I've only been working at my new job for 4 days...when my little parasite decided to start squirming his way out ^_^




Yep he's not supposed to see the light till the next 7 weeks. So now I'm forced to sit on my ass all day.

But on a lighter note, I'm definitely going to love this year :)

I've left TV production to pursue a career in the gaming industry. And though I have to abide by a bundy clock (no corpy attire thank god!), I'm having a blast being in the midst of the local gaming hub. Being behind the scenes, and actually contributing to its growth. Yep, I have met my "corpy" match.

And of course, Cas and I have a squirming wriggly weetle maggot on its way :) Hopefully we can finish the remaining 5 Lamaze sessions before he pops out :p I need it coz just thinking about it already gets me panic-stricken.

Hail 2008! Bring it on!

And the highlight of Day 2 of my social networking revival, is a surprise Multiply invite from...



Wha..?! Seriuosly? Is that for real? HE wants ME in his network? How? Why?

I know this gets cross-posted in Multiply...so if ever YOU, my newfound online friend, stumbles upon this post... I just want to say Thank You. And I crushed you when you were slathering your abs with Johnson's baby oil. 

If you've gone on a virtual hibernation, like me, one whole day is not enough to amass a gigantic migraine from re-establishing an online identity. So for those who have become a permanent fixture on their computer chairs, here's...

How To Maintain a Social (Networking) Life:

1. Log on to Facebook and:
- update status
- mass poke
- attack vampires, zombies, slayers, werewolves, and ninjas
- challenge a friend on a flixter quiz
- send a gift, egg, plant, cocktail, pet, tree, and soiled underwear
- burn a friend
- pee on a friend
- nominate a superlative
- pet a fluff

2. Update Friendster bulletin. Snoop around for new relationships and breakups. Brighten someone's day with a testimonial.

3. Comment on Multiply blogs. Create more albums. Upload those baby pictures. Review Bea Alonzo's stellar smile on One More Chance.

4. Nag Twitter followers with a blow by blow account of the bargains in the SM mallwide Sale.

5. Log on YM, MSN, and GTalk. Verify the new relationships and breakups you discovered in Friendster.

6. Share your latest YouTube discovery on LJ. Drop a couple of comments.

7. Email back your grade school, high school, college block, university organizations, corporate company, and barkada Yahoogroups.

8. Create a Wordpress or Blogspot that focuses on your favorite Taxi company names. Such as "Ok Ka Taxi Co.", and "Katas ng Saudi". There may be a niche market.

9. Visit your cobwebby MySpace and Yahoo 360 accounts.

10. Spruce up your LinkedIn profile to appeal to international potential employers.



Really, who has time to meet up for coffee for a Starbucks organizer stamp?!

Hopefully an organized virtual life will translate to an organized real life...

I cleared out my Gmail inbox, from over 1000++ messages, to only 50 messages, all tagged and properly labelled :)

Btw, what does Gmail have against folders?!

I'm proud of clearing out my Yahoo inbox. Since they gave me unlimited storage, I've never been able to trim down my unread messages from 1600++. True, you never have to delete ever again. But are you sure you want such a cluttered mailbox?

Now it's down to 8 inbox messages :) All read. And the important ones tucked away neatly in folders. I thought though that once I've organized my dusty 7 year old Yahoo mailbox, I can finally use the new Yahoo interface. But it's still so stressfully slooooOOoOOooOOoooow...guess I'll be sticking to the classic interface.

I love my netvibes. It's my one-stop shop for ALL the sites I visit. For those who are going crazy with their multiple browsers and tabs, or those who constantly use various PCs and can't keep track of bookmarks, I highly recommend this.

Look at how I can see up to 8 different sites and gazillions of topics in just one glance!



And this virtual organization seems to be working. My week's news line-up is much distinct, I'm not groping for stories as much, my inbox has ceased to be my to-do list, and I'm feeling much more productive and getting less online clutter stress.

Now to tweak my Twitter, tech blog, Multiply, and Facebook.



Now if I can only please please please stop playing Bogglific.

Things I would be doing if Facebook didn't exist:

1) Playing actual boggle with actual friends.
2) Actually poking actual people.
3) Driving actual 93 Mitsubishi Lancer.
4) Eating actual fortune cookie and reading actual fortune.
5) Watching actual movie.
6) Reading actual book.
7) Maybe growing actual plant.
8) Cooking actual egg instead of waiting for it to hatch.
9) Not comparing friends.
10) Not thinking of superlatives.
11) Fixing actual bookshelf.
12) Not watching an aquarium.
13) Actually X-ing.

But that's all so much work :p So in the meantime, i'll sit behind my PC for another couple of hours and pet my flying giraffe.

I can't even manage real life at the moment, and I just spent over 3 hours trying to manage an online life. My inbox in my 2 email addies is cluttered beyond the thousand (as in 1000+ unread messages). I just joined the Facebook bandwagon and trying to figure out what the hype is all about (I think the aquarium will do me in). Our game clan (which just had it's 2nd successful EB last weekend) is in need of shaping up for the upcoming Territorial Wars. My netvibes tabs needs organizing. And I can't remember my passwords for my virtual to-do lists, online calendars, twitter-whatever, online bookmarks, photo albums, and other online crap lists applications which I initially thought handy and could still be if its potential was maximized by me.

I'm late for work.

I have nothing much to say. Just exercising my fingers. Ta-tah!

I want to come back. But I will do so slowly, and with much effort, and intermittently. Like some sort of blog constipation.

*****

We Do Not Live On Trees
(silliest things I've been asked about the Philippines)

1. Is there KFC in the Philippines?
2. Is there teppanyaki in the Philippines? Where?
3. Is there mexican food in the Philippines?
4. How about Italian?
5. Is there buffet in the Philippines?
6. Is there drive-thru in the Philippines?
7. Is there condensed milk in the Philippines?
8. Are there automatic cars in the Philippines?

*****

The most irritating blood-boiling hormone-enraging request I've ever received:

"Can you tell Willie Revillame to send my distant-distant cousin here to the States?"

Ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you very much for your continued patronage and support throughout the years.
Thank you for laughing with me, sharing in my stories, following my humdrum day to day adventures.

Unfortunately, Tarush has now ceased to exist. Without an author, we are unable to continue posting entries.


This blog is now closed.

I am afraid of blogging. Because I am afraid of being confronted with my own thoughts.

I am afraid of actually admitting how disappointed I am with myself that I couldn't hack handling a frou-frou show. And that I had to give it up. I am afraid of thinking about how frustrated I am with my surroundings, wardrobe, finances, that our beloved car Bicycle is scratched up untinted with a detachable sun visor and a torn apart stereo with a casette stuck inside that I try to pry out with tweezers during traffic. I am afraid to realize the aspirations that I have that I'm not working towards. I am afraid to pinpoint that I cannot for the life of me start to get my brains working to cough up more newsworthy items. I am afraid to admit that all I wanna do is sleep all day and I do not even derive pleasure from it.

So I will stop blogging now. Till I am ready to do so again.

Hello world...I think i'm ready to come out again :)

14 days before I can fly around medieval China!!!

Perfect World CBT moved to April 10!!!
At least that gives me time to tick off some stuff in my To-Do List. And then I can make virtual smoochy-smoochy while on a silvery horse like this:



I can't wait to go on addict mode again!!!

Feeeeliiciiiiiaaaaaa!!! Let's migrate from India to China!!!

I am up to HERE with tasks.

Juggling weekly Dtour, churning out tech features for Newscentral, laying the groundwork for that Soul of Manila docu, struggling through Kikay Machine's pilot, trying to blog everyday, maintaining domesticity....and all that I have to accomplish in 2 days!!!

2 days is the personal deadline I've set for myself. Why? To make room for my upcoming addiction....Perfect World!



I wrote about this game over a month ago here. And finally, Closed Beta starts on Wednesday! And I need all the time and energy I can muster to explore, run, jump, swim, fly, fight, level, PvP, PvE, gather, party, farm, grind, and boss hunt.

I plan to make the drastic shift from "All Work and No Play" to "All Play. Period."

A 2-week special on Newscentral is coming up! The Soul of Manila documentaries will highlight the stuff the city's made of: Food, Places, Fashion, Music, and Visual Arts.

I'm putting in the groundwork for the Visual Arts portions. Who are the key people behind this now? Is it still Arnold Arre for graphic novels? Is Paolo Dy the buzz on indie film now? Is Lomomanila still the photo community? Any feature-worthy Manila-based vlogger?

Which souls are major contributing factors to Manila's visual arts?

Well it's not really an electric shock treatment for when you park your bum for too long, but it's a great and handy way to organize your long and cluttered TO DO list.

Plus, you can view it in an effective flowchart:


I find it to be a much better tool than those desktop post-its. Here's how it works.

It's not a helmet. It's actually a spycam that you view by Video Call-ing it. Read about it in Tarush Tech.

Out of all the press launches I've ever been to, and all gadget raffles I've been a part of, the only luck I've had so far is a Belkin laptop bag with no laptop.

Ah well, maybe someday my luck will turn around. I could've been the new proud owner of this though:



Click here to find know more about this.

Funny how little things nowadays can trigger a sudden flashback. Like chicken wings.

11 years ago, Jollibee had a short promotional offer of chili chicken wings. I was dorming in the Taft area then, and taking summer theater worskhops in CCP. My grandma would commute all the way from Bulacan to visit me once a week, sometimes sit in during the workshop.

And during these 2 summer months, we were fixated with Jollibee chicken wings. But they were so spicy, I can only eat 2 pieces with each serving of rice. So everytime my grandma would come visit, I'd walk over to the nearest Jollibee and order chicken wings and extra rice for take out. This was the meal we'd share once week. Like a ritual. And during the weekdays when I missed her, I'd get chicken wings for myself which would last me 2 meals.

I wish Jollibee would bring back the chili chicken wings.

That's in-game graphics...and that's with sub-par PC specs.

I've taken a hiatus from Tantra to participate in the closed beta testing of Granado Espada, and I haven't looked back since (well except to look for you Feliciaaaaa!!!).

Here's why (click!).

I have to be frou-frou.

It's been years since I last picked up a Cosmo mag, because all it contained are sex tips and unaffordable beauty products. And it made me want to stash half of my closet contents to storage boxes coz they said it was passe.

I'd rather sit behind my PC and level Tarushva (who is now 19% to level 81 and is the proud owner of a Datu Sunietora +10 with 200-200 fire damage! ... of course no one understands what I'm talking about).

And I've been trying to cough up nothing but tech topics for all my freelance work, and forgetting about the tech blog which is the most uninformative most boring destination online.

But now something's cooking up on the horizon! Presenting the revamp of Kikay Machine! Where you discover beauty inside and out...and is the...uh, authority on things like make-up I think, and clothes for your body type, and the right hair color to match your nail polish or something like that....wah!

Gaaad....gaaaad *anxiety attack*.....how do you make a frou-frou show? Can I combine it like frou-frou tech as in armor to fit your MMORPG character type and how to put dancing hippos in your blog?

I was looking forward to covering the launch of Ragnarok 2 today.

But then I bumped the car..

.. into a van ..

.. a stone's throw away from our house.

Boohoo!!! I was so shaken up I called my mom immediately for help!
It was obviously my fault. I proceeded rounding the corner despite the oncoming van. And I miscalculated my turn. Good thing I wasn't going too fast and it was just a small scratch and crack in my bumper.

And the kind ladies driving the van said I don't need to pay for the long huge scratch I caused on their door.

So after my mom talked to them and the police officer, I decided to cancel my shoot and head home and mope and stay shaken up.

Now I'm drowning my nerves in vodka-coke.