the area surrounding it were dry!  I can already see my new skin starting to emerge.

Another good thing about it was wound didn't darken at all.  Before, whenever my klutziness would get the best of me and I would get wounds or abrasions or whatever, they would somehow look darker once they started to heal.  But now, no!  I wouldn't have to worry about darkened knees or something. Yay!

My wound hasn't completely healed yet, but it's okay.  Now, I have a new remedy for wounds.  Yay!

american idol boo hoo

i thought this season's american idol is promising.  but when they started to eliminate pia toscano, i somehow got tired of watching it.  it all became just what it really is.  a popularity show.  so much more when they booted out casey abrams. :(  why?  he's a performer.  in the truest sense of the word.

casey abrams

i especially loved the way he sang your song.

SUPPORT THE FREEDOM TO LOVE!

i love this video.  it is so heart-warming. and touching. and real.

i have yet to see this here in singapore.

but i want to see this in the philippines!  why can't we have something like this?  why can't we be more open to others?  why do we have to restrict ourselves to what other people tell us or think of us.   you don't need a degree to know how to think for yourself.

let's start thinking for ourselves and what's good for us.  it's about time.

oh you will be mine soon...

redhill: ikea is still one bus ride away.

so. we're moving. finally.

it's one more mrt station away from the office for me, and one station closer to ross.  two minutes doesn't really make a difference, so it's okay.  besides, the walk from the redhill block to the mrt station doesn't take five minutes, so yeah, it's okay.

honestly, everything still feels surreal.  for the past two weeks, i haven't been really looking for rooms as i was still clinging on to the idea that come june, i would talk to the owners and practically beg them to let us finish the one-year contract.  but it was all too weird.  i woke up friday morning with a message on my phone, advertising the room.  i was a bit hesitant because i thought it was an agent.  eventually, ross and i decided to give it a try and take a look at the place.

i was surprised the moment we went inside.  someone was cooking.  frying is more like it.  frying fish actually.  and the singaporean owner was just there, sitting on the sofa.  smiling.  i said to myself, hmm...suspicious, but interesting.  tenants are allowed to cook!  tenants are allowed to fry!  instantly, i liked the place.  (yes, cooking and doing kitchen work is a big deal for me.)  so, we went inside the room and it was small.  like one-eighth smaller than our current room.  and that was when i had second thoughts.  how can we fit all of our stuff in that room?  actually, our mattress and ross's tv stand and the cabinet provided by the owner will fit just fine.  it's just that there won't be enough walking space in the room anymore.

the owner told us to think it over the weekend and let him know of our decision the following week.

ross and i headed to vivo city to eat and think it over.  we even drew on the superdog paper the layout of the room and where we would put our stuff.  after more than an hour of mulling and thinking and drinking ultimatemocha and talking over the phone with karla, it hit me.  ever since the confrontation/bastusan incident with the siblings in the queenstown place, i was more paranoid than ever.  i became super cautious when preparing food in the kitchen, even if i'm just grilling hotdogs or hams or preparing a sandwich or getting water.  i became more jumpy whenever i hear people speaking outside of the unit or whenever i hear keys being turned to open the gates.  i always had to ask ross to see if the kitchen and the floors are clear and clean of whatever.  i told ross that, and said we have to move.

the room is smaller, yes, but i'm hoping i would have peace of mind there.  we decided to see the place again that night and make measurements.  apparently, we have more than two feet of walking space (i think) between the cabinet and our mattress.  we can make everything fit.  we might just have to ask the owner if we can leave some of our stuff outside, like maybe our iron board and laundry bag and maybe our foldable table.  i don't know.  we have yet to see on the day we actually move in with our things.

this is a big relief for me.  one less thing to think about.  now, all i'm worried about is packing and cleaning our queenstown room so we can get our deposit.

this is the third room that we're renting since we've been here in singapore.  i really really hope that third's a charm.

lipton peppermit tea: a sleeping pill in disguise

oh yes.  my new found love for tea is slowly branching out.  i started with the twinings ceylon tea and lipton cranberry raspberry strawberry tea blended together then moved on to the much cheaper lipton ceylon tea and forest fruit teas.  now i'm into peppermint tea!

sleeping pill with a minty taste

i started drinking tea a few months ago because of kenneth.  whenever we had team meetings, he would bring in to the meeting room his tea blender/pitcher or whatever you call it and give each one of us a cup.  the very first tea i had was ceylon and peach blended together.  and i loved it.  i was actually surprised that i loved the taste.  i used to think that it was too bitter that's why i never tried drinking.

anyway, i decided to buy my own.   surprisingly, it was good.  the ceylon tea was a bit strong, but it was neutralized by the sweetness/tanginess of the berries.  i drank a mug (yes, a mug.  simply because we don't have cups at home.) every night, after dinner as it helped calm my stomach and relieves me the feeling of being bloated.  my bladder also "felt" better.  doing number 1 feels so much better now. :)

i'm going off-topic.  so, after i finished the box, i tried the fruit floral flavors of lipton.  i blended it with their ceylon tea too (i cannot afford to buy twinings anymore.  it just so happened that the first box i bought was on sale.), which is milder than twinings.  the fruit floral flavors felt a little weird at first as it felt like i was eating flower petals.  but the taste and the aroma grew on me.  so i went back to my habit of drinking tea after dinner.  in fact, i started loving tea so much more that i drank, at most, three mugs a day.  ross warned me that tea can cause stomach pains because of its acidity.  luckily, i never had that problem. 

so, the latest box that i bought was lipton peppermint.  last sunday, i tried one pack and blended it with ceylon again.  (i don't know why, but i love the smell and taste of ceylon tea.)  it smelled like an herbal medicine.  ross said it reminded him of lagundi (an herbal medicine for asthma).  but the taste it minty (of course, it's peppermint) and refreshing to the palate.  halfway through my mug, i started feeling sleepy.  i was playing on ross's iphone and my eyes were literally drooping.  i put the iphone down and slept for more than an hour.  when i woke up, it felt like i slept for almost half a day.  it was one of the best sleeps i've ever had.  while waiting for ross to finish speaking with his mom over skype, i drank what was left of my tea.  and yes, i started feeling sleepy again.  the same thing happened after we had dinner and i drank another half-mug full of tea.

so what's with peppermint tea?  for one, it doesn't have caffeine so it's not really an upper type of tea.  but the other teas i've tried before do not have caffeine either.  whatever it has, i like its calming effect on me.  while it makes me feel sleepy, it doesn't make me feel as if i'm tired or worn out.  it's pretty much similar to the chinese medicine that mama made me take before when i wasn't sleeping so much because of work and school. 

the only downside to this is i can't drink peppermint tea at work.  navpreet will probably kill me if she sees me sleeping :)

going loco over adsense

would someone please tell me how come my adsense banners were on my blog this morning, and now they're gone?

as in they just disappeared.  i tried adding them using the design tab, but still no luck.  i did get the confirmation though that i've added those page elements.  but when i preview the blog, they're not there...  hmmm...  maybe i should just try wordpress.

delinquent blogger

yes, that's me. 

i think since 2002 (or is it 2001) i've tried to set up maybe four or five blogs.  plus one more for my online store, which i've also abandoned because i've moved here in singapore.  i've deleted all of them to remove the tracks and remnants of my past life. 

the reason for this, i think, is that i couldn't keep up.  i coudn't keep up because i couldn't really decide on what i want my blog to be.  you see, it's supposed to be my "journal".  my outlet.  but as i go on and look at other blogs, i've come to realize that i can also use it to earn income.  but what the heck will i write that would even minutely interest other people?  i see the blogs now, and they are all filled with pictures and with all other sorts of interaction.  and that's one more thing, i'm too lazy to take pictures.  take pictures and upload them and fix them in photoshop.  i do get the creativity bug once in a while.  but it's a very long while, i tell you.  so that's why.

anyway, i've decided to keep this one for the meantime.  i still have the brown paper journal that ross gave me for my birthday last year (he said that journal is supposed to be "memoir of happiness."  but i only open and write to it once in a while.).  and i intend to keep that and write on it too...as in write on all of the pages.  oh, i don't know.  i love writing, and it's a very good outlet for me especially when i'm mad or super sad...  but sometimes i feel that it's better to just re-live the events in my head.

oh my gad.  i just really hope that i don't get alzheimer's.

what's with facebook anyway?

Image from the ever reliable Wiki. Blah.

okay, so i think i'm the only person on earth who doesn't have a facebook account or is even interested in setting up one.  heck.  even my mom has one.  even my 9- and 10-year old nephews and nieces have their own facebook accounts. 

most of my friends and relatives have been urging/pushing/threatening me just so i get my own facebook.  they tell me that it's the fastest way to get in touch with people.  that it's the easiest way to know the latest happenings in one's life.  it's the most convenient way to see my friends' pictures (because i always bug them to email me pictures).  yeah, yeah, yeah...  i get all of that.  and then what?  after i've seen the pictures and have updated myself to the latest status/rants/raves of people?  what now?  ruth even told me to just set up an account and then they'll do everything else.  what for?  i just don't see the point.  it's not even being about defiant woman anymore, one who does not want to join the bandwagon just because she doesn't think it's cool.  there's just no point for me.

the pictures?  i can always bug my friends and relatives to email me their pictures.  pictures that are worthwhile to look at.

the updates?  yes, i love all of them and would want to know what they are all up to but...can't i just call them for that?  i would still rather hear their voices and truly determine their own states of being by personally talking to them. 

the games?  oh please.  i have enough games on my pc and i can get a lot more from other places.

so, what else is there for facebook?

i get the social networking concept.  but for me, it has already gone out of control.  i hear about some people posting entries about what they've eaten or what they're watching or their feud with other people.  really?  some things are meant to be kept on your own.  or if you want it shared, then share it to people who are really close to you.  you don't broadcast them to the world.  because, honestly, not everybody cares.

PART 2

okay, let's do this thing again.