I am quite happy right now because I was able to watch new episodes of two of my favourite TV shows – House and Rome. But really, I’m mostly writing this post mostly to make my Aunt and Cousin jealous because they have to wait until someone enterprising individual has the chance to make bootleg copies of the latest House episode, and they have a chance to buy it from the nearest tiangge.

Anyway, *because* I know my cousin and aunt will be reading this, I can’t say much about the episode (One Day, One Room), except that it’s one of the recent episodes that I actually enjoyed. Actually, I enjoyed the whole plot line with House almost going to jail and all, for writing fake prescriptions, but in general, I was starting to really loose interest in the first half of Season 3. Season 2 is when I first started the show, then I bought Season 1 on DVD. But until yesterday, I used to work on the nights when House comes on (Tuesdays), and I didn’t have the energy, after that 14 hour day (work and school) to watch the time shift (especially after I started loosing interest – of course at the beginning of the season I would stay up late to watch the time shift, but I stopped after like 3 episodes). So I actually missed quite a bit of Season 3, until I started watching it again during Christmas Break. But now I seem to be liking it again, especially this episode, though it might have to do with thinking that House’s patient is pretty cute (a rape victim who is trying to get House to open up). Maybe she’ll be back in later episodes? Doubt it, but meh. So yeah, now that I have my Tuesday nights off again, I’ll definately be watching it some more.

In fact I have quite a few shows to catch up on… Including one new show that I’ve only recently gotten into, despite the fact that everyone’s gone crazy over it already, Grey’s Anatomy. I started liking it after I watched this clip show-type thing in the Philippines, where they were showing I guess the best “moments” or something. But in the process, they were like showing the story a little. I actually wasn’t able to finish it, cause we left halfway through the episode. But after watching it, I decided I would watch the next episode I can, here in Canada. I did just that last week, and I think I shall continue. Problem is, it comes on Wednesdays, when I’m pretty busy (today for example, I’ll miss the first showing cause I have worship team practice) but, if it’s not too late, I’ll definately watch the time shift.

And now we come to Rome, a show I actually got into 2 years ago. I never missed an episode, and now I’m really happy that the second season is finally here, after a 2 year wait. Good thing I’m not missing any episodes (I actually missed 3, but they’re on TMN on Demand). It’s just like I remember it. Very realistic, but yeah, quite crude. And I love it. Can’t wait for the next episode, yay!

Why does MTV Canada suck so much? And I dunno, there’s just something about their VJs, that make them seem so… Pretentious. That’s really the best way to describe it. I’ve always thought this about them, but I think so even more now. There’s just such a difference between these Canadian VJs, and for example, VJs from Asia – and of course from the States. Those guys are much more confident, more genuine. These Canadian ones seem so… forced and laboured. So bad that I think the MuchMusic VJs (except for a few who I can’t stand at all) are way better, even though technically, MuchMusic is supposed to be the inferior station (though it’s way more popular here in Canada). It’s a shame cause MTV has some really good shows that I like… in fact some of the shows that I liked from MuchMusic actually originated from MTV (except for Video on Trial, of course, which is MuchMusic’s pride and joy).

Anyway, that’s all…

No this post isn’t about Relient K’s song. In fact, it has nothing to do with the song except for this: ARGGHHHH! MY LIPS ARE SO CHAPPED, BUT I HATE WEARING CHAPSTICK! SO I’M JUST GOING TO KEEP ON GOING OUT IN THE COLD WITHOUT CHAPSTICK ON UNTIL MY LIPS FINALLY CRACK AND BLEED! *THEN* I’LL PUT ON SOME CHAPSTICK. BUT WHEN IT FEELS BETTER, I’LL STOP WEARING IT AGAIN, UNTIL MY LIPS CRACK AND BLEED AGAIN.

Hmph. Ok, enough said. This post is actually about all of the new things that are coming up… well not so much coming up, but things that I will be implementing in my life. Starting with this. I am now working out. HORAY! LOL. *Shudder*. I am doing so to satisfy my Doctor, who I know will be freaking out when he sees my blood test after this little trip to the Philippines – where, yah, all I ate was frigging cholesterol. Although, yah I guess it’s a good thing for me to start living a healthier life style. Oh but that’s just it, I’m not, really. I’m kind of just stacking things to my advantage a little – see I noticed that actually, my bad cholesterol isn’t that bad. That’s the cholesterol that clogs arteries. You get it from things like fast food and lots of fried foods. The problem is, my good cholesterol isn’t good. Good cholesterol is what cleans your arteries, and you get it through exercise and eating good food like stuff with Omega-3 in it.. But even those aren’t so bad. My good and bad cholesterol aren’t horrifically bad – I’m not a slob, I can just get lazy sometimes. So what really worries my doctor is the ratio of good to bad cholesterol. This is what magnifies the problem. See if I only had problem with one – either good or bad, it wouldn’t be a problem. But since my good is slightly low and my bad is slightly high, the ratio can actually get bad. So the solution – fix one of them. And I’ve decided to fix the good cholesterol – that is, exercise more. LOL. Yah, there’s no way I’m going to go on a diet. I like food too much. But exercising, that I can handle. In fact, I’d like to do it more, especially right now, since I have these gym memberships from UofT that I’m not using (I’m actually a member of 4 gyms at UofT. Hart House, and the Athletic Centres of all three campuses). I don’t even know how much I pay for it – cause it’s part of the incidental fees that I pay to UofT, that I can’t opt out of. So I might as well use it… I’ll be going to the gym on Mondays and Wednesdays (for an hour and a half each day), while I’ll be using our treadmill here at home the rest of the days (except weekends lol). This brings us to my next subject… the change in my scheduling.

Actually the main change is this – I asked for an extended leave from working at the Call Centre. I just can’t handle it, which is what I realized a few hours ago when I was trying to get some sleep. Going to the Philippines really messed up my sleeping schedule. And I’m not in the mood to try to correct it. So simple solution, quit one of my jobs. LOL. Actually it’s not *that* simple. I do need a break from that job. Too. Stressful. Well not stressful. It’s too annoying. Plus it my most inconvenient job in terms of where it is, and the hours they ask me to work. But yeah, once I sent in my request for a leave (which if it’s turned down, will turn into a resignation), I felt such a burden lift. It’s quite amazing. I know it’s a burden that’ll be placed elsewhere – mainly on finances, but whatever. Especially right now, time is what I really need the most. Time for myself. To think. To consider things. To do things I’ve been neglecting (ie. Studying). Etc etc. So because of this, here is my schedule now…

Mondays – Gym 1:30-3:30, Class 4-6.
Tuesdays – Work 4:30-8, Class 11-4.
Wednesdays – Work 4:30-8, Gym 2:30-4:30, Class 5-8.
Thursdays – Work 4:30-8, Class 12-4.

And that’s it. Tada… Haha, actually though, don’t be deceived by how free I may seem cause that’s just an illusion. In between all that are the times that I need to use to study. But still, it is a great change from working at the Call Centre – cause even though I only actually get 7 hours of work a week there, it eats up more like 15 hours of my time a week, with all the commuting, and waiting, etc.

Ok final change. Money. I am now officially on a budget. Which is just a necessity because of the $250+ worth of income per month I’m loosing by quitting the Call Centre. But even more important about it – my aim is to cut my debt in half by March, and to have it completely paid off by the end of the school year. All the while, of course, making sure that I still have a little money left over for fun and stuff. But anyway, I’m basically going to be giving myself a $50 a week allowance. Or wait. Let’s change that. I’m going to be using up $600 for all of my responsibilities (actually, just transit, cell phone and credit card bill). With the left over going towards fun. This fixed way of doing it will be much better, I think, cause then after that, I’ll be using what I normally used to pay my credit card to build up a savings. My goal is $3000 by May of 2008. Actually, wait, my bad. That’s my goal for the Philippines in 2008. My goal for savings is $10,000 by May of 2008. So I’ll have money to pay part of my tuition and books. In order to do this, I need to have $5000 saved up by the end of August. So the burden to save isn’t so much during the school year. This probably means I’ll have to find another job to supplement my income in the summer (since working for TEC and UofT alone won’t work).

Meh. Enough about that. I’m actually sick of writing about this. Now it’s time to implement. Here goes nothing.

Yah, already… So I slept ’till 4PM today, instead of noon, like I said. LOL. But it makes sense, me staying up till midnight yesterday was really bad, then having to get up at 4:30 this morning. Although now this is really bad too cause I’m back to my Philippines-sleeping habit. When I got up, I noticed I have an email from Protagonist, my host, and they’ve got my newest website up… I forgot to mention that during all those spare moments I had on Wednesday, I ordered a new domain, www.torchbearers.ph to make the Torchbearers Website. Sweet! The problem is, I’ve got a test and 3 papers to handle within the next 3-4 weeks… Although after that 3-4th week (can’t remembe right now) is my reading week, horah! That’s when I’ll get started putting some meat on to the site.

I finally got to contact my boss, which is late for the day so I’ll be coming into the office on Monday instead of today. Hehehe. That’s actually good, so I’ll have somewhere to park my car on Monday for free. But it does look like she’s got some work for me, which is good also, to earn more money.

Uhm. Ok well that’s all the updates, I still don’t know what I want to do with what’s left of the day, but it being so cold out, I’m really tempted to just get back in bed, and just… stay there.. LOL. Starting next week though, I pledge no more laziness…

Well, I’ve officially returned to pretty much all of my responsibilities – School, Work, and Church, except for a few – with one most notable: my work at UofT. In fact I’m putting off returning to work there for so long that I’m actually concerned that I won’t have a job to come back to when I do decide to come back. Not that it’ll be the end of the world for me. In fact I probably wouldn’t mourn the loss all that much, the only things that’s keeping me in that job anyway are my cool coworkers and the absolute necessity of earning a little money as quickly as possible to get out of debt.

But anyway, here’s a break down of my week thus far…

• Monday – Returned home around 6:30PM, only managed to stay up another 2 hours or so then pretty much just crashed.
• Tuesday – Had to work at 4:30AM. Actually pretty glad to be back until I actually started working. After that, all I could think about was why I needed to to do it… Pay off the frigging credit card. Finished that work around 8AM, tried to take a nap, but couldn’t back to sleep. So I did something unthinkable… I studied! LOL. 10AM I left for school, hehe. My dad paid for my train pass, hehe. That’ll keep me going for a little while. I was in school and in my first class by 11AM. 5 straight classes, and a very irritable stomach (due to the cold) later, my day is done and I rushed home. I was asleep again by like 6:30PM or so, which meant I woke up around 11PM. I had some supper and meds, and thankfully was able to sleep again till I had to work the next day.
• Wednesday – Work again at 4:30AM, but I could tell I was feeling better already. Whatever was ailing my stomach was pretty much gone. I was feeling a little aches and pains still but a tylenol quickly took care of that. When I finished at 8, I went back to bed, and practically didn’t get up the rest of the day. I had to take my mom to a doctor’s appointment at 12, and took the time to have lunch. Slept again till I had supper at around 9PM (which meant I skipped my class that evening), then slept again till I had to work the next day.
• Thursday – Yup, Work at 4:30AM yet again… it’s everyday except Saturday to Monday. Then I slept alot until I had to leave for school. Actually I skipped my morning classes, and only went to my afternoon one – I had to, International Relations, freaking hard. The good thing is, I had the car, which is actually really really good cause it was -30 with the wind chill. After school, I went to church for work… I actually missed my kids there. Oh and John, my filipino kid, got a new piano book – Sound of Music. LOL. I was surprised he even knew about the movie, but I suspect it was an imposition on his parents part. But we had fun learning “Do a Deer”. I tried to teach him Eidelweis, but he didn’t seem interested. We’ll see. Actually before I started teaching though, I had a little meeting with Rob.. well it wasn’t exactly a meeting or anything, but meh, you know, he was telling me about what’s coming up and stuff, giving me new music and all, and most importantly, my paycheque from December. After work, I deposited the check, and finally was able to pay part of my Credit Card down… 6 more weeks and it’s going to be gone completely (actually 8 weeks, technically, cause I have to wait 2 weeks to get paid for these 2 weeks I’m working right now). After that, Josh and I talked on MSN for quite a while actually… reminiscing about old times, and making predictions about the future… LOL. I can’t talk much about it cause it’s kinda… embarassing, lol. But it was fun. Josh if you’re reading this.. just keep in mind… a leaner, fitter me… and… miserable (?) you… LOL.
• Today/Friday, yup you got it, work at 4:30AM. And, well even though I’ve still got an hour left of work, I already know what I’m gonna do the rest of the day… Well what I plan to do. I plan to sleep until noon today, then watch a movie. Either in theatres with my friends, or at home (as in rent a DVD) with my mom. LOL. Actually it’s looking more like I’ll be hanging out with my mom, cause my friends who would normally go see a movie with me are gonna me gone. The ones who are left need some cajoling, but I don’t know if I’m up to doing that. Although I actually also just remembered that I need to call my boss with the City, which most likely means I’ll be paying a visit to Main Square today.

But anyway, I’m looking forward to a pretty relaxed day. Movies and Video Games are the plan. So horah. Feels like the Philippines again. Which by the way reminds me of another thing I’m starting to really really really miss Jollibee.

Yesterday, for some reason, I was reading about different cuts of meat, and I somehow came across burger steaks from jollibee, my favourite item… and I was like aweeee maannnn, I want some. Meh. 16 months, it’s not too long to wait. Ok back to work.

I was dressing for school yesterday and thought, man, what a comparison from not even 24 hours earlier (at that time I had only been back in Canada for about 16 hours or so). It was -4 degrees celsius, with a windchill of -10. And so I thought it might be a good time to start wearing the long underwear. 3 layers on my bottom. 3 on my top. Scarf, toque, and gloves. All this while 3 days earlier, I remember so clearly coming home from Mall of Asia with my legs – my legs! never happened to me before, actually sweating. Man I promised my family and friends that I was going back in April next year – which by the way is aparently the hottest month there. So I dunno how I’m going to handle it :S. So yeah, I have nothing else to say, really about that, but I like the cold better… Ooh actually I do. I like how all those clothes hide some of the weight… lol

Anyway. My first class was Colonial Americas tutorial. Which I enjoyed. I actually participated despite having done very of the readings. Then I had the lecture, which I actually skipped instead. I did some of my other readings for another class, then headed into Canadian History. Man how different is that lecture now that Professor Penfold is teaching it (it’s split between Penfold and Montigny). He actually sang the British National anthem, while Montigny would just put you to sleep. Actually I counted it out and I only went to 2 of Montigny’s lectures. LOL. After that was the tutorial for that class, which, again I still participated in amazingly, despite not having done any of the readings at all. By this point, though I knew I was getting sick, and I actually considered skipping my International Relations Tutorial, right after that class – mostly because it’s a 10 minute walk away. But I trudged on, if only to see my marks from first sem. But after the class, I was pretty much dead for sure. I was like a zombie on the GO Train…

Anyway, I did receive some good news yesterday. Most of my marks are in, and they look pretty good. I’m avaraging about a B-, which is pretty sweet, actually. I gotta work really hard on the rest of the term though, cause I’m missing the mark that I’ve set a little. With a B- average, my GPA’ll rise to about a 2.85 from the 2.73 that it’s on right now. But I want it over 3.0 by the end of this year. And hopefully 3.2 by the end of next year… With a graduating GPA of 3.5. Meh, we’ll see how it goes.

Ok I’m gonna go eat. Coming soon, about my trip to the Philippines. I’m still gathering my thoughts about it so we’ll see how that goes. Also, continuation of my series “In a Relationship” which was really helped out by a conversation I had with Josh and Eman yesterday. The questions they were asking of me really clarified a lot of things in my head too. So sweet.

In the… 60 seconds before I have to start working, I just wanted to make an ode to my bed, which I missed so much while I was in the Philippines. It’s something I didn’t realize until now cause while I was there, what I was missing most was… cleanliness. lol. the cooler wheather, clean public toilets. etc. etc.

Then i got home and I saw my leather couch and I realized how much I missed it. But what I really didn’t realize is how much I missed my bed sooo much. Anyway, that’s it for now, gotta get to work.

So I’ve gone like 18 days without any proper entries… And there’s so many to talk about. I think this past 16 days here in the Philippines has had much more blog-worthy events than my past what… 4 months of life. LOL. Lunch / pretty much spending a whole day with Chris and Bonnie Thomas (Chris Thomas is the international director of Torchbearers, the international organization under which is Capernwray Harbour, my old bible school), and seeing how down to earth he is. Going to Baguio and living in Lucio Tan’s house (Lucio Tan is the richest man in Asia, and also happened to be friends with my grandfather before he died. My uncle is now his chief helicopter pilot). Uhmm. Finally being able to see Febias (Far East Bible something something… basically one of the top bible schools/seminaries here in the Philippines). etc etc. But all that must wait cause there’s still so much more to be done. Tomorrow for example, I shall get to go to Mindoro. I don’t even know where that is, but it’s about time I get to see something in the Philippines other than Metro Manila, Subic Bay, and Baguio.

So anyway, all that said, I shall begin my exposition with this… something I wrote in transit here. It’s not complete, so the end might be a little incoherent. But meh…

2006 Person of the Year: ME!
December 31, 2006 / January 1, 2007 (depending on which timezone you count it as)

Before I launch into this wonderful little piece, a little about where I am right now. I am cramped elbow to elbow in a Northwest Airlines 747 flying to Tokyo, headed to Manila. Yes, this is what I’ve been dubiously alluding to as my “big vacation” for the past week or two. I’ve had to keep under wraps on the off chance that one of my cousins comes into my blog (I’m sure none have), but meh, it was fun. We have been traveling for about 6 hours now. Been on the air towards Japan for about 2 of those. We flew to Minneapolis – about 1.5 hours – then had a lay over. Japan is actually only a brief stop for us, I don’t even think we’ll be getting off the airplane. It’s 12 hours to Japan, then my guess was 6-9 hours to Manila. My bro says different (as in, a lot less time), but we’ll see.

So, on to Time’s 2006 Person of the Year… Me! And a few million other bloggers/online pundits who they perceive to be the ones who control the information age. LOL. I of course boldly lump myself into this category, despite the fact that my website averages at most 50 visitors per week, many of whom are most likely friends there to see what kind of wacky ideas good ol’ Big City has come up with this past week (or those who have nothing better to do, like a certain fellow that I am thinking of at the moment. Lol. Love you, Jules :p). But hey, once in a while I see a referral from google, someone who had searched something regarding politics in Canada. And so I hope in some of those rare instances that just maybe my politics was in some way expressed to someone who actually cared enough to read it straight through.

But anyway, I just wanted to quickly quote what Richard Stengel, Managing Editor of Time Magazine had to say on the subject. I really liked what he says, so here it is…

There are lots of people in my line of work who believe that this phenomenon (the phenomenon of “amateur news makers” around the world) is dangerous because it undermines the traditional authority of media institutions like Time. Some have called it an “amateur hour.” And it often is. But America was founded by amateurs. The framers were professional lawyers and military men and bankers, but they were amateur politicians, and that’s the way they thought it should be.

I couldn’t agree more to what he has to say – especially by his description of the nature of the framers, who founded the United States. In my American Politics course, I think one of the most profound moments that I can remember is my the professor kind of “setting up” the constitution for us by first talking about the Articles of Confederation, and of Bacon’s Rebellion, which is kind of the catalyst that really pushed the framers to hurriedly produce this profound document we all know as the Constitution. He made it quite clear to us that the creation of the American constitution wasn’t the result of years of careful study and philosophizing, but as a result of the frantic efforts of amateur politicians trying to save a nation.

Hehe, I often imagine myself making the same introduction one of these days, in my own introductory course to American Government. Possibly in UofT too, after I complete a Ph.D, or maybe even in University of the Philippines as I work on my Masters. But anyway, who ever said amateurs couldn’t do anything great.

OMG I FINALLY GOT TO LOG ON AND I CAN’T EVEN STAY! ARGH. Meh. Stupid internet here in Asia is slow everywhere – specifically Yahoo. But it’s bad enough that I wasn’t able to even load the blogger website.

But anyway, I am in the Philippines right now. Not on my own computer, so I can’t even post some of the stuff I’ve been writing the past couple of days. Uhm. So much to write about, but yah, not enough time. Right now, I’m on my way to get a Thai Foot Massage. Whoo. LOL.