The Martini Glass

Dear Belindy,

Yes, Belindy was our code name for you, a portmanteau of your father and my names. And the following is a little early story of you.

We were planning for your conception towards the end of 2011. I, your mom, was an avid advocate of basal body temperature method (along with some other symptomps) to pin point my fertile time of the cycle. This way we can hopefully, God willing, time your arrival when the right time comes for all of us to start a family.

As an engineer, I believe in measured quantity and in interpreting data. The past three months before your conception, though, your father and I were renegades. I was not recording my temperature as dilligently as can be observed on the two data point (some times one point) charts. Your father, bless his heart, straight up believed my words that we were "safe" just based on my historical data from last year.

Early June 2011, we had bought tickets to a two back-to-back weekends wine tasting festival up in the Santa Cruz mountain. By that Thursday, I still did not get my period and were not observing that it will start anytime soon. What a long cycle, I thought, which I had attributed to stress at work and travelling. FYI, we were just got back from Texas that second week of May for your father's PhD graduation.

Being responsible people, your father and I went to get a home pregnancy test. If we were pregnant, we did not want to poison a developing embryo. As I am not a trained aimer, I opted to collect my urine sample in a clean cup. The problem was that we did not have any clean cup for this purpose except for the two extra disposable martini glasses we had for our New Year Eve 2011 at Lake Tahoe. By the way, your crazy bubbly Aunt Antonia was there celebrating the New Year evening with us. If you happened to be a girl, you were going to be named after her.

I was not drinking a lot of fluid that morning except for my 16 oz french press coffee. It was not surprising that my urine was in dark yellow hue and "thick". Your father upon seeing this filled martini glass pronounced that we were pregnant with you (and that I should drink more water). The next five seconds and three minutes were not necessarily the longest three minutes of our lives. Your father then lifted the aluminum cover that he used to cover the test stick. And there it was with two strong pink lines and the word pregnant we were full of mixed emotion. Your father kissed me and said "Congratulations, Mommy."

Darling, it was not sinked in on us for the next few days that we were going to have you. Part of the reasons it that we were worried because we thought it was not the perfect time to start a family yet. Ultimately, we believe in God and everything is going to be okay.

We were not officially announcing to the world about your impending coming. We wanted to pass the 12 weeks mark or after we observed your heart beats. Only a handfull of our closest friends and immediate family knew of this development. You have to read the next story I have for you to see why.

Stranger with a Strange Heart

Really, one should easily accept that music is influential and ubiqutious as a meliflous background to one's everyday life. I, on the other hand, can go for months not listening specifically to anything. Forget about work these days, there's never enough time to listen to the internet while I am too busy moving and thinking. Then, you would think that time at home affords you the chance and the entertainment. But save for watching occasional VH1 reminiscing countdown shows with Hubbostrich (and clicking on links from friends to "one hit wonders" on Yo*t*be), it's pretty much a barren desert of music in my world.

In the car, though, while talk radios occupy 90% of my ten minute driving each way to and back from the work place, I occasionally scan the radio and usually ended up at one psychedelic channel that is Stanford radio KZSU. This morning, I heard this song for the first time there and have been playing it over and over with a smile in my face. I do believe there's no more tricks up my sleeve and although the good old days have passed, the good times are definitely coming.

20 years of schooling, I just never learned the math
That 1 and 1 don't equal 2, they often equal half
While I've tried to live the high life, the best that I know how
And I bought my share of debonair, parlayin' it on the crowd

Oh I, I do believe that there's no more tricks up my sleeve
Oh, the good old days have passed and the dip turns after that
And slowly I've become undone, a stranger with a stranger heart

Well, I plan to hit the bottom, the bottle then the top
And I pray that something quits me before I got to stop
'Cause the masquerade is over but I was barely there
The masks come off the gilded clock, yet I'm just barely here

Oh, and I, I do believe that there's no more tricks up my sleeve
Oh, the good old days have passed and the good times after that
And slowly I've become undone, a stranger with a stranger heart

Oh I, I do believe that there's no more tricks up my sleeve
Oh, the good old days have passed and the good times after that
And slowly I've become undone, a stranger with a stranger heart

I do believe that there's no more tricks up my sleeve
Oh, the good old days have passed and the good times after that
And slowly I've become undone, a stranger with a stranger heart

I do believe that there's no more tricks up my sleeve
Oh, the good old days have passed and the good times after that
And slowly I've become undone, a stranger with a stranger heart

--"Stranger" by Dr. Dog from the album Shame, Shame (2010)

Baby PhD

What can I say, I miss Hubbostrich so much. He spent a week after defense in College Station to finish up some lab work and now he is visiting his family. Yes, he is a Mr. Dr. N now!

On behalf of my sanity and health, I can't wait until he gets back here Wednesday. Sleeping with the light on and eating junk food are recurring old habit I need to rid of, all while I am nursing a cold. Although, I am enjoying driving his SUV to work everyday and that working late is not such a sorrow with no one to come home to.

Yesterday, I texted him a couple times, I didn't get any reply. I then sent him a picture message of me doing an impersonation of Hannibal Lecter just to relay a message that I was getting a little bit annoyed, I still didn't get any reply. As last resort, I called him twice in a span of one hour but they went straight to voicemail. I know he knew I was ringing him. After all those my only conclusion is that the biatch is ignoring me for reason I have no clue what, which is more annoying than the ignoring itself. Gosh. What a resourceful wife to do? Call her father in law of course!

"Who is this person?" says FIL.

"Aw, I am bored and lonely here. You guys are having fun without me!"

"Oh, you're about to miss this kid more, I am about to beat the s*it out of him!"

"What happened?"

"Well, since he's a PhD now, he thinks he's the smartest person in the world...he is actually pretty ignorant."

"Aww, you're the dad of the PhD, of course you are smarter! It's only paper work."

"I know, I just don't have the credentials."

Now I know where Hubbostrich get his "confidence" from.

Hubbostrich was handed the phone. He told me that this father and son are having the highest time of their 33 years career as a-father-and-son. They have been talking for hours on anything and everything. There were a lot of beer drinking involved and a lot of leaving the tables from disagreement on some X, Y, and Z topics. Taking my calls or responding to my texts is simply wasting time and out of place. The nerve!

"OK, Babe, just don't get those guns out. It will be one heck of a Law & Order: Criminal Intend episode."

Hubbostrich to his dad, "X says that we should not drink and be near guns."

His dad in the background, "Tell her, there are three just laying around in the table, and a couple knives scattered around the room."

Hubbostrich then says, "Even Goren couldn't figure this out, one person got a gun shoot, another has knife on his eye, what are you gonna describe to 911?"

"Yeah, when Goren looked at your dad's background...a former *** agent...and your background...a doctorate degree in Chemical Engineering...what is going on here?" I added.




And then I broke Hubbostrich the reason why I insisted on talking to him that instant.

"My mom just called and she is wondering why we are not pregnant yet. Are we doing the best we can? We need to remember that I am about to wither on my 31 years of existence in the world."

This is so inline with what my sister put in my Facebook status when I announced to the world that Hubbostrich passed his defense.


All I need to say to busy bodies (and to myself from time to time) is this quote from where else but my favorite Ecclesiastes 3:

There is an appointed time for everything, and a time for every affair under the heavens.

Uban oh Uban

Bermula dari ngomongin uban, dasar cewe-cewe chatting royals...

bu!
uban saya tambah banyak
*wail
*beat chest in sorrow
*hide under a rock

you want to hear where my uban is
di alis
hahahahhahah

WHAT
hows that possible

kmrn dah dicabut tumbuh lagi ????
itu brarti udah akut
si Stacy What Not to Wear itu highlight putih

she's probably starting a trend

lol that
trend udah dari jamannya si mamiek
inget mamiek nggak

no
anaknya P. Harto?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v229/wahyudi/mamiek.jpg

LOL!!!!!!!
kagettt

haahahaha
inget nggakk

inget2
what about this

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjht-TR2MJoD8BJKhPpE-LeMstu6GWXX9CKOEznbxOJZR1ft-jnWrYYQ2VAoAL-Jz_at6jhoWzeNBylS17j80_1sy9Lfy_wRS_dESNA4F4FTYvfiEU2mfIyoKw35JpgU25GJ0lGyQ/s1600/koes2.jpg

lebih menyentuh hati
4 3/8 nada

nada pertama!

hahahahah
no 1/2 nada

No Habla Ingles

Hubbostrich finally finished his dissertation on Thursday. He is working on the slides for presentation since then. His defense is this coming Friday. Apparently, all of these have finally taken a toll on him. As a little break, we said yes to a birthday lunch of a girl in the gank today. In the car,

I feel better today.

You were that burnt up...burnt off...I mean...burnt
out yesterday?

Yeah!

At the lunch, the two of us were casually discussing NY's recent drama with her job and how talented she is overall. [Crossing our fingers, but NY's going back for good is imminent. More on this tomorrow when words are finalized. Damn you, JCP. I so want to switch carrier to be an advocate of the law.]

I think your sister has an excellent English skill of anybody I know, even you!

...Hold on!!

Babe, you mix up words

Yeah? What words?

You want me to make a list?

[Thinking about conversation in the car 20 minutes ago] Burn up?

That's what they do at refineries, Babe

Burn off?

That's also what they do at refineries

Burn in?

That's what you guys do at your work

Burn out!!!

Three strikes and you're out!

LOL LOL Hey, but my writing skill is supposedly better than hers

Yes, your editing skill is excellent

I think it has to do with time you spend with
somebody

You meant I didn't notice her flaws as much as yours?

Exactly

This reminds me of a conversation in the car coming back from a lunch with NY, brother, and then Fiancestrich. Apparently, I uttered a word with a wrong pronounciation and was innocently unaware of it. That prompted NY to a bashing which is pretty mild according to her standard.

"She can't speak proper English, you can't speak Indonesian, how do you guys communicate?"

We all couldn't stop laughing.

Blot Blot Western Baby

While I was getting pulled in into a project with demanding work hours (this morning I got home at precisely 2:01 AM) and Hubbostrich is on a deadline for February 19 defense, our household has given up a few time vested luxuries such as meals from scratch and recreational activities. Before bed time TV watching is now reduced to numbness entertainment (well, hello, Aqua Teen Hunger Force) or dramatic money making ventures (American Pickers, Pawn Stars). Hence, updating this little blog is not a priority lately, although like Ms. Cecily Cardew character in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, I enjoy a life of deliberate contemplation poured in a written format, time permitted.

On my occasional free time at nights and weekends, Hubbostrich makes used of my playing editor skill to work on his dissertation. Did I tell you I enjoy being an editor? In fact, that's what I want to be when I grow up.

"Babe, you always forgot to put a period at the ends of your sentences!"

"Well, you sometimes can't see them in Times New Roman."

Such a ridiculous excuse. An Arial will work better, he claims. But wait, there are more of ridiculous situations coming my way. For instance, when Hubbostrich says he is done with a chapter of the dissertation, it means there are 50 unknown references need to be gathered around and 10 figures to format. Who is responsible for this? Yes, such a sweet life of an editor.

I still make sure to use my higher up in the food chain position to point out things to be corrected in his dissertation.

"I'm telling you this is not a good abstract, you have to be dramatic. Think headlines. Short and to the point, snip-snip!"

"F- the Thesis Office and their 350-word abstract," is all he can say in frustration.

Ah! A couple more hard work days and we will submit a draft to his advisor.

Bonus point:

Hubbostrich has been claiming this as the official soundtrack of his dissertation writing. He can totally relate.

Exposé

My group at work has an opening. I handed a hard copy of a friend's resume to Manager in Charge of this hiring. The resume in transit is four pages long. We are all eager to sell expose ourselves for jobs we want, but at four pages it probably is not going to hit the point. Also, a third party tête-à-tête is tad more efficient. The irony is I just realized those after MiC talked to me at my cube a few minutes after I handed him that resume.

"Is he/she a smart PhD? Because if he/she is not, then..." he asked me point blank.

"Where do you think I put my allegiance on, I handed you the resume."

I only wished I had the courage to speak that up; secondary, it also feels like a slap in the face-we need (a) whole other post(s) for self pity. Instead, I tried to sell my friend out to the best of my ability.

"...he easily adapts to new fields...he was an intern here...yes, he is smart, I was a his defense...bla bla bla..."

"Let me think about it," said MiC.

I think I just failed my poor friend.

New Year New Responsibility

Pseudo-boss: "Happy?" He chugged a devilish laugh.

He was walking by my cubicle this afternoon. I was pulled out from his project to another one by my Big Boss (which is really at the same level as P-B 's) last week. This week feels brand new to me. I have never been this scared working on a new project. The past two years I was a baby learning to walk. Somebody always grabbed my arms and shielded me from falling hard. This new project is that baby running.

Me: (Shrugs) "I don't know what to expect. But I have a big meeting with Big Boss tomorrow."

P-B: "Don't worry, he'll explain A to Z." Devilish laugh part deux commenced.

So, here is to self-development. Gotta remind myself that I am not in this only for the money.

Red

Last night when I got home,

Xindy: What's for dinner, Babe?

Hubbostrich: Something with meat sounds good.

Xindy: Does chicken count as meat?

Hubbostrich: Yeah!

Xindy: OK, think exactly what you want for dinner while I'm excusing myself to the bathroom.

Hubbostrich: OK!

Xindy is back.

Xindy: So..?

Hubbostrich: Chicken with Aaron's famous rub, baked potato chips, oh, and some salad.

Xindy: OK, sounds good to me!

Hubbostrich: Don't we need wine?

Xindy: Hmm..yeah...

Hubbostrich: Wanna walk to Safeway with me? I have this one in mind.

Xindy: What is it?

Hubbostrich: Remember the spicy cabernet?

Xindy: Oh yeah, that'll go with the spicy rub, and it's cheap too. What is it called? I don't have it written down on my black book.

Hubbostrich: Hmm...I don't quite remember, it has red blots on the label and somethingCatholic.

We managed to walk to the store and,

Xindy: I don't know where it is, Babe.


Hubbostrich: Oh, it's somewhere in here. Ah, here it is.

Later that night he accidentally let out that he was at Safeway earlier that afternoon for something else but managed to browsed thru the cabernet section and liberally had this bottle in mind.

What is the point of this blog post you ask? Well, I just want to share that I used to have a 100% success rate in detecting Hubbostrich scams. This time I failed, I was scammed into thinking that it was purely his innocent choice of wine for the dinner we have had just discussed.

I should be more attentive. Clue number one, there's no way he remembers informations as trivial as those. And the way he said was a tad too coy. "Red blots"? It is actually called Red. "Something Catholic?" It is from St. Francis Winery. Clue number two, it was not more than two seconds between my question of the wine whereabout and when he found the targeted wine.

You know, Bibi, Tiger Xinda never makes the same mistake twice. She definitely will detect scam-in-progress better next time.

Miaow

Nothing strikes my senses a couple of mornings ago other than stumbling upon this article via a certain microblogging. It sucessfully raises my blood pressure as well as mental confussion, the article hit bases too close. As we all know, Hubbostrich and I have teamed up on the so-called Western-Asian household model for a couple of months and counting now and we do have a few ideas on raising our future children "succesfully", certainly not the Tiger Mom way.

Anyhow, after a careful examination, the WSJ footnote mentioned that the article is an excerpt of an upcoming book by the author. So it is more than possible that controversy is intended as part of book marketing. Although, I am not sure how succesful this gimmick is for your more-than-average pedestrian. I, myself, am going to wait for a library copy instead of wasting a couple of hard earned yuen on it. I guess it is not hard to infer what we could get out the book. I sincerely placing hope it is not a how-to manual for every day Tiger Mom but more like a memoir, shall we say, a path to author's parenting-discovery.

This other microblogging site, on the other hand, succesfully brought us a lighter, I mean sarcastic, note on the subject. I must say it is a much better channel to direct your disapprovement. I can't stop LoLing on its almost daily witty one liner (and footnote) and don't get me started on the Asian MILF, she totally images the original Tiger Mom's profile.

St. Claire Cooking

Tonight I discovered French provencale cooking by chance. A recent bout of vegetarianism leads me to buying a large eggplant thinking to make somekind of lasagna. Hubbostrich, though, had some craving for cheeseless, hence less calories, pasta dish. We consulted this indispensable book for an eggplant recipe and stumble on Ratatouille Provencale.

As always, yours truly and her partner in crime never stay true to a recipe. We modified JoC's recipe even added some ground beef (the vegetarian me is finally cured after a week) and some purple head cabbage to the hearty stew. I also boiled some elbow macaroni and toasted rye bread as side dishes.

I couldn't really identify what is so good about it. It's probably just the amalgamation of all natural glutamates in the tomatoes and the onion, shallots, and the sweetness and flavors of the vegetables including the eggplant and the beef taste in the background and the hint of vermouth.

Bibi and I each had to come back two more times for a total of six helpings between us (recipe was for 8 servings) and was left with small container for somebody's lunch tomorrow. If that is not enough to testify on how good the stew is maybe you should come visit us and we will cook it for you.

Without anymore ado, here is our recipe.

Xindy's Ratatouille St. Claire

On dutch oven,

heat up 1/2 c olive oil

pour in

approximately 2 c (1 lb) 1" x 1" cubed peeled eggplant
1 c julienned purple head cabbage

cook covered until tender, approximately 10 minutes.

Remove vegetables from dutch oven onto a dish.

Season with salt and black pepper.

On dutch oven,

brown approximately 1/4 lb ground beef

pour in 1/4 c dry vermouth

cover and cook with medium heat approximately 15-20 minutes (if started from frozen state).

Add

1 clove sliced shallot
1/4 c sliced onion
1 sliced red bell pepper (yellow will work too, this is mainly for color)
3 sliced cloves of garlic

Cook at medium heat for 3-5 minutes.

Season with salt and pepper.

Add to the mixture

1 can of Italian tomatoes
1 tbs of sliced fresh sage
2 bay leaves
1 tbs of fresh rosemary
1 1/2 c water

Cook for another 10 minutes.

Reduce to low heat, add the eggplant and cabagge mixture, cover and cook for another 20 minutes.

Bon appétit.

Office 2011

New year, new resolution, new hope for a better life.

This year I started at the 9 x 9 ft square patch of green box where I perch during some of my hours at the office. The project started in the spur of the moment the second day of work in 2011. I acquired a gently used white board from the division secretary by chance of reading her email a few minutes after she had sent it. And then a manager walked by with an LCD monitor and offered it to me. After another acquisition of keyboard a secondary work station was ready for me to use.

While I was rerouting cables and such to set up the work station, it striked me to clean up around the cubicle. After all, this little space is considered a second home and who in the right mind doesn't appreciate a clean living space. So, I threw away boxes and what not and rearranged stationeries and office stuff around. I then consulted the internet and my dedicated online designer to help me with decoration.

I touched up, cut out, and affixed some flower patterns from MS Publisher template to the rolling door of one of the shelves to the left of my work station. I decided to have shades of purple as color theme. Leaves (and two four-leaf clovers for good luck) cut out were added to fill in some left out spaces.



To continue the flower and color theme, I added this wicker basket that contain artificial tulips. This printed Periodic Table of the Elements has been with me for some time and I think the table and the tulips look lovely placed side by side.



One of my undying passions is to be learned in Latin, as such one of my favorite mottos is naturally in the language of interest. MS Publisher template striked again. I printed the motto into a tweaked template on a brochure paper and affixed it on the corner of the cover of the shelf on my right.



The other part of the right shelf rolling door is decorated with postcards from the places I have been on road trips. Postcards to me are such inexpensive useful mementos that posses minimum dust acquisition tendency.



That is it for now but I figure am not done with revamping yet. Next in line is some lighting to warm up the place and to use the wall behind me for further decor.

Happy New Year.

The Making of Donuts

Idea for homemade small ring-shaped cakes fried in a fat aka donuts stroked Hubbostrich one Sunday morning. We used The Joy of Cooking recipe for sour cream donuts. It was not going to take that long if we didn't have to walk to a nearby grocery store for cooking oil.

After gathering wet ingredients, mixing in the stand up mixer and a bit of folding of dry ingredients, Hubbostrich went to roll and cut the dough. We substituted some of the all purpose flour with whole wheat flour. We regretted this decision later on as the donuts came out a bit bread-y.



Rolling and cutting. Rim of glass of appropriate size can be used instead of a biscuit or donut cutter.

I cut the inner holes to complete the donuts using the rim of a shot glass. I then transferred the cut donuts and the holes to a flour covered wax paper on top of a flat surface.



Waiting to be fried.

The oil was heated to 375 degree F. Hubbostrich has such thermometer handy to monitor temperature before and during frying. Cooling rack was positioned near the fryer. Also, we resorted to use the smallest of our pans to save oil.



The fat of choice was this blend of canola and vegetable that was on super sale at the grocery store.

Glaze and toppings were to follow once the donuts were cooled for safe handling. Here we also used The Joy of Cooking recipe, it was translucent glaze. I used brandy for liquid and some lemon zest. The choice of toppings were chocolate sprinkles and mixture of roast walnuts and almonds.



Brandy glaze and yummy toppings.

The final products needed to be guarded from donut-predator. Where is Billy The Exterminator when you need him? Next time we will omit the whole wheat and try to make it a little cake-y instead of bread-y.



Left over donuts.

Bonus:
Daddy donut with his daddy.

Thomas, aka Didymus

Yes, we got your wedding invitation as well as the favor frame. They are so lovely!
Thank you for inviting us to be part of your day….it makes us think about our own wedding day back in May.



But, we are pouting because we just couldn’t make it back home for your wedding.

We are praying that everything will go smoothly on the D-Day so that you two love birds can just start your next day as a husband and wife already.

Cheers!
Inda & Billy

PS: Dua undangan & dua bingkai poto lainnya untuk U & Y juga dapet kok!

Halloween Pooper

Wife: Bibi, are we going to carve pumpkin this year?

Bibi: Hmm, I don't know, it's too much work. We'll see how we feel about it.

Wife: Yeah, it might be Baby's First Halloween when we will get around to it.

Bibi: *Pause walking* What do you mean?

Wife: LoL. Nothing.

We didn't dress up for Halloween and didn't go anywhere either despite of a (kids friendly) party invitation. But instead we had three Alfred Hitchcock DVDs(Rebbecca, Rear Window, and Vertigo) courtesy of Santa Clara Public Library and a bag of Kit-Kat and left over SF taffy on a silverish dollar store platter. We put last minute "Treats" sign on the door so little witches, Harry Potters, ballerinas and what have you, won't just pass by our apartment. By 7:45 PM there was a grand total of two knocks which left me with 1/3 of the candy bag all for myself. Yuh yuh. Not so yuh yuh, Rangers was producing nil on 7th inning.

Maybe next year I will make a conscious effort to be a blond Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson donning a dress, big hat, heels, a jacket, a gun, a big purse to dump all my crap investigative materials in, and a glass of mint julep on my hand, "thank you."

Labels

On our recent excursion to the wine country, we visited this small winery in the Russian River Valley appellation. Its name is Christopher Creek. It was a surprise to find one of the wine makers actually graduated from Texas A&M! Texas and California are not really all that dissimilar when it gets to the country side. But the point of this post is not about the wine or the winemaker but about the labels in the wine bottles.

See, I know nothing about typography or labeling. Bu Didi will be the best judge of those, she is one helluva an amazing designer. Anyway, the labels on the Christopher Creek wine bottles are very catchy, at least to me. It has this Russian icon art feeling to it. It was an eye pleasing change to their old labels I found as our wine guy showed one of their old bottles. Labels are getting too generic these days.

Evidence A, on the left is the internet picture of 2006 Petite Syrah label Trish (Bibi's sister) gifted us. On the right, the old label I found randomly from internet.




















See what I'm saying?

Eat This, Bibi!

My flightless avian spousal unit/sidekick and I love thriller political drama movie. All hell breaks loose when we watched The Ghost Writer the first time this past Saturday. We just could not help to watch it again two more times within the next 24 hours. Note: those two more times watching were with caption turned on for greater clarity.

In between times of the day we were not concentrating on the movie, we both turned to IMDB for its user forum using our respective laptops. Hubbostrich kept yelling stuff at some of the posts, while I kept my cool and reading. The next morning, he even started his day perusing more postings on the movie. Yes, he was totally fixated. Everything about the movie fascinates him but the story line, the parallel to real world politics, the characters, and the ending got his most attention.

The highest point to me about this movie was this dialogue between Hubbostrich and yours truly. I was laying down in the sofa with my laptop munching on some chocolate while Hubbostrich was getting all worked up by his passion for the movie. If we were to connect an EEG machine to him, we could probably see his brain operating at its fullest capacity.

Hubbostrich: "See, they needed to hire a smart ghost writer. They are not going to hire you [pointing at me], they are going to hire me [pointing at himself]."

I: "What? Are you saying you're smarter than me? [Proceeding to choke him.]"

Hubbostrich: "Ouch, stop, you're hurting me."

All I am going to comment is that a smart person should never proclaims his/her smartness because you know there is somebody who is smarter than you and you will be left feeling foolish about yourself. Furthermore, the nature of our relationship as man and wife is best left to the character of Maria Portokalos, "The man is the head, but the woman is the neck. And she can turn the head any way she wants."

All in all, we both really love the movie and that is all that matter.

Sing with Me

We were driving on Highway 101 back from Los Angeles to Santa Clara Sunday night. As we cruised along the coast, moon light was reflected in the Pacific ocean. Together with the dark they cascaded an undescribable feeling.

The thing about being on a road trip is you get to think about anything and everything to the point that it is therapeutic. A big plus if in the background you have songs that further enable that kind of cerebral yet sentimental moment. One of these songs for me is Aerosmith's Dream On. Sing with me...

Every time I look in the mirror
All these lines on my face getting clearer
The past is gone
It goes by, like dusk to dawn
Isn't that the way
Everybody's got their dues in life to pay

Yeah, I know nobody knows
where it comes and where it goes
I know it's everybody's sin
You got to lose to know how to win

Half my life
is in books' written pages
Lived and learned from fools
and from sages
You know it's true
All the things come back to you

Sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tears
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away

Yeah, sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tear
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away

Dream on Dream on Dream on
Dream until your dreams come true
Dream on Dream on Dream on
Dream until your dream comes through
Dream on Dream on Dream on
Dream on Dream on
Dream on Dream on

Sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tear
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away
Sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tear
Sing with me, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away...

Introducing...

The Rotisserie Chicks!

Should Quit Twittering and Start Writing

I am having a writer's block. It's that time of the year when we, lowly servants of the capitalist world, have to write self-assessment on our performance at our jobs. I'd say this self-review has no value since when the bosses get to it, it doesn't really matter what you think about your performance, it's what they think about you.

In my line of work, it is a possibility that you do a good job but it corresponds to a negative result. Think about it this way. You prove them that it is just not feasible to do whatever big picture stuff they want to achieve but they still count it against you because it is not feasible. Get it? Of course, worse things can happen. This is when you can not even prove the feasibility of the project. In that case, you're probably out as a bottom 10%-er.

Anyway, back to the writing process, it also got me chatting thinking.

me: Buu, I hate writing about myself

*diem
*mikir
what are those FB, Twitter and blog posts about?
LOL

D***: review?

me: yeah
FB, twitter, and blog posts do not turn into financial advantage
while review does!
hmmm...why is it so hard then?

D***: cos you got to convince someone
to buy it
haha

me: hahahahhahahahah
so it has to have a certain quality
and definitely not silly stuff like bashing Hubbostrich (tm)?

D***: lol

me: what an epiphany

“Breadwinning and the art of writing must be kept absolutely apart.”

Suffice it to say, Franzie's thesis doesn't apply to my situation.