...it'll be my birthday! Yay! I have been making a wishlist of the things I want to get. I know I won't get any of it, but that doesn't dampen my spirit. I am still going to make a list. After all wishing is free.

So here is my birthday wishlist:

• a five day vacation to Palawan
  
• an iPhone 3G
  
• a 500 GB LaCie Rugged Hard Disk - FireWire 800, FireWire 400, and USB 2.0
  
• an AirPort Express
  
• a manual Mini Cooper - Astro Black, Chili Red, or Lightning Blue please
  
• a Canon PowerShot SD790 IS
  

If I get a simple greeting on my birthday, I would treasure it the most. After all, having someone remember me is better than all the things in the world.

I presume someone knows, worldwide, the tragedy that happened to M/V Princess of the Stars. This is the latest among the list of Sulpicio Line's maritime tradegy. I am not blogging late. As a matter of fact, I have many times started to write but did not know how to end it without pointing a finger. But as much as I tried, I know that what I would write about will just end that way so I stayed away from the topic. After all, after having read the editorial in Philippine Daily Inquirer last June 26, I realized that the questionable safety record of Sulpicio Lines could not have been better worded. So I wanted to write about other things or not write at all. That is until I watched the news today...

Government officials ordered salvage divers to cease retrieval operations in M/V Princess of the Stars because of the presence of Endosulfan - a neurotoxic insecticide which is known to be an endocrine disruptor. Swallowing an eight milligram of this chemical means death in minutes without cure. The report said that M/V Princess of the Stars carried 10 metric tons of this chemical and currently it is located in the submerged portion of the boat near the stern. If it were not a letter sent my Del Monte Philippines inquiring from the the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority (FPA) it might have been too late for the government to fix the problem.

Since this chemical is neurotoxic not only humans are endangered but also marine life as well as migratory birds and any animal exposed to the chemical. If a leak occurs this will be a multibillion disaster because of the chain of effects due to the damage in the ecosystem. If it happens, it'll be one catastrophe the whole world will see.

I'm pissed. Really pissed. I don't eat pork, beef or any four legged creature, I am weaning myself from chicken, and because I know those fishies would eat the carcasses underwater I am refraining from eating fish lately. But fishies are our friend. I don't want my friends to die. And I don't want my friends to die because they were poisoned by a pesticide. *Sniff* Fish are not pests! So they better get that damn pesticide cargo out soon without leaks.

To make matters worse one of Go family, owner's of Sulpicio Lines, was in the news today bitching that this was not only a company tradegy but also a national crisis. He was teary and he said that he knew the crew members of M/V Princess of the Stars. I feel you. But I stopped feeling for him when he said that people should stop blaming them because most of them in Cebu do not even go home to sleep because of this crisis.

Your company allowed a ship carrying hundreds of passengers and crew, loaded with illegal pesticides, to sail into a typhoon. Hello?!? Eeedjit. People will blame your company because of lack of security and crisis management. Sweetie, nobody wants to be blame, but that's part of the job. Accept it. If you can't, don't bitch at the media. And hire a bettere PR team if you want to keep your company afloat.

My mac is baaaaaaaaaaaaack!!!
Even if it got downgraded to Tiger.

Lately, I find myself not blogging. Since my MacBook is still in the store and I'm stuck using Linux at work, I am busy surfing online in order for me to understand how to add programs if the Add/Remove option fails. This has been eating my time besides looking at job applications, checking trainees work, and suffering multiple power interruptions because of Typhoon Frank.

Since using Linux, Mozilla crashes on me an average of 3 times a day especially if I am surfing multiple things at the same time. Since my work uses browsing alot, I wanted to kick this dinosaur's balls out of frustration. I have been mulling over using Safari instead but I knew that they did not offer it for Linux OS.

Because I am too hard headed, I was curious if Safari would run in Linux. So what if they didn't write one for Linux?!? I figured maybe it would work using an emulator. And maybe it would be faster than Mozilla without the crashing.

So I went to trusty Google and lo and behold! Two websites taught me how to install it using Wine as the emulator and Terminal (the sudo can be challenging without Ctrl+C and Right click paste). I felt giddy as I clicked on Wine and found the blue compass of Safari.

As I click on the icon, it was disappointing to note that it was slow. Way slower than Mozilla. Too slow. If it was any slower my mac would've been fixed by the time it opened the National Geographic website. I give up.

So here I am, in an internet cafe trying to finish this entry amid all the noise and distractions from other users. *sigh*

Your inner 'type A' personality is coming out full force right now, which could make this day go really well or really badly. It pretty much all depends on the people around you. If you'll be dealing with folks who don't like to be told what to do, your ferocious organizational energy could make some waves. But if you'll be with people who are eager to hear your good ideas, things should go along quite swimmingly. Make sure you know your audience today!

I'm irritated with one of my duckies. Midge (which isn't her real name of course) is getting to my nerves. But I don't want to snap at her or get pissed. I don't want to lose my temper. But today I can sense the devil and angel are arguing on the top of my head each one wanting my attention. And as much as I try not to, today I'm listening to the guy holding the pitchfork.

I know that I haven't been writing much. Honestly, I feel like I lost a limb.

Last Friday, I turned on my MacBook and heard the usual "Bong!" and stood up to check on my duckies. I know the sequence already of my MacBook, it will take a good minute before all my tools would be ready. After a couple of minutes I went back to my seat and discovered that my screen was still in the second step - GREY.SCREEN. Right then I felt queasy and nervous. This is not right...

I used to be connected with Apple and I went through the motions of their technical training also even if I was to take a managerial position. As I stared stupidly at the grey screen I was slowly transported in a four corner room filled with technical support agents and my lesbian trainer asking what to do on an instance where a kernel panic happens. I felt panicking right then and there. I hope this isn't one of the kernel panic cases. But base on my experience, Kernel panic or no Kernel Panic, nothing is worse than erase and install.

Ten minutes later and having paced so much my screen finally changed. But it was still bad news. Flashing folder with question mark. Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn! So it's still going to be erase and install. My three thousand songs, innumerable movies, excel files, thousands of pictures, applications, preferences. Shit! Shit! Shit! Why did I not back-up last week when I was musing about it. Why of all days did it happen that day.

One of my duckies looked at me smugly and said that my stars did not align. It seems like Friday the 13th caught up with me and bit my ass bad. This comment made the other duckies grin. It wasn't funny. I feel pain. And it was getting more painful because I realized I do not have a Leopard install disc. I am now one of the statistics of Apple users who did not back-up and regretted it.

So for four days now my Mac is in the hospital, and I have resorted to using Ubuntu and it's coarse interface. I feel terrible because when he comes back he won't recognize me anymore. I would have to do the getting to know you like Adam Sandler in 50 First Dates. I am the saddest.

Among the men and women, the multitude,
I perceive one picking me out by secret and divine signs,
Acknowledging none else--not parent, wife, husband, brother, child,
any nearer than I am;
Some are baffled--But that one is not--that one knows me.

Ah, lover and perfect equal!
I meant that you should discover me so, by my faint indirections;
And I, when I meet you, mean to discover you by the like in you.

The video below freaked me out. Seriously, when I look at my cellphone now I imagine my brain popping like a popcorn. Even if popcorn is my all-time favorite food, I want it in my tummy not in my brain.

The Colonel called me. He shared that he was in the Farm and had asked the caretakers to plant rice. I agree. Rice is so expensive now just today the woman I buy my daily portions of cooked rice said it's now 45 pesos a kilo when it was only 34 two months ago. Yesterday my half cup of cooked rice was only 6 pesos, today it is now seven pesos. Imagine a family of five with an income of P5,000 a month. Seriously. I can't imagine.

I was watching an investigative report on rice and was saddened that the Philippines which is blessed with so much fertile ground is more impoverished because land that was used agriculturally have been turned into golf courses, subdivisions, malls, skyscrapers, or a measly parking space. Farmers do not want to plant rice because their ROI is non-existent. An interview with a rice farmer revealed he borrowed money as capital to buy the palay* and chemicals. The money he borrows, usually 50,000 pesos, is used only for his 2 hectare land. By harvest time which is also the time he is due to pay his loan, his loan has ballooned already to 75,000 pesos due to interests. Usually he would be able to harvest the amount he needs to pay his loan. This is if the weather cooperates.

This interview was conducted at Banaue Rice Terraces, which UN declared a world heritage site in 1995 not just because of its beauty but also of its purpose. Despite the abundance of land they only till it once a year since the hybrid rice could not be sustained in the high altitude of the environment. The younger generations also do not wish to farm as they opt to work in the cities or for local tourism. One can't blame them as farming is tedious work which sometimes does not yield much.

Rice crisis is not just centered in the Philippines. Globally, the food crises is manifold including the rise of cost of fuel, the changes of the weather due to global warming, drought in Australia, earthquake in China. Here in our country the pressure is brought on by demographics. Our huge population overpass problems of biofuels and climate changes. We used to be the number one country that produced rice, we even taught other nations how to cultivate it. But now we importing more than we are producing. Our population is increasing but the land we till is declining. Thanks to a surge in rice and oil prices, inflation hit a three-year high of 8.3% in April. According to the Manila-based Asian Development Bank, a 10% rise in food prices will push an additional 2.3 million into poverty.

While our government is providing rice subsidies and fast food restaurants now offer half portions of rice to prevent waste, I can't help but wonder how long will it last before the public coffers will be depleted? That with the rising cost of electricity and fuel, the continuous corruption of our government officials, the lack of the government's ability to come up with long term realistic plans for our country, the Catholic Church stance against contraceptives, I feel sorry for the 30 million Filipinos who earn less than a dollar a day. We have a saying "kapag maigsi ang kumot, matutuong mamuluktot**" but how long will the Filipino people try to adjust? We are a pretty enduring bunch usually laughing when misfortunes strike to deal with the pain, but as I passed by a long line of people waiting to buy NFA rice (cheap rice from national depots) I don't see anyone smiling. Only tired, sweaty, sad, and impatient looking faces.

Lately, whenever I eat I can't help but stare at my rice and feel guilty. Somewhere in that same moment, I know another person is hungry and could not afford to feed himself or his children. With this thought I say a prayer and hope that they would be blessed like me.

*palay - Unhulled rice

**kapag maigsi ang kumot, matutuong mamuluktot - if your blanket is short, learn to bend (or something like that)

I'm not a fan. But when I heard over the radio that Rudy Fernandez succumbed to cancer it seemed like another one of the oldies is gone. And for a moment I felt sad.

Below is a 4-minute video on our global carbon footprint set to the music of "Fragile" by Sting.

Horrifying but eye-opening.

From UNEP

World Environment Day is being celebrated today.

The theme is low carbon economy, UNEP came up with Twelve Steps to Help You Kick the CO₂ Habit. In my own small way, I made a commitment not to light up today. I just get to hold my cigs and hope for the best my Zs pull me through the entire day. *sigh*

Ahhh...June.

Coming from the mall and passing by National Bookstore made me wish I was buying school supplies. The fresh smell of new notebooks, clean lines of Mongol No. 2, colorful erasers that looked like pastilles, and the happy color of yellow pad. I love June. I love it after September, which is my all out favorite month of the year. June reminds me of beginnings, hope of better things, and new stuff that won't happen again until the next year.

So I was standing there watching people. Watching mothers trying to police their children and makings sure they are getting the cheaper priced supplies. I watched children point, beg, coerce and even throw a tantrum because they wanted a cooler looking notebook.

It was fun...until depression started to set in and I had to get away from that place because I was hyperventilating. The kids running, the mothers bitching and teenagers hanging with their barkada was getting into me. I quickly walked out. That was no place for me. Suddenly those things gave me an avalanche of memories and it wasn't a happy place anymore.

But no matter how fast I walked out the bookstore the things that was crowding my brain was inescapable. I'm still not over the message the Colonel sent me. I have pushed it way way waaaaaaaaay back in my mind but it was damn persistent. Every time I hold my phone it felt heavy. The message he sent felt heavier and heavier as the days pass by. I felt irritation sweep over me and yet the guilt permeates more. I feel the ball is now in my court and I am the sourpuss who wants the game over. Gah!!! What to do. What to do. I often know what to do but his message was an uppercut.

I want to ignore the message. Completely. Because if I don't, I will dredge the past and throw it at his face and the General as well. Doing that will let me forgive them, doing that will probably even lessen my disorder.

But I can't. I don't want to do that. Because it means the years of pent up hate and hurt inside would detonate and I wouldn't be able to control it. Despite everything, I don't want to do be free of angst in expense of their own happiness. Truth be told, I want it to be over. I want to be able to see family oriented commercials and not feel pangs of loss. But I have no means yet of finding peace without inflicting the same pain he gave me.

Maybe in time...I don't have a fast forward button and this is the singular moment in my life which I really wish I do. So all will be well. All will be over. All will be happy.