Today, I am unloving...

Noah goes back to school next week. So today, I am unloving... that summer vacation is ending because I will miss staying up late in bed with Noah talking about the oddest random things. 

During the past two months, because I didn't need to get him fed, bathed and sleeping by 830pm, we could have the longest conversations. Once, he brought up wanting to live in the US instead of the Philippines. So I enlightened him on the pros of living in the Philippines. We also talked about the cons of living in either country. This led to a conversation about our third-world state and what got us here. But the best part is that we got to talking about what we (and in the future, he) can do to make the Philippines a better place to live in. :)

Another night, we were talking about me going to work the next day. He pretend-cried and said, "You don't love me. You want to leave me." So I asked him if him leaving for playdates or sleepovers with his buddies meant he didn't love me. Of course it didn't, so he got my point. Then he said, I wish we were super rich so you don't need to work so we can buy stuff. I realized then, that our rushed conversations during school nights led him to the wrong idea about work. When he would tell me not to go to work, I would respond with, "How will I afford to buy you Legos?" or something like that to cut our conversation short and get him to sleep. But since it was summer and we could stay up all night, I got a chance to tell him I work because I love what I do. And I got to tell him that he needs to figure out what he loves to do and make that his career. Of course, he still maintains he wants to be a YouTuber when he grows up. Gah!

On a different night, Noah asked who puts money in the bank so Isabella can get money from the ATM. So I launched into how bank accounts work. This led to me showing him my BPI mobile app which led to a conversation about savings accounts, loans and investments. 

Things I never thought would be kid-friendly topics figured into our nightly conversations just because one convo led to another then to another. And this was only possible because we had all night. 

But when school starts, I'll be back to cutting our convos short, in a panic to get him to bed on time. I will certainly miss the learning opportunities in our conversations. So today, I am unloving that Noah and I will no longer have time for our long, random, insightful conversations. 

Photo from nyctaughtme.

Click here for previous posts from the Today, I am unloving... series.

dear Cheetos

You know I love you! You are my daily after-dinner snack. I'd have you for breakfast, lunch and dinner too if I just wasn't afraid for my health.

I hate that I cannot go on any of those diets (South Beach, Cohen, Atkins, etc) because none of them will allow you in it... Because I seriously can't live without you. 

I just wish you could learn to keep our love affair our little secret. If you were broadcasting our love to the world with a 2-carat diamond ring on my finger, maybe I wouldn't mind. But orange stains on my thumb and index finger certainly pale (no matter how orange) in comparison. Somehow, it's hard to look professional in boardroom meetings the morning after our dinner date with orange fingers.

So my ever dearest Cheetos, could you please keep my love for you our little secret?

Photo from here.

Click here for previous posts from the Dear... series. 

why i'm blogging again

People ask me why I'm blogging again after a 2-year hiatus. Is it because I'm bored (in a whale?!) and have nothing to do?

Is it because I've been feeling lonely and in need of my old positivity journal?

Or is it because my mom has been missing my blog so much that I'm doing this for her?

The reality is it's because I'm trapped in bad traffic more going to my new office vs. my old one.

And I discovered the Blogger app.

So now, I no longer panic while sitting in traffic that I might be late for work...

... because I pass the drive, er- standstill time blogging. 

Photos from heritage and my screenshot of my Blogger app.

Today, I am unloving...

So I turned 40 last February. For a whole year before, my friend A kept telling me that "It's like clockwork. The day you hit 40, your eyesight deteriorates." For a whole year, I was constantly teased about getting reading glasses as my 40th birthday gift.

Thankfully, I didn't get reading glasses as my present. And it didn't seem like I needed them. I was reading perfectly fine, thank you very much!

Until, on a whim, I tried my friend A's reading glasses... And it was, literally, eye-opening. The text on my phone (my only reading material during that night at Barcino's) seemed larger, sharper, clearer! I was shocked.

A week later, when the shock  (and denial) wore off, I had my eyes checked. And... [sob!]... I do need reading glasses!

Today, I am unloving that the "oldometer" really is like clockwork. And that I need to read any scale - oldometer or other - with (gah!) reading glasses!

Photo from heritage.

Click here for previous posts from the Today, I am unloving... series.

the up button is getting me down

The elevators in my very old office building serve different floors. But the Up buttons control all 5 elevators rather than say, just the one that stops on my floor. So when one elevator opens at the ground floor, the Up button lights of all 5 elevators turn off. 

I guess the assumption is that that one elevator is sufficient to serve the ground floor riders. But in the morning, there are 5 long lines of people at the ground floor waiting to go up to one of the 24 floors in our building.

So the people at the front of the lines at the other elevators need to be alert. They need to press the Up button as soon as the elevator that just stopped at the ground floor moves up. Because if the Up buttons stay unlit and an elevator skips the ground floor, the person at the front of the line will get dagger looks from everyone behind him.

But what gets me in a panic is when my elevator is neck-in-neck with another elevator. When that other elevator stops at the ground floor and people are piling in, my elevator from the basement ends up skipping the ground floor. So I have to wait all over again for my elevator to go up to the 24th floor and back down while hoping the other elevators don't pass the ground floor just a few seconds again before my elevator. So imagine my panic when people are piling in so slowly into the other elevator while I see my elevator inching up... B4... B3... B2... B1... Get in, people!!... 

And the tricky thing is that you need to wait for the right time - for the other elevator to start moving up - before pressing the Up button. If you press it too early, the other elevator's door re-opens and it ends up stopping at the ground floor even longer! Gah!!!

Who would have thought an Up button could make me feel so down?

Photo is of a postcard I got from a cool art shop in Vietnam.

Click here for more of my elevator woes.

Today, I am unloving...

Isabella is going to college this coming schoolyear so she will be taking driving lessons before the summer ends. 

I can't help feeling ripped off by the fact that she will be taking lessons to drive an automatic. Having taken lessons at A1 Driving School the summer before college myself, there seemed to be way better value for money learning to drive a car with manual transmission. Now that they don't need to teach the lessons on shifting gears, on getting the right rhythm of releasing the clutch and stepping on the gas (in other words, "making timpla") and on driving on an incline ("hanging"), I'm not really sure what lessons I'm going to be paying for on an automatic.

Okay, okay, they may not bring her to steep inclines...

but they''ll make her drive in busy thoroughfares... 

... (I got honking-jeepney-and-bus-filled North Edsa on my Day 1 years ago!) which I would never do if she took driving lessons from me. And yes, they'll still have to teach her to parallel-park. 

Still... the absence of the manual gear shift just seems to eliminate the lesson that requires the most teaching. And somehow, it doesn't seem to be "real" driving when you don't know how to shift gears. That seems to be the essence of driving - feeling your car's power, knowing the right moment to shift gears as you speed up on the highway.

So today, I am unloving... that Isabella's driving lessons may teach her how to maneuver her car around the city, but it might not teach her the true essence and joy of driving. 

Photos from annniegirl and americanhoney.

Click here for previous posts from the Today, I am unloving... series.

oops, my neurosis is showing...

As you might know from here, I've been enjoying my new grown-up's coloring book. But I have to admit that when I started out, it kind of tested my decision-making skills.

After coloring in one part, so many thoughts flooded my head: Which color do I use next? Which warm color do I put beside this cool color? Should I pair it with its complementary color or not? 

With all these decisions, coloring a page took a while. Until I started a ROYGBV color scheme...

Coloring rainbow-style made it easier to choose which color to use next! So I've been obsessed with it.

Gee, I wonder when I'm ever going to finish this non-ROYGBV page now...

Oops, my neurosis is showing again.

Photos are my own and from here.

Click here for the of-dots-&-things version of this post. Click here for previous posts from the Oops, My Neurosis Is Showing... series.