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Holiday Haul!

26 Dec 2009 | By Iris

I grew up in a Christian sect (which shall remain nameless) that staunchly discourages the celebration of Christmas. Nevertheless, I'm a big fan of the holiday - not only now that I've left said sect, but even back in the days when I was quite the active member.

Because of this upbringing, however, I don't see Christmas the way most people do. For one thing, the religious implications are completely lost on me, so I'm not going to go into that. I simply see Christmas as a time for family, friends, great food, and of course, presents.

This year's Christmas is definitely one of the best ones - EVER. I'm thinking it's probably because so many great things happened this year, and everyone in my family just has so many things to be thankful for. Not only that, because most of us work at home, we haven't been obliged to go to this or that party to socialize with people we may or may not like, so our holidays have been spent with the very people we wanted to celebrate with - each other. Most of all, the coming year is going to be a big 'un that'll bring about a spate of huge changes that I can't talk about right now, so I guess thinking about this time next year is making everyone want to make the most of this year's holidays. (Plus, this year saw the return of mum's famous "turbo chicken", a family favorite that we haven't had in at least 5 years!)

And then there are the presents. Everyone in the family gave the best, so we all received the best. No, I didn't get any of the gadgets on my wish list, but I did get a lot of stuff that I wanted and needed.

First, there's the fabulous new bed and mattress that The Husband and I decided to give ourselves as a Christmas present. The bed frame and headboard are made of a soft nubuck, which is really lovely to the touch. It's also Queen-sized, a bit of an upgrade from our old double bed. The thick, firm foam mattress is somewhat recessed with a good half-foot nubuck border/frame around it, so I'm not likely to fall off the bed anymore.

We were actually eyeing it for months at SM's Our Home where they had a camel-colored one on display, but when we finally decided to buy it, it was gone. I nearly burst into tears! Luckily, the salesman told us that there was a chocolate brown one still tucked away in storage, and when he showed it to us, we had it reserved right there and then. I've had zero insomnia since it was delivered a couple of weeks ago. In fact, I don't think I've slept so well in my entire life! It's well worth the $500 price tag!

The Husband and I decided to get the bed because we couldn't decide what to give each other for Christmas. The idea was not to give each other presents anymore, but somehow we ended up getting wrapped presents for each other, anyway. I got him a Casio Edifice chronograph; he got me a Moleskine Daily Planner because I didn't win the giveaway (sniffles). He couldn't find the Moleskine Color-a-Day sort, so he just got me the plain black one because I already had a red Starbucks planner this year. I'm so happy! Moleskines are L-O-V-E.

The rest of this year's haul was quite as impressive. Chin gave me my present earliest: a beautiful notebook made of all native and recycled materials, which is a great addition to my ever increasing notebook collection (yes, I have one!). The best thing about it is that Chin has its twin - isn't that sweet? I wasn't able to take a picture of it, though, because I didn't have Caesar on me that night.

My best friend, Aileen turned up the morning of Christmas Eve with a fabulous Guess? bag - in purple! Now, I'm extremely bag-challenged. I hardly ever buy bags because I usually just take whatever my mum isn't using (she has LOADS), and I would normally use whatever bag I'm currently using until it's worn out beyond recognition. It's nice to have a pretty new bag of my own, for a change.

My uber generous mother surpassed herself this year. The whole month has been a constant stream of surprises from her. I got a pair of jeweled wedges, several fancy Wacoal underwear, a fancy jewelry box, gorgeous white gold hoop earrings, and Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger. The rest of the family got a ton of really cool stuff from her, too. Our mum is definitely the most awesome one in the world!

From my sister, her darling Mike, and everyone's darling Xabier, I got an extremely cool portable laptop stand and cooler in hot pink. It's totally ergonomic, and I'm working more comfortably now. Octavian is also kept nice and cool at all times, which I'm hoping would prevent heating problems in the future. A week without Octavian is a week too many!

From Tita Pilar, my sister's mother-in-law, I got a beautiful pair of pearl stud earrings, which had me squealing with delight. I love, love, LOVE pearls, but I haven't worn any in years! I gave all my pearl jewelry to mum before I left for Thailand, and I'm just so happy to be wearing pearls again.

Yes, aren't Christmas presents lovely? Why, I love 'em so much that I'd be quite happy getting promotional tote bags!

What about you? What did you get for Christmas?

All I Want for Christmas

25 Nov 2009 | By Iris

The Husband, he doesn't read my blogs. Or at least, I don't think so. I've never found any indication that he does, so I suppose it's safe to assume that he really doesn't.

Here are 5 things that I really want for Christmas, anyway, on the off chance that he might read my blog. Who knows? He might stumble upon my list while looking for worthwhile Christmas gifts for her - that is to say, ME.

Of course, I could always just tell him, but then, the rest of you, my beloved readership, won't know what I want for Christmas. I figured I'd make it a bit easier for you, just in case I'm on your Christmas list, tee hee. Hey, a girl can dream!

1. A White 32GB iPhone 3GS. I love all things Apple. But though I've come close to buying one of these several times, I just couldn't bring myself to buy myself another gadget when I've already bought so many this year. I still want one, though. In fact, I'm wanting it more and more every day, preferably one that's already jailbroken.

2. A 64GB iPod Touch. Okay, I admit the iPhone is a tad too pricey, but I'm reasonable. I would happily settle for technically the same thing without the phone and camera functions, among others. Naturally, I want the model with the most storage because how else will all the I, Caesar documentaries and Dexter episodes I downloaded fit?

3. An 18-200VR lens, also known as the 'all-around' lens. I knew photography was going to be a really expensive hobby to get in to, so I'm not going crazy on accessories for Caesar, nor do I plan to. I do know, however, that I'll need to invest on lenses eventually. Of course, it'll be a lot better to just get one for Christmas.

I want an 18-200mm lens because it's wide enough for landscape shots when I travel, yet it also takes decent macro shots, which I do more often, anyway. I'm thinking getting a good 'all-around' lens for Christmas will help me stop blaming my bad shots on my poor kit lens.

4. A Tenba Messenger Bag in Plum, size small. I have been longing for this bag since September. It's a messenger bag that's designed to carry a laptop, an SLR and 2 lenses, and just about any other stuff one can think of throwing in there along with these gadgets, such as chargers, cables, external drives, portfolios, etc. I'm so sick of having to carry different bags when I'm out with Octavian and Caesar, so this is the bag of my dreams.

As far as I know, only Digital Walker in SM carries these in Cebu. I was about to buy one one day, but they only had the larger size in black. After that, I kind of lost my nerve. At $108.95 (a whopping P7,500 from Digital Walker, for some reason), it does require a bit of courage. But watch the video, do! You'll know why it's worth every penny (or centavo).

5. Books aplenty! To be perfectly honest, I really am probably one of the easiest people to get presents for. Sure, I could harp on about how I'd like to have every single gadget known to man, and sure, I would be very happy to get any one of 'em, but really, I will be just as happy to get a good book or two.

Because I've spent the last 8 months reading 'em stories of Rome and Caesar, however, I've got very specific books in mind because I've got a lot of catching up to do on my reading. I'll probably post a list of the books that I really, really want soon-ish. That is, of course, assuming I don't get sidetracked.

Goodness, how did my 5-item list get so long? Off to bed with me, methinks.

Category: Married Woman, Me Likey! Tags: Cebu, Christmas, Dexter, iPhone, iPod, messenger, Rome, Tenba Messenger, USD 2 Comments

Octavian Gets an Upgrade

20 Nov 2009 | By Iris

It can't be any fun being my laptop. I don't spend my days surfing, or watching videos on YouTube, or even playing games on Facebook. All I do is work, work, and work some more. And don't get me started on the amount of work I do. Let's just say that in any given day, I have about 3 days' worth of work to do IF I do everything manually. Fortunately for me, my boss loves buying me software, so most of my tasks are automated, which is definitely the only reason why I actually manage to do everything that I'm supposed to do every day.

Now, most of these software run on - surprise, surprise! - Windows. My darling Octavian, however, runs on Mac OS X 10.6.2 (Snow Leopard). This means that to be able to run these software, I have to run Windows on a Macbook Pro somehow. One way to do is to install it in something called Boot Camp and choose Windows when I boot up Octavian . . . Yeah, right. Like that's going to happen! Running Windows on its own on a Macbook Pro is like playing a shitty VCD on a perfectly good Blu-ray player - it's sacrilegious, to say the least.

So as an alternative, I've chosen to purchase a software called VMWare Fusion, and this is, by far, one of my best investments yet. VMWare Fusion allows me to run Windows as a virtual machine (I named it Lucius Cornelius Sulla, tee hee) so I won't have to leave OS X to run Windows applications. This means that I'm actually running two computers simultaneously on one. Add the fact that I'm also running another half a dozen apps on the native OS X system, and I've got an extremely overworked laptop. Very few laptops will be able survive such a beating without crashing, and Octavian's one of those - he's never crashed once. Rather, he valiantly takes whatever demands I put to him without complaint. Yes, he's a good boy, that's why I love him to bits (no pun intended).

Octavian came with a 2GB DDR3 RAM, which was a big deal for me, considering the crap that I had to put up with before I bought my first Mac. Though it's sufficient to run both my systems simultaneously, I do suffer lags every now and again, which is really a bit annoying when you're trying to get things done yesterday. I knew a RAM upgrade to 4GB would take care of this, but since the DDR3 technology is fairly new, the chips weren't readily available locally - and I felt that I had to purchase it from an authorized Apple store/service center to get their techs to install it for me. Unfortunately, there was a 2-month waiting list to order 'em chips, plus it would be about twice the price of getting it from somewhere like TipidPC or eBay.

Now, for as long as I can remember, the guys at the PhilMUG forums have been insisting that a DIY RAM and hard-disk upgrade was as easy as pie. It's so easy, in fact, that these sort of upgrades do not even void the warranty! I've been toying with the idea of doing it for the longest time. I've even watched videos of how it was done, and they all made it look so easy! I've always chickened out at the last minute, though. I don't know what came over me this week, but I suddenly fancied that my poor Octavian was coming down with asthma from all the hard work (the real Octavian was asthmatic, after all) and that I needed to do a RAM upgrade stat! So I ordered a couple of 2GB Team Elite chips from a TipidPC seller, who came highly recommended from 'em forum guys, on Tuesday. I paid P4,700 (about $100) for both chips plus shipping on the same day, and got confirmation that it was en route to Cebu.

The chips turned up the next day, Wednesday. The idea of opening up poor Octavian sickened me so much, though, that The Husband ended up doing it for me that afternoon. First, he tried to get the screws off with a really old #00 screwdriver that he found buried amidst his old junk. That didn't really work - 3 of the screws won't come off!

So we hurriedly took a trip to True Value in Ayala to get a new screwdriver and ended up with a set. This time, Octavian was successfully opened up. The Husband removed the old 1GB sticks and replaced 'em with the new 2GB ones (there's two of each). The process took no more than a couple of minutes. He then closed up Octavian, and I re-booted. To my horror, it showed that I only had 1GB of RAM from the 4GB I was expecting! I nearly cried. I did a test using memtest, and yep, there's definitely only 1GB.

So The Husband opened up poor Octavian again, and sure enough, one of the chips was loose. He fiddled with them somewhat, and they were finally in nice and tight. I booted up Octavian again, and scarily enough, he only had 3GB! By this time, I was definitely in a panic. The Husband opened up Octavian again and removed the chips. We both checked if they were identical, and they were, right down to their 2GB DDR3 warranty stickers.

The Husband had the brilliant idea of trying to isolate problem. He installed just one chip, rebooted, and checked the system - definitely a 2GB. Off came Octavian's back case yet again, and this time, he installed just the other chip. Lo and behold - it was a 1GB!

So it seemed that the problem was with that second chip. I thought it might have been mislabeled or something, but the guys on the forums believe it's a faulty chip. I contacted the seller - who was really nice, by the way - and he asked me to send in the faulty chip yesterday so he can replace it. I thought he was going to wait until the chip got there before he sent me a new one so I was resigned to the fact that I'll have to wait a couple more days, but no, he sent it straight away, the moment I confirmed that I've sent the faulty chip. I'm expecting it sometime today.

Right now, Octavian is running on 3GB RAM - the new, working 2GB chip and one of the original 1GB sticks. I have not experienced a single lag since, even when I've got Windows running, too. It takes a bit longer to start up (about 30 seconds), though, but that's perfectly understandable. It's the actual working time that matters to me, anyway, and a longer start-up time just means that I have more time to get breakfast ready.

With the favorable experience that I've had with the 3GB RAM so far, I can't wait to see what the 4GB would be like! I'm getting stuff done even quicker than usual, too. A happy Octavian means a happy Mommy Iris.

~~Now, if only LBC would turn up with that chip already . . .~~

LBC turned up just as we were about to head to the mall to watch New Moon. Once again, Octavian was reopened, and in less than 2 minutes, he was sporting a spanking new 4GB RAM. (Check out the wallpaper. Cute, huh?)

A Freelance Writer’s Journey: Part Deux

18 Sep 2009 | By Iris

Picking up where I left off...

I came back from Boracay a tad browner and somehow sadder than before I left. I got a glimpse of how the other half lived. I met people untethered by corporate jobs and familial responsibilities who spent their days bumming around the island and traveling elsewhere whenever they felt like it. Of course, these people probably had trust funds and stipends from God-knows-where that made such a life possible for them.

That did not stop me from coveting that kind of lifestyle, however. I started considering my options. I had this crazy idea of giving up my day job, moving to Boracay, and living off the P8,000-a-month I was earning from writing. Pretty farfetched, I know. After all, who lives on P8,000 a month in a very expensive island like Boracay? Still, I hoped and dreamed and hoped some more.

Then things started happening all at once. First, Chin got wind of the depressing rate I was getting. It was she who told me I was being taken advantage of. I was meant to get paid at least 3 times that rate for the same amount of work for starters, even more as I gained the experience. She then introduced me to the lovely woman she was writing for and who was more than willing to pay me the going rate.

While this new deal was definitely a huge help, it still didn't address my feeling of restlessness. Once again, Chin came to the rescue. She knew a lovely Filipino couple, Paul and Rose, who worked as teachers in Bangkok, and they just happened to be looking for someone who can work as an office assistant. The pay was 15,000 baht (about $400). It wasn't a lot but with my new writing rate, I figured I would have enough to live on comfortably, albeit simply.

For someone who had never left home before (except for those brief summer vacations to visit my dad in Manila), it was a huge and scary decision, but I took it anyway. My family and friends had misgivings, but they still supported my decision, and between all of us, we managed to scrape up enough money to get me to Bangkok and tide me over until I got my first paycheck. Barely a week after I started talking to Paul and Rose, I landed in Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport in the wee hours of the morning with a suitcase full of clothes, Fita biscuits, Milo, cup noodles, and a flashlight and a Neo laptop that I got on loan (payable within 6 months) from a friend.

My first few hours in my new city was extremely harrowing. I couldn't find Paul (who was supposed to pick me up) anywhere. I didn't have his number (stupid, I know), and I was scared shitless. He did eventually find me, thank heavens, and I stayed in his and Rose's place for a couple of days until I moved into a one-bedroom apartment a bit closer to the office. For 1,800 baht a month, I got a tiny bathroom, a double bed with a rock-hard mattress, and a small wardrobe. But it was clean and decent, and I fell in love with it at first sight.

The office I worked at was beside the railroad tracks across the old Don Muang International Airport, about half an hour by bus from where I lived in Pathumthani. It was a placement agency for English teachers, and my job involved developing their lesson plans and playing liaison. I met the man I married on my very first day, though we didn't start dating until a month or so later. I guess you could say I was off to a good start.

Naturally, the office had Internet connection, so I downloaded my assignments and found research material while I worked during the day and wrote at night. By then, I was earning a cool $150 every couple of weeks from writing alone, and I enjoyed it immensely. The writing kept me busy enough to fight whatever loneliness might be lurking around the corners of my tiny apartment.

Bangkok is ripe with Filipino English teachers, and I met many of them while I worked for the agency. Now, I've been speaking English almost from the moment I learned how to talk, and having spent my entire career life up to this point working in call centers, I took pride in my language skills. I found the English proficiency of these Filipino teachers dismal to the point of non-existence - a very disconcerting fact, considering that they were meant to be teaching the language. They also got paid more than I did (upwards of 20,000 baht), so the hoity-toity part of myself felt mildly insulted.

My Thai boss, bitch as she was, refused to give me a teaching job, so I started looking elsewhere. It didn't take long before I landed one, and oh, what a disaster that was! I was fired within a week (click the link for the full story), and because I resigned from the office job to take on the teaching job, I was left unemployed and just a tad broke in a strange, new city that I still regularly get lost in even after a month of living in it.

I was at a crossroads. I had two choices: I could go home, lick my wounds, and go back to my old job (my supervisor said I could), or I could stay in Bangkok and try again. At this point, however, I've gone right off teaching. For me, it was as pleasant as the prospect of colon cleansing. I had absolutely no talent for it and no patience for rowdy Thai students, and the thought of classrooms just made me ill. By this time, however, I've already started dating The Husband and it was starting to look serious, so I knew I had to find a way to stay.

And I did. I e-mailed the woman I was writing for and asked her if she had a full-time job available, and she made me team manager! I was put in charge of all the campaigns she got going on top of the writing I was doing for her. Fortune was definitely smiling on me. I started earning at least $600 a month (often a lot more), which, in turn, allowed me to live more comfortably, travel more, and move to a bigger and better apartment in The Husband's building.

By the end of 2007, life couldn't have been better. I was in a wonderful relationship, I had a job I thoroughly enjoyed, I traveled a lot, and I was earning more money than ever. On top of all that, I was learning so many things from my job that would prove to be completely invaluable later. To be continued...

A Freelance Writer’s Journey: Part Un

31 Aug 2009 | By Iris

Every once in a while, I find myself looking back at my life just a little over two years ago. The early part of 2007 found me very bored and more than just a little bit sad. The years that passed me by saw me neither happy nor unhappy, but mostly empty with the knowledge that I absolutely had no idea where my life was going and what I wanted to accomplish.

For 3 years, I went through thankless jobs that barely gave me enough to make ends meet, let alone the chance to indulge in a simple luxury or two. More than anything else, I wanted to travel. Instead, I ended up with nothing but resentment for the things that made this desire unattainable.

I found an outlet in writing and bore no illusions about my skills. Not for one moment did I see it as a talent. It was just something that I did because I could, something that felt as natural as breathing. It never really occurred to me that this was something that I could do for a living. After all, I haven't a modicum of formal training to speak of. I had too much respect for the written word to presume that I can make money off writing when there are others far more skilled and better trained than I was.

Maybe it was kismet, or perhaps it was just sheer luck, but of all the people that I've met online at this time, I found a friend in Chin, whose blogs I used to stalk senseless until I eventually found the courage to make my presence known to her. By then, she was already writing freelance, and not only did she point me in the right direction, she encouraged me when no one else would.

My first paid writing gig was for a local couple who ran a writing team. This was my first introduction to the world of keywords and keyword densities and sub-headers. They paid me P8,000 ($160) a month to write 8 (!!!) 500-word articles a day, 5 days a week. That worked out about a dollar per article, and without knowing any better, I thought that was perfectly reasonable.

The first few assignments were absolutely maddening, especially since I was still working as a Quality Assurance Analyst for my old company. I wrote articles between (and sometimes, while) rating calls. Instead of crawling straight to bed after working 14-hour shifts, I wrote and wrote and wrote some more.

I had a dream, and I was determined to reach it. It was nothing as lofty as buying a car - with auto accessories to boot! - or going on frivolous shopping sprees. I simply needed enough to be able to travel, even if it was just somewhere local. Never mind that I was beginning to look like something out of the Evil Dead.

And travel, I did. In May of 2007, I visited Boracay for the first time - a trip that became not just a vacation, but the second step towards the major life-change that I desperately needed.

To be continued...