someyougiveaway

They said that this year of the rat will prove lucky for snakes --i'm right about to believe it. I can't remember the last time I felt this lucky. Not in the sense of being so blessed (I'd like to think we are all blessed everyday with little things) but lucky as in bet-in-the-lotto-and-win-the-jackpot lucky. In short, I think that Santi and I are in a roll. We are cruising-- as a couple, as partners, as lawyers, as a family.

Maybe it's being in our very own home. Albeit small, it still fulfills us, almost reduces us into tears everytime we come home from work. I attempt to cook (attempt is the operative word). He throws the trash. I wash the dishes. He mops the bathroom floor. We got our LCD mounted and its simply nirvana to watch CSI and actually hear Grissom think. And our bed.Haaaay. We haven't slept this well in the past two and a half years of trying to fit in a single bed back in my parents' house. Forget the hanky panky, just the sleeping part is pure bliss.

In the morning, we don't hurry. We take the sweetest time having coffee, staring at our view of the sea while watching Sofia finish her Coco Crunch. We leave at 7:30 and get to work by 8:00--that hasn't happened to me in 30 years of living in Alabang. Plus, our toll paying days are over. So over. We can go to work with nothing on our wallets so long as we have gas in the tank--which gas still comes free, courtesy of Mr. John G. 

Ooops, we actually have something in our wallets now--my first ever plastic. After years of wondering why we never got approved, we finally figured out why and had it ironed out. ( N.B. thou shall not max out your credit card especially when you're broken hearted aight, santiboy?) Now, we can do the groceries, pay Fitness First, shop with zero interest while earning points to travel. That is the masterplan.

Finally, our private practice is picking up, really picking up to the point that I wonder: What was I thinking flying 10,000 miles when we can have it all here?

In one of our hearings together, Santi and I chanced upon this and realized that it's another auspicious sign of good things to come, and how lucky we've always been. And how we so deserve this windfall we're having because we've gone through so much and came out of it together, still.

So we're going for it. Our next project--on the 11th floor this time...

And maybe I'd pass by the lotto in MOA tomorrow.

You never know

someyougiveaway

and the image of true sisterhood!

For the Lambda Rho Sigma! the Best!

Here's to 25 years and more!

Minz is: never been prouder

someyougiveaway

I once knew a girl who I thought had it all. This was years ago so my memory might be a tad too rusty. But she did. She sure as hell did. The prettiest face. An equally handsome boyfriend. A budding business. A profession in the making. And the best set of friends anyone can ask for.

I'm not sure of how it happened but she left it all behind. In a heartbeat. For something or someone, which until today, I can't put my finger on. Maybe it's because the versions of her story became such an urban legend that no one really knows how it all went down. Why she chose what she chose. Why she never looked back.

I try (tried is what I mean--I gave up like a month ago) to know her all over again. But then I realize there's too much water under the freaking bridge that it's virtually impossible to cross it or whatever it is we do with bridges.

I got to think of her over the weekend but I had too much alcohol in my system to explicitate why.

I'm sober now.

I wish she looked back. Just for a millisecond. So she could have seen what she left behind.

I remember now why I thought of her. But I'd like to keep most of it for myself.

I wish her well, always.

For my part, suffice to say that I'm glad I looked back, when I could have easily gone the other way and left everything that have ever mattered to me. Humbling as it was, I am where I belong.

To a bunch of girls who fend for each other, root for each other, respect and love each other despite the  neverending "I told-you-so's".

So there. This is what I meant to say yesterday along with the drunken pictures of us.

To my girls, my sisters, we might be one less but we are still us, nonetheless.

I heart you all.

someyougiveaway

"You asked for a pittance".

That's what my boss told me yesterday, referring to my salary which became a hot topic in one of his meetings with Human Resources. He said that I could have gotten more had I asked for it when HR asked me how much I think I was worth three months ago. I wanted to tell him, "You see, three months ago I had my head up my ass" but I thought that wouldn't help my case. So I kept my mouth shut as he ranted about HR getting away with murder. I can easily dismiss it as pure office politics but when your boss had your pay in his agenda with top management, you'd know something was wrong. Now the whole department knows how much I make which doesn't bother me more than the fact that they know I'm getting what I'm getting because I asked for it. Gad.

That's the problem. My whole history of settling for less than what I deserve is catching up on me.This is what rankles me. Forget my infamous salary--that will be settled in the next few months. By that time, all hell would have broken loose and HR will just have to give in to the boss' demand---put Mina back into the curve, even if she was the one who broke it in the first place. Finis. Case closed.By then I should be getting twenty thousand more. By then I should have shoved it into my thick head that what I'm getting now is nothing to sneeze at. It's just that I deserved more. I probably would have, by then. I got my head in the right place nowadays.

I just wish I didn't settle so easily before with other things. You know, other things.  It's one thing to be foolish, and another to shortchange yourself. That's me quoting myself--maybe I'd wear that on my forehead one of these days just to remind me that some things you don't get to change. Once you've settled, you're done. It's part of history. It sparks a chain of actions and reactions. Unlike with my stupid salary. that can be fixed.Though that will be etched in corporate memory, who will care about some lawyer's missed-by-a-mile entry-level package? No one. 

It doesn't work that way with other stuff. Those that deal with your worth not financially but personally. Funny how, in my case, these two are joined in the hip. Nyeta, magkapatid sila. I lived in a vicious cyle of asking for a pittance. Taking whatever I can  get (maybe I should have checked that status in facebook) from people. relationships--which is why it has extended its octopus arms to my work. That's the bottomline. Having said that, I can't really tell the boss, "hey, do you know that two years ago I was making 18,000 pesos in a Makati firm and I thought it was okay?" or that "I gave birthday parties to friends who don't even go to mine" and of course the kick-ass of them all, "I used to drive from Alabang to Fairview to see someone who didn't know me the next morning." 

I don't think telling the boss the above-mentioned is wise. So I won't. Let him wonder why I was the way I was. It doesn't matter.

I only got what I asked for.

And besides, that is history that will never repeat.  

someyougiveaway

I was traipsing around Galleria in a hunt for a swimsuit when I looked down at my toenails and saw them screaming for a pedicure. I rushed to the salon on the 4th level and slumped at one of their vanity chairs. I picked up their latest edition of YES! and was leafing through its glossy pages when I heard the first few strains of this song.

I have moments like this which Santi cannot comprehend. He thinks it's so telenovela-ish. And childish. And wierd.

I was at it again today. I put the magazine down and asked the parlor folks to turn the volume up and I just listened to what sounded like Moonstar 88, memorized enough of the lyrics so I can google it later, and just stared into space.

Sometimes I need days like this to remind me how rich and beautiful and meaningful OPM can be.

I am REMINDED. Rock on, noypis!

You got me again, Moonstar. di na kayo nakuntento sa torete, dinagdagan nyo pa. anak ng tukneneng na lyrics yan.

Kainis.Mi-nigraine ako.

someyougiveaway

It rained of good times, good friends and good news.( I will expound on that later, we have an Eraser heads concert to catch.)

In the meantime, these will have to do.

Just an aside..they say good things happen to good people but I think what really happens is that

good things happen to those who choose to do good things when it's far easier to look the other way.

There's a difference. That's the difference..

By this time, all of Manila would have heard of the "tragic" end to the Eraserheads Reunion concert. How Eli "collapsed" from exhaustion after singing 15 of their hits. For my friends and I who were there by 3 p.m. when the concert was scheduled to start at 8 p.m., this is tragic, indeed. Sulit na yung 15  but of course, everyone wanted more. There's nothing much we can do about it now except wish that the promoters have another go at it for loyal fans like us who grew up with the Eraserheads and their music. I will be there by dawn if it need be.

Whilst having our butts slumped at the Fort Open Field, the gang reminisced about the 1990's , when we were still in highschool--the first time the Eraserheads broke into the pinoy music scene with their first hit "Ligaya". I think there's no question that what E-heads brought into  the  table was their ability to write songs about the simple joys of life, of Filipino life at least.

"Ilang isaw pa ba ang kakainin, o giliw ko? Ilang tansan pa ba ang iipunin o giliw ko". Who would have thought a song about a dude pining over an unrequited love for Ligaya while gorging on isaw and counting bottlecaps will spur a cult following? 

My friends and I realized with so much pride and wistfulness that we were lucky to have lived in a generation when simple things carried so much meaning and brought so much joy to the daily grind. Take for instance the following:

Those times when we had to wait hours for people because we didn't  have celphones -- only quarters for payphones.

"Hika and inabot ko, nang piliting sumabay sayo".

Or those times when we didn't wish to have a car, but just to learn how to drive was enough.

"gusto kong matuto mag drive (kahit wala akong kotse)."

Or our memories of youthful rebellion and the angst that went along with it.

"Ang daming bawal sa mundo, sinasakal nila tayo...akoy's lumilipad at nasa alapaap na, gusto mo ba sumama?"

And our early doses of hopeful idealism. Well, mine at least.

"Lift your head , baby, don't be scared, of the things that could go wrong along the way, you'll get by with a smile, you can't win on everything but you can try."

I guess what we all wanted to say was that we are damn lucky to have lived in generation where the Eraserheads wrote and sang songs of our lives. This concert might just have been the last hurrah, ang huling el bimbo. It didn't last long, like most good things are. But we are grateful for even just a while. We were kids again.

To our E-heads and its fan-dom, "minsan sa may Kalayaan, tayo ay nagkatagpuan...sanay' huwag kalimutan ang ating pinagsamahan."

Eli Buendia, lead, august 30, 2008

Our very own ultraelectromagnetic pop pose, Fort Open Field