Jaye and Arn

He welcomed her to his wacky wacky world.

He promised to make hers as wacky as possible.

Brave girl.

Now the days in the life of this wacko are shared with another future wacko...

http://jayeandarn.multiply.com/

sorry ladies, I'm taken...

sorry guys, I don't swing that way...

Chicago Botanic Garden

Chicago botanic garden, with its world-renowned plant collections and displays, is one of the US' most visited public gardens and a preeminent center for learning and scientific research. The 385-garden features.... oh just read it from their site --> http://www.chicagobotanic.org

It was my second time in this great place. It was the first with friends. My first visit there was part of my first great Chicago tour I named "Arn's Adventures" which was a huge success. The resulting book is in our living room probably under mom's coffee or dad's beer. I didn't have the luxury of people driving me around here and so I learned to move around via buses, trains and plenty of hiking. Anyways, this time I went there with Ria, Shawee and Gezelle. Ria was so kind to pick us up from Oakwood.

This was a huuuuuge garden... like Angelina Jolie's lips. Flowers, plants, fruits, trees, vegetables and everything else that grew from dirt. There are landscapes everywhere! Fountains, gazebos, benches, sculptures. Anywhere you look looks like a post card. The animals there were cool too! There were chipmunks, squirrels, fishes, ducks, insects and all sorts of birds. I saw a wedge of Swans too. I was kinda used to seeing swans with people on their back paddling. In one pond, Gezelle and I were taking pictures of this duck while a kid was throwing fruit loops at it. The fruit loops attracted these big fishes and one just came out from below and bit the duck's butt. I was laughing for a good 20 minutes like a seven year old. I went back to the duck and laughed at it...

"ahahaahahahaha kinagat sa pwet!".

I love my digital camera. I just recently shot my 10,000th picture with it (since the picture numbering has been reset back to 0). I really feel it is one of the best gadgets I had. Then comes Gezelle with her digital SLR camera. It was like I had a slingshot and she had an AK-47. A chipmunk ran by and her camera went rat-at-at-at-at-at with continuous pics. All clear and crisp. All properly zoomed. My camera went "bark" which went down in history as one of the lousiest sound effects you can have for a shutter release. The picture...well, there's this dot on the path that was supposed to be a squirrel but it looked like something that came from a dog. (kaya pala nag bark).
Here's a more detailed comparison.

Here's the duck from my cam

From Gezelle's cam. Parang grad pic!

ahahaahahahaha kinagat sa pwet!

After visiting the garden we dropped by one of my favorite stores in the world. Krispy Kremes!!! :D:D:D This was one of those stores where they actually made the donuts. They closed the only one in downtown I know and the others are just retailers. A devil appeared on my left shoulder and told me to forget about my diet. An angel appeared on my right shoulder and told me the same. Tapos nag apir sila.

We really enjoyed this day. For Ria, for driving us all the way there... a thank you so so so big.

...like Angelina Jolie's lips.

Thanks Ria, really.

Survivor: Chicago The Finale

Day 6 and 7

Sorry for those who have been asking for updates and I appreciate all who have offered help. You have no idea how much attention this series has generated. Day 6 was a pretty boring one and so I didn't bother writing about it anymore. The funniest thing (by my standards) that happened was when I had "Green Garden Expired Salad" for lunch. It was one fourth of a salad bag, some ranch dressing, pepper and "croutons" (which are really old slices of bread that i chopped... then I later found out that croutons are actually baked which is why they're hard... not because they're old and moldy... ewww...). I was saved though on that day since Rico had his farewell party and that night I ate up all the chicken wings i could gobble.

Day 7 came. Woke up, poured some milk that was past the "sell by" date and grabbed a bag of Cheerios (which was on sale at Walgreens). Turned on my laptop, checked my account online and saw that my allowance has been credited already. Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! I wanted to eat at Red Lobster that night but was too hungry to wait. I ordered for some Italian Beef (I've always wanted to try that) from Portillo's that night. Strangely, 1/4 into the sandwich and I was already full. :-S

...and so that concludes the reality bit. Some ending credits:

- I should have started a charity... "Alms for Arn" would have sounded nice.
- I lost 7.5 pounds. Maybe if my allowance took 2 more weeks, I would have gone up to 812, knocked and called Gezelle fat. :P
- Thanks to Jaye for making sure I was ok. (mwah)
- Thanks to Ria for offering the food she made for Rico's party.
- Thanks to Vince for offering to drive by and drop some canned goods.
- Thanks to Weng for offering to ship some frozen meat. Can you really do that?
- Thanks to Tessa and Copi for offering to lend me money. You guys would make a great couple.
- Thanks to Tito, Jhon and She for offering to lend me money. Jhon and She would make a good couple but... Jude's my friend e... sorry dre.
- Thanks to Mike for picking up the extra two dollars after our billiards game. That's good for 3 bars of Snickers.
- Thanks to Gezelle, Mel, J-Lo and Aji for always inviting me for dinner.
- Thanks to Gwen for the moral support. :P
- Thanks to Oakwood for the donuts and the cookies from the leasing office.
- Thanks to whoever cooked that pasta in the pantry.

Survivor: Chicago Day 5

Still no money. Actually I have 18 bucks left but I’m setting it aside for emergency. Gezelle paid me 10 bucks (we ate out last week), and loaned me another 10 bucks.

Same question. Different morning. What’s in the kitchen? I have tostito’s, a few more slices of bread, some pasta noodles, and spices. Spaghetti noodles with chips, basil, olive oil and pepper? Sounds nasty but I can place it there with the squirrel recipe :P

Now it gets real ugly. For lunch, I skipped the team lunch out since I went to the bank with Reza to help her setup her account and I thought it would be best if I don’t eat out for the next few days to hold on to what I have left.

Across our conference room was another room where a meeting just ended. It was a lunch meeting and so naturally… there was lunch. But they were now gone… and there was my lunch. I took a bite out of a roast beef sandwich with the petrified bread which carved the upper part of my mouth. Who cares? After that, in the pantry was a big platter of chocolate cookies, brownies and fudge bars.

I had dinner with She, Lei and Sha at Rock N Roll McDonald's. She and I shared a cheeseburger meal. =)

Breakfast: took 2 donuts from the Oakwood lobby
Lunch: kwento
Merienda: Pasta and brownies
Dinner: McDo

Thanks to…
Reza, Pads and Lianne for providing the kwento (or listening to mine)
She, Sha and Lei =D

Status: hungry.

Survivor: Chicago day 4

Still no money. No more pasta. No magic menudo. It’s always the same question I ask every morning while staring at my bare fridge.

“Now what?”

I don’t know why I even bother opening the fridge. Nothing there but my Brita pitcher, some packets of ketchup, cheese and other condiments. For lunch, I ate out with the team and used my emergency funds. I found out there was no maintaining balance for my account. Good.

I had dinner with She and Sha at my place after another long pictorial along Michigan ave. Though it wasn’t much, having people over for lunch/dinner makes you more full.

Breakfast: a donut. It’s on sale at Walgreens
Lunch: cheeseburger and fries at Portillo’s
Merienda: cookie which I took from the leasing office (hee hee hee)
Dinner: Jewel roasted chicken and bread.
Late night snack: the rest of the donuts. Portillo’s choco cake!!!

Thanks to:
Walgreens for placing the donuts on sale. I didn’t check the expiration date anymore. Don’t worry, if it’s bad already, I won’t sue.
Leasing office
She and Sha for having dinner with me. =)
Ria for the choco cake! My favorite!!! :D :D :D

Status: good but wondering when the blessings will end.

Survivor: Chicago day 3

No money. No more pasta. I was checking the house for any makeshift squirrel hunting gear.

Now it’s turning ugly. I was able to use the loose change I have to buy a wrap at the canteen. After work, I went grocery shopping and got me a roasted chicken (my tummy wasn’t well anymore). I invited Gezelle over to help me with the chicken. She brought the rice =)

Breakfast: a cup of water
Lunch: a half wrap.
Merienda: coffee from the pantry
Dinner: Jewel chicken
Late night snack: more water

Thanks to
Gezelle
My ashtray for holding my change for me.

Status: hanging on.

Survivor: Chicago day 2

No money. No more menudo. Time to hunt squirrels at the park?

I went to the office with a laptop and a prayer. Lunch time came and I was going to have coffee for lunch. I bumped into Shellane…

Shellane: yan lang lunch mo?
Arnold: a oo. Diet hahahhah…

20 minutes later she IM’d me and told me there was free salad and pasta at the pantry. 10 seconds later I was at the pantry with a styro plate and a big spoon. Salad? Nah… I took some pasta and placed it in a bowl, grabbed another empty bowl and placed a rubber band. I grabbed another bowl and ate that for lunch. The other one’s for dinner. I’m saved!!! Gezelle IM’d me a few minutes later saying that there’s pasta in the pantry.

“ows? Di nga?” :P

Breakfast: one last serving of menudo. Bye bye menudo.
Lunch: the pantry pasta
Merienda cold pantry pasta
Dinner: pantry pasta in a bowl (and a slice of bread)
Late night snack: even more pantry pasta

And they all tasted like menudo.

Thanks to…
Shellane
Gezelle
Whoever provided the pasta

Status: good.

Survivor: Chicago day 1

The biggest problem will be food as expected. I can go on a few more days without shopping for anything else but food will be the main hurdle.

Breakfast: menudo from tito roger
Lunch: reheated menudo from tito roger
Merienda: reheated menudo from tito roger
Dinner: reheated menudo from tito roger
Late night snack: reheated menudo from tito roger

Thanks to…
- Tito Roger
- Gezelle for bringing me food from Tito Roger =D

Status: good. Developed a strong dislike for menudo for the next few days.

Survivor: Chicago

The Greek tragedy of financial planning. Here’s what happened in a nutshell. I charged a lot for expenses this pay period and so I’m expecting a haul. Pay is given on the 7th. On the 6th, I bought myself a laptop which cost a lot but it was ok since I was gonna get paid the next day anyway. I think it was something I did but fate just came down and kung fu kicked that plan on the crotch.

My payroll processing got screwed up and they couldn’t give me the money yet. Right now my money is there and I’m sure to get it before I leave. The only question is when.

How about my credit card? Good question. There’s another twist when I bought my laptop. I bought one online, I was informed it was backlogged (will take 25 days to ship from their warehouse) and so I cancelled the order. The problem was that the amount floated in my credit account and now my credit card is worthless.

It’s not as bad as it seems to without money while on an onshore assignment. The utilities have been paid for. I have some groceries. Maybe this will be so easy… it will actually be boring and I’ll end up asking you guys to ignore these posts.

So what’s the status? I have 25.05 dollars, a CTA Pass (no need to pay bus/train fares), an ashtray full of loose change and some coins under the couch.

I appreciate the people who are trying to help me. The thing is, I dug myself into this hole and I’ll figure out how to get through this.

…I think.

Welcome to my first reality show series exclusive here at the ArnoldRocks blog! (who would post something this stupid anyway?) By the way, these were all posted on the same day here but I wrote it on my other blog days ago. Don’t mind the date/time. =)

The Past Few Days...

Ran Lakeshore
After some rehab sessions I was ready to try out my knee through some long distance running. Oakwood to Lakefront to North Ave Pier and all the way back. I was running while talking to my friend behind me. I think I was explaining something then a minute later, I looked back and Gezelle was more than 10 feet away from me. We reached the end of the pier with a magnificent view of the Chicago skyline, Lake Michigan and some geese. Dang! We didn’t bring our cameras =(

The next day, I got tendinitis and I was back on the disabled list.

Lucky Strike
Mike and I have been looking for pool tables around downtown to no avail. I know some pool tables but… well… they’re in bars and it’s a totally different environment there. There’s only one place here I know that has those Manila-style pool halls with 15-20 tables lined up.

Gezelle, Mike and I were supposed to go to Lucky Strike down Illinois St. Gezelle bailed out on the last minute after our 2 hour long pictorial in Michigan (pagod :P). Mike and I had to play one on one now on a small 14 dollar an hour table. 14 dollars?!??! (pause to convert)… but we were so desperate to play that we agreed anyway. This was the fastest game I played. No more thinking or strategizing. Just aim and shoot, aim and shoot, aim and shoot and once the 9 ball was down, 5 seconds later the balls are already set followed by a break another 5 seconds later. Mike won 11-6. Bill was 17 dollars (included tax) and we didn’t tip anymore. Mike didn’t know we had to. I didn’t know that Mike didn’t know. So it's Mike fault.

Transit
Clubbing and drinking on a Saturday night in Chicago. We went to transit again (see Gwenny’s blog for details about our previous event there). It was that night when me, She, Sha, Lorna, John and Mike were all not ourselves. Maybe it was the beer. Maybe it was the atmosphere. On a Saturday night that was supposed to be our rest night after a grueling trek earlier that morning, despite the fact that was raining ridiculously, we had fun. Lots of it.

Bought a laptop
It’s a Toshiba A105! :D Cool machine! I bought a lower version of this laptop online but then the order got backordered and fixing that was such a pain. You should have heard me over the phone with a customer service representative who could barely speak English. I was so upset you would have sworn I was talking German.

I eventually cancelled that order and bought one directly at Best Buy Clark. Patience really isn’t one of my virtues.

Rent
“I should tell you, I should tell you, I should tell you, I should tell you…”

Gezelle and I watched Rent… the musical/movie (so do you call it a movical?). We were glued from start to end… analyzing, feeling, singing then finally crying at the end.

Gezelle used up all my tissues. :P The next few hours I was singing about everything I saw…

“The eggs are buuuuurrned… the eggs are buuuuuuurned again”
“I don’t wanna get up, doesn’t feel good, doesn’t feel right after a weird and wacky Saturday niiiiiiiiight”
“I hab to do my laund-ree… so I hab to call up melody… but melody is busy… so I hab to wait for mon-dee”
“Whhhhhhhhhhhhy is the garter of my brip sira…”

oops… overshare :P

Labor Day

No-work Holidays are very few and far between here in the US so I plan to make the most of labor day on Monday next week.

I still don't get it though. We celebrate labor day...

...by not doing labor?

Not that I'm complaining but just like NAIA's terminal fee, it just doesn't make any sense.

The Journey to Chi-town

It was time to leave for the airport and I was still snoozing with my bags still barely packed. I added an extra hour to the usual 3 hour check in requirement for international flights because of that London bombing attempt incident. A few minutes later, I woke up in panic and I was stuffing all the items I think I’ll need into my bag. I got ready in around 15 minutes, zipped Crispin and Basilio close (yes, my two luggages have names) and dumped them into the car.

A day before that our company sent out a memo that there will be no carry-on luggages allowed which means all I could bring with me was my passport and my travel documents in a big brown envelope. That was it. No iPods, no laptops, or other reading materials as they were all checked in.

I still don’t get it. Some time ago some dude placed a bomb in his shoes and now we have to take off our shoes every inspection. Now some dude had a bomb made of gel and liquid and now we can’t bring my Bench Fix hair gel and Gatorade on board? Imagine if that bomber snuck a bomb in his pants… :-/

So I was at the airport late and checked in just in time. I was able to meet up with Lianne but no sign of Gezelle. It was while in the check in line at Northwest when it was announced that we could bring electronics and carry on luggage after all (but still no liquid substances). I quickly stuck my hand into my luggage and grabbed any item I could take with me in my brown envelope. First try, I was able to pull my camera. Yay! I needed that. Next I was able to pull out a can of shaving cream. Hmm… back it went. Third try drew a Digtal Fortress book. Cool! At least now I have more things to entertain myself with.

After checking in, I had to pay the terminal fee. Fee for what? NAIA looks like a mess. The award for the stupidest fee is a toss up between the NAIA terminal fee and the LTO computer fee.

Then came the inspection. I was asked if I had any liquid with me. I wanted to tell her that the human body is made up of approximately 60% water but I know more than to fire jokes at airport security personnel. My inspection lasted for only a minute since I practically brought nothing - it was just a brown envelope in a plastic bag which I grabbed right before I left the house. The poor guy behind me was held up by the security people. He was holding something that was being analyzed and seriously discussed by four inspectors and they were obviously baffled about what to do with what he brought – a block of tofu in a tupperware. Well, in fairness it wasn’t really liquid and it wasn’t gel-like right?

Finally I was at the gates with Lianne who looked like a zombie… just like me. She made fun of the plastic bag I used to carry my envelope with. Well, I didn’t have time to grab the manliest plastic bag I could.

Pogi points = pogi points – 50

zombie

I boarded the plane, set down to my seat and was quickly asleep even before the plane took off. When I woke up we were already at Narita. Wow! That was fast!

At Narita airport, we were finally able to meet up with Gezelle who quickly made fun of my plastic bag as well. I was beginning to think maybe I should have taken the extra minute to look for my camouflage or my black Chicago Bulls plastic bag but noooooo… I had to grab the mint green and baby blue bag with two sissy fishies blowing bubbles.

Lianne and Gezelle’s flight was an hour earlier than mine so I used up the extra time to have lunch first at a nearby McDonald’s. Good thing they accept US dollars. In a heartbeat, I devoured my Beeg Maaku meela and laaaj frinch fraaaays. (you have to read it with a Japanese accent you goober).

I was mostly asleep during the 14 hour trek to Detroit and nothing big really happened. At the US immigration booth, the agent was laughing at me because I was going to Chicago and I was wearing a BoSox shirt. He told me not to get beat up there.

Next came the Detroit luggage carousel as I was looking for Crispin and Basilio. After going around the two carousels I found out that some jerk picked up Basilio and put him on the floor. Hey, if you grab a bag and it ain’t yours, put it back to tee carousel so it can er… uh… carouse its way to its owner (I’m bad at making up words). As for Crispin, it was on the other carousel. More inspections came and I was now even more tempted to fire the “body has 60% water” joke but I had to restrain myself. (No Arn, huwag dito…) After ditching my bags and going through another set of inspections, it was a mad rush to the gate for my connecting flight as I only had 10 minutes to reach the end of the Detroit Airport. I had the strangest feeling of déjà vu since the same thing happened back in Minnesota a few months ago.

Now I was flying FIRST CLASS to Chicago! Wow! All that frequent flying finally paid off. I was sitting in seat 1 – B. I was amazed with all the leg room I had and I was frequently looking back at row 6 behind me (the economy people) while swinging my legs madly. Heheheh (I’m so mean). I had a Pepsi and they gave me a glass of ice… not that dinky plastic cup. They also gave me gourmet mixed nuts which I finished within 20 seconds. They also gave me some pretzels which tasted like sticks with salt… ewww… this was 1st class?!? Oh well…

Wheee... first class...

So there I was back in Chicago. Hello my friend we meet again… I ran to the luggage carousel and quickly retrieved Basilio. Where’s Crispin? I was waiting for more than an hour frantically looking for Crispin until the carousel stopped with still no sign of it. I was frantically running back and forth the carousels looking for Crispin but I still couldn’t find it. I wanted to shout “Crispiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin!” but that would just look too stupid. Besides there were a lot of Filipinos in the crowd who might wonder why Sisa suddenly become so fat. I lined up at the nearby Northwest office and found out that Crispin was still in Detroit and will be arriving in an hour. So there I was sitting at one of the benches - exhausted and drained. An hour later, I was now deciding whether to take a 40 dollar cab ride or a 1.75 dollar train ride. My weary body was begging my brain to go for the cab but the wallet says take the blue line instead. So train train ride it was.

I arrived at the Thompson Center and lugged Crispin and Basilio out to the street for the 4 block journey to my hotel. It was real nice of Tessa to book me in that hotel. What a friend! Just when I was finally starting to feel happy fate just decided to put a halt to that. One of Crispin’s wheel came loose and now won’t turn and now it was like pulling a large sack of rice. 4 blocks later, I was at the hotel exhausted, drained and now sore, when I heard that one sentence that haunted me for a week - “There’s no Arnold here”. I didn’t have a reservation. “but but but my prend kold last wik and booked me to dis pleys.” (nawala na accent ko sa pagod). Turns out Tessa booked me to the wrong hotel more than 10 blocks away.

TV News Reporter: “…police are in Wacker drive here in downtown Chicago investigating on a filed report about a madman threatening a certain ‘Teysa’ while shouting what appears to be profane words in Tagalog near the Club Quarters hotel before fleeing away in a cab. Sources say that he is backed up by two goons named ‘Crispin’ and ‘Basilio’. Police wanted to label him as armed and dangerous but surveillance cameras show us what appears to be a mint green and baby blue plastic bag with two sissy fishies blowing bubbles and eventually declared him as just a big wuss…”

1 Win - 0 Loss

I think this was the first sport I ever played in Chicago. I hit two home runs while hitting with a left handed stance. The first was sliced to the opposite way just barely grazing the fence while the second was way over the fence to center.

Amazing? No doubt!

Felt good? Not one bit. :(

We were playing tennis.

Mike and I played last week too, I was losing 0 – 3 before they closed the courts. This time, I was losing 2 – 6 in the 1st set and was losing 0 – 5 in the 2nd set, when Mike decided to call time out and eventually called it quits.

So… according to the rule book, I get the win right?

Milan

The story of neverending onshore drama...

Stole this Quiz from Gwenny...

'What" will your obituary say?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Book Tag

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences on your blog along with these instructions.
5. Don’t you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.
6. Tag three people.

“Being too handsome is indeed a problem that though has only plagued a select few, involves a big challenge and should be addressed properly in addition with the problems of being too sexy and too talented. In this chapter, we will be discussing these three problems all at once and at the same time, learning how to mingle with the average Joes and how to “dress down” so as to not offend the other not so fortunate and blessed ones. Humility will be discussed in full in the next chapter.”

… Ok fine I made that up. Here’s the real thing:

“Query parameters are different from report parameters in that they filter the rows of a dataset and are always linked to report parameters to get a value. When specifying a query parameter in a query, the notation that must be used is the @ sign followed by the parameter name. To manually create a map between the query parameter and a report parameter, select the dataset in the Data view, click the Edit Selected Dataset button, and select the Parameter tab.”

page 123, Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Report Services for Dummies by Mark Robinson.

This is what I’ve been reading the past week since this is why I’m here in the first place. =) What a geek!

I tag... Liza, Gezelle and Rogeena. =)

Back Where It All Happened

What are you doing here?

I don’t know.

You’re not yet supposed to be here.

I know.

…and yet I am. Back to the place that has meant so much to me already. Back to the place where it all happened. It’s weird coming back here. Surreal. Both Oakwood and Sterling have that aura. Same goes with La Salle drive, McDonald’s, #22 bus and Singha. So many places. So many events. So many memories.

To be with the people I said good bye to a few months ago. People I thought I would never be with again. It feels weird to be walking these streets and being with these people again.

Surreal. There isn’t any other word to describe it.

Elevator Basics

(set sarcastic_tone = true) … ok game...

The elevator is a veeeeeery complicated machine... I know... On the ground floor, there’s only one button and since it doesn’t have a label, who knows what it’s for right? When you enter one, there are too many buttons inside! I only need to go to the 22nd floor… Gee… I wonder which one I should press… I tried the one beside the big number “12” but oh no!!! it stopped on the 12th floor!!! There’s got to be an instruction manual somewhere… maybe it’s that sheet of paper the size of a stamp that’s on a 8x11 frame oh wait, that’s only the elevator permit. (Look, I’m not a legal expert but maaaaaaaaybe there’s a law that they have to print it on a 2x2 paper… the size of a photo ID… maaaaaaaaybe it’s to conserve paper, help the environment and save the endangered Philippine tube-nosed fruit bat… I really don’t know…)

Anyways, don’t worry because though I am weird, at least I’m helping you guys out by sharing my vast knowledge in the world of elevator usage.

Press the button just once. You’re on the ground floor, you’re late or you really have to go to the bathroom, you press the up button. Good job. Look, there’s no need to press it again. If it’s lit, it knows what you want. It’s thaaaat smart. Pressing and mashing the up button won’t make the cars arrive earlier. Once is enough. Besides, that technique is only known to work in remote controls. Press the change channel button and it doesn’t do anything. Press it harder and lo, more channels!

Look at the up/down lights. You press the “up” button because you want to go up. I won’t tell you what the “down” button does… there’s a quiz later. Once one of the elevator cars is available and does that doorbell-like sound, look at the lights on the outside – there’s an up light and a down light. If the down light is lit, it will go down. If teh up light is lit, it will go up. Trust me. I’ve tried it.

Closing doors. Filipinos are not known to hold the elevator door open for others, actually they even press the close button. If you are about to board an elevator then the door suddenly starts to close, there’s absolutely no need to shout and panic. There’s no need to scream at the people already inside the elevator. Just put your arm between the doors and it will open. There’s a silver thingie as well on the edge that once pressed, will open the doors too. It’s designed to close but not to crush people ok? Just stick out your arm, you’ll be amazed.

Face anywhere. While inside the elevator, there’s no rule where I can face right? I mentioned I’m no legal expert but this one I can be sure of. With that, if I want to board the elevator with my back against the door while facing the other people inside it, I will. Yes, Arnold is THAT weird. Besides, whenever I’m waiting for the elevator going down, then it does arrive but it’s already full and so I have to catch the next one, it’s funny how people “arrange” themselves such that when the door opens, it looks like a big family portrait.

Lastly, if the elevator buzzes, it’s saying “HEY!!! ARE YOU GETTING ON OR WHAT?!? DECIDE NOW AND STOP TALKING TO YOUR FRIEND! IF YOU WANNA TALK TO HIM, BOARD THE NEXT ONE, IF NOT, GET IN!”.

Ok fine, that last one I made up but if the elevator does start buzzing, and you’re still deciding whether to get in or not, you have issues, dude.

…and stop asking me what the “push to call” button is for.

That Night

Before leaving for Glorietta that night, Jaye cut out some packaging tape as we wrapped the wiper blades which left a big question mark on Allan’s head. At least the wiper’s there. That’s Arn’s basic concept for repairs – if it moves but it shouldn’t, use packaging tape. If it doesn’t move but it should, use oil. Simple as that.

Funny thing I saw while driving home. On this one way street, a cop was in the middle waving his towel and directing traffic. Dude, it’s a one way street… where else would I go?!? Maybe he’s the same guy who worked at the DFA. Somewhere out there in the city, some helpless guy was probably held up but are the cops there to help him? Noooooo… they’re in Marikina… directing traffic on a one way street. Sheeesh…

By the way, remember the thing with my knee right? Last month, after more than 2 years of rest and rehab, I finally got the clearance from my doctor to play again. Cool! The first activity I did and I injured my foot – plantar fasciitis and it’s a bad one. Automatically, I was shut down for another 1 month. Finally, after lots of medicine and exercise, my foot’s good to go now.

… then I stepped on a pothole in the mall parking lot and badly sprained my ankle. I fell flat on the pavement again.

It’s like the Greek tragedy of rehabilitation stints. “Arn meet pavement… pavement meet Arn…”

“you again?!?”

That’s the thing with having badly injured legs like mine, it’s strong per se but one push and it collapses. One thing I learned through rehab is that it’s better to fall down than to try and regain balance since you injure yourself more frequently that way. This means that once I become even slightly off balanced I fall down as if I was shot by snipers… or like those world cup players.

On a side note, interesting how those soccer players, especially during the world cup play right? They are bringing down the ball, someone slides a few feet in front of them barely touching them, they fall writhing in pain, screaming as if someone pinched their… you know… with pliers, lie down, roll around, holding their leg then once the referee’s whistle blows, they quickly stand up and run casually to the opposite side of the field as if nothing happened. Wow!

The Day My Wiper Bailed Out

It was raining hard this morning just like it did the past few days. I was stuck in the usual C5 morning traffic listening to Chico and Delamar gazing at the dark sky through my windshield which was temporarily cleared by my old reliable wipers which would wipe the rainwater off for a few seconds before it gets shrouded again.

The wipers each have 2 main clips on each end and 4 others in the middle. The 2 at the end hold the wiper blade while the 4 give it that arched design so it can glide through the glass cleanly. Then came the most horrific scene of the day, one of the clips came loose as the wiper was somewhat severely arched like a crossbow. What the?!?

Taran-taran-tarararan…

“Pop!” goes the wiper…

It was like I pressed the “eject wiper” button somewhere in the dashboard as it flew out – like a missile. Good thing it landed on top of my hood.

The bad news is that with the wiper out, the right side of the windshield wasn’t being cleared. The good news is that the left one was still working. The really really bad news is that without the right wiper, the 6 clips turned into 6 claws badly scratching away at my windshield. I quickly turned it off as the irritating metal-to-glass scratching sound was gone.

Great. Now I can’t see a thing.

I stopped and got out the car to fix the wiper blade. So there I was, drenched in the rain, studying how the whole wiper thing works by studying the left one and comparing it with the right one until I realized that the wiper blade is already damaged and I cannot really fix it.

Ok McGyver within, let’s see what you got.

I just reclipped it. I didn’t have time to gather up a paper clip, a string and some bubblegum (I dunno… this is what McGyver would look for I assume) and I was already drenched in the rain just like in those boyband music videos.

It worked… for a while. In Makati, the wiper came loose again and it started scratching at the windshield. I just turned it off and used my Jedi powers to navigate all the way until the office parking lot. Actually I was driving with my head constantly bobbing like a parrot looking for spaces on the windshield that is clear of rainwater. I also stick my head out of the side window ala Ace Ventura (but not all the way of course). Some Jedi power eh?

Going home tonight will be trickier I imagine…