I have updated my gallery.

Albums were deleted to make room for new pictures.

Two new albums contain pictures from our RX 93.1 Concert Series gig and my Baguio expedition for a friend's wedding.

Check it out.

You made me cry, my dear friend, for the first time in a while.

You were a still single the last time we had one of our talks. I was in the darkest of moods but after a while you had me laughing. After reminding me of who I am, you soon had me back on my feet. We talked then of my plans and yours, of our hopes for the coming years. I was happy for you that night since you were getting married to an amazing woman in a few days, but a small part of me wished that you weren't. I have need of my most stalwart friend, no, brother, in the days to come. And there you were, about to leave me to my own devices.

That cold morning of your wedding day, you made me cry, my dear friend, for the first time in a while. As you declared your love for wonderful Cheremyn before God, man, and the tall pine trees of Baguio, I wept.

I saw in your eyes how much you adored her. By the way she looked at you that morning, I saw that she was giving back as much as she was taking, maybe more. That cold morning of your wedding day, we all basked in the warmth of the love you have for each other.

How can any sense of dismay, loss, or regret in me survive such an onslaught?

I cried out of joy as I witnessed the long awaited union of two blessed souls. I wept because I was then the happiest person alive, after you and your new wife, of course.

But more than that, seeing you together has given me an unlooked-for hope. You two are living proof that good things can still happen, that not all hope is false, that pain and brokeness are not the only fruits of loving. In you I saw that not all tomorrows are bleak, that some lead to mornings so bright that I shield my eyes from their radiance.

That cold morning of your wedding day, you gave me a glimpse of something I have always yearned for but not quite found. For that I am grateful.

May the Lord God bless the seeds of your new family as you strive to remain faithful to Him all the days of your lives.

This scenario has been playing in my mind for the past few days. I just want to get this off my chest.

A mother was busy preparing dinner when her 7-year old kid barges into the kitchen holding up two bloody stumps where hands should be.

The kid cried gleefully, "Look ma, no hands!"

I want to rant. I want to scream. I want to complain.

But I think I'd rather let Sheryl Crow sing for me instead.

This song is from her C'mon C'mon album. I didn't like it (the album) much when I first listened to it but it grew on me and now it's like my official CD for 2003. As Kuya Guidong would have said, "The album speaks to meeehh."

I hope this is the last I have to say regarding this subject. For a long loooong time, at least. I'm tired.

It's Only Love

I think I met my match again
Standing round the candlelight
In the middle of this blizzard you stood
And melted all the ice

CHORUS:
Oh, it's only love
Oh, it's only love
Oh, if only love comes round again
It will have been
Worth the ride

You were master of so many
A savior to none
I waged all of my hopes so plenty on you
Now look what I've become

[CHORUS]

Sometimes lonely is not only a word
But faces I have known
And if you see me could you free me with a smile
So I can let go

[CHORUS]

You are going to marry viggo mortensen.He is very
friendly and funny and has a lot of respect for
you and your friends. He is also very good with
kids and would be an ideal father. Congrats!!


Which male celebrity are you going to marry? (10 results that have pics!)
brought to you by Quizilla

Two words: HUMAN EATERS!

I didn't get a lot of presents this Christmas. Here's the short list:

1. A Nestle Crunch chocolate bar from my mom leftover from the pack I brought home from Clark.

2. A striped shirt from my sis, good only for days I'm sure I won't meet anyone I know.

3. A jingly keychain that promptly got stolen.

4. A 'Things That Make You Go Hmm...' CD from our office Kris Kringle. I don't know if this counts since it's not freely given, but this one's super cool.

On the other hand, I wasn't able to give out a lot of presents this past year either. I refuse to give out hastily thought-of gifts. Excellence or nothing is what I always say.

Whatever.

I was able to give out a few trinkets, since I have already thought of theirs way before. As I handed jamby her present, I asked her what gift would she give me in return. She immediately replied, 'Time kuya. My time.' then flashed a big grin toward me.

I got the better end of the bargain, I think.

What to do, what to do, this 2004...

1. Make more music. I have to finish the half-written songs in my notebook. I need to write new material too. Maybe I need to get an acoustic guitar, to aid me in songwriting. I never get to play my own electric guitar. A pity.

I have Fruity Loops installed on my PC but I haven't had time to play with it. I have several loops-in-progress and one 'rave' song finished. I hope to add a bit of digital flavor to HIGHBEAM's music. The possibilities are endless. More.

2. Wander some more. I am definitely going back to Baguio later this year. The place seems friendly to wanderers. I might go there alone, maybe take some friends with me. This time I get to pick who goes with me.

Sagada is a likely destination as well, and my home province, Antique. I hope to visit another country aside from Japan, maybe Thailand or Singapore.

3. Get a credit card, if only to facilitate having a paid account on tabulas. I need the gallery space. Plus the mp3 playback is cool. I envy artistmonk's blog.

4. Be nicer. Our bassist, Al, is nice. My officemate, Armin, is nice. Not me. No sir. I am nasty and mean, especially to people who I know won't say or do anything that would ever interest me.

I suspect that some people think that I'm a snob. Not really. I'm just terribly shy when meeting new people. Plus, I think my face is made for frowns rather than smiles. And I brood a lot. I avoid meeting aquaintances again because I'm not sure if they remember me and I don't know whether to greet them or not. Rejection is such a painful pill to swallow. But I'm not a snob, really. I think.

5. Start my empire. I think I'm done with about a third of my life (subtracting a few years due to a carnivorous diet) but everything's still on the drawing board. I need to start planting the seeds of my empire soon. They need time to germinate.

Life is what happens while you're making plans
- Sheryl Crow, Diamond Road

I saw C the other night in SM Fairview, of all places, at the stroke of midnight. The encounter consisted of a smile, a wave, some polite conversation, and a farewell. The whole thing lasted 15 minutes but I think I'm gonna be giddy throught the weekend.

I met C in UP several years ago and I became quite enamored with her. I was young then, simple bordering on naive. Joyful and innocent. I wrote a song for her, the sort of song that I would hesitate to sing in public. It had lines that go something like:

I cannot help it but when you're near
My grin goes up all the way to my ear...

and

... You are the only star on my nighttime sky
The first sunbeam to kiss me and greet me as I lie
You are that special thought that always makes me smile
Where where you all the while? ...

Great allowances must be given for youth and naivete.

I fancied myself in love with her. Then she graduated, and we both sort of forgot that the other existed.

I saw her rarely since then, and always during times and places I least expect. Yet everytime I do it always shakes me to the core of my being. Not, I think, because of any feelings I may have for her, although she has only grown more beautiful in my eyes since the last time I saw her.

Seeing C thrusts me back to the time when all was light and bright, when there wasn't a cynical bone in my body. Back to the time when I haven't grown my fangs and claws and spines yet. She takes me back to the time when I was a boy drunk with youthful love. A heroine-junkie, she was my addiction.

Those memories are precious to me. They never fail to make me smile, like I do now.

Strange, I notice that she always wears this funny look on her face whenever we do see each other. Her smile is true, I know, but it's tinged with something else. It's as if seeing me again thrusts her back through time as well, only the memories aren't as pleasurable as mine. I suspect that she has a beef with me, that sometime ago I committed a grievous error, but we will never get to talk about it. Ever.

I guess it doesn't matter to much. It's not as if I stalk her or anything (and last I heard she had a boyfriend). Raising the dead is definitely the last thing on my mind. We just happen to meet, sometimes, by means of pure serendipity, perhaps even Divine Intervention.

And I will always thank God whenever we do.

I expected winter to be cold, but not THIS cold.

But it's cool. No pun intended.

I think I'm getting the hang of it. I walk to the office everyday dressed like I'm going on a ski trip. So far, I haven't met the dreaded winds of the Tamagawa river yet. My officemates tell me that we're so lucky the weather has been extraordinarily warm eversince we arrived.

Thank God.

Being in Japan has it's advantages for me. I literally leave everything back at home whenever I go here. No problems. No cares. No friends too. It's like I start with a clean slate everytime I come here.

I intend to make use of that temporary freedom from all that I hold dear to get some new perspective, to get a fresh look at all that define who I am.

And shop till I drop.

Even though I don't really like Japanese girls, I do admire their guts for wearing miniskirts in the dead of winter.

It just struck me as odd how I can be currently surrounded by undecipherable glyphs and yet be OK about it.

I am now hammering at this Japanese keyboard, enjoying the 1 hour free broadband net access courtesy of Yahoo! BB Japan. They're so nice to gaijin in here. When my time's up I am going to Tower Records to see if the latest installement to Weis' and Hickman's Well of Darkness is already out. Then it's off to RecoFan to browse for some bargain and hard-to-find CD's.

I am flattered that people are starting to visit this weblog. It has its disadvantages though. Now that I know that people actually take notice of this site, I can't be as blunt or as direct as possible. Consider the following rantings:

"My boy, wit is both an art and a science. The secret lies in brevity and in impeccable timing. Fail in either of those and you end up annoying the people around you, like you make me feel right now. So do yourself a favor and Shut. Your. Trap."

"Ack! Just get a friggin get a room, you two!"

"Go away. GO AWAY! You have no right to be perky while I can hardly keep my eyes open. And no, my life is not a topic for light conversation. Go bug somebody else and leave me with Sheryl Crow and Kurt Cobain."

Sigh. Talk about vaguely talking about vague things.

Things have been set in motion that cannot now be undone.

My trip here in Japan is relatively short yet it's the most productive, by far. This weekend I made the following aquisitions:

Dragonlance Second Generation by Weis and Hickman
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
Sheryl Crow's 2nd and 3rd albums
Stone Temple Pilot's Core album

and the price catch...

a Delta 44 Professional Audio Card.

The audio card cost me a small fortune yet it's just a small part of the home studio I envisioned a long time ago. A small but important part, the heart of it all. Now that I have it, I am compelled to add a mixer, some excellent mics, and a decent monitor setup in the near future, all in all costing me another mid-sized fortune.

I just hope this doesn't turn out to be a big white elephant.

Because of the incomplete setup it may take some time before I am able to record a full song. Then there's the small fact that I know practically nothing about recording and mixing and mastering. I bought the card expecting some feeling of exultation from finally going ahead with a long-planned purchase. Instead I feel a bit daunted by the task before me.

Yes, it has begun.

This would probably mean that I won't be able to buy a lot of pasalubong this time (sorry, my friends). And that I would have to cut back on my libres and other luxuries. But God help me I will see this project through.

It's your fault, brother. Visions are such dangerous things.

I haven't been here in a while.
I have forgotten how this tastes --
To be free to walk or run as I choose;
To be still, or walk away
Or return if I want to.

I have taken the power back.

I shall stand in the eye of the storm
Bend it to my will.
Ride and force the winds to take me where I wish
With the thunder heralding my approach.
I will dance with the lightning
To the drumming of rain.
With its fury is spent
Only I will remain.

I have taken the power back.

I know, I know. By posting this entry I am breaking a self-imposed rule: no more than two posts a day. But with the cold and all I can't go to the net cafe often. Gimme a break.

***
I'm now in Starbucks Harajuku. It's my favorite place here in Japan. There's also a Yahoo! cafe here, but I come not for the free net access. This particular Starbucks outlet is a nexus of sorts for expats.

I collect faces. Pretty faces. Faces with character. Ageless ones. Anything that's worth my notice.

A sampling of the latest additions to my collection:

... this girl waiting in line at the subway station a few days ago
... my Japanese counterpart at Canon Inc.
... the Korean girl who lined up with me at the Japanese Immigration counter

Now this Korean had one of the most breathtaking faces I have ever seen. I spent the most part of the half-hour burning her image in my memory as I waited for my turn in the immigration counter.

Staring at people is not polite and invites disaster. The trick is to take several quick glances, separated by appropriate intervals of looking at nothing at all, allowing her the luxury of viewing your profile as well, if she wishes.

Anyway, at least three gorgeous ｂlondes caught my eye within a quarter of an hour. I am in heaven. And then there's this other blonde with gray eyes I sat next to at church this morning.

I wonder if anyone here has a thing for exotic-ectomorphic Filipinos.

***
My right-hand glove has a hole at the tip of it's index finger. Whenever anyone asks me what caused the hole, I tell them that I met this monster the other night and I had to use my rei-gun at him.

... from all the second-hand smoke I inhaled while we were conducting the final technical review of this document I am creating for the Japs, I trudged on to this place to make my final pilgrimage before they close this Yahoo! cafe in Harajuku.

I know you couldn't care less but I'm gonna tell you about it anyway. I am currently specializing on this Formal Design Verification Tool called Solidify, which, incidentally, is the title of a cool Sheryl Crow song ("Why should I? Why should I... solidify? Make it real..." Teehee. Sorry, couldn't help it). I was tasked to create the guideline document that's going to be used by all Formal Verification Engineers in the Canon group. Pretty cool, huh?

Anyway, my deadline's tomorrow. I finished the semi-final draft of the document and we reviewed it this afternoon. All was well when suddenly a group of Japanese dragons met in the cubicle beside ours. I could barely breathe while making my presentation.

Ah, but Shimizu-san was smiling oh so sweetly, so of course I had to go on.

We made some small talk as we made our way to the elevator. In her cute, halting English she asked me where I was staying in Japan. Whoa.

Curse this language barrier! How am I supposed to give her instructions? I would have reallyed loved teaching her some stuff... like English.

But I digress.

The point is, I only need to modify the document a bit, add a major section or two, and I'm done.

Which means I get to go home this Friday.

YAAAAHOOOO!

Which also means I get to go to this HighBeam gig this Saturday.

Can't wait, can't wait. But first things first, I gotta clean up my room.