What Happened in December

This December has been a pretty hectic month (as it is for everyone, I guess.)

The Hong Kong-Macau trip at the end of November with my teammates was fun, but it also meant I had some catching up to do at work as soon as I got back. Once December came though, the company Christmas parties came one after the other. First was the company-wide party/charity fundraiser at PTTC beside the Manila World Trade Center (it was originally supposed to be at the Megatent in Ortigas, but was moved to PTTC less than a week from the event because of some, uh, trouble? in Megatent.) Next, there was my team's planning session/team building/holiday party at the really nice Punta de Fabian resort in Baras, Rizal. It also served as our farewell party for our teammate Mel, who's leaving to take up her Masters in Australia.

In between those two events, I went up to Baguio to attend Karon and Wayne's wedding. This was the third destination-wedding-care-of-former-teammates that I attended this year, after Camille and Marlon's Baguio wedding and Mich and James' Iloilo wedding. Baguio at this time of the year is just so nice. The weather, the food and the sights are awesome, and of course, Wayne and Karon's wedding was really nice too (the food was GREAT!)

Congratulations, Karon and Wayne!

After that, there was the AMG (our group) year-ender party at the New World Hotel, where everyone was dressed well, and the food was great and the party was nice. It's probably the best HP party without alcoholic drinks I've been to (because for some reason, alcoholic drinks aren't allowed at official company parties anymore, effectively killing any chances of the HP Beer Bash ever coming back... Boooooo!)

And that's why a day away from Christmas eve, I'm still not done buying Christmas gifts for my godkids and housemates. (Actually, it's really because I'm not a big fan of Christmas shopping and I'm a lazy shopper... but why say that when you can claim to be busy attending parties?)

Before Our Noche Buena Starts...

Happy Holidays, Season's Greetings, and Merry Christmas to you all!

Here are some Christmas things I found on youtube:

Wherever you are and whoever you're with, enjoy the happy, special moments this day brings and the love of the people around you!

5 is The Number of the Week.

I got five (5!!!!) new shirts as gifts last Christmas. Is that a subtle sign that the clothes I wear suck? If so, noted, and LOL.

The other thing I enjoyed doing last Christmas was buying gifts for my godchildren (I've got 5 so far), mostly because they're all kids/babies/pre-teens and it's always fun to look for the coolest toys and other baby items. My oldest godchild is actually around 10 or 11 (or 12?) years old already (I don't think I was even a teenager yet when he was born) (his name is Denzel btw, and yes, he was named after Denzel Washington), so instead of buying him a toy, I gave him 3 Hardy Boys books instead, since I was about his age when I started reading books.

Yep, those Hardy Boys paperbacks (and Archie comics) were the main reasons why I got into reading.



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Now playing: Newton Faulkner - Foundations (Live On The Live Lounge)
via FoxyTunes

Gifts as Character Reference

I just did my Christmas shopping earlier today, which is actually pretty early for me. Last year, I was still scrambling to buy Christmas gifts on the 24th.

Anyway, one of the things I found were these cellphone-holder-while-you-charge things:













The idea is you plug in your cellphone charger through the angel/devil's mouth, wrap the charger cord around its neck, and leave the cellphone sitting comfortably on its lap. I found them charming (and convenient) enough (which are also qualities one should look for in a one-night stand, btw), so I bought about a dozen of them, divided equally between the Angel and Devil design. I figured I'd give my nice friends the Angel ones, and my asshole friends the Devil ones. See, this way, not only will I be giving them a gift, I'll also be giving them an idea of how pleasant or nasty I think they are.*

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Another thing that I recently bought is this 17-in desktop monitor that I'm staring at right now. My old monitor was making its best efforts in giving me a migraine and turning me colorblind by filling the screen alternately with blinking, saturated greens, blues and reds, so I was only too happy to get rid of it. Good thing Mich and James, the eBay conglomerate that they are, were selling this item at the time I was looking for one. At least now, I can put being colorblind at the bottom of my "things to worry about" list.




*For the record, I'm just kidding, and I'm keeping a devil design for myself.
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Now playing: Modest Mouse - Spitting Venom
via FoxyTunes

All We Need Are Blinking Christmas Lights.

I didn't realize that Christmas is actually less than two weeks away until I bought Christmas gifts for my college friends before our dinner last night. That's odd.

It's probably because luck hasn't been on my side lately. Or because I really am getting a bit too old for the shiz that is the season of joy and gift giving and Santa and merrymaking. Or maybe it's because our company's Christmas party was canceled because of cost-cutting measures (and to think that I was actually complaining about last year's sucky Christmas Party. Now, all I can say is at least '07 actually had one.) Or maybe it's because our Christmas tree doesn't actually have Christmas lights on it.

Aaaaand, I'm actually part of the Christmas Party committee for our team. So, I really need to step up my Christmas spirit, I guess.

Hell Yeah

Snow in Zakopane, and Parties in Manila

I've been back in Manila for more than a few weeks now, but hey, better something than nothing.



Here are some pics from our trip to Zakopane

Zakopane is a nice, small town up in the mountains in the southern part of Poland, near the Slovakian border. We stayed at a really nice hostel called Stara Polana. And we made a snow man!

The place is really beautiful. The ten-hour train trip was worth it. =)

I came home just in time to join our off-site team building trip to Anilao, and two company Christmas parties. The trip to Anilao was awesome; my teammates are always fun to be with. The first Christmas party was for our bundle, the HP AMG-DME group. It was a costume party, as usual, and our team came as characters from Robin Hood. It was a pretty good party (I got a 10-cup coffee maker as a door prize!) I'll post pics on my multiply site later.

The second party was for the whole company, and to be blunt about it, it sucked ass. Logistics was awful and the food wasn't all that great. I can't wait to fill out that post-party survey.

Merry Christmas everybody (who celebrates it)! Happy Holidays (to those who will get to spend one)! and have a Happy New Year (if you get by the next eight days without dying)!



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Now playing: The Postal Service - Such Great Heights
via FoxyTunes

little tests, why I can't be a motivational speaker, and why Natalie Portman owns my soul.

I need a shirt (white, plain)

I need a pen and paper (not anymore)

I need a drink (a glass of water would suffice)

Last week I was on a team building weekend get-away, and one of the activities we had was to choose 15, from a series of 50something, statements that best describe us. Each of the 50something statements fall under one of six different categories: Acheivement, Autonomy, Influence, Relationship, Security, and Balance. These six categories are actually categories of motivational factors. We chose our 15 statements beforehand. During the event itself, the six categories were revealed to us and we then had to tally how many of our chosen statements fell on each category.

Once the tallying was done, I found out that, according to this little test, my dominant motivational factor is Relationship, as 4 of my fifteen statements were on this category. I would have thought that the category that would win was Influence (who got three, as do Autonomy and Balance), so I was very surprised that Relationship did top the survey.

Why the surprise? Let's see. I have had only one serious non-platonic (after consulting my mental thesaurus because I did not want to use the word "romantic") relationship in the past. I also have none in the present, not even plans. If you asked for the name of my best friend, well, you won't get an answer. I never strike up a conversation with anyone I'm not already friends with(unless I'm drunk, and in that case, I shout at any one that's in front of me). I enjoy doing many different activities while I'm alone (going to the mall, eating, watching the tv). Simply put, on a scale of Yes to No, my rating of how sociable and eager to relate I am to people is No. Not that I'm anti-social (I'm not), or I'm uncomfortable/scared of being with people(I, again, am not)... But relationship as the main motivating factor to my performance at work (let alone life) just does not strike me as accurate.

In fact, I think it's the worst kind of motivational factor, because most of it's power rely on how other people respond to you. You can be the nicest, kindest, most generous person in the world and it still would not matter if you work with people who are plain assholes (not that I work with any), or the situation is just so extreme that you can't stop feeling negative about every little thing. And once you do succeed in making a relationship work, how would it help you then? When things are going shitty, your friends will make you laugh, but it will not increase your job satisfaction. It will not take away the bad policies of your company. It will not set you up for a more lucrative position in the future.

It just doesn't make sense to make relationships your motivation to succeed.

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Maybe it's my lack of relationships that's motivating me to choose relationships as the dominant motivational factor in improving my performance at work (and in life). What a trick. I hate self-evaluation-conducive tests.

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One of the things we did in the short gap between drinking and sleeping was to play spin the bottle. Once we got bored with asking one person a question that they may not want to be asked, we moved on with asking each other questions that we may usually find in a Grade Fiver's slum book. One of the questions asked was "I am happy because _____" (okay, so it's more fill in the blank than answer a question). I answered that I am happy because I am financially-stable. if you were to ask me that again, this time I would say that I am happy because I realize that I don't need to get paid to do my passion.

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Speaking of passion, one issue I'm really passionate about is this policy our company has about not paying its employees any holiday premium for working on a holiday. I deserve a fucking good explanation at least, on why they are not following the labor laws of the Philippines. On why we are being cheated out of what is fairly ours. I don't think the company I work for is going bankrupt anytime soon. Its number 11 in the Fortune 500 list for fuck's sake. Why can't they pay their employees(us) a decent holiday premium for working our asses off on Christmas? On New Year? at 3 in the fucking morning!???!

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I am writing this at 5 in the morning, Dec 23. I was supposed to sleep about 3 hours ago, but as I was about to lie down my bed, I turned the tv to HBO, which was then showing Closer. Which is why I am still awake up to now. Because really, can you actually go to sleep after watching that movie? Wow.

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I'm writing this now, Dec 25 4:25 am. Have a great Christmas Day everyone.

also posted on my Multiply: Bloodsport and Riot

Pasko, ikaw na naman?

Last Tuesday, my company held its Christmas Party at the Le Pavillon. The theme was Le Carnivale, and there were clowns, people on stilts, and mimes everywhere. The party was really fun, it started at around 6 pm and ended at about 1am (i think). The food was blah to be honest... It was supposedly catered by the Hyatt Hotel, but the food wasn't really all that interesting. (Last year's food was better.) All performances featured my co-workers, and most of it was really fun to watch. Cheers performers!

One thing I hated though was I got almost exactly the same freebie gift that I got last year! (Last year, I got a rectangular baking dish, this year I got an oval baking dish.) The good thing though: Free Overflowing Beer! Any party with an open bar is a great party if you ask me.

Then on Friday, I went to another Christmas party, this time it was the our Bundle's Christmas party. As it's becoming a tradition of sorts for out team, we were all supposed to come in costume. Two year's ago the theme was the 80's, last year it was the Movies, and this year it was White. Each sub-team had to wear a common costume, as long as it was predominantly white. The party was held at our teammate's house in not-so-nearby Commonwealth. (We came 2 hours late, besides getting caught in traffic, we took some time dressing up, and also had to take a slight detour to pick up some props: our balloons.) Oh yeah, we came as kids in a kiddie party

Last thing on the agenda last week was our sub-team's Team Building. We left Manila Saturday evening and made our way to Tagaytay City, Cavite where we had dinner at Lesley's (the dinner was heartstoppingly delicious: Bulalo, Crispy Pata and Sisig. Yum!) After dinner, we proceeded to this awesome house in Nasugbu, Batangas (thanks Vic!) where we slept till late in the morning. The next day, we went to San Juan, Batangas to enjoy the beach! We booked ourselves to La Luz Resort. La Luz was a little disappointing. The rooms were really nice, but aside from the beach, there was not much to do once the sun came down. Good thing we brought some vodka with us. That definitely kept us entertained till the early morning. We played our team's favorite game, 1-7-11 (woohoo!), and another game that Primo introduced to us, Raise (Race?) It wasn't really a game as much as it was a way for us to finish of the bottle of vodka. WOOHOO! Once the vodka bottle was all cleaned out, we used it to play spin the bottle. All I can say is, we didn't have enough bottles to get us to talk out of our asses that night.

Cheers to all who organized the parties! Last week's parties was really fun.

One party I failed to go to was the one organized by my college friends. It ran smack into out team building, so I couldn't make it. Sorry guys.

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On a more bitter point, I'll be working on both Dec 25 and Jan 1. Jeez... And what do we, holiday workers, get for it? Nothing. Not even 1% extra pay for working on those two holidays. Because the company I work for somehow has this twisted policy where they do not pay their employees anything for working on holiday. And they expect us to be motivated and deliver high-quality output.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.