monthsary weekend round-up

I took this photo hehe. ILU love. 49 months! That's longer than my college education already! HAHA.

Marked our 49th month on Saturday and spent most of Sunday walking around (30%) and eating (70%). FORTY NINE MONTHS. I know, right, who'd have thought we were here for the proverbial long haul? Haha. Love is funny. Here's Andrea's account of the fantastic food-trip-Sunday over at her LJ (complete with photos!)

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Also on Sunday, Andrea joined in the bi-annual Read-A-Thon and finished six books. Hurray for avid readers!

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Meanwhile -- I've been considering my battle plan for the upcoming Nanowrimo 2011 (a.k.a. November! Let's torture ourselves!), primarily because, looking back, I had fun last year. (And I even have proof of it right here) I can't believe I just said that, but there. 2011 hasn't been a big year for writing AT ALL (except for a couple of things I finished earlier this year), and I happened upon a PDF of maps, letters and a brief guide to navigating scars while cleaning out my harddrive this morning and I'm all inexplicably weepy. JFC I need Happy Lemon in my life right now.

Anyway, last year's piece was, mostly: heat, beaches, quiet. This year, let's go for the opposite: cold, deserted roads after dark, and, well, running away from explosions and robots and gunfire.

Or maybe not. Which is the best thing about this exercise: It could be about anything.

the midweek round-up, 9.21

Anniversary week! ♥♥♥

A few things:

- Went to the Manila International Book Fair on Sunday with her folks. Not as outstanding as our previous visits, but thoroughly enjoyed just the same. I got my friend Caloy's "Corpus" from the UST Press, while Andrea got Lourd's "Super Panalo Sounds," which, from what I heard, is also super panalo.

- As part of my anniversary loot for her, I gave her the Samsung Galaxy Mini that came with my new Smart unlimited data plan, which she is currently thoroughly enjoying. (e.g. by taking photos of herself as twins, etc.)

Hello there!

- Exchanged anniversary gifts a few days early! On account of our low EQs hehe. I did this series of 48-word stories for her on Tumblr a.k.a. mixed media (LOL -- there's an Issuu file, and audio files everywhere, because I secretly like reading things aloud, etc) also, meta: It is easier to write something lengthy than it is trying to trim things down to a certain word count. This was a new experience for me as a writer. /end meta.

48-words on Tumblr.

48 words on Issuu

- But as usual, I have been trumped yet again by an AWESOME 365-DAYS-IN-THE-MAKING COLLAGE MINI-BOOK. Shet. True to form, love. True to form. It has collages and drawings and stories and, believe it or not, scratch and sniff portions.

I love you, my multi-talented loverrrr.

n.b. Here's Andrea's account of the weekend!

(There are more things under this cut!)

six, redux

It took a message from the company's HR department to remind me that this day marks my sixth year with the newspaper.

SIX YEARS! How amazing is that? :) Since waking up this morning, I kept looking at the calendar and thinking, May 26th has to mean something, and then I remembered AHA, AJSS graduation in 2000! LOL. While that is also true -- really, memory? Fail on some level. Haha.

Anyway -- oh wow. Six years. In keeping with the common metaphor -- had this been a child... Haha. Prep school already!

So to say something brief and sentimental: I have learned so much and I am still learning, and my god, there's still so much to learn. I mean -- six years is six, but even then, it's only six. :)

So, yeah. Here's to the years ahead, and in the wise words of Rebecca Black: WE WE SO EXCITED.

(Reading recs and a proposal under cut)

ghost of thick dark words

footshooter
She says, Let's pretend it's all new. 2,700 words.

someday, this too will make sense

(I feel sad this isn't going anywhere. So I chopped off the rest and kept three paragraphs. Murder.)

She asks about how you are, and you think, how is this so easy, falling back into old routines of How-was-your-days like nothing hurt in between today and the last day you saw her? Seven years. Is it long enough for things to be written off, just like that?

And yet, you say, "Older and wiser," smiling as you lead her into the kitchen, pulling out a seat for her at the table and flipping a switch on. She squints at the light, and she suddenly looks so young; something tightens in your chest as your heart turns itself over. "You?"

"Older," she just says, shifting her eyes back down to the surface of the table. "A whole lot older."

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maps, letters and a brief guide to navigating scars

maps, letters and a brief guide to navigating scars
people with pasts are frightening creatures. 7,000 words.

NB. After Mnemonics. I have invented most, if not all of the routes. This is not an accurate guide to vacationing in the Philippines. Consider yourselves warned. And yes, similarities to real people are coincidental. Of course. (Perhaps).

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BRB trying not to die. See you after the elections.

nine

Whatever, I'm always talking about pregnant women anyway.

That said:

Nine
5,000 words. Two girls at the end of the world.

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These days I'm always having these weird dreams; the other day it was about frustration with a photocopying machine and the SWS-BusinessWorld pre-election survey. This morning, it's about a horrible Wowowee dance number concerning Kim Chiu being thrown about in a wooden basket. *cringe* The space in my head is scary.

On other news: Do yourself a favor. Go watch How To Train Your Dragon. IT IS AWESOME.

you make a girl insane

i've always had reservations about writing something set in an all girls high school basketball team because it scares me to think about how it could trip a lot of real chords unintentionally, but then again, aren't we all about tripping chords everywhere?

footnotes to a mixtape
~3800 words, to barbie's music from the buffet table.

i dismantle broken fans for breakfast

very early this morning, andrea woke with a start. long story short, the standfan had stopped working. le sigh, it was barely two years old; i dismantled it this morning using my father's trusty screw driver. awa ng diyos, nagkasya pa rin sa loob ng kahon from which we took it out when i first moved here. signos ba ito ng darating na pagbabago universe, hahaha.

anyway, i think my sister is a considerable percentage closer to graduating this april. hahaha. she had me proofread her acknowledgement page - my favorite part of the thesis, truth be told. bilang namems ako sa sarili kong thesis days (looking back, ngayon ko lang ata fully na-appreciate yung words na "for binding". ano ba yun.) e inungkat ko ang final manuscript ng thesis namin ni julie na na-save ko sa isang CD somewhere. wala lang. dapat talaga pinag-iisipan kung sinu-sino yung nilalagay dun e. haha joke lang.

anyway again, the other day i tried to write something. it's always a struggle lately, and this one i had to wrestle out of myself early in the morning. i just find it frustrating how i could start staring at the computer screen at 8:30 in the morning and only start typing around 11. damn.

and guys, guys - have you heard of schuyler fisk? because she's amazing. ktnxbye.

a portrait

found this in one of my sister's more recent photo albums. last month a couple of months ago, we marked my mother's birth anniversary. she would've been 50. i'm not sure who took this photo, but this is by far the most final photo i've ever seen of my mother's tombstone. sorry i wasn't there mom. you know how it is. of course, you do.

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anyway it feels like ages since i last wrote wrote something. i still attribute it to the lack of nicotine. jesus, a year hence and still that part of my brain is still not working on its own. kinda scary, if you think about it. what exactly have i done to myself. tsk.

so yeah, a couple of nights ago i finished something that had been sitting in my hard drive for the last six months. that night, the ending came to me, and i was like, Of course, how else could it have ended? indeed. how else.