Good morning, Cubao!
The gnome innkeepers have a breakfast buffet for late risers.
Photo by JR Dalisay / April 21, 2017
Wednesday, November 30, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with four syllables in your name: Continue exploring your areas of interest, but be able to separate the mediocre from the truly brilliant.
Tuesday, November 29, 2022
Watched Australia's 2018 Hotel Mumbai (2:01:52), based on the large-scale terrorist attacks on Mumbai in November 2008. The action focuses on the Taj Hotel and the persons inside it at the time: the chef, the staff members, and the hotel guests.
The movie is suspenseful and comprises a satisfying screening, though the structure of the narrative is reminiscent of that of The Towering Inferno, dwelling on specific characters and relationships, only a few of which are shown with happy endings.
As with all terrorist stories, the root of everything is religious fundamentalism. All religious fundamentalists, to me, are terrorists at heart, even if most of them attack their non-believers not with weapons but with their words and attitudes and narrow worldviews.
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with three syllables in your name: Know and acknowledge your gifts. Allow them to shine with your pride.
Watched all eight episodes in the U.S.A.'s 2022 Wednesday by Tim Burton. First , we need to remind ourselves that not all of the episodes were directed by Tim Burton, and, second, that the entire series is a deliberate spoof on Nancy and Sluggo's Oona Goosepimple, the Harry Potter characters and series, Scooby-Doo, Carrie, Grimm, Nancy Drew, perhaps even Horror of Dracula, and other vulgarly commercial--or commercially vulgar--series that teens are currently into.
The series suffers from postured-intellectual, sophomoric dialogue, as though it were written by a student who just graduated from K-12. It tries too hard to be witty and ends up being stilted and artificial-sounding. Examples: "That thing was a fashion emergency not even lightning could resuscitate." "We're original thinkers, intrepid outliers in this vast cesspool of adolescence."
And then there are too many special effects, which are favored over production design, and which is, of course, totally un-Tom Burton. Special effects and production design are two completely different things, and one cannot ever substitute for the other. To begin with, Nevermore Academy is no Hogwarts; it looks like a Lemax Christmas village house. Its architecture and chambers are unclear, and the viewer cannot tell how the rooms are related to other rooms and how far they are from one another.
I recognized a shadowy Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Luna Lovegood, Madame Pomfrey, and Sirius Black. The performers, though, are no help. Wednesday Addams's consistently deadpan expression gets boring after a while and Principal Larissa Weems is too Meryl Streepy. Morticia's gown is not cut on the bias, so that it does not flow. In Episode 8, it is evident that Eugene, lying in hospital, can actually see without his glasses.
Like all Netflix movies, things get exciting only after half of the entire series has been screened. But, that isn't the only flaw in the screenplay. If, in the beginning, Wednesday is making an effort to not be an Addams like her parents, why doesn't she make an effort to adjust to the normie schools she was initially sent to? During the entire series she is writing a novel, but her narration sounds more like a journal than a novel. And the problem with having a protagonist who experiences psychic flashes is that the flashes are too convenient and too corny a technique for exposition.
I was expecting this series to be about a girl's serious, albeit macabre, struggle for survival in a world of normalcy, but instead saw an Addams Family Halloween special minus the laugh track.
.
Monday, November 28, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with six syllables in your name: They took away your December bout, but worry not Had it remained in the slate, you would suffer a concussion.
Sunday, November 27, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: You trained to be sent abroad, but your lack of finances threatens to dash your dreams. Have a reality check, and then go with reality.
Saturday, November 26, 2022
Whenever I'm doing nothing, I have all the time in the world to observe other people--compound tenants, neighbors, and people who happen to be online. They are fodder for characters for my succeeding novels, and, yes, I've begun writing another one a week ago, though very leisurely because I never set deadlines for myself.
Been fluctuating between that and window-shopping online. Was tempted at some point to purchase a wall hanging of the head of Apollo--calipered from the original--but prevented myself from doing so because a) my granddaughters won't like it, and b) it is made of plaster of Paris, a material that is always a bad investment.
Still waiting for the new cradled canvas to arrive. I was informed that the framers took a one-week vacation and have just come back. In the meantime Painting #13 has already been wrapped and is in storage with Paintings #1 - 12. I'm considering this a break period from work on my next exhibit, and I'm actually loving it.
I love doing nothing--and having the options of doing something or everything.
I'm back to oversleeping through mid-morning, having tall coffees and special teas, two-hour lunches, one-hour snacks, two-hour dinners, and long, leisurely showers, napping, shopping online, and messing around inside my bedroom.
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: Continue to raise your family with love, with common sense, and with whatever is good for them. Your simplicity and your attitude to life are blessings they always count on.
Your Messenger message:
"Magandang gabi po sir tony, pasensya napo sa abala.
My reply:
Hello ________!
Nagkataon lamang na tatlong beses kang nakasalubong ng ahas. Huwag mong hanapan ng malaking kahulugan ang lahat ng bagay.
Nagdaan na ang mahabang tag-ulan at malakas ang sikat ng araw. Umiinit ang lupa, at natural lamang na magsilabasan ang mga ahas, iba pang hayop, at mga insekto mula sa kani-kanilang lungga, lalo na sa madadamong lugar.
Your Messenger message:
"Hi, sir Tony. I hope you are having a restful weekend.
"When I reached out to you for help, you mentioned that my ancestors saved me from dying.
"I just wanted to be sure because from then on, I was thanking them. Lighting joss sticks like you recommended.
"However, one night, I overthought something.
"You see, I am an adopted child.
"An unwanted child.
"My biological mother was forced to give me away to a distant relative because my biological father and his powerful family/clan (Davao and CDO) can’t bear to mar their name.
They were college students back then.
"My adoptive parents and their clan accepted and loved me. I grew up not knowing that I was adopted.
"My question is, who’s ancestry will I ask for help and guidance? My flesh and blood or the clan who loved and took me in?
"Thank you for your generosity in helping us spiritually. 
"
My reply:
Hello _____!
BOTH sides (your biological parents and your adoptive parents) are to be honored and asked for help and guidance. Both continue to love you and guide you despite all appearances, and both are major players in your karmic group.
Friday, November 25, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with four syllables in your name: Magic opens the door for those who least expect it, and then they are no longer the same persons they used to be.
Staggered dinnertimes; Angelique and Jazz are having dinner out after Angelique's three-day workshop, Aubrey preparing for her night shift.
Asked Bertod to bring some food over to M.'s cafe staff.
Night chores.
My favorite time of the day has come again: an evening shower, and then snuggling in bed with a book I am still trying to finish reading.
Thursday, November 24, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: Scan the landscape from your residence while the sun begins to set. Do you see a golden bull lit by the sun-fire charging through the trees?
Dinner at home alone; Aubrey resting upstairs. She has no work tonight because of U.S. Thanksgiving Day.
Asked Bertod to bring some food over to M.'s cafe staff.
Night chores.
My favorite time of the day has come again: an evening shower, and then snuggling in a bed with a book I am still trying to finish reading.
Your Messenger message:
"Good afternoon, sir.
"I recently dreamed of a black eagle. "It all started when I had a scrawny chick in my hand in what seems to be a parrot since its feathers were colored green and its beak was colored red. "Somebody told me at my back that it was an eagle. I then sought to turn it over to the government for proper care. I separately approached two government employees, but both rejected it. "I had no recourse but to take care of it. I then went home. "At the next scene of my dream, I peered through a window and saw that the chick had grown big like a brown chicken. It was just there on the ground. "I told her to fly away because she had grown big and that she could take care of herself. "As it flew away, it turned into a majestic, black eagle with shiny feathers. And that was it."Thank you"
My reply.
Hello ________!
I hope you are well, and that this dream was not triggered by an illness of any sort.
The black eagle in your dream is your perception of mortality. It is a parrot at first, a stereotype image of what mortality is, as handed down to you by tradition and popular notion. Your psyche tells you that it is not what it seems. You hand it over to higher authorities but discover that they, too, have no definite ideas about death and life after death.
The bird grows into a brown chicken (life). You shoo it away, allowing it to exist on its own outside your care. It then transforms into a black (death) eagle (life after death) and flies away.
Your dream ego rests content in no longer seeking answers to the unknown.
Wednesday, November 23, 2022
Bought lunch food at the hawkers' stands. Among other stuff, fried chicken, menudo, and two orders kinilaw na Dagupan bangus, one of my favorites. Considered buying labong (bamboo shoots) cooked in coconut milk, then changed my mind because I found something I'd never tried before: takway (taro roots cooked adobo-style) from the Ilongga cook. I hope I like it. Now I can pretend to be Scarlett O'Hara unearthing taro immediately before the Intermission of Gone with the Wind and say, "As God is my witness, I will never go hungry again!"
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with six syllables in your name: Carve a name for yourself, and with integrity. Do not rest on your parent's laurels.
Tuesday, November 22, 2022
"Is this the little girl I carried/Is this the little boy at play?/
"I don't remember growing older/When did they?/
"When did she get to be a beauty/"When did he grow to be so tall?/
"Wasn't it yesterday when they were small?/
"Sunrise, sunset/Sunrise, sunset/Swiftly flow the days/Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers/Blossoming even as we gaze/
"Sunrise, sunset/Sunrise, sunset/Swiftly fly the years/One season following another/Laden with happiness and tears.../"
Above: Old photo of my sister Alice and two of my granddaughters, Angelique and Aubrey, from their childhood playmate Honey's photo collection. Taken at some restaurant when the grandkids were still in grade school. Nobody remembers when and where this was taken.
Below: Angelique and Aubrey, now mature and responsible young women, during their vacation this year in Boracay. Angelique is 27, the same age I was when I started working as a Cultural Affairs Specialist at the Embassy of the U.S.A.
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: Celebrate modestly. Do not splurge.
Monday, November 21, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: Sleep as snugly as an enchanted fox in its cubbyhole.
Sunday, November 20, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with seven syllables in your name: Everyone changes over time, and so do you,. Keep this in mind when getting in touch with friencs from the past.
Saturday, November 19, 2022
One Message For One Of 1,700 Friends, One Every Night Of The Year
You with five syllables in your name: If you still live in the place where I first visited you, your dead friend lives there with you and calls your attention to his presence from time to time.
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