oh well. i just got crazy with this imaging feature (the "post picture side-by-side with the text" thing, like this...) 'coz this is the first time i'm doing it (i finally got the code!) ... not much update today. i got a little depressed with the way my grades are going the past couple of days, somehow got over it (dad made me read an article about "Emotional Quotient" and being motivated to get what you want -- thank you very much) ... we're on the last leg of our first semester... a week later -- ta dah! the DARN FINALS... *really need to study* ... for now, better get my theology portfolios all thought out (and my pending accounting exams!) :|

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TIMELINE OF BLOG LAYOUT ALTERATIONS:
March 25 - the original schizo "v.1": retro-turquoise checkers
April 20 - "v.2": pink argyles & stripes
July 25 - "v.3": flower power / blue in motion
September 25 - "v.4": applegreen... simply irresistible

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have you noticed a trend? i wasn't aware that i've changed my layout FOUR TIMES in SIX MONTHS! guess i have short attention span haha... and the dates! somehow i always change them at the tailend of a month... weird but cool. anyhoo, you're witnessing the outcome of my 3-day labor of love, the AppleGreen version. i've decided to succumb to my whims and subliminal addictions to the citrus hue and voila! (cheers!) this is the first time i've actually designed an image header for my blog. i took time in selecting the coolest apple-y pictures from GettyImages (thank heavens for this site!) and started from scratch, cropping stuff, making use of the cute elements and sizing it upon on Microsoft Photo Editor & Adobe Photoshop (but still i'm not so good at it.) i typed up the "apple green" inscriptions (similarly in french, german, italian & dutch -- in that order -- since the translations were short, and touches up the blank spots! haha... looks fitting ain't it?) and dearly loved the "bad apple" pic to place it as the centerpiece! (it's so cute!) ... again i have to edit the colors of the scrollbars, the text & link colors, and so on (that was last night) ... just to make it all perfect. and i'm very pleased. :)

don't you think this layout adds a little more sunshine to everything? :D
please comment! i'll be out in 2 days (b'coz of practices)
...and i'm looking forward to check back.
i now realize i'm obsessed with my blog. *smack*

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ah, did i tell you i was going to have (quote, unquote) a slew of posts over the weekend? well, this is it.

i perused a copy of the latest issue of Newsweek International, topic which is "the Future of Entertainment" and found really neat stuff that i'd like to share (and somehow, serve as wonderful memorabilia on my blog archive... haha) lovely that it has the web counterpart on MSNBC (or else i would have copied them letter by letter, the thought of which drives me lazy and crazy!)

suit yourself reading. as for me, i have been busy tinkering with my new blog template (experimenting it today) and i hope i'll be able to unveil the new layout within next week. i am TOTALLY EXCITED! :)

P.S. i watched "Red Eye" (cillian!) on pirated VCD with my folks this afternoon. (haha, after all the swooning, it all boiled down to my "homebody-ness". besides, it's raining outside!)... it was a pretty good film. my parents and i were raving about it! (the ending, though... but still it's one thrill of a show)

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this article caught my eye. it deals with criticism (obviously), and the proliferation of blogs. i'm pretty sure all bloggers (and blog audiences) are interested in what this would have to say. :)

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CRITICISM IN AN UNCRITICAL AGE
With more content comes more critics. But do they have anything to say?

By John Simon, Newsweek International

Sept. 26 - Oct. 3, 2005 issue - We live in an age when everyone is a critic. "Criticism" is all over the Internet, in blogs and chat rooms, for everyone to access and add his two cents' worth on any subject, high or low. But if everyone is a critic, is that still criticism? Or are we heading toward the end of criticism? If all opinions are equally valid, there is no need for experts. Democracy works in life, but art is undemocratic. The result of this ultimately meaningless barrage is that more and more we are living in a profoundly - or shallowly - uncritical age.

A critic, as T. S. Eliot famously observed, must be very intelligent.

Now, can anybody assume that the invasion of cyberspace by opinion upon opinion is proof of great intelligence and constitutes informed criticism rather than uninformed artistic chaos?

Of course, like any self-respecting critic, I have always encouraged my readers to think for themselves. They were to consider my positive or negative assessments, which I always tried to explain, a challenge to think along with me: here is my reasoning, follow it, then agree or disagree as you see fit. In an uncritical age, every pseudonymous chat-room chatterbox provides a snappy, self-confident judgment, without the process of arriving at it becoming clear to anyone, including the chatterer. Blogs, too, tend to be invitations to leap before a second look. Do the impassioned ramblings fed into a hungry blogosphere represent responses from anyone other than blogheads?

How has it come to this? We have all been bitten by television sound bites that transmute into Internet sound bytes, proving that brevity can also be the soul of witlessness. So thoughtlessness multiplies. Do not, however, think I advocate censorship, an altogether unacceptable form of criticism. What we need in this age of rampant uncritical criticism is the simplest and hardest thing to come by: a critical attitude. How could it be fostered?

For starters, with the very thing discouraged by our print media: reading beyond the hectoring headlines and bold-type boxes embedded in reviews, providing a one-sentence summary that makes further reading unnecessary. With only slight exaggeration, we may say that words have been superseded by upward or downward pointing thumbs, self-destructively indulging a society used to instant self-gratification.

Criticism is inevitably constricted by our multinational culture and by political correctness. As society grows more diverse, there are fewer and fewer universal points of reference between a critic and his or her readers. As for freedom of expression, Arthur Miller long ago complained about protests and pressures making the only safe subjects for a dramatist babies and the unemployed.

My own experience is that over the years, print space for my reviews kept steadily shrinking, and the layouts themselves toadied to the whims of the graphic designer. In a jungle of oddball visuals, readers had difficulties finding my reviews. Simultaneously, our vocabulary went on a starvation diet. Where readers used to thank me for enlarging their vocabularies, more and more complaints were lodged about unwelcome trips to the dictionary, as if comparable to having to keep running to the toilet. Even my computer keeps questioning words I use, words that can be found in medium-size dictionaries. Can one give language lessons to a computer? What may be imperiled, more than criticism, is the word.

I keep encountering people who think "critical" means carping or fault-finding, and nothing more. So it would seem that the critic's pen, once mightier than the sword, has been supplanted by the ax. Yet I have always maintained that the critic has three duties: to write as well as a novelist or playwright; to be a teacher, taking off from where the classroom, always prematurely, has stopped, and to be a thinker, looking beyond his specific subject at society, history, philosophy. Reduce him to a consumer guide, run his reviews on a Web site mixed in with the next-door neighbor's pontifications, and you condemn criticism to obsolescence.

Still, one would like to think that the blog is not the enemy, and that readers seeking enlightenment could find it on the right blog -- just as in the past one went looking through diverse publications for the congenial critic. But it remains up to the readers to learn how to discriminate.

Simon, a longtime critic in New York, recently published three volumes of his reviews on theater, film and music.

© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9378697/site/newsweek/

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..and here's something about my former favorite guy ("it's a long story!"), Al Gore. at least now he's got something to do. i'm pleased with that. (the bloated, bearded guy i saw post-Election 2000 really just put me off. at least he looked much more decent in magazine pic.)

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DO-IT-YOURSELF NEWS
Viewers pick what to cover on Al Gore's network.

By Jonathan Darman, Newsweek International

Sept. 26 - Oct. 3, 2005 issue - No one expected a television thrill ride when word got out that former U.S. vice president Al Gore planned to launch a cable news network. To some, Gore's professed ambitions as chairman of Current TV - to create a democratic news space in which young people could tell stories about the world around them in a format their peers could relate to - seemed like just another opportunistic attempt at edginess from the "inventor of the Internet." Current even had a focus-group-ready slogan just asking to be plastered on the side of a bus: "television homepage for the Internet generation." Zing.

And yet for all of its predictable pandering, Current TV did manage to deliver a major surprise when it debuted this summer: Gore's network was actually, well, kind of good. The network's broadcasting approach takes heavy cues from the emerging world of Internet news, eschewing traditional half-hour broadcasts in favor of two- to seven-minute "pods" - short-subject features submitted, in many cases, by Current's own viewers through a screening process on the network's Web site. Programmers maintain that the jarring subject jumps - from street violence in California one moment to street performers in Colombia the next - allow the network to cover the broad scope of world news. Interspersed amid these featurettes are brief headline roundups from Google News. Though Current is so far broadcast to only 20 million U.S. homes, the network hopes to use the Internet to create buzz and lure more viewers.

But Current's greatest innovation so far - one likely to spread throughout the industry - has been to make the news, not the news deliverers, the star. For nearly three decades, network news in big markets like the United States has lived and died by the fame and "relatability" of its anchors. But as corporate parents put more pressure on news divisions to churn out profits, some industry leaders say the economics of the star system are becoming harder to justify. A transcendent TV news star, after all, can cost upwards of $10 million a year. Add a handful of those to the roster, and a network loses the luxury of even considering reporting on events in Buenos Aires or Mumbai.

It's hardly a surprise, then, that several U.S. networks are pondering retooled evening newscasts that place the anchor in a diminished role. But to solve the eternal dilemma of broadcast news - how to bring new viewers into the mix -programmers are turning to less conventional means. In its coverage of Hurricane Katrina, CNN used footage of the storm and its disastrous aftermath supplied by amateur filmmakers shooting on digital cameras throughout the Southeastern United States. The network has experimented with this trick in coverage of big news stories going back to 9/11 - the idea being that there's no better way to create a sense of urgency in news viewers than to make them a part of the story. Like other broadcast networks, CNN is giving increased prominence on its Web site to video of stories that generate heavy traffic from Web viewers - allowing news consumers to become news directors.

In this respect, Current TV, with its viewer-supplied, viewer-controlled content, is ahead of the pack. But the question remains whether the very concept of a network is obsolete in the Internet age. Gore's network may find itself desperately picking up the scraps from two polarized groups of news viewers: those who prefer traditional, formal broadcasts and those who require programming to be purely democratic and unrehearsed. For the moment, though, the former vice president finds himself where he has always wanted to be: ahead of the curve.

© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.
URL: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9378692/site/newsweek/

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i admit, i've been searching for images for my NEXT SCHIZO TEMPLATE with the luscious theme, Apple Green... so far, i've been raiding GettyImages with good results (though i have to search more). now the little fuss i have is that i'm not so good with photoshop even if i had all the images. so it looks like i have to go experimenting! :)

coming for the weekend: a slew of posts! just relax folks. :)

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mp3 playing: "old habits die hard" - mick jagger.. just felt like playing it. :)

pardon my post title, it's so uninspired. but i bet the pic will smack you:



for no particular reason, i ADORE this car. i've been walking past a car exactly like this sometimes in school. and everytime i do walk past this, i never fail to ogle. there's something different & irrestible about this car. it looks pretty modern, comfy & omg,expensive!! practical. just the car i'm dreaming of driving (but if you didn't know, i'm scared shit of even learning how to drive). and yeah, it comes in APPLE GREEN! first the iPod, now this! i think i'm obsessed with that color... maybe i'm changing the template next time to apple greenish. (haha! i'm the Grinch!) :-p

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oh. maybe you don't know what've happened that made me so sh*tty and busted out today. let me recount the ways, and you decide if i really had a bad day:

i walked a block with my skirt zipper open and obviously i was UNaware.

the skirt i wore today was so loose, it swirls in REVOLUTIONS.

& because of that, i had to un-swirl my skirt every 30 seconds the WHOLE day.

my stupid period came 3 days too early. made me all the more irritated.

i went to school to find out we weren't going to have any classes today.

and that the only thing i came for was PE, w/c was at that time 3 hours later.

so i had to while the time in search for a fx-570MS, w/c was a lost cause.

my legs and feet were all sore from walking (Med to CFAD to Library to Gym).

and i can never get myself untangled from WtFGirl (groupmates again).

yes, yes, i do live a charmed life. :-|

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Y 2:12 PM

blah'd

i'm lapping here in the library right now. at this unholy hour. i came to school today to find out that i seemingly have *no classes* (we just have to go to this symposium, game, whatever)... and that the actual ONLY thing i have on my sked today is PE. damn freakin' PE. like it's the last i've got to attend to get to heaven. so from 12nn onwards today, i went on walking desperately, hoping to find someone i know with a fx-570MS Casio scientific calculator. but sadly, i found no one who did. thus, i trekked to the other side of the university (at the CFAD building) to meet my bf (best friend, duh) and some of my batchmates in HS to umm, kill time. i was so morose from all this sh*tty worry (we have a math quiz tomorrow and i have the wrong calculator! f*! it's math dammit! for once in my life i wanted to excel in something using the easiest means possible!)... but then anne saved my life (well, yeah! SAVE's the word!) she taught me a short-cut technique that didn't need the calculator but still very efficient & easy to do! so if i still had no more options by tomorrow morning, then i'll just have to stick with this method. i really just have to study and work hard.

end of sermon. (3pm's nearing...)

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vendredi, septembre 16, 2005 Y 5:56 PM

rainy day math

oh Poddy, when will i hear your melodious megabytes? (details later)

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if last summer i was complaining about the sweltering heat, this time i'm venting my frustrations on the rainy weather. sure, the chill makes for fitful sleeps, but i simply hate it when there's a downpour everytime i'm outdoors. well, it's been all damp these couple of days and it makes my commutes hassle-y. i'm carrying a ton of a heavy bag and yet i have to handle a small wet brolly! it makes me look cramped and chicken-looking (cock-a-doodle-doo!). especially when i have to cross a particularly flooded passageway. my shoes aren't built for sloshes, dammit! and i would be so grossed out if the floodwaters reach the insides of my leathers. so i sometimes have to walk with my heels... it's the most awkward moment ever. i wonder how i look like. (Mother Hen teetering with her feathers!) i wouldn't want it if i carried more than my bag, like today, but i found it still tolerable nonetheless. (i hope it won't rain on tuesday though. you know why!)

and since i mentioned about my commutes... here goes the creme of today's post.

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my daily pocket money consists of my transport fare (usually 40-50php), whatever i have to pay (class fees), and the barely touched 'emergency dough' (i am such a cheapskate.) going to school (haha, i'm used to calling it school, not college) means having to take three PUJ rides to AND fro. it usually costs me 20php for both ways, and if the drivers were intentionally (or unintentionally) taxing, i'd reach up to 24php in some cases. so most of the time i come home ending up with an empty coin purse. poor dahling!

but since around july, i've taken another alternative whenever i have the chance: the bus! i call a 'stroke of luck' everytime i see a bus in the morning (they are not so many in the AM..) because it takes all the advantages over riding PUJs: 1) it IS more cost-efficient (1 bus & 1 jeep, rather than 3 jeeps. plus i hate it that the 2 PUJs i ride before the third only takes short distances... like if i had my way, i'd rather walk. but then i'm just kidding.) 2) it has a shorter 'road time'. the PUJ option takes me 45 minutes tops, while the other takes only 30! like today, i'm too lazy to come out of the house, but still i arrived on time. (but the prof was absent! *groan*). and perhaps 3)i have an excuse to go MALLING! since my "going-home" alternative also consists of a PUJ and a bus, and the bus pitstop is located behind the mall, i most certainly have to pass through the mall before boarding, right? (Mallrat Logic, baby!) in some bus-riding days (when it's still quite early) i hang out in the bookstores or simply stroll around (and eat? hahaha)... anyway i'm not doing anything illegal. (my parents know!) :p

and due to all these, i've been saving some of my excess fare for "the Fund"... where someday, somehow i'll earn enough and get to buy something i really, really want... like that iPod mini above (make it an apple green one!)... or maybe a CD, or a book... so far the fund's still pretty small. but then, with my *wink,wink* pre-CPA & economic managerial skills, one will never know...

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mercredi, septembre 14, 2005 Y 6:05 PM

three months later

the hand that rules over 'em all (notice the obvious watch strap!)

..it's been (almost exactly) 3 months since i first entered the wunderbahr world of college life, and simultaneous with it the now-daily commutes i have endured and have gotten used to. isn't that fantastic? i'm not sure whether i really feel like one of the colegialas-- carefree, sophisticated and balanced. but what i can say is that i love adapting to this present syndrome. the sked so lax (i may wake up at 7, but i enjoy spending the morning myself -- i am the captain of my ship!), the workload mostly reduced to small quantities but sometimes dreadful (i could say that again), the people absolutely different but manageable, the environment big and bustling. and although i think mine's just a small shift compared to others, i think i have fared satisfactorily -- i am no longer afraid of being alone outside (just a bit wary), independent enough though i really have to work harder on my intrapersonal skills... a little more studious, and perhaps really a good girl. cheers. :)

with this life comes some beauty downside: i am not the "snow white" i used to be (exaggeration)!!! my skin has gone a wee darker because of its exposure to the evil sun (10am rays are kinda harmful already), and it has discolored some parts of my body (meaning my arms and legs -- the insides are still whitey) so that leaves me with an uneven skin tone (see pic above). groan. and if that isn't going to make me think i'll be a brown banana the next time around, i'm having godawful zit explosions! it's really discomforting. my forehead has those icky little spots (some big spots), blackheads on my nose, and blemishes on my face! maybe these all came from staying up late. my zits have never gone this bad, and i hope it won't get any worse. or else in 6 month's time i would've been a brown AND pimply banana!

just some thoughts from your friendly neighborhood alfalfa.

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vendredi, septembre 09, 2005 Y 5:57 PM

of sexy ankles & rubber bands

Coming Up: since when did rubber bands become a male hypotrend?

another one of my ridiculously inane commentaries... i promised i was going to write something 'sensible' -- well maybe these two particular topics aren't, but anyways.

1) oh baby do i love your ankles.
it's been years since i suspected myself of an ankle fetish. 'ankle' meaning the back of the foot just before the metacarpal phalanges that makes up the feet & toes.. i think it started back in 2nd year, when i unconsciously stare at ladies' ankles while going up the stairs in school. i ADORE those ankles (made me think, maybe they're "dancer's ankles" since most of the sexy-ankled ladies were dancers), and i wish i had them. sadly, i'm not even close to being a dancer & my ankles are kinda invisible. so i'm not saying that's my "men turn-ons" since i've never actually seen a man's ankles (long pants! hello?? -- unless you're talking about my dad who's got them, but duh! =p) i just envy those women. i think sexy ankles ARE sexy. (and heck, it's not a sign you're malnourished!) they sort of send a signal that you're attractive. i don't really know. just my humble opinion. (credit tea for making me think about this!)

2) attack of the rubber rubber
i've noticed lately that many men are wearing those ubiquitous bands (rubber bracelets, baller bands, whatever you call it)... it's like a phenomena -- 5 out of 15 (perhaps) got 'em slinged on their wrists. when there are stuff like these selling on the sidewalks, men come forward to choose & buy. in one particular PUJ ride, i've seen not only one, not two, but THREE guys in a row wearing the yellow-orange-blue bands! that's well, wow! i never really thought men would go for accessories, but then, hey we're at the 21st century and it's a 'sexual' revolution for the Adams-- the fight for the right to be a heterosexual, a homosexual or a metrosexual. oh well. like when some cool famous guy (think david beckham or the hoops people) dons that band, the others follow suit. maybe it's also the ONE campaign with jamie foxx wearing the white band that's influenced some others out there... or just the 'wanting to be cool' people would like to show their masculinity. (men protest: "you're not the only people who wear jewelry, you know!") i personally don't really like them, but i wouldn't mind. mom thought they're cheesy. what's your take on that? *again, talking to myself*

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mercredi, septembre 07, 2005 Y 6:25 PM

a doldrum-my world

~~the accountant's poem~~

First published in 1801, here is a famous poem to
help students of double-entry accounting remember
what to credit and what to credit.

By Journal Laws - what I receive
Is Debtor made to what I give;
Stock for my Debts must Debtor be,
And Creditor my Property;
Profit and Loss Accounts are plain.
I debit Loss, and credit Gain.

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mp3 on replay: "amber" by 311 -- the OC plug was too infectious

oh well. found this on friendster (my bulletin board)... whatever its origin, this could serve as a constant reminder to my "calling"... grouch, grouch. i'm so lazy for everything, i think it's a full-blown disease! ;p

will post something sensible soon.

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samedi, septembre 03, 2005 Y 10:43 PM

waiting in vain (?)

the Da Vinci Code triumvirate: Neveu (Tautou), Teabing (McKellen) & Langdon (Hanks)

~NEWS ADVISORY : THIS IS MY 101st POST! CHEERS!~

wow! i am absolutely excited to watch "the Da Vinci Code"! although it hasn't finished filming yet, its tentative release date here will be on May 17, 2006... isn't it wonderful? this beats my anticipation for "Harry Potter 4" (well, even if it's on november)... just updating for people who's also psyched about the film adaptation. i want to reread the book during my break, just to refresh my awful memory & somehow try to imagine how the actors will do it. (haha! tom hanks and his hair!) i really wish too though that "angels & demons" will be made into a film. but i think it's sensitive for the vatican side. (will they even allow to film it inside vatican city? very minute possibility.)

as for "red eye", i think mom & i will be gearing up for a movie date 2 sundays later. (studies first!) i am counting the days... :)

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Y 10:10 PM

breaking away from damnation

i really sucked today. (the report. it totally bombed.) to take the sh*t away, i engrossed myself into filling this mini-quiz. read it and see me in a stranger light. i swear, i don't feel that bad... i'm PASSIVE! PASSIVITY RULES! :)

7 random facts about you:

1. errm.. my left eye is smaller than the right (though it's not that obvious)
2. i love being alone. like, right now.
3. i am quite a perfectionist, especially with presentations.
4. as i said before, i unexplainably take a liking to fictional villains.
5. i *used* to fantasize about dead famous people. don't ask who/why.
6. i am a frustrated dancer/broadway actress/model(!).
7. i *almost* got published in a book.

7 things that scare you:

1. extreme darkness
2. fear of falling
3. ghosts. who likes them anyway?
4. expectations, both others' and myself's.
5. failing. it will hurt sooo bad.
6. clowns & their replicas. something's scary about them.
7. clones (copycats of someone's identity). evil.

7 things you like most:

1. the internet. (like shuri said, it's a Gift From Heaven!)
2. being in the company of the people who i love & loves me..
3. being able to express myself (through this blog & my essays)
4. music! it's my type of drug.
5. reading material (books, newspapers, etc.) i love information!
6. not having to worry about anything
7. the FRS cycle: Food, Relax, Sleep! :)

7 important things in my bed room:

1. the bed.
2. at least two pillows (one for the head & the other for hugging)
3. the desk
4. lights!
5. vicks, for times when i'm sore and/or insomniac...
6. stuff to read when bored
7. music player
*(optional #8: the imagination!)

7 things you plan to do before you die:

1. learn how to really cook and (probably) set up a desserts biz.
2. write in a magazine (a column? something like that)
3. write even just one best-selling, prize-winning novel. i'll die happy.
4. sing with a big band orchestra. the classics!
5. find a lovely guy, live in a lovely home with 3 lovely children. hahaha.
6. go skydiving or bungee-jumping. something extreme..
7. travel to Paris and go TNT! nyahaha!

7 things I can't do:

1. draw. i'm not the artistic type. (if you want stick people..)
2. convince people. arrgh. no PR! need to develop!
3. speak before an audience. gawd, everything turns awry.
4. not get sensitive.
5. say what's really on my mind.
6. become sociable. i don't know why.
7. lose weight. i try, i try!

7 things that attract you to the opposite sex:

1. the eyes.
2. the brains. followed by a sense of humor.
3. knows how to sing, or at least a some shared interest.
4. knows how to respect & make the person feel important.
5. the hair, probably?
6. thin carved sexy ankles (tea!) though i'd attribute that more to girls.
7. a certain allure. i can't exactly describe it, but really!

7 things you say the most:

1. sh*t!!!
2. crap it
3. ano????
4. bullsh*t
5. anyway..
6. ..
7. ..

7 celeb crushes:

(as of the moment..)
1. Cillian Murphy! (Red Eye! Planning to watch it!!)
2. not a celeb, but a politician... haha
3. --nothing follows because i can't remember--

7 people you want to take this quiz:
anyone who reads this blog and has their own. i wanna see yours!

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