Remarkable

by Max Lucado

Every day I have the honor of sitting down with a book that contains the words of the One who created me. Every day I have the opportunity to let him give me a thought or two on how to live.

If I don’t do what he says, he doesn’t burn the book or cancel my subscription. If I disagree with what he says, lightning doesn’t split my swivel chair or an angel doesn’t mark my name off the holy list. If I don’t understand what he says, he doesn’t call me a dummy.

In fact, he calls me “Son,” and on a different page explains what I don’t understand.

Remarkable.

At the end of the day when I walk through the house, I step into the bedrooms of three little girls. And one by one, I bend over and kiss the foreheads of the angels God has loaned me. Then I stand in the doorway and wonder why in the world he would entrust a stumbling, fumbling fellow like me with the task of loving and leading such treasures.

Remarkable.

Then I go and crawl into bed with a woman far wiser than I … a woman who deserves a man much better looking than I … but a woman who would argue that fact and tell me from the bottom of her heart that I’m the best thing to come down her pike.

After I think about the wife I have, and when I think that I get to be with her for a lifetime, I shake my head and thank the God of grace for grace and think, Remarkable.

I’m learning not to take these everyday miracles for granted.

I’m discovering many things: traffic jams eventually clear up, sunsets are for free, Little League is a work of art, and most planes take off and arrive on time. I’m learning that most folks are good folks who are just as timid as I am about starting a conversation.

I’m meeting people who love their country and their God and their church and would die for any of the three.

I’m learning that if I look … if I open my eyes and observe … there are many reasons to take off my hat, look at the Source of it all, and just say thanks.

From In the Eye of the Storm
Copyright 1991, Max Lucado

To Not Expect

There are times when you come to work looking forward to a great day but you end up so harassed at 6pm, you almost resemble a lost puppy forgotten in a thunderstorm. There are also those times when you so dread what's coming to you only to be pleasantly surprised that it wasn't so bad after all. Is this the law of the unexpected working? Does the mantra that goes, "Thou who does not expect does not get disappointed..." hold more truth than ever? Is this why salesmen sandbag, challengers low-ball, people who receive compliments show a face of false humility?

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cheers! dinner meetings you didn't expect to go very well, but did
it's ok... if you missed another out-of-town vacation because today, work takes the higher priority
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WoW Davao!

Top 8 Reasons Davao is More than the Usual:

1. Yosi Kadiri! Never will you find cigarette smokers light one up in public areas. If there is no Smoking Area sign, you cannot smoke. The smokers are quarantined in a room while people with no cancer-stick-burning urges stay in the main area. How refreshing it was to go home from a night of drinky-drinky with your hair not smelling like you used it to sweep cigarette ash into an ashtray filled with butts!

2. PhP26 (US$0.50) peso taxi rate. For non-aircon taxis, that is. Not that most of us mind. The jeepneys around the city rarely emit smoke from their diesel engines and the weather is not deadly hot. Hurray for cheap cabs!

3. Sunny during the day, rainy at night. In other words, beach weather during the day, and cuddle-y weather while you sleep!

4. Seafood galore! Fresh and Cheesy Garlic oysters for our appetizer, Crispy Pata, Tuna Buntot, Kinilaw, Chopseuy & Adobong Pusit for our main course, and fresh mango shake all around for our drinks/dessert. Headcount: 13 pax. Total Bill: less than PhP3,400 (roughly US$65!). Priceless indeed.

On our last day, we went to Citra Mina Seafood Market to buy some fresh fish. For PhP 560 (a little more than US$10), I brought home 4 x smoked bangus, 1 x tuna panga, 1 x tuna belly & 1 x tuna sashimi, all packed in a check-in-ready styro box. Whoopee!

5. Cheap Drinky-drinks. A pitcher of flavored Margarita: PhP350 (US$6.7). I was in heaven.

6. From Island to Highland. A white-sand beach is 10 mins away. A Tagaytay-like hideaway is an hour's drive from the airport.

7. Mangosteen, Pomelo, Marang. Oooh! Some of those fruits are almost foreign to the Manilenos, but ask any Davaoeno and they will each have their say about where to get the best deal on these heavenly fruits! I bought a whole box of pomelos (around 11 pieces) for Php630 and the vendors were so nice that they gave us 4 pieces of peeled ones as "gifts". They were promptly consumed by Carlo, Marje and I. Winner ito!

8. Durian. This fruit, to me, is so special that it deserves its own entry in my Top 6. Those who have eaten durian chips, durian ice cream, durian candy or durian pastillas and have tasted fresh durian will agree when I say the taste is nowhere near those of the processed products. From what I learned from my short visit, there are 3 main varieties available in Davao: the Bangkok, the yellow and the native varieties. My personal favorite: native one.

How does one describe the durian experience? This spiky, to the point of deadly (to those people who are tasked to harvest it --- imagine a whole durian falling on your head as you walk under its tree!), fruit is indeed a wonder. There are people who cannot stand the smell of this weird thing (weird would be an understatement); will not touch it with a ten-feet pole; will not even DARE taste its yellow meat. The smell is supposedly so offensive, that bringing durian inside public places, like your hotel, for instance, is banned. Wipe your durian-stained hands on your shirt and the smell stays (and will spread to the rest of your clothes in the bag) until you get back to Manila. Eat it and smell it in your breath as you burp!

If one is brave enough to overcome these to actually try it, the "King of the Fruits" will reward him with its taste that is almost indescribable! It's butter-y, but not quite. It's fibrous, but not really. It melts in your mouth, but not too much... I will go back to Davao if only to taste this fruit again!

By the way, it's mega-high in calories, and is considered an aphrodisiac (what?!! a fruit that is an aphrodisiac?!). YES.

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cheers! a business trip that ended with pasalubong-shopping
it's ok... if you dread the work-week. Everyone dreads it too!
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Breaking from a break

During lunch, Inaki asked me how my vacation was. I looked at him in confusion, wondering what he meant. "It was a long weekend, right? So it was pretty much an unplanned vacation... ? So, did you go out of town? How was it?" At the time, my mind was still stuck with the unfinished email I left in my ThinkPad before Jeanette & Aleta almost dragged me out of my desk for a much needed lunchbreak.

Time-check then was 12:40pm and already the 3 day weekend felt like weeks ago. Don't you think it's funny how we always need a "break" before coming back from a break? You just want a few hours at your desk to catch up on missed emails, reply to urgent voice messages and make appointments for the following week. All these, WITHOUT interruption in the form of calls, texts, unexpected cubicle visits or someone asking for your time for a super-mega-important-urgent-but-quick-I-promise meeting. If there's one thing I hate, it is to finish a long and very busy day and realizing that NONE of your To Dos were ticked. It just meant that your hours were controlled by other people, without you even realizing it.

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Man, was it raining this morning on my way to work! The floods and the sheer volume of cars stretched my travel time from 45 mins to an hour and a half today. Geez.

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cheers! competently answering a note from your GM demanding root causes and actions to address "our lack of progress" in a high-focus area
it's ok... if you weren't able to go to the gym... just because.
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To Prada or not to Prada

Spent my afternoon at the mall with my sister, Paula. Had some good old-fashion bonding over traffic, shopping, popcorn and the chick-flick of the moment, The Devil Wears Prada.


I'm sure everyone has had their share of hellish experiences with their bosses. Some days yours will be kind, supportive & reasonable. Other times, you would feel like this person you work for is the spawn of less angelic origins.

When I found out that Meryl Streep will be playing the role of Miranda Priestly, I was giddy with excitement to watch the film. Though I wasn't really imagining her when I was reading the book, I knew she would be the perfect actress to play the role of such a vicious, cold-hearted biach. And an amazing biach, she was! The scrutinizing but stoic look, the scarce nods of approval, the devil-may-care manner in which she casually throws, "That's all," to dismiss you and signal the end of a conversation (regardless of your concerns, opinions and/or confusion)... all these Meryl Streep executes brilliantly, with perfectly manicured tips and not a single strand of hair out of place.

Of course, the couture was just as amazing! Oh, I would watch it again... if only to get a longer glimpse of the gorgeous outfits, the flawless make-up and absolutely to-die-for SHOES! (Excuse me while I casually ask the Imelda in me to make itself scarce). My sister and I almost drooled at the sight of such pretty designer clothes.

Hilariously, when Nigel, Runway's Fashion Editor, said that size 6 is the new 14, I almost choked on the Holy Kettle Corn I was happily munching at the time. Apparently, in the world of glam New York fashion, 6 is considered hideously fat. Ooooh... the peril!

Eventually, Andy (Anne Hathaway) joins the game and swaps her Northwestern getup with sophisticated, polished and very now, designer clothes. She ends up wearing stilettos that also go clackity-clack on the marbled lobby floor.

Being naturally smart and a whole lot stylish, Andy gains Miranda's respect, but... loses her love and her friends in the process. What is a girl to do??

The movie ends with Andy realizing that she had almost sold her soul to the Prada-wearing-Runway-Goddess, Miranda Priestly. And it happily concludes with Andy tossing her Blackberry into a public fountain in Paris and simply walking away from it all.

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Andy Sachs, The Devil Wears Prada: Thousands of people would KILL for your job... soon you may find yourself begging them to do just that.

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cheers! ticks on my to-do list
it's ok... if you're between sizes 4 and 6 and that you sometimes find yourself putting an M back to the rack because you're buying an L.
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So... to Prada or not to Prada? Maybe... but to Jimmy Choo? ... to Manolo Blahnik? If I can afford it or someone gives these to me for free? Oh yes, definitely, YES!

photos courtesy of Foxmovies and jimmychoo.com

Those Blog Things

I didn't know I was THIS goody-goody!

How Evil Are You?

Pitter-patter on a Sunday morning

Woke up this morning in a potentially VERY BAD mood. Went to sleep last night at almost 2am after watching Dodgeball (typical Ben Stiller movie, but hilarious, just the same!) and talking to my bud for our usual weekend online date. I was cozy and dreaming, cuddled up in my pillows and fresh sheets when I got startled by a rap on my door. It was our helper telling me that my airport transfer is already waiting for me outside our gate. I rubbed my eyes and hastily looked at my calendar, trying my best to remember where the hell I'm supposed to be travelling to. I finally told her they must have been given the wrong Llanto, as it has happened before: they were supposed to pick up my Tita--who's also a Llanto, obviously, also works for IBM, but... lives 20 mins from our house. The helper came back to tell they do have the right person and someone from the Alamo Head Office is on the phone asking for me. To cut the long-winding story short, our wonderful and brilliant travel agency gave Alamo the wrong departure date. They gave instructions to pick me up from the house today, the 20th, and from the airport on the 23rd. They said I was leaving for Cebu when in fact, I'm leaving on the 23rd and will come back on the 26th. And I'll be going nowhere near Cebu. I am leaving for Davao. Gosh. Oh, and after 6 years of regular travel, the agency still has my address wrong (but that's another story). I can actually go on and on about past experiences to showcase how their service stinks, but I won't go there--not today...

Now, problem is, I can't change my travel agent. IBM's global contract with American Express dictates that we can only work with one travel agency, otherwise our travel expenses will not be reimbursed. It's frustrating how we get charged an arm and a leg and end up with service quality that sucks!

So anyway, since I'm one of those people who find it hard to go back to sleep just like that, I find myself eating breakfast at 7:30 on a Sunday morning. On the brighter side of things, I got to write in my blog, get to read Zsa Zsa Zaturnnah and spend some quality time with my dad over coffee, sardines and the Sunday paper. I am also blessed today by a wonderfully slow morning. With light rain drizzling outside, the cool weather and nothing too serious to finish for hours... it's looking to be a good day, after all.

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cheers! long and slow weekends
it's ok... if you're a victim of other people's gaps in brilliance
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Bloggity-blog

promised genot (and myself!) too many times that I'll update my blog. i kinda have to be worthy of being that first name in her 'beach bums' link list! the problem is what to write, what to write? hmmm... it's pathetic how i can make so little sense after so many words into this post!

gen left for canada almost a week from today. it's great that she keeps us updated thru her blogs. the world IS getting smaller, isn't it? sometimes it overwhelms me how a lot of my friends have left the phils and are now based in different countries... there's one in KL, one in canada, in singapore, a couple in shanghai, another in canada, and of course tons in the US... at this day and age, it seems as if those despedidas are not really about permament goodbyes. with the internet, mobile roaming, and ridiculously low plane tickets (i just saw an NWA ad this morning offering a roundtrip ticket to the US for only 550 bucks! -- that's how much it used to cost to get your bum to singapore 2 years ago!) it is always, "see you again soon".