2009, the implacable approach of

..then it will again be my birthday. How harsh.

I envy those who are able to write almost on a daily basis. After this entry, I do not know when I could visit again. I do drop in more often to check out some entries and huwaw, andaming masisipag dito.

Wishing us all with everything we deserve for 2009. If we don't deserve anything better bahala na. We're not in total control but it helps if we do little somethings about our lives. Being fatalistic has got to be one of the corniest things.

..a little less alcohol, greater control in eating, lower blood pressure, more sex, more friends, new apartment -- 2009, here I come. Cheers.

BTW, who's celebrating the New Year over at MOA? I'm thinking of going there. I'm such a sucker for fireworks.. Then let's play with drinks and fireworks after.

alright i'll buy you

Friends please. Like, real ones. We stop being innocent idealists a couple of months after we leave the school and start looking for our first job so I won’t say I’m looking for people who’d stay stuck through thick and thin, whatever that cliché means. I’m not out to look for lifetime companions although that kind of thing can exist. Friends, please. That’s about it.

I grew up about 400kms north of here, went to a university about 100kms also north of here. The real people I spent so much time with were either contented staying where they were which is an ugly thing, or have left the country thinking they could be happier which is sad. There’s a much bigger world than your hometown but you don’t have to live and work your ass off outside your country to appreciate this vastness. As such, I’ve thrown myself into this metropolis of pickpockets where I lost a cellphone a couple of months ago, where I was cheated my first big purchase with my first pay, where I was ditched by people I called friends because I stopped dating their friend. How much uglier can things get around here?

Was it Brandon in Beverly Hills 90210 who said that it’s in college where you’ll find the people who’ll stick with you through your life? Guess what, Brandon,,, they’re two provinces away (I know I can count on them but let’s get real. How many times a year can you actually hangout with or run to best buds that aren’t physically there?). Or they’re in seclusion in a dimension called Relationship. They feel that they have to be secluded to show they have evolved. That seems to be the notion of maturity these days.

I deserve more fun than this and bleep you if you think this is midlife crisis hahahaha. I’m young and I’d like to think I’m younger than I look, while people around here seem to be growing older faster than they have to. People are getting a bit too serious.

Hangout buddies please, if not friends. People who can hop out on weekends and not say No because they’ve got nothing to spend or are too tired to be out. Or damnit let’s stay in but please it’s a weekend let’s grab some bottles. Lots. People who drink. People who are smart but won’t insist on a smart conversation because that, absolutely, is not necessary on a weekend. People who won’t talk serious unless they have to; just talking with sense isn’t so bad. People who wear cheap old Gap or Old Navy, instead of Armani in exchange of having enough for gas or parking.

Sit back. Take it easy. Drink. And let’s just be kids before we forget how it is. Call me.

Wake Up

You spend 20 years in bed, unconscious, doing basically nothing, where you’ve got absolutely nothing happening for you. That’s a good one-third of your life. Then you die.

An average person spends about six to eight hours in bed sleeping. If he’s heartbroken, only two hours are spent unconscious while the rest is taken over by wallowing. No matter. Most of that is still time wasted. I’m not saying that humans should do without sleeping. You’ll mess up with your endocrine system and deprive yourself of serotonin. In English, you’ll make yourself cranky. I learned this from Scully. Tempers would flare and if nuclear bombs don’t annihilate mankind, we will die in our own rages. It’s only that I believe in staying awake while you can.

It’s 10:30pm right now on a Sunday. You’ve got work tomorrow? So do I. get your MP3 player and with your blaring earphones, walk the streets and stop by at Burger Machine for a longganisa with egg sandwich. Buy pirated DVDs and have a movie marathon. Write. Have sex. Write about it. Text your girlfriend. Blog about it. Surf the net. Meet new people. Then have sex again. Build relationships and destroy those that aren’t healthy for you. Sit in bed drinking while waiting for Chowking to serve breakfast, although they’ve replaced the ham with paper. Visit the red-light district. Text your ex and flirt with her. Learn a difficult song and sing it and just this once let it be you who disturbs the peace of the neighborhood. Do a hundred sit-ups. Go to Starbucks and complain about their Wi-Fi fcuk it it’s supposed to be for free! There’s just too much to do and if we live to be 60, that’s practically throwing 20 years in a vegetable state. Make something happen. Right now. Sleep only when you can’t sustain a vertical position any longer because there’s just too much opportunity for that when that time comes when you aren’t able to wake up.

What time is it? II

My weekends are mine. Nobody has got any business taking ownership of my Saturdays and Sundays. Fridays, even.

I will laugh my teeth out till they fall off, say some crazy and stupid things that I won’t admit to saying afterwards, and shut down my brain circuits. I will talk to everyone even when I’m pissed. I will smile at everyone and don’t take that to mean flirting. I refuse to ruin my non-work days even when that means I gotta sell myself.

If something’s not right, I will neither think nor talk about it on a Saturday. I will hold it off till Sunday. When Sunday comes, it has been forgotten. I will not face it on a weekday either, hell no. It would steal my focus from work. That’s just goddamn unacceptable. It’s enough that I deal with a daily hangover. Weekdays are a bummer so my weekends deserve to be a huge wildfire. I’d like to keep it that way thank you; now move to the side and let me pass.

It’s an hour and a half past Saturday. I shouldn’t even be writing. That’s what time it is and I’m gone. Don’t run after me unless you’re prepared to get ran over. Naaah. Just playing. Inuman na!
---------------
Originally written on 09nov08, 0130hrs | midnight sentiments

What time is it?

"Time is the fire in which we burn..." Dr. Soran, Star Trek: Generations, by Rick Berman
----------
There are only 24 hours in a day. It’s practically the same throughout the 365 days in the year. Unless you’ve been abducted by aliens or have been altered by extraterrestrial influences, you know you can’t stretch it.

I spend six to eight hours sleeping. It’s when my hyperactive mind rests. It rests not by way of shutting down. It kicks away the rules and let something akin to insanity take its reign. It figures how to spend P130 million because it smells it can happen. It doesn’t matter that the probability of winning in the 6/49 lottery is almost 1 in 14 million, which is roughly the same probability as obtaining 24 heads in succession when flipping a coin. In my life, I've done lottery thrice. The odds of winning is... insane.

I spend about an hour and 15mins trying to wake up, dragging my feet to the bathroom, bathing, getting dressed, and basically making myself battle-ready for another week day. I don’t put on a battle gear but I make sure that my head can take a day’s battering.

I spend 10 hours at work looking for a problem, coming up with a solution, presenting it to the bigger executives and having the solution rejected. It doesn’t always happen but when it does it is phenomenal. I burn my circuits out while doing a million other things (please don’t let me use Multitasking the word is overused and overrated I feel like imploding every time I hear it) like answering a question nobody else attempted to answer as fatasses decompose in office chairs better than mine saying this or that particular solution isn’t good enough. I come too close to spontaneous human combustion every time. Or spontaneous human explosion. I fear for the tenants of PBCom the building just might not be able to take it.

I spend about two hours waiting. I can’t stand waiting but it’s a necessary evil. I wait for a cab amidst the noise and haste, suspended within a cloud of smoke and dust and heat. I wait for the green light as the cab crawls through. I wait in line to get some lunch. I wait for the end of the day itching to be home with my chips and vodka.

I spend about an hour eating. More if I eat breakfast, which I don’t usually do. Sometimes eating isn’t so much as eating. I’d call it ingesting. I go through it because it’s needed. I will skip lunch if it didn’t make me cranky as the afternoon progresses. But I really have to stop eating. It’s still a flat tummy down here but I seriously feel I’m gaining weight.

I spend about two hours trying to clear my head when the day ends and be prepared for another refreshing insanity in dreamland. I read a book, listen to music, hit the shower for a second round, text, write or whatever else under the moon. When I assault the sheets with my weight, I make sure I head straight to dreamland. Being awake for an extended time in bed is such a demon.

There are 24 hours in a day. There isn’t much else that I do, and I’ve got no time for complications.

No Excuses, but with a Disclaimer. Get that.

This does not refer to anyone I or you might know. It's just mental overflow, which you can assume as the product of exorcising my mind. You don't have to relate to the demons.
---------------
There’s no excuse for being an idiot. It isn’t in the kind of milk you had as a baby. I stopped drinking milk even before I realized that I did. It isn’t because of your parents, your teachers, or the schools you went to. It isn’t because of the bad friends you had. It isn’t because you grew up in some remote province where the only TV channels were RPN9 and PTV4. It’s always been your brain. Only you had anything to do with it; unless you’re really sick in the head, in which case I’m not talking to you. Being an idiot is a choice. Being smart is a quest – if you don’t dig it, you’ll always be stuck in the shallows.

There’s no excuse for not eating veggies. These call center ants and the recently promoted yuppies who earn more money than any of their parents saw in their combined lifetimes are too proud of not knowing what saluyot is. I’ll buy the clothes off of you and expose the smut that you are. I am sustained by fast food chains twice daily unless I feel like having breakfast which would make it thrice, but I’ll gladly trade my big burger plus large coke and fries for your mom’s malungay soup. Feed me with talbos ng kamote for a year. You won’t hear me complain. What you have on the table does not speak of how high you are on the professional ladder. I’ll ardently trade fake adobo for ampalaya and know that it isn’t because I take forever in front of an ATM wishing I can withdraw close to what I actually need in the next 15 days. Go on and check your balance both before and after you take money hoping that 5,000 minus 500 is still 5,000.

There’s no excuse for getting someone pregnant, not wanting the baby, but still having it. You have no fcuking right to seriously complain about raising a kid. If you knocked someone up, or if you got knocked up, know that that organism didn’t beg to be conceived. You have to change diapers, stay up at night when he cries, look for someone to watch over him if you can’t and if you don’t find anyone, you better goddamn do it. You could’ve flushed it but chose not to. And when he grows up, know that he doesn’t owe you anything. He survived because it was your responsibility to see him live. If you bring a living creature into the world, he is your responsibility. Not the other way around. If he lives even after you stop seeing to him, he’s done it. You have no right to get paid for it.

There’s no excuse for using your emotions more than your head. Emotions are everything to some people. When they whine and ask for better treatment, they are sh!t. If investing your feelings turns up okay, that’s unjustified luck. If it doesn’t, call it Normal. Expected. Reality. Do not ever pull others around your emotional outbursts. Be aware that they don’t deserve it. It was you who made the move. Have the decency to suffer the consequences of your own sacrifices. No one asked you to make them. No one makes those decisions but ourselves. You chose to jump, don’t talk back even if only to say Sorry – and even more so if by saying it you hope for understanding. There's freakin' no absolution. It’s the pig’s way of imposing on someone. Breathe your stink and shut up.

There’s no excuse for being alive when you ought to be dead. The doctor said my heart might give up if I didn’t change my lifestyle. My organs will fail. I smoke, I drink, I go to fast food chains like I breathe air. And I go to work which has become too unhealthy lately. This job kills me but I make sure that I’m able enough to trudge my way to the office daily not because I like it, but because I can’t find a better one. The hungry bears will take my post and scream in joy about it. I want a better one. I'll become even bigger than what I am. Or die first. If I die tomorrow I will die having done what I promised my innocent self not to do 11 years ago. If I die tomorrow I will die not having done what my mature alter ego wanted me to do. If I die tomorrow I might as well die tonight with my vodka and Cheese Ring. It might very well be just luck that brought me to where I am now despite of my messed up credentials and fierce recklessness but with all boldness I say I serve more purpose than that idiot, uneducated pretender all of us know. No one can assume the privilege to think that I will die. I may be unhealthy and heading towards no particular direction but make way. I’ve got every right in heaven or hell to be here.

I didn't make excuses.
---------------
Originally written on 07oct08, 0257hrs | drunken sentiments

In Perspective

Reading the article below put my loss in a different perspective. It might have been my fault that I put my new cellphone in my backpak where it could easily slip out of the pocket without me noticing, and took the bus because I was too impatient to wait for a cab. I was already running late. I cried over it, I'm not over it yet, I'm done with being sad, now I'm just burning in outrage.
---------------
You explode. You feel like crushing the world with your bare hands. Of course, you never realize that you’re an earthling and could get crushed along with the planet.

I am not an environmentalist but I love the planet. I would never attempt to do anything that would bring about its demise. I live here. And I’ll stay on. I’ve had more than my share of troubles and I’m still alive. Splash acid on my face, transform me into a tortured mythical character like Sisyphus, sentence me to reclusion perpetua - I’ll still be here and with smug optimism. Escape is possible. For some people, it’s inevitable especially in a country like ours. Pull some strings and you’re free again. Life is the best thing ever. You have no business taking it for granted. The point is, as long as you’re alive, there is something out there. You’ve got a problem? Sleep it over. Let the demons haunt you through the night. After all, tomorrow is just another day. The sun rises. Live it up.

Think selfishly. Think of yourself. Take care of yourself because essentially, there’s nobody else to pull you through. In the unlikely situation that someone abnormally selfless comes to the rescue, don’t hold your breath. It will depend on whether or not the help will actually work on you. And sometimes people are better off alone. It takes away some of the glory in making it through. Survive if you can and let that step up your worth and not owe it to someone else.

Do not depend on others and do not depend on God. He has too much trouble in his hands already, what with all the praying going on in places where your problem doesn’t mean anything at all. There’s a war out there. There’s drought and famine. There’s a whole community where only a few are spared of AIDS. There’s too much suffering in this world that God won’t even notice you. Just ask: Among billions of people, most of whom in distress, what makes your benign existence so especial that the boundless universe and God in his infinite glory should pay attention? Is there a God?

Do not say the deep sh!t you’re in is a part of God’s master plan, or that the Devil pushed you into that pit. That’s a shameless, cowardly excuse. And so is Psychology. It continues to come up with terminologies to explain aberrant behavior, which makes you less of a culprit. Oh, that was due to my excessive-compulsive disorder, or it was my alter ego, or I’m sorry if my being a nymphomaniac is making you uncomfortable. Just about every other thing that leads to something unpleasant has a psychological explanation that could extricate you conveniently. If you can’t find the correct term, simply abuse further the most abused defense of all time and state the obvious: I’m only human. You might as well say you’re a bacterium. The bottom line is, you did something wrong. You fcuked up. Whether or not it was intentional, it happened because you caused it to happen. The Law of Causality was still working last time I checked. Face the consequences. You’re responsible so shut up.
---------------
Originally written in March 2000 | taken from my Essay Portfolio

Help...

This is Samsung G810 and I'm inloved with it. Been so since I first saw it. Had one. Then lost it. Just today. My Globe SIM is gone with it. My number for 9 years; gone, just like that. My Smart number is still active. You can contact me there. To whoever's reading this: help me curse the thief. I hope it figures in an accident. I hope it uses my phone in a gas station, then the phone explodes in its face. I hope it uses the phone while crossing the street then gets ran over by a 10-wheeler truck, instantaneously fusing its molecules with the asphalt.

Bugs

Breathe. You can take it easy now. I haven’t left. You know I won’t stay forever but when you reach out now, you can still grab hold of my shirt. But don’t pull me closer. You don’t wanna tear it up. I’m here and I’m not naked.

Don’t push it.

Yes, I don’t have time for you. I’m buried six feet under deadlines, ad hoc work requests, piles of papers; I hide behind my computer screen, behind megabytes of emails, at the end of my telephone lines… wanting to get away from professional crap. It’s what having a real job means and earning decent money. I know. It’s what most people think they want. They don’t know what they want. I don’t want them. I don’t have time for them. I don’t have time for you, I don’t have time for myself. Was it necessary for you to ask?

If I told you I’m seeing others would it ruin you? If I told you work doesn’t really eat my time and eat me would you tremble in outrage? If I told you I’m leaving would you run after me, or run away? What if I simply didn’t tell you anything? Would you stop asking? Can you stop asking?

I don’t ask questions. Personal questions. They’re cockroaches that impose their presence on personal space. They stink. They look repulsive. They deserve to be crushed. They must be reduced to pulp. I don’t care how people claim they’ve got nothing to hide and say a filthy fcuking cockroach wouldn’t be there in the first place if the insect wasn’t lured with filth. Like an ugly question, it’s there for its own goddamn reason. That in no way lessens the point of fact that it is cockroach. Let’s not justify its existence.

I might have gone out last night and had the greatest fcuk of my life. I might have held hands softer than yours will ever be. For all you know, it might be that the only reason why I can stay in this place is because I’ve got a house here and living with someone who offers to shelter me for as long as I want. Would you believe that? Will you assume that much if I didn’t answer your questions?

I don’t like questions. I will give you answers that I either want to give, or am prepared to give. Do you see now that it doesn’t matter? I don’t like giving answers. I don’t like surrendering sh!t about my personal life. That’s my own sh!t. I’ll deal with it my own way. I wouldn’t deal with it if I didn’t want to. When you stop liking me because of this, run away. You have the right. When it happens, for all your kindness, you deserve someone better. Who am I anyway but bait? Insects will surround me. That speaks for itself.

Now this is who I am. If you’ve got a problem with that, we do have a problem. For the meantime, I’m staying. But don’t take my space for your own. Don’t push your questions. Don’t get used to the comfort that I will answer. Take it easy. You’ve got a life to live apart from living it on my side of the world. The world is bigger than my hellhole. Take that for your own instead.

But we still got air around here. Let’s just both breathe. And drink. Right here. Today.
---------------
Originally written last week | midnight/drunken sentiments

For The Taking

I am tall, tan, medium built with a nice flat tummy. I am 21 years old, I have a boyish appeal and although talent scouts will not buzz excitedly and scamper to capitalize on my looks, I’m tempted to add that I’m charming. This sometimes deposits me right into pleasantly scandalous situations. I’m smart, eloquent, refined and intelligent with an independent mind. You may now gather that I have an attitude. Or ego. Acquisitiveness is a fine virtue.

I ferociously believe I have talent but that sometimes-humorless thing called fate has been pointing its finger at me and looking down its nose on me for quite some time now, having decided that I must remain a useless tissue matter. With mirthless passion, I hereby state the obvious: I am a bum. I couldn’t figure myself into a more productive state and not for lack of trying.

I station my bum-hood in Cavite at my sister’s apartment, which she shares with her husband. My immediate concern is to move out and have my own pad. I’d like to live in the Makati area. Not that I remarkably enjoy breathing poison among other threats to my existence. Only that like most people, it’s more reasonable for me to think that bigger opportunities are in bigger, more urbanized cities. And when I’m finally settled in, I shall set up a command post from which I could hunt for jobs. I do notice that the process looks more realistic when reversed: Paycheck first before the bills. Here again is my knack to play with chance.

I am not being ambitious, at least not at this point. I don’t want a penthouse right away wherefrom I could survey the expanse I might later plan to conquer. I don’t want an entertainment system whose acoustics could blast you off to Mars. A studio-type unit will do so long as it has its own bathroom with walls that I could touch without feeling sick. Of course, I need a cozy bedroom. I’ll bring along my portable stereo and stack of pirated CDs, and then I could live for as long as I have clean clothes to wear. When I run out, I’d have to run back to Cavite. It would be presumptuous of me to think that I’ll have a washing machine as soon as I move out.

I am hoping for a spacious enough pad where I could put some divisions between the bedroom and the living room and the kitchen. It might turn out to accommodate a maximum of just three people at a time. Nevertheless, how I will afford it, I do not know. We live in a place where the reward for hard work is insultingly, outrageously, and despairingly meager. It was a constant wonder how slum people could buy washing machines, TV sets, VCD players, etc. Middle class people in the province don’t even have washing machines. And yet, slum people still have money to spare. They periodically play lotto and drink beer and buy cigarettes and play tong-its and all the while wailing about and passionately complaining regarding how expensive living costs and blaming it all on the government. Aside from realizing that they don’t pay for the land they built their shanties on, I was belatedly enlightened by a news program, that the honest members of the population are the ones who shoulder the electric bills of some squatter areas as their unscrupulous consumption remains unmetered (I use the adjective Honest comparatively). No wonder. But grudgingly, I’ll say I don’t blame the poor entirely. The power company is inefficient and the government snails its way in addressing the housing problem. I don’t have to say that I’m relegating the blame in fear of a homemade explosive and a rusted ice pick.

And then there are the migrants from provinces far away, hoping to find opportunities, as if by magic, in the metropolis. When their hopes get crushed, they say it’s the President’s fault. May I ask: Who decided to leave the province in the first place? These people are crazy blaming the consequences of their discontent on someone else, much like activists who know no other leisure except whining and wailing and causing traffic jam. They’re not helping any. If you don’t have a solution, shut the fcuk up. When you’re in the province, what you need is diskarte then you could eat talbos ng kamote and tuyo everyday without having to worry about steak or caviar. It’s healthy. And if you had even just a bit of land and an honest resolve, you cannot really go hungry. If you want more than that, decide to take the risk of migrating to the city but knock some sense into your head and face the challenge you so wanted to take, but were too fatalistic to comprehend.

I definitely plan to stay away from places where disgruntled migrants build boxes they call home. I’m sure discontent isn’t contagious but I’d rather play it safe. Then, for as long as I have my clothes and my music, I’d be fine. Talking about music, I used to listen only to R&B, disco, hip-hop and rap back in college. I went through college in a place where no one is allowed to listen to anything else. It was universal: Girl/Boy bands must be hated, clothing apparels must be imported, everyone must have a lighter skin tone. Everybody looked the same. Everybody smelled the same. Everybody felt cool. If I wasn’t listening to Eraserheads or Martin or Barry Manilow, it wasn’t because I had to be just as cool and hate everything local or old. I was deprived the embarrassment of being different since no store would sell a CD that couldn’t be patronized by everybody.

Cavite isn’t at all like that to a point where the most degraded form of vocalization may be worshipped. At least it’s a free country down here. There are people who formulate their own standard by which music is judged, just by looking at a singer’s face as if her eyes, nose, ears and mouth were shaped like note symbols arranged into a divine melody having the entire face as the G-clef (no offense to the long-chinned). And then there is this case where just because of her outstanding acting career, this artist’s album was awarded a platinum recognition. Her fans pay no respect about the distinction between Do and Re. Hell, everybody sings because our leaders sing specifically because of the ardent determination to be liked and get reelected.

I sing better. I wake up late and when there appears to be a concert inside my sister’s bedroom, you’d know I’m up. I love being challenged by high notes. In my relentless attempt to reach my third octave, I’m excitedly surprised that the mic is still working. When I grab the mic, you’d have to pray for reprieve. When I get my own place, I’m going to have it soundproofed. Don’t take this to mean that my voice is a torture to the ears. I’m now a sucker for ballads because I just realized that I could do good vocals. I’m annoyed that my friends invariably find this claim comical. Wait till I’m confident enough to exhibit myself onstage. I mean as a singer.

In the meantime, I’ll do my singing in my sister’s bedroom, bum around and eat. Chronic insomnia has again taken its grip on me. Now, before hitting the sheets at 4AM, whereupon I hibernate until the same time in the afternoon, I eat. Thank heavens I have good metabolism. My tummy is still flat unlike my male contemporaries who seem to grow mountainous over the midsection every year. Even so, I suspect that if you ran a scalpel over my wrist, a murky substance would gush forth: masticated rice. If you know of a job that fits someone with an overly healthy appetite, please approach me.

What else is there for me to do? I guess I’ll just point a finger back at fate. Not the index but the middle. I get jaded just thinking about life sometimes but I’m young. The world awaits me. I’ll move that damn mountain. For now, it’s in the form of my laundry.

I have what it takes to succeed. And hey, I’m a good citizen, okay? How can I still be jobless? I hear about evil people and con artists, hopelessly stupid people and unscrupulous politicians who are successful and filthy rich. I am more than commensurately enraged. Such knowledge in the face of my benign existence begets a more bitter appreciation. I’m not sure I’m complaining. Just angry, I guess. Life is unfair. I sing, eat and fantasize about my own place and a job for I wouldn’t wallow in an idealist’s agony knowing very well that in the first place, and I’ll say this over and over, nobody ever said that life is fair. Won’t waste time imagining that it is.
---------------
Originally written in May 2002 | taken from my Essay Portfolio

It’s terminal. So? That’s nothing new. Everything is terminal. Hate dies. Love dies. Friendships die. I’ll die.

My lola died when I was in high school. She was 94. It was my first confrontation with death. She was my refuge. When Dad won’t trust me to drive the car, when Mom decided I didn’t need a bigger allowance, when my siblings insisted on a different TV channel, or drowned Bioman conversations with that blasted stereo in full volume, I had my lola. She died and it was the loneliest time in my wonder years (I so wanted to be Kevin not because I’d swoon just to kiss Winnie but because his life seemed to be the greatest, compared to my dreadfully uncomplicated childhood). Death is such an ugly thing but we have to understand that the moment we were expelled into the world, the countdown already began. We shall die. Even if I were Fred Savage.

To a point, it becomes better to know you're dying. You can actually project your existence on the calendar. You have it finally defined. Other people forget that life too shall pass. When we are reminded and get through the denial phase, we live our lives the way we wanted. We stop doing what our boss wants, what puny things our friends demand, what impossible feats the world asks. We cram, we try to have fun, we stop caring about the mundane truths because we are dying and we have ourselves to think about.

Even people better than us die – people with bigger lives, people who make a dent in this aspect of existence. What are we anyway?

Which is why you have to feel the world revolves around you, without the arrogance. The universe worships you. Don’t grovel at the feet of anyone. You’ve got your own life. You’ve got no business taking life for granted. There’s no afterlife. This is all there is. Don’t assume anything more.

Fuck the boss. Fuck the society. Fuck that insect who ditched you. Live. If you’re not happy with something, burn it. Don’t complain. It’s a rainy day again today but hey, you can’t tell the weather what to do but you can take charge of your life.

Laugh your tonsils out, scream till your throat is sore and cry when it hurts, damnit. Love but don’t live only because of it. If she doesn't love you back, stand up you swine you can't afford to let other people ruin your life. Don’t believe the poets, they talk about love and poetry. That isn’t how things happen. Don’t believe in love songs. Believe what you have right there. That is real. Hang around your friends everyday if that’s what makes your days bearable but don’t let them tell you how to live. Love your parents. In your life, you won’t ever find other people who will be more loyal to you. Love your work to make it easier but get a life. Soar away. No dying man ever said he wished he spent more time in the office.

You’ve got no right to give up because it’s your duty to make the most out of this so that even when fate plays it’s dirty trick and eliminate you tomorrow, you will have the comfort that even as a mere human, you tried to fly.

I don’t talk. I can’t talk. When I speak up, listen. I don’t really say anything. I can’t talk about myself.

I will talk about what others feel. I will talk about the world. It’s a fcukin world. Let’s all fcuk up. It doesn’t matter. We will eventually be forgotten. Even this won’t be remembered. It’s not important. We’re not important.

Tell me what happened. I’ll tell you it didn’t. But in the sh!t of creation, my words won’t matter. Friends will notice but the world wouldn’t. It’s impervious to our little schemes. Who am I anyway? And who are you? I will shut my mouth on this. When I talk it might mean something to people. It won’t mean anything to me.

Don’t ask me to speak up. You can listen but you won’t have to. I will say many things about them, about this, about trash, about lies – but don’t ask questions.

About myself.

I don’t know who I am.

We’re better off not knowing.
---------------
Originally written on Tuesday, 12 August 2008 | midnight/drunken sentiments

Light a fire. Burn me. Sharpen your nails. Scratch my skin off. Grab a bottle. Throw it at me. Hold your bottle tight and just hit me. I know you won’t do it but I present my head. Exsanguinate me.

Would it help?

Laugh. Tell yourself it’s a matter of supreme indifference to you if I bled. Take Rhett Butler’s words. Then laugh again.

But inside, you’re letting your doubts kill you. Then you fight. Then you try to shut it out. Then you forget. Then what?

Then I let you.

How does a lie taste like? Would you want to throw up?

Throw me up. Didn’t the universe send you a warning? I’m poison. Dig that.

Poison. Addiction. Reason.

Assumption. Now you know. It will eat at you. It can kill you though I know you won’t let it. You will fight it. Then what?

You don’t know who I am. You don’t know your poison. You don’t know what you’re puking out. You don’t know what you’re intoxicated of. Do you know why? It’s because you think you know. It’s because you think. And will think.
---------------
Originally written on Monday, 11 August 2008 | midnight/drunken sentiments

Here then is another task: Trinity. I don't have to suck up to it to level the scale. I'm not essentially hedonistic but the other side has been taking charge of most of my thought processes that I just might start shooting cabbies for sheer pleasure. The heavenly master, his human offspring, the holy ghost: I won’t flagellate myself towards expiation, but I have to write something about trinity.

It’s an ongoing thing between friends and I. We trade topics to write about, which I believe is an indication of an unconscious fear of being reduced to plants. The brain has to exercise around issues of the world such as Pitch, Thunder, Draft, Horse, etc. Ultimately, we plan to solve the rice shortage, put order to chaos that is the permutation of the price of gas, scour the Pasig River for a more pleasant commute, and inhale this thick form of matter that is the Metro Manila atmosphere so we could all breathe easier.

Mr. Green wants order. He tests things to make sure they work as intended. He tells you what needs to be done to make things better. He’s interested in cute little things like conversation and he believes it can fix things. He does it over coffee. I do it over vodka. If your life is broken, if you just got dumped, if your friend and S.O. are dating and you need to belt out your rage on someone, I feel like he’s the right guy to talk to. He wrote about Storm. Congratulations for meeting the deadline, and my apologies for being late and this entry’s high nonsense potential. My brains oozed out of my ears because of my neighbor’s scooter. The attached pretentious speakers spewed out torturously loud noise all afternoon. The moment he started playing Tagalog covers of popular English R&B, I went comatose. I’m writing this in this state.

On the other hand, Mr. Blue will whack it in your head that there is no shortage. Run to a resto under a rain of fire called sunshine. Order as much as you want, eat as much as you can. When the glutton in you is itself protesting your excesses, leave the table and watch the games. The Blue Team must win and your leftover is inconsequential. You can’t solve the famine in Somalia by finishing your plate. But if he could, I know he will. He’s supposed to write about Deviant. He hasn’t done it yet.

As for me, Mr. Black, I’ll make sure not to undo their latent contributions to the world. I’ll make sure not to shoot a cabbie with a bullet. There are other means. And this time around, I made sure not to impose the darkness of my previous entries on the world. I feel I can threaten the universe when I write, but not this time.

Cheers to us three. Wait, do I still need to write about Trinity?

Slap

I’m sick.

I remember that certain time in college when chatting was the past time of teens approaching the non-teen years. It was one of the last efforts at frivolity. When you’re 20, you’re supposed to have really grown up. Cute alibis become lame reasons. Crazy antics become dumb moves. Chatting replaced the two-way and “Roger that, control” was kicked out of place.

It was the age before text messages virtually conquered all modes of communication in the Philippines. It was during the advent of network games, but before the emergence of modern online games. (I used to spend 10 times the money I spent on food on those pathetic games and I’d gladly do it again if I had as much time.) It was before those ever-resourceful Filipinas used the Internet as a manifestation of their, well, resourcefulness.

Yahoo! Chat was my weeknight world (weekends were my alternate universe). I derived pleasure in correcting grammar, spelling, slang usage, making romantics look like disgusting ants, playing with psychology and attempting to smash the egos of those that thought they were on top of the food chain, which I was mostly successful at. I got booted out many times but there were plenty of other rooms to be infamous in. Cheap thrill. I attacked behind the cover of a mesh of computer networks. The New Cowardice was born. I’d like to think I’m one of the pioneers.

Prick. Call me creep. Imagine me as a crawling insect. Sink your teeth in and puke. Step on me with your fake Havaianas or with that cheap Old Navy if I deserved it more, because I am that parasite that feeds on your frustrations.

Did it cross your mind that I wouldn’t have tread on your dirty linen and played with what you swept under the rug if you made sure I couldn’t get inside this tiny cubicle you call bedroom? I’m a coward and I hide under the sheets, I stop you from getting a good night sleep, I know what’s in your closet. I hid there too. You don’t hide your dirt good enough. Know this.

Or perhaps what you know is that unlike other men and all the contraptions of the universe, yours is the only presence that can rightfully inflict itself in the world of being. But if you’re an insect like I am, you can try invading my space. I will kill you. Will you do that to me before I get into yours?

One time I was chatting to this sentiment. Someone aptly replied, “Man, you’re sick.”

Remember how lolas in the province ordered you to stay in the house every time you were sick? The draft might get you. You will get worse.

The draft hits me in the face.

Shut up. Listen.

"If that illusion is indistinguishable from reality..we have no choice but to accept it as reality and deal with it as best we can. Otherwise, we might as well sit in a corner, doubt the existence of everything and just..do nothing." Jadzia Dax, Star Trek DS9:Inferno, by Judith Reeves-Stevens
---------------
I don’t know that I can but I will sing. I hated music when I was growing up because my two villainous sisters just loved drowning the conversations in Bioman or Astroboy or Shaider with the radio. TV was my world and music was theirs. Growing up in my corner of the world where MTV couldn’t conquer till much later, music and TV never went together, specially when stereos had bigger speakers that they seemed to reach into all the rooms of the household. Not only that I was the youngest of three siblings, I was also outnumbered in terms of preferred kind of entertainment. I learned to control my rage.

I grew up. In addition to hating music, I hated academics. I hated routines. I hated whatever was impractical. I couldn’t understand why I had to measure the shadow of the flagpole and the angle of the sun to figure out how high the flag actually was. I didn’t think I’d spend my life trying to find out how high a damned thing is, though I might want to pull it down to earth, exactly like what I’d want to do with the stars. But I loved the stage. I’d like to think I spent more time on stage listening to myself talk and to applause than in classrooms with no decent air-conditioning systems.

I grew up some more. Now, I don’t hear anyone clapping. I’m doing my fcuking best okay so gimme a standing ovation.

I went out with some friends one time and saw this idiot twit who went on stage to jam with the band. He delivered. The mob rose to a mindless applause. And I clapped.

The world is different now. I still need to be on a stage but I gotta play a different game. I have to sing and I can’t do it out of pitch.

I need the applause.

And it was loud

Rewind to 10 years ago. Just before midnight…

Cut classes. Slept till after sunset. Again. Had more that enough sleep but somehow, I don’t feel rested. My hands shake as I turn the shower knob. It might be the hangover. It might be my turbulent mind. It might be the hormones playing with my insides. I’m 17 years old and I don’t know what to make of my life. Bullsh!t, not this demon of a thought again.

I get off of the shower after infinity has passed. I’m dripping wet. I light a stick for supper and stare at the mirror. I look good enough to eat. That’s the ego talking. I don’t mind. I force my hands through my closet and grab something to wear. I put on my windbreaker. It’s a slow night. I get out of my pad and I’m greeted by a full moon and a cold breeze. Nice.

I walk four blocks to the convenience store and get a six-pack. I’m starting to relax. It’s going to be okay. I’m young. I have demons in my head but my brain works, and not always in fcuked up ways. I’m alive.

My feet take me to a bridge for some reason. I sit on the edge, my feet dangling 30 meters above a loudly gushing, murky river. It might be the sewers. Who am I to decide what it is? I cut classes again.

I open another can. Decadence. But hell, it’s going to be okay. It’s a breezy night, I’m young, I’m alive.

Suddenly, I hear the sound of thunder.

Septic

"I followed all the rules; man's, God's - and you... you followed none of them. But they loved you more [...] even my own wife." Alfred Ludlow, Legends of the Fall, by Edward Zwick and David Wagreich

“Life is under no obligation to give us what we expect.” Gone With The Wind, by Margarette Mitchell
---------------
Life: Call it sh!t - it's one of the few words that cause more than a little uproar. It couldn't get any better even if you sprayed it with perfume. The smell is masked but the sick truth holds: it stinks.

Like Alice, sometimes you gotta run twice as fast to stay in place. Kick some butt and though sometimes you couldn't exactly say there'd be hell to pay, payback comes in fcuked up terms. Save someone else's neck but get real. You don't pull off anything that sticks to you except that you dished out that generosity you want given to yourself.

Life has a retarded sense of humor. Cut yourself a little slack and when you get back to reality, you discover that reality still bites. And it chews.

Get back at it. It might make a Sisyphus out of you but keep pushing the boulder, damnit. Don't be a wuss. Stick up the middle finger and shove it at reality's face like some power ammo. You can't ever really fight back against the indifference the universe puts up but it's a way of saying, "Here I am, still alive and thrashing about." You can't piss life the way it pisses you but you can always try.

Don't complain; that's useless. It will always be that way. That's how the world works. If the universe listened to prayers, man wouldn't have been created. Life is a screwed up game where everything is priced higher than what it's worth. That means you can't win anyhow. It sucks, but the real loser is the one who quits. It's premature, shamelessly dramatic and unpardonably ugly. Grab a beer, get back at life, stick up the middle finger, and get the most out of it even if it means you gotta wear your butt out but don't complain because in the first place, nobody ever said that life is fair.

Are You Alive?

"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience is the trade name of the firm." Sir Henry Wotton, The Picture Of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde

"It's not safe out here! It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid." Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation, by Gene Roddenberry

"Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it." Ricky Fitts, American Beauty, by Sam Mendes
----------
“The red pill or the blue pill?” Modern placebo. I'll take both, let’s see what happens. That's the postmodern attitude... Don't ask me, I don't know what that means.

I don’t make sense. The world doesn’t either. The only time it does is when living becomes too much of a damn paradise that you scream so hard your throat starts to burn and your teeth shoot out gunning down whoever's in the trajectory. That might never happen.

You wouldn't know if you didn’t try everything. Explore. Take the adventure. Please the senses. If you missed out on something, it might never happen again and it'd be your goddamn fault.

Just do it. Don't be afraid. Sin is a manmade construct. It's weak like flesh when it's dead and rotting. Pleasure isn't. It's more than an idea. It's solid. It's a hardcore legacy from those awesome beasts we now call humans. If you gotta be scared, be scared of getting stuck, of uselessness, of death. If you’ve always been scared, there's no use being afraid of death. You were never alive to begin with.

Cheap, but I won't buy it

Yuppies. Who do they think they are?

Young urban professionals. I doubt that they know the etymology. Most of them aren’t bright. They’re just deluded. They think they’re on top of their class; most of them aren’t. They think that by being able to say the word Proactive, everybody must be impressed. I’m not. It isn’t an IQ or economic status determinant. Lately, it has come to equate with pretentiousness.

To them and their fellow decadents, it is a matter of fact that a yuppie is richer, hipper, and more technologically savvy than his average contemporaries - hence, more worthy of respect. Let me educate you: the yuppie came into being in America in the early 1980s post Vietnam War period, which ushered the end of radical idealism. It was replaced by materialism. The yuppie philosophy dictates that one must succeed at all costs. A yuppie can be dumb, previously without taste, and ill-bred as long as he works for a call center even when that call center is after cheap labor instead of what is grammatically correct. His employment doesn’t prove anything. A yuppie can be ugly and inept as long as he is a sucker who can suck up to his Ayala and Ortigas bosses and wipe their butts. His corporate wardrobe doesn’t prove anything. A yuppie can be well over his 30s as long as he has the nerve or shamelessness to deny the obvious and has a car he is willing to starve for even if he can’t afford to buy gas or pay a parking fee. Put more simply and in words succinct enough for them to understand, a yuppie is a pretentious jerk and a useless tissue matter. I’m sorry, are the words Useless and Jerk redundant? Go figure. There’s a thing called dictionary. Just an advice: that’s called dictionary and it isn’t a substitute for the head.

Drink Me

Understand that I don’t drink to prove how tough I am. Understand that I don’t drink to count with my bottles the number of girls I currently date. Understand that I don’t drink to prove I can topple everyone and sweep them under the table like some broken glass. I drink because I want to and I’m not out to prove anything. You wanna prove something. That’s you. That’s bullsh!t.

Who says drinking is a "guy thing?" I have a girl friend who can guzzle up three bottles of tequila and still pronounce the longest word in the dictionary without faltering. I bet you don’t even know what that is. She isn’t masculine. Take the number of girls charmed by your conscious effort at whatever a "guy thing" is, and the number of guys drawn to her charm. You lose. You try to compensate with alcohol. Wake up: it doesn't work that way.

Mine is bigger than your average dick and I can finish three six-packs while you eat supper and still be able to walk two miles for another round from 7-Eleven. By the time I’m having that next round, I’ll sing you an R&B hitting the right notes all the time. I don’t intend to prove anything but you must be told: if you measure yourself by the number of bottles you can empty, you’re nothing but bottle. You’re on the edge alright. When given a bit of a push, you crash down to smithereens. Pull yourself together, assh0le. Tell me you can finish 10 mucho mugs but frankly my dear, you aren’t quite the macho you fantasize to be.

Kabadtripan

1) Sam Milby’s smile or his approximation thereof.
2) Foreigners acting like they own my country and countrymen who make them feel that way.
3) People airing their misfortunes and blaming it all on the President as though she is solely responsible for that feature of existence called life.
4) Evangelists who practically say you will go to hell assh0le if you don’t join them.
5) MRT/LRT Escalators that won’t work and those able-bodied beggars at the foot of the stairs.
6) Noontime shows whose hosts scream in pretended joy, and goad their contestants to reveal their darkest sorrows squeezing every bit of a tear for the public to see.
7) Sappy and self-important commercials.
8) Local brands of that stuff they call corned beef.
9) Cabbies that reason out - once they open their mouths, you are bound to hear something that will ruin your day.
10) That mountain at the corner of my room called laundry.
11) Friends’ parents who assume that you’re the keeper of their child when out of sight.
12) Call center dweebs in their fake subtlety in assuring everybody that they do work for a call center.
13) Nursing students assuring everybody that they do know the medical field.
14) People who assert their intelligence by quoting (and misquoting) textbook.
15) Loudmouthed moviegoers and those who’d rather text than understand a plot.
16) Hollywood flicks that are more like loud music videos or video games.
17) Novelty songs as muzak in PUVs and malls and restaurants but thankfully are diminishing in airplay.
18) Karaoke patrons who understand singing as a style of reading in various forms of loudness.
19) Aired singing competitions whose contestants can’t sing.
20) Has-beens staging concerts in the P.I. (a marketing strategy I know but it just makes them look like malcontent suckers).
21) Rock bands who insist that rock is all about shouting.
22) Boy bands who call their music non-pop and respectable.
23) Girls who believe they’re cool because they smoke.
24) Guys who believe they’re cool because they drive.
25) Girls who think they’re gorgeous because they have boyfriends, vice versa.
26) Girls who pretend they’re drunk then ask favors and losers who proudly oblige.
27) Girls who think they’re sexy because they drink tequila.
28) Guys who think they’re “the man” because they drink, period.
29) The terrible price of beer in better bars and restos.
30) People with MP3 players who wear their little gadgets like jewelry.
31) Nokia for giving the market a headache about whatmodelthis and whatmodelthat toys (they don’t look like cellphones to me).
32) Forwarded messages that flood the inbox with jokes that aren’t in the least bit funny.
33) Forwarded messages that fcuking promise the worse if not forwarded more.
34) MS Word’s grammar checker, which insists that my spelling is wrong and underlines most of the above items for correction unless they are bulleted.

Assumption

It eats the brain like a carnivorous worm. It feeds as if it will never feed again. Self-preservation. It devours reason as if it’s on a dreadfully strict diet when it could feed on humor instead. But that could be worse. Rob me off of my sanity, but let me be happy.

I’ll flick it off if I could. Stick it to the hinges of my bedroom door before I step out and bang it shut. Mash it with a flip flop until it seeps through the wooden floor and stinks.

Let it hold the reigns and it will drive you to the farthest and most impertinent paths in swift movements where your sanity is jettisoned like empty wooden boxes. It’s worse than nicotine. Worse than alcohol. Worse than a drug. It’s a recurring headache for which you won’t take medicine.

It’s not that you like it for all your denied masochistic tendencies. You will compromise yourself, commit to something you know is dangerous to start with, wish for the best and hope that your feelings and time and attention are requited. Nothing really happens to smash your expectations but for some bizarre reason, the worm feeds again.

Counterstroke

I’ll shout your name but I won’t say I’ll remember it. I’ll take it as it is. But to begin with, I have to know what this is. I’ll find out.

Do you think it would matter to me if I found out this isn’t real? Do you think this is my world? Do you think that I bleed? The question really is, do you think?

I do.

I drink, I smoke, I breathe. I sleep, I get up, I move, I run. I’m messed, I’m jaded, I throw up, I call you, but you need to know that whether or not you come, I’ll live and won’t run after you if it were up to me. I know that I’m alive although you may not, but don’t dare tell me you don’t know that I feel. I’ve shown enough. Would you ask for more?

I’m messed. How do you like it? Give me the freedom to assume you are hooked. Then give me the freedom to think that this is all a bad game. Now think.

How do you know that it has become real? Or should I even ask? Are you interested to find out? Or is that too heavy for your head?

I know you’d rather sleep. With all the places we went to and the things we had to deal with, you’re tired. It’s been another day. Go to bed now. Close your eyes and forget. We’ll play again soon. We have the reason to. Give me the privilege to assume that you made sure of it.

Go to bed now and tomorrow when you wake up, wake up to Monday as if it were any other day because the sun will shine on you like it always does, you get up and hit the shower, drink a glass of water and before you put on your shirt, light a stick and think about your neat little game. You may think about your next move and think about me in it, if you so choose, if you think at all, but just before you step right out of that door, you will stand before the mirror. You will look at the reflection but do not be surprised if – with all your presumptions about who’s in control – it will be me that you see.

Then I’ll hear you call my name.

My Name Is Bitch

Look at me. I am young and I am free; it doesn’t matter what I do with my face to make it look fairer, it doesn’t matter that I can’t buy a plane ticket when I want to get away – I give the impression. I will talk as if I am on top of the world while you sit here right beside me. The wind blows. Listen. Until you feel you know me.

We’ll go somewhere else. You will want to take me everywhere. Let’s play. The world is a pretty big place but I will talk to you until you feel you are my world. Talk to me. You won’t catch my eyes but you will feel you know me. You will feel like you own me.

I was a mess. I am a freak. But dress me up. Feed me. Show me off. I won’t be the prettiest face they’ve seen. I won’t be the biggest happening they’ve been to. But I could make it happen for you. Buy me.

I’ll mess with your head. I’ll be your poison. I can become your addictive reason when reason could no longer stand upright. I will tell you to fight for me when you are confused. I will tell you I’ll be there. I will tell you so many things whispering softly in your ear until it bleeds, until it becomes too loud to listen, until you’re no longer happy.

Feed on me. It’s unhealthy but you won’t believe it. You’re scared now. Believe it but you won’t do anything about it. There will be nothing else left to believe in… when you know me.

I’ll keep talking until you no longer know me. Then you’ll start questioning yourself.

You don’t know what I do at night when you’re not watching. It doesn’t matter if I go out dancing, or go on dancing in my head. It means the same thing. In both instances, I tell you: you’d rather be somewhere else.

But you’re still here even as you want to go places, want to dance, want to sing, want to scream, want to win, want to own me because suddenly, you’re wanting again with that intensity of purpose that was lost in you some time ago, somehow. You’re here anyway and you can’t stop yourself from drinking me in as if I were your salvation because face it, I move you, I make you feel, I seize your head, I mess your life when in that instance before I came along, there was nothing in you worth messing. I gave you that. Even as you do not know who I am, you know what to call me. You know how I taste like. Eat me.

And when I leave, you will punch the wall until your knuckles fall off. But don’t. Punch yourself. Bleed. You let me in.

And when everything turns red, shout my name.