Pichur!

Okay, I’m really sorry for not updating this blog for uh, almost a month? I hope you’ll forgive me. I guess, a bug bit me. Well, yeah, I have a writer’s block right now. So yeah. That’s mainly the reason why there are no updates in this blog lately. Another reason is school. Though I have lots of new experiences, I can’t post them here. By the time I get back home, most my energy has already been depleted. Then, there are still other things that I have to worry like endless paperwork, Ms. Irresponsible1, and other things that make me annoyed. Besides, the reason why I’m keeping my identity would be defeated if I published them here.

But if you can’t resist2 me, I suggest that you follow me on Twitter and Plurk. Also add me as your friend, contact, fan or whatever on Last.fm, Facebook, Flickr, Delicious (The new Delicious site is… delicious!), Google Reader, and Digg. But erm, there’s no 100% guarantee that I’ll reciprocate. XD

So, what’s with the title? Well, I dunno if I’ve already introduced you to the word pichur. Haha. Obviously, it’s synonymous to the word picture. Use it in a sentence? Okay, here we go: Have you seen NYTimes’ feature on Angelica Panganiban’s photoshopped pichur? I guess this word was created circa 2005 by my chemistry-teacher-slash-adviser who has pronunciation problems.

Because I’m really out of words, I’ll be using photos to express myself and I’ll try to put a short description. Hopefully, this will work. And uh, I hate to admit it but this post is very random.

Let’s get the film rolling!

Agony in the Garden
Agony in the Garden - March 25, 2005

I’m pretty sure I’ve already posted this photo here. This is one of our heirlooms. My Dad reckons it was sculpted around the last quarter of the 17th century. That makes it more than a century old. Every Holy Week, we go to Dangwa Flower Market (near UST) to buy flowers for the procession. The float is designed with various flowers. Around six in the evening, the procession starts. But lately, I didn’t like how the float was decorated (20063, 2007, 2008). My Grandmother insists on buying white flowers only. It looked too simple to me. Currently, this photo is in Flickr’s Explore. Uh, if you have a Flickr account and you like this photo, please add it to your favorites and leave a comment as well. Well, I’m not coercing you. Haha.

Eat
Eat - December 24, 2006

A little bit of history about this phone: before it landed to me, my younger and sister and mother used it. Well, I’m not really a fan of phones. So even though it came from the Jurassic Era, I really don’t care. Lately, it was malfunctioning which forced me to use the other old phones here at home. But now, it’s working again. The culprit was its bloated battery. On a related subject, I’ve already owned one Smart, one Sun, and four Globe sim cards. Currently, I’m using two Globe sim cards. One is for my offline life, and the other is for my online life (but I don’t regularly use it).

Fully Booked
Fully Booked - April 06, 2008

You know how much I love books. Books are the fuel of my life. WTF?! I really enjoy reading books, that’s why I don’t mind spending hundreds of Pesos on them. Yeah, reading is an expensive hobby. Unless you have other resources like borrowing reads from the library or from your friends, you’ll surely get broke. But owning a copy is still different, eh? Right now, I don’t have anything to read. The books in the local bookstore don’t look interesting to me. Someone suggested a Chuck Palahniuk book to me, but after reading the synopsis on the back of his book, I hesitated. I think I will not like his style, besides, the synopsis kinda scared the hell out of me. I badly want to visit a Fully Booked store!

Bread Talk
Bread Talk - August 08, 2008

I have to say that Bread Talk is officially my favorite bakery. The presentation of their pastries and breads is awesome! I always salivate when I see breads (and not to mention cakes) from Bread Talk. And oh, the structure of their shops is also cool. Simple but amazing. The only downside is that their breads are expensive. Oh, look at that sign! The “NO PHOTOGRAPHING, no smoking, no eating/drinking, no shoplifting4” sign can’t stop me from taking photos of this amazing bakery!
PS: I submitted this photo to the Flickr 888 pool.

Print Cartridges
Print Cartridges - August 09, 2009

I’ve been bragging on Plurk that I’ve used my HP 56 Print Cartridge (as seen on this photo) for a staggering two years. What’s more is that I didn’t have to buy a new cartridge because I used up all of the 19 milliliters of ink but because the cartridge malfunctioned. That’s how tipid I am with ink. Haha. You see, I usually use “fast draft” for Print Quality (for text). Well, the quality is good and the text is still readable. Yesterday, after checking the prices of the print cartridges in four computer shops at SM City Pampanga, I bought the cheapest HP 56/57 print cartridge combo-pack for my old printer-slash-scanner-slash-copier I’ve found. I was able to save more or less PHP 1000.00. In one of the shops I’ve visited, if you bought a HP 56 and HP 57 print cartridges separately, you would have to pay them for PHP 2680.00 (I’m glad I didn’t buy from that store)! Now, that’s an impressive deal! I guess, those are that last print cartridges I would buy until I graduate from college. Haha.

Uh, I guess this worked for me! w00t! I now have my first post for this month. I actually enjoyed doing this. I’m off to visit your blogs, then, I’ll try to catch the Olympics (read this article: 10 Fascinating Facts About the Ancient Olympic Games) later.

  1. That’ll be her name here in my blog from now on. Also, I believe that the whole class now knows how much I hate her. Wait, have I mentioned about her here in my blog? []
  2. LOL. What’s wrong with me? Resist?! Seriously? []
  3. Weird. I can’t find a photo of this in my Flickr account taken back in 2006. []
  4. Uh, I’m not sure if it’s a “no shoplifting” sign. The illustration was so vague. []

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Not your ordinary book store

These are my experience with the nearest book store here in our place so as it is the only branch of the store that I’m very familiar of, it does not mean that these are true with its other branches. Oh, don’t expect me to give you the name of the store.

This store is more than a book store, it does not only sell books but it also does have merchandises like office supplies, cards, gift wraps and other things that are not related to books whatsoever displayed on their shelves.

During a month before the classes starts here in the Philippines, this book store sells more notebooks than the books that they have. Don’t forget the other school supplies that an ordinary student would need… bond paper, adhesives, pencils, scissors, pad paper, and so on. And now, as the Christmas holidays is fast approaching, a visit to this store is not complete if you would not see their gigantic Christmas trees for sale, Christmas balls, and artificial Poinsettia flowers.

What I don’t like with this store is that there are less titles to choose from compared with other book stores that I have seen. And if you want to look for a good read, you would have take some time to look for a good one. And to make it a little more complicated, the books are not arranged in a very systematic order. Yes, the books are grouped according to their genre, but they are not arranged alphabetically. In this case, the tactic read first some reviews about the book that you want to buy before proceeding to the book store is not applicable as what was stated above, there are less titles to choose from compared with other stores. So your last resort is to take note of the books that you found in the book store that interests you, read reviews in the internet, and go back to the book store to buy it.

They also have this list of the bestselling books, but most of the time, they don’t have stocks of the books that got to the top ten. How stupid…

*****

Last Sunday I and my family went to Metro Manila to have some quality time. We went to the Block (annex 3 of SM North Edsa, picture bellow). Whoa! The mall was so great. And in this mall, I found a branch of Fully Booked.

theBLOCK
State of the art. The Block is one of the newest malls in the country.

I saw thousands and thousands of books! Almost all of the books that I want to have were available on that store! The problem is that I don’t have sufficient funds to buy all of the books that I want. But at least, I was able to grab a copy of the book that I wanted to read since last year. It’s called “About a Boy” by Nick Hornby. The book costs around PHP 500.00!

Here is the updated list of the books that I want to have. Oh, if you want to buy any of these books for me, just notify me, okay?

  • For One More Day — Mitch Albom (around PHP 900.00)
  • Dogs of Babel — Carolyn Parkhurst
  • Eragon
  • The Five People You Meet in Hell (a parody) –Rich Pablum
  • Harry Potter (Collector’s Items) — JK Rowling (around PHP 3500.00)
  • A Spot of Bother — Mark Haddon
  • Other books of Nick Hornby

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