Read, Listen, Play

READ:

Most awesome read in the last 30 days --- Dragons of Summer Flame. The team-up between the descendants of my favorite characters in the Dragonlance Chronicles, white mage Palin Majere (son of Camaron, nephew of Raistlin) and dark knight Steel Brightblade (son of Sturm Brightblade), is definitely the best that I've read in any fantasy book. The book is a great follow-up on the combined stories of the Dragonlance Legends Trilogy and Dragonlance Chronicles Trilogy. The gripping plot, fantastic storytelling and powerful imagery used in this 350+ page book allowed me to finish it in less than 36 hours.

Current read --- Quicksilver, by Neal Stephenson. I picked up this book last weekend while browsing through a local bookstore. I'm a sucker for a bookstore's "featured book", and I usually buy them after being satisfied with the critic reviews on the book cover and flyleaf.

Quicksilver is the first book in an epic trilogy set in 1600-1700s. I'm only into the first 90 pages or so, I've no idea of what the book is all about yet (I'm guessing it's related to alchemy), but I've already met Isaac Newton. What's holding my interest at the moment is that I get to read (and imagine) the human side of famous brains like Newton, Euclid (geometry), Leibniz (calculus) --- people termed as Natural Philosophers.

Okay, okay... it's a bit of high-interest-material for nerds as of the moment. I'm hoping that there'll be some development later on in the book to make it qualify for general patronage. Otherwise, I wasted 1200 pesos on it.

LISTEN:

Maroon5 - Songs for Jane. Two songs on my last-song-syndrome playlist: (1) Harder to Breathe and (2) This Love.

PLAY:

Badminton thrice a week. My backhand cross-court drop shot is definitely improving. Wall-climbing once a week. Gonna buy climbing shoes by next week. I believe that I'll get a +5 rating for my agility and dexterity, and a +2 rating on my form (hahahaha!). Playstation2 every night. Just finished Growlanser Generations 2, and I'll move on to Generations3 next week for my PS2 gaming.

It's Friday, wahooo!

Laugh a Little

Need a laugh? This might do it.

http://www.funpic.hu/swf/numanuma.html

Ma-ia-hiii... Ma-ia-huu... Ma-ia-hoo... Ma-ia-ha ha!

+ Friday Hilarity

Officially, January 7th was the first hilarious day of my life for 2005.

I was having a nightcap with some of my airsoft friends at Starbucks in Metrowalk. It took me some time to decide what to have. By the time I was ready to order, everybody else were seated at our table outside sipping on their drinks while exchanging stories and jokes.

I was telling the barrista that my hot chocolate will be a size "Tall" when I felt a hand squeeze my ass. Hard. "What the...?" I jumped in surprise!

I turned around quickly to blabber something like "Did you just do that?", with a matching stern look on my face, to the person behind me. Lo! The person behind me was a girl. Pretty cute one if I admit so myself.

Silent mental talk to myself: "Okay. She's cute. If she did it, I'd be flattered." "If she did it though, it's still an inappropriate thing to do." "Should I say, 'Did you just do that?'" or "'What the hell...'".

Then my peripheral vision caught sight of a familiar shine from a bald head. Now there's the culprit: Rhichie Brown. And he's got that unmistakable smile of someone who just did a naughty thing.

Being the good (but mischievous/funny) person he is, he readily admitted that he pulled the joke on me. Afterwards, he introduced me to the lady behind me. (Yikes! Good thing I didn't try to get fresh on her.) She turned out to be Rhichie's friend and guest for that night. After getting our drinks, we made a beeline back outside to join the rest of the group.

He made a fool of me once that night, but it could have been worse. He could have made a fool of me three time over that night.

Nevertheless, it was a hilarious incident.

Ninety six thousand two hundred twelve...

... that's how much I spent in pesos in 2004 on gasoline, lubricants and periodic car maintenance.

Drat... I've been on the road too much. But I've no regrets. It means I travelled a lot in the past year. I've a lot of pictures and souvenirs to prove it. Best proof of all: I gained a lot of acquaintances.

Funny thing is... I work for an oil company and here I am complaining of high fuel prices.

Battling New Year's Resolutions

A lot of people undergo the practice of creating new year's resolutions for themselves. We hear the usual litany of going on a diet, quitting smoking, drinking less, being a one man/woman person, excelling in their studies or jobs, spending less on shopping --- the resolutions are focused on being a better person than they were in the year that has passed. Some seem to write it on water, for no sooner than a few days they have managed to demote their self-esteem to low levels by breaking their resolutions. Others have a determination with a glow of a burning candle and trace their resolves on sand, but they can only hold out for a certain length of time until the wind blows and snuffs the candle out and shifts the sand. A select few manage to cast their resolutions on stone with great effort and determination. If they don't die in the process (I know one person who died of a diabetic shock because she went on a diet and she didn't know she was a diabetic), they emerge triumphant.

Making and accomplishing New Year's resolutions is a war in itself. It's like a fortified medieval superpower where individuals who make resolutions are the battlefield tacticians and generals. It is not an easy conquest: many have tried, but few have succeeded.

And I am not among those who make New Year's resolutions. I'm no war general.