maynila sa mga kuko ng traffic

There are days when like E.T., you just want to go home. Like our gnarly alien friend, you are unfortunately experiencing transportational difficulties. You’ve been stranded on EDSA Ayala for roughly 49 minutes and three yawns. Everywhere you look, there are more stranded people, presumably waiting for the same bus you’re dying to plant your behind on.

As your standoff with the universe and the god of buses nears the one hour mark, you feel that standing around is not going to do you any good. You are goaded on by the desire to get home, eat dinner, take a shower, and get your well deserved 8 hour shut eye. Suddenly, getting home takes a whole new different sense of urgency and at the same moment, you get a bright idea: Gee, why don’t I just cross EDSA and catch a bus before it makes a U-turn to southbound and before ten million people clog its doors and beat you to a seat?

You almost hop and skip up the stairs leading to the Ayala MRT station, until you reach the massive mass of meat puppets lined up for the train. Like a good solid cockblock to your bright idea, the mass of faceless henchmen are scrunched up so close to each other that you get a sudden irrational fear that somebody may get impregnated just standing there. Before the fear overtakes you, you plunge in and find yourself suddenly neck deep in a moving, breathing, sweating and subsequently stinking mass of bodies.

During this odyssey you find yourself examining all the things you’ve done in your life and what you could have possibly done to deserve being pressed tightly against a big guy whose last shower seems to have been last month and a scrawny lady who indulges in using her overlarge umbrella to stab people in the foot. Twenty feet from the stairs, you realize that there is a queue snaking from the said stairs to you. You first think this is a queue for a lotto stall, but upon closer inspection, no, it’s a queue for the STAIRS. If you want to take the stairs, you would need to line up. Ah, the night has turned into hell with fangs on and armed with knives.

Forty-five minutes later, you’ve made a circuit around the Ayala Avenue to Pasay Road stretch of EDSA exactly twice. You’ve also gone from Denial, Anger, and Bargaining and have finally accepted that you will be spending a night in Ayala. You heed the calls of your grumbling stomach and buy overpriced (squid) balls from a random street vendor. After paying for said overpriced balls, you see a bus. Not just any bus, but YOUR bus. It’s your bus, stopped by a red light at the EDSA-Ayala intersection. In the middle of your run toward it, the light changes to green.

If you hesitate, you risk being run over by a car, or worse a truck and a bus then several other cars. This is one of those circumstances when being slightly athletic pays off. Driven by the desire to get home and slightly energized by 5 overpriced squidballs, you sprint to the bus, cling to its side, and finally leap into it. (Disclaimer: Replicating this stunt is highly discouraged. This is not only dangerous; it is severely batshit insane as well. You do not do these types of stunts unless dying a painful and horrible death is on your To-Do list for the day.)

Finally, a note to the bus driver who may or may not have seen me but slowed down either way: I swear to Batman, when I start driving around, I will try my hardest not to swear at your brand of bus. Or at least, not for the first few weeks.

matamaan, sapul

This morning I woke up in a mood fouler than a garbage dump on collection day; this is usually accompanied by a screeching migraine and the grim realization that even though I don’t want to I have to get my sorry ass to the office. So while nursing said bitching migraine and said crippling and despairing thoughts, I naturally am annoyed at everything and anything in existence.

[digression] While on the topic of annoyances and “things to fuel your murderous rampage,” I’d just like to say that reading and seeing news about a balding 50 year old’s love life is not only annoying, but also highly disturbing. What makes these news networks and broadsheets think that everybody wants to be subjected to this type of torture? Don’t tell me it’s because this balding 50 year old is the first bachelor president, it’s impossible to care less about whom he (and his sisters) deems worthy to take out to dinner. Here, I’ll ask a sensible question: Did you ever wonder about Erap and Loi’s sex life? How about the Ramos’ adventures under the sheets? Did you? If you did, you may want to seek the help of a professional.

And you know what would make for more compelling news? The Maguindanao Massacre. The Hacienda Luisita Massacre and the “fair” deal they gave the farmers. The Pork Barrel (teka, pera ko yan ah). The recent Bus Strikes (I’ve never wished death upon anything harder than I wished for the death of Claire dela Fuente’s cuticles). The Hostage Taking (last I heard, everybody got a slap on the wrist and a lollipop). [/digression]

As I leave the house somebody asks me, “Meron ka nanaman ba? Ang sungit sungit mo nanaman.” (Are you PMSing? You’re grouchy.) At times like these, that is the wrongest thing you should ask especially if you are a. a guy and therefore is bereft of a uterus or b. not gay. When a guy asks this question I wish I had superpowers that would allow me to shrink gonads into non-existence and bestow the new eunuch with a spanking new vagina. That way, he shall then have the ability to menstruate, get pregnant, and experience the wonderful world of PMS.

Again, matamaan sapul.

kanya-kanyang sayad, kanya-kanyang katangs

Sabi ng kaibigan kong si Allen, uso daw ang pakikipagbalikan sa mga ex ngayon. Sa isip isip ko, “Nauuso pala ang pagpapagago.” Sabay nagpop out ang chat window ng isa ko pang kaibigan (na itatago natin sa pangalang Lareina Velasco) at nakwento nyang nakikipagbalikan sa kanya ang isang ungas na pumunit sa puso nya dalawang taon na ang nakalipas. Ang ungas in question ay naghahanap na daw ng babaeng magiging loyal sa kanya at hindi sya lolokohin. Ang nasambit ko lang ay ang mga katagang, “How can he expect to get a loyal girl when he himself is such a whore?” at ipinaliwanag ang Ber Rule.

Isinasaad sa Ber Rule na kahit kupal man ay nangangailangan ng warmth tuwing malamig, pero dahil kupal nga sila, hinahanap nila ang warmth na ito mula sa mga dating pinagkukunan (na ginago nila dati): ang mga ex nila. Awtomatikong naaactivate ang Ber Rule kapag –ber months, palakas ng palakas ang kagustuhang makipagbalikan habang palapit nang palapit ang Pasko at Bagong Taon. Ang mga madalas gamitin ay ang “I’ve Changed” card, ang “I’ve Realized You’re The Only One For Me” card, “I Shouldn’t Have Let You Go” card at ang “Ikaw Na Lang Talaga This Time, Promise, Mamatay Man Ako” card. Ang success rate ng mga ganitong banat ay depende sa katangahan (emotional vulnerability at kung gano na katagal ang katigangan) ng sinasabihan at sa galing pag-arte ng ungas (pangFAMAS Best Actor ba?), pero kadalasan, katangahan lang talaga ang pinapairal.

Isang magandang pangontra para dito ay “Kaya ka lang nya babalikan kasi nilalamig sya? Magkumot sya kamo. Or magkape sya, para kabahan naman sya sa mga pinagsasasabi nya.” Masama mang sabihin sa kahit ano mang konteksto, wala naman sigurong nangangarap maging panawid gutom. (Ikaw, kung nangangarap kang maging panawid gutom, una magkape ka para magising ka sa katotohanan, at pangalawa, eto pera, bumili ka ng Pride. Kung “masaya” ka, fine, pero pag pinaiyak ka ulit wag kang mag atubiling lumpuhin sya. Alalahanin mong 3 for 100 ang doormat, murang mura kaya hindi din sya mag aatubiling palitan ka.)

Pero kung natanga ka lang minsan (aminin nating nagyayari talaga yan kahit sa manunulat na ito) at wala kang balak magago ulit, magdiwang dahil mukhang inabutan na ng karma ang ungas mong ex. Ipraktis ang pagtawa ng Moo-hoo-ha-ha-ha dahil ito ang gagawin mo pag naghain ng Reconciliation Cake ang ex mo. (Hangga’t maaari ay durugin mo ang kanyang ego ng pinong pino at kung maaari ay kantahin and/or patugtugin ang I Told You So ni Carrie Underwood at Randy Travis. Be as smug as possible.) Tandaang maige ang kanyang reaksyon matapos mo syang tawanan sa mukha dahil ang alaalang iyon ang magagamit mong pampasaya sa susunod na abutan ka ng lungkot.

To recap: hindi mo matatakasan ang lamig ng -ber months, pero maiiwasan mong maging tanga (this includes whining about how you’re trying not to call him and shit). It’s just the weather. Sa simpleng pananalita, sa tingin mo ba magandang pundasyon ng relasyon ang lamig (or init, for that matter)?

I rest my case.

every time i look at my paycheck, i die a little.

Yap, just one of those days.

You leave for work 15 minutes early. You get on the bus and nab your most favorite seat. This is located right beside the bus door, the best place in your opinion especially in cases when immediate evacuation is required (see Rio’s Zombies on the Bus Contingency Plan). So anyway, while waiting for the rest of the bus to fill up, you distract yourself with thoughts of medical health plans and of writing the boringest, blandest pieces of sh- work you have written and will continue to write for the sake of sustaining your debilitating addiction to eating three times a day. When you tune back to reality, you glance at your cellphone and realize you’ve been sitting in a stationary bus for the past 15 or so minutes. Only then did the bus conductor realize that the passengers need to get to their respective destinations – in your case Ayala Avenue, hopefully by 8.30 and just so it’s clear, you need to get there today. The plodding creature (in retrospect, the guy looks like breathing is a conscious effort for him) calls the driver to get with the program.

The collective hostility turned from the conductor to the driver. To answer everybody’s hostile glares, the bus driver lets out a series of grunts which you take to mean in Earth language that the bus has refused to move its gigantic rusty ass and has blown a hose to punctuate its point. You calmly abandon your most favorite seat and actively restrain yourself from braining the bus conductor who was shaking his head and staring at the ragged pieces of hose and wires sticking out of the bus’ innards. You proceed to attempt to disintegrate the driver, the conductor, and the bus into a smoldering pit of refuse but you suddenly remember that you left your evil powers at home.

You make a mental note to never leave your laser beams of death at home and proceed to cross the street. This is fairly easy since traffic has been effectively blocked by the bus you were just on. Something cuts through the tempest in your head (and your path across the street), specifically a scooter. At this point in the story, you realize that you basically woke up this morning completely oblivious to the fact that the universe got out of bed today totally intent in methodically screwing with you.

Eventually, you find yourself in a shuttle service van on its way to Makati. A quarter into the trip you lose any sensation from the top of your head (bumbunan), cryogenic effect courtesy of the van’s exemplary subzero airconditioning system. You run the four blocks to your office and finally sit down to work.

Yap, just one of those days.

So somebody gave me an arcangeling today and now I want them all. 

mental constipation

Have you ever been constipated before? You want to poop but can’t, however hard you try? (Actually, if you tried hard enough you might get yourself hemorrhoids.) Anyway, bad bloody images aside, constipation is a bad, bad thing to have. Good things come to those who cannot shit though, as there are drugs available that can help you with your intestinal evacuation problem (nope, this is not an ad) whereas you can’t drink anything to cure constipation of the brain.

When one gets brain constipation, ideas refuse to be shat out and sentences that were there a second ago evaporate into thin air. I imagine they wave goodbye as they go. This is typically bad news for somebody like me, who like the girl in the Dulcolax commercial is left feeling terrible, out of sorts, and irritable. The difference between me and the girl in the commercial is that she doesn’t get paid to empty her bowels, I on the other hand, am paid to write.

(At this point in this post, all of the other sentences have happily jumped into a void of absolute nothingness and thus I am forced to shut the fuck up.)

So yeah, last Sunday I went and turned 27. I spent the day doing nothing but stare at the Manila Bay while sipping on a giant cup of coffee and generally enjoying Rem’s company (since Mabie pulled another Jerko on us). The day was nice and steady; the weather half-cooperating to give me a half-assed sunset that was nice nonetheless. On the commute home, I got on a kamikaze bus of doom (what better way to end your birthday than with a near death experience, right?) and contemplated being 27.

It certainly feels a lot like 26 (or 25 for that matter), though I know I’ll need to change a few things – like the age listed on my resume. Seriously though, wouldn’t it be nicer if growing one year older makes one feel the same way as Mario (theoretically) feels when he gets a 1UP? Or if you’re more into big budget stuff, why not get the same special effects as the electric bolts Duncan MacLeod (note: does not sparkle) gets when he levels up, i.e. after killing another immortal – is this a self contradictory phrase? Hmm.

Wait, as I was saying before I so rudely interrupted myself, it would be nice if one got some stat buffs (Congratulations! You get +1 Str, +1 Mag, +2 Vit, +2 Int, -1 Agi) after a birthday, wouldn’t it? That or maybe I’ve been playing video games I’m supposedly too old to play.

Anyway, the world continues its roundabout and I continue with my personal RPG. Thanks for playing.