Look At This Tangle Of Thorns

It's a Saturday and I'm stuck home again. I seriously cannot recall the last time I was out. Visiting hospitals and the corner McDonalds do not count.

Now there's nothing inherently wrong with being at home but it does feel like the world has moved on without you.

...Boy, Christmas depression came early this year.

So let's just recap what's happened since the last post and maybe I'll snap out of it.

• The long-awaited new Guns N' Roses album Chinese Democracy came out last week. Ex-drummer Matt Sorum is caught on TMZ saying that it's "a toe tapper". I'm surprised at this. One, that people can point out Matt Sorum in a crowd, and two, Matt Sorum has a personality.
• Finally finished reading Nabokov's Lolita after two failed starts. I read the last page about a week ago, and I still feel dirty.
• After years of Gibson fandom I've gone out and bought myself a Japanese Fender Stratocaster that's at least 20 years old. To which my cousin remarked: "Ewww John Mayer".
• The condo (dubbed The Condeaux for an added touch of class) is slowly making the transition from "tiny" to "cozy". Now if I could only start actually living there...
• A few folks from work are/were in the hospital (for different reasons). I think sicknesses are getting more complicated. And we've no Dr. House to help us out. Maybe we do in terms of temperament, but not in terms of expertise. I kid doctors.
  

Later...

Sometimes I think that at the start you're given a bunch of credits on which to build the rest of your life with, and I've unwittingly withdrawn and wasted them all and that's how I ended up where I am. I remember a friend telling me that He doesn't work that way and there are days when I desperately want to believe her.

Lonely Planet

Well, it is.

Boracay IV was even more subdued than the previous trips. Did nothing but sleep, eat and stare. At the ocean. But given how work has been lately, doing nothing feels entirely justified.

This is of course step four of the cliche Boracay trip: blogging about it, I do get minus points for not using a DSLR. But cliche as it is there really is nothing like that sunset. Even sunrise people agree. I could've done without the ensuing existential crisis, though.

This is of course the yearly thing with my mom where she takes me or my brother as her plus-one when she goes on this money-market seminar with a few hundred brokers and traders and other people I have little in common with. I don't remember when I started going on this trip; but the little girl I once convinced to henna tattoo her arm much to the disappointment of her banker mother is graduating college next summer. God that's depressing.

There was this part at dinner where all the older bank officers were raving about the Beatles bossa-nova remakes that was being played over the speakers. I didn't know Bora had a two-year time zone difference.

Spending the weekend with a couple of hundred bankers isn't as boring as it sounds. You can tell that everyone has a bit more swagger than the usual yuppie, playing with money and all. You can tell by their choice of swimwear.But being at this beach is like being a kid at the candy store. With the candy under lock and key. And the storekeeper is watching. And you're with your mom.

Cover My Descent

October is over already? And not a single post. Which means yes, I'm monumentally busy again. And that's no longer news, is it?

My cousin suffered an aneurysm some three weeks ago, and a week later the family buried next to our lolo. He was just five years older than me, which means growing up I found it hard to relate to his high school/college/working world at the time. But I will remember a couple of things. One, that I would do some of his high school art projects for him and they would get recognition at his school (Claret?) whereas projects I would do for my own classes would get nothing. And two, my mom eventually sold our car (the one I was driving after college) to him; a '92 Corona, which is the car I wanted to drive when I first learned how to, and the car I crashed into the back of a cab after the 2002 UAAP championship. I'd learn later on that he was caught for speeding on the NLEX, so if anyone from college or Magnus Philippines Inc was witness to that, that wasn't me. He is survived by his wife and three kids, and some award-winning artwork.

Later...

October came and went, and that means the company Beer Bash just concluded last week. While it wasn't as crazy as 2006, it did have its moments...moments already lost in a drunken haze. Thank God for photogs and their Multiplies.

Thursday, went to an Analog gig with a couple of other bands at Route 196. The guitarist from Blue Teeth makes me want to quit playing guitar altogether.

Friday, spent Halloween mostly at work (predictably) and then had a quick bite at Grams before signing off. Signs of slowing down? The horror!

Later...

I've been feeling so inept lately, which is never a good thing in general, but is a horrible thing coming into another big project. Need to snap out of this. Retail therapy so far hasn't worked as well as expected, and my bookshelf is quickly running out of space. I have some other ideas, but they all involve complex sugars.