Boom Tarat Tarat

Suddenly, I'm the sickest person on the planet.

With the total absence of anything resembling free time outside of the two-week Christmas break, I decided to make a trek to the friendly neighborhood doctors to finally get around the consultations I should have done oh so long ago.

In a nutshell, I now know the smell of burning skin. Yep. You get to inhale the smoke and all. But, it's really not that pleasing. That's probably why nobody is into smoking dead skin.

I also got to acquaint myself with some of the prescription drugs that I have been trying, and failing, to have "reimbursed" by my employer for years. In a rather sick twist of fate, I can safely guess that I won't have any problems having these expenses reimbursed this time.

Speaking of free time, Weng got me a copy of NBA Live 07. You have to know that this franchise is the only reason why a Sony Playstation2 is sitting in our room (and of course the Playstation, before that). I had copies of NBA Live 98, 2000, 2003, 2005, 06 and now, 07. It's simply the best game out there, ever. Things have certainly gotten better since I spent free time at Cervini beating the crap out of Roger in bball, but that's another story.

The good old CS faculty in Bagumbayan is now preparing for their second season of NBA Live (PC). Leave it to the CS faculty to come up with such ideas. We once spent days (in between classes, of course) and nights at the office shooting the brains out of terrorists and counter-terrorists. Somebody got bored and decided to rescue naked female hostages, instead. I have no idea how good they are now in NBA Live, but when I left three years ago, only Joshua has managed to give me a good game, and to actually have a chance to beat me, in any given day.

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Huwag maging dayuhan sa sariling bayan.

I will be off to Bicolandia this weekend to spend New Year's Day with the in-laws. And as I'm writing this, I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to bring my PS2 controller with me to Naga. Paksyet.

Happy New Year y'all.

Breaking Out/Going Home

I discovered Prison Break last week. As of last night, I only have about 7 more episodes to go before the protagonists, I presume, finally break out of Fox River Penitentiary. It really has to end soon. Otherwise, I will not be able to get around reading my 30-page backlog in Crimpro. (Forget about advance reading - I am way behind.)

While I get the idea that some of my friends watch the series because of Wentworth Miller (yes, they're girls), the series is rather good in its own right. (Seeing Sarah Wayne Callies regularly doesn't hurt either.) It has a great storyline (I know it looks like a Shawshank rip-off, but I love the Shawshank Redemption) plus the series has several scenes shot in Chicago - which, for me, is always good. Most of the scenes shot downtown are places I'm familiar with: Lower Wacker, Navy Pier, Wrigley Field, the Chicago River - which, by the way, is still as green as ever. Sweet home, Chicago.

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Speaking of home, I will be off to Gapo over the weekend to spend the holidays with my folks. So, Happy Holidays to you and your family. Cheers.

Person of the Year: ME!

I am TIME Magazine's Person of the Year for 2006.

Seriously.

According to the AFP (the press people, not the people shooting the press people), TIME Magazine named 'You' as its person of the year Saturday, with a mirror cover designed to reflect the importance of user-generated Internet content as a driving force in the modern world. The Dec. 25, 2006 issue of TIME Magazine says:

Who are these people? Seriously, who actually sits down after a long day at work and says, I'm not going to watch Lost tonight. I'm going to turn on my computer and make a movie starring my pet iguana? I'm going to mash up 50 Cent's vocals with Queen's instrumentals? I'm going to blog about my state of mind or the state of the nation or the steak-frites at the new bistro down the street? Who has that time and that energy and that passion?

The answer is, you do. And for seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME's Person of the Year for 2006 is you.

This certainly calls for a celebration. Now, I only need to figure out how to put this into my resume without making me appear like a clown.

The Hill

I left home at 16, in a sense, never to come back. I was young, I was brash, and I was looking forward to meeting head on, four of the most challenging and unforgettable years of my life. For the first time, I was alone, and for the first time, I was completely surrounded by brilliant people whose academic preparation sadly exposed the magnitude of the shortcomings of my own high school education.

I have visited my old college campus many times since I left it as a student many years ago. While more and more buildings have sprouted from what were once open fields, and Camp Big Falcon has risen from what once was the shortcut to Bel; while traffic has since gone from bad to really god-awful, and somehow you think that less girls are wearing shorts now; as sappy as it sounds, somehow, you still feel that you are home.

Downtime

For all intents and purposes, 2006 at Malcolm Hall ended last night for the block. There is still a class scheduled for tonight, but knowing the man's propensity for disappearing acts, chances are we won't see him again until 2007, if ever.

In any case, I plan to be at the University on Friday to (1) pick up my "copy" of a textbook from the SC, (2) maybe see the lantern parade for the first time since 15 years ago (for the love of everything good and holy, has it been that long?), and (3) diss the faculty at the Malcolm Madness.

Workload at the office is rather light. In fact, it is so light that for the past week, aside from doing school work, I have just been picking on idiots at public fora and stalking people over the Internet.

If you know where to look, you can find almost anything on the Internet. Aside from learning that your friends have hot friends who frequent Boracay (the pictures really help), sometimes, you also get to remind yourself, that indeed, only a few things are as pleasing as knowing that the stuck-up homecoming queen ended up with Cornelius.

Now, ain't life grand?

Course Work

The regular visitors of this site (yes, all two of you) must have noticed that not much is happening 'round this neck of the woods. On the contrary, I have been too busy screwing my employer that I barely found the time to screw it some more (Yep, that's where I'm composing this masterpiece right now).

We had quite a load to read last week, which was precisely why I was virtually on leave from work. But, of course, if you would only diligently check the records, you will find out that my ass was at the office for 40 hours.

Of course, not a single one of the good professors who assigned the comatose-inducing readings was able to cover all their assignments (one of them did not even see us the whole week), but trust me, you really do not want to risk being caught unprepared - unless, of course, you feel lucky. That, and you really want to make some professor's day.

All this couldn't possibly make me long for the looming Christmas break any more than I do right now. I really need a freaking break. At least, last year we had interesting stuff to read, like drawbridges being bombarded, politicians screaming "vulva of your mother!", half -naked dancers interpreting the life of a woman whose guerilla husband was killed during the war, and naked would-be rape victims running in front of the town hall. Now, all we have are debtors screwing creditors, and creditors screwing debtors. Well, that, and irresponsible drivers who hit people on bicycles, fences, stores, and other people trying to fix a parked car on the side of the road.