the new World of Darkness and Vampire: The Requiem books
are out and i do not have the money for them. Fuck fuck fuck.
Really. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. I hate this.
I can't afford to buy the books I wanted to get. Argh...

I really should try looking for more sideline jobs. I really should be less generous and expect people to pay me back. I really should start charging for the small favors I do other people who aren't really even friends.

If by some miracle, someone actually treats me both books as a present with no strings attached... I will definitely, without doubt, go through a life-changing moment of epiphany and reconsider my life.

Grabe. Drama ba?

DILIMAN is offline.
Yep. Something wrong with my webspace it seems. Contacted the person in-charge and hoping for an answer soon. Hope its nothing that bad. Really do.

Til then, sorry to all those who hoped to check the site. If you haven't gotten a copy of the free CD with PDF versions of the first ten issues, you might still be able to grab one at Comic Quest, Mega Mall. Go ask for Vinnie.

Gotta love them
Look at this site if you're a Square Soft fan.

Don't want to lose Time of Judgment
With the new World of Darkness out, the old World of Darkness stuff seem to be in the process of being removed from the site. Have to save the news tickers!
Find them here.

Stuck at home today
Some rash appeared on my legs and body today. The weather? Bed mites? I dunno. The doctor says its probably stress. Hehehe, I wonder if I should tell my boss, "this work is making me SICK!"

Hmm...

Hahahhahaha!
Gonna recuperate.
Loads to chase after come Monday.

Darn
Geocities.com does not like boobies.
:-(

Bitch Bitch Moan Moan Bitch Bitch Moan Moan
Punyeta. Ang kapal ng mukha mo.

Yung lang po.
*bow*

Tis raining
Woke up to the sound of very strong rains. Had the wishful hope that it would mean no work.
Beep came the text message and my officemate, Joey, informed me na work was called off. A split second before I could rejoice, BEEP came another message telling me that I had to still go to work due to the TV guide project.

Whoopeedoo.

Am home now. Earlier since I finished early and yes "Flexi-time po ako. I have work-life balance needs to settle."

HA!

Just in case Angel down there is lonely
I need a vote. Which of the two would be a better partner for Angel down there?
A. "Appear! Disappear!"

or
B. "I wanna wiggle it"

WAG NA NGA!
Okay. After doing everything from being welcoming, open-armed, inviting, and almost to the point of actually pleading, I'm leaving you to decide when you want to hang out. Maybe I'm just too blind to realise this is a subtle way of saying "No, Tobie, we don't want to hang out with you" or maybe this is simply me being tired of trying to be understanding of everyone else, but damn it, I'm going to just enjoy my time and if anyone else want to share those moments, give me a ring.

SIGLO
Konting konti na lang.. Lettering na lang.
God give me the courage to finish this and hand it to Dean and Vinnie.

DILIMAN 13
It was refreshing to receive an e-mail from a person asking if the issue was coming out soon. I guess I do still have readers. Well. Reader. Yay nontheless!

Moolah Problems
Still hoping to get back the 5,000 bucks I lent a friend soon. It ain't easy stretching 500 pesos for a week. And try doing that for almost four weeks.

It is a sick sick world
Former employees of a Cornelius, NC, dentist claim he made female patients unwittingly swallow his cum during visits to his office. <>Dr. John Hall is accused by the state dental board of violating dentistry's standard of care, engaging in immoral conduct, and committing sexual assault or battery.

A Romanian surgeon operating on a patient with a testicular deformity suddenly went off the deep end, cutting off the unconscious man's penis and slicing it into three pieces.

The patient was rushed for emergency reconstructive surgery where the penis was sewn back together and re-attached but it is doubtful whether he will ever be able to perform sexually again.

The patient’s wife is suing the Dr. Naum Ciomu who was a senior physician at the Bucharest Hospital.

My God.
And they say GAY RIGHTS are a threat to our rights.

NICE and PURTY
The new White Wolf website is up.
Love the sleek design. And the forums look better too.
Check it out!

Oh look its a Holiday
and I am at work.
Anyone surprised?

30 hours of work and...
...my Macintosh G4, with all my projects especially two major projects (one of which was due today), crashed. God knows how close I am to just freaking out if more things don't go the way I hope today. Especially with today being a day that so many things are aggravating me.

I want to cry.
I want to go home, take a good shower, get into clean clothes...
and maybe, while in my room alone and contemplating on the fact I still have to go to work tomorrow
(which happens to be Quezon City day, a FUCKING holiday damn it)
and try to salvage the mess that has swamped over me..
break down and cry for a moment, wishing there was someone to hold me close, whisper to me how much I have done more than enough today, and kiss me to console me that even after all this, I am still a better person than others think I am.

It is now 10:26a.m...
...and I am STILL in the office! I definitely want to take a shower (and there are showers) but I don't have any spare clothes (or spare underwear) and sadly, I hate taking a shower only to re-wear something I already have worn.

Sigh.

At least I'm covering a lot of hours. Who knows, I might actually be permitted to skip off Friday and stay home?








Well... theoreticaly.
Never hurts to dream in theory.

Good nightie Monday
Decided to head off to bed earlier tonight. Johnboy passed by and we laughed our asses off watching Trainspotting. The scene in the toilet (yes... in) just cracks us up everytime!

Silent Hill 4 Soundtrack
Got a copy! Yahoo!!! Now I pity my Orpheus players!

Quickie Update:
Met Paolo Dy today. Amazing young director with a charming smile, an evidently present surge of creative ideas as well as a "let's do it" attitude that I wish I had. Here's hoping the commercial goes well. Will be meeting with him tomorrow again to do the Director's Storyboard.

Went to IO KTV with Joey and Hoho today. Found myself, again, following Carl's footsteps, singing songs like Better Days and Fever. I can't wait til I get to really learn to sing them better. Joey's rendition of Summertime just blew me away. Gotta learn that song too! Not bad for a 120 peso lunch.

Sleepy. Tired. And still not done with Siglo: Passion. Congratulations to the first team of creatives who did the first book. Your winning the National Book awards is a testament to your true creative spirit. I only hope my contribution in the next one does not fuck up your good vibes.

One last before I jump into Bed
MirrorMask is another upcoming movie I can't wait to see.


MirrorMask centers on Helena, a 15 year old girl in a family of circus entertainers, who often wishes she could run off and join real life. After a fight with her parents about her future plans, her mother falls quite ill and Helena is convinced that it is all her fault. On the eve of her mother's major surgery, she dreams that she is in a strange world with two opposing queens, bizarre creatures, and masked inhabitants. All is not well in this new world - the white queen has fallen ill and can only be restored by the MirrorMask, and it's up to Helena to find it. But as her adventures continue, she begins to wonder whether she's in a dream, or something far more sinister.

Now, if that isn't enough reason to check it out, allow me this other tidbit of detail that whets the appetite to see it:

"From the Creative Minds of Neil Gaiman, Dave McKean and the Jim Henson Company."

Ah!

Now, if you're looking for something unexpected, erotic and just... oh-my-gosh............. them!??!
Look here for the movie I think you'd love to see. I know I do.

Another movie to look forward to
Steam Boy is Katsuhiro Otomo's next major animation after the amazing and ground-breaking AKIRA.


Damn... I hope it comes out here too!

Reuters Photo Calif. Court Voids S.F. Same-Sex Marriages (AP) - The California Supreme Court ruled unanimously Thursday that San Francisco's mayor overstepped his authority by issuing same-sex marriage licenses this spring. The court also voided all the marriages of gay and lesbian couples sanctioned by the city. The court said the city violated the law when it issued the certificates and performed the marriage ceremonies in a monthlong wedding march that began Feb. 12, since both legislation and a voter-approved measure defined marriage as a union between a man and woman.

It is on times like this I am happy to be in the Philippines. What sort of country celebrates the accomplishment of stripping a minority of a basic right it asks for? I am appalled by this. Really. This appalls me more than things like war and stuff because this ins't even a political agenda or a terrorrist thing. This is about people who want to live and be happy and other people who want to be the only ones who have such a right.

Damn them. Damn them to hell.

I want to see this soon!
Check out the trailer for the upcoming movie The Forgotten.
Wow.

Opinions and Editorials
To my knowledge, an editorial cartoon was always the opinion of the artist in relation to a main theme or subject matter that exists in the attentions of the media. Typically, the editorial cartoon connects to the editorial of the editor only in the sense that both tackle a particular issue. An editorial cartoon is never excepted to deliver the SAME message of the editorial, nor deliver a supplementary message (though there is no rule saying it should not) in relation to the editorial. In exists, like the editorial itself, as an expressed opinion on a subject matter.

Why am I ranting about this?

Been asked to do a cartoon editorial for our office paper, you see. Subject of the editorial is the word: UNITY. As I mentioned earlier (with a picture accompanying it), there has been this attempt to shape the mentality and views of people in my office to believe there exists a unity within the rank and file employees and the higher ups. Now, don't get me wrong. I am not one of those naysayers who believe that the higher ups are always oppressive and self-serving. Nope. In fact, I have very optimisctic views and beliefs that those in the upper management of our office our doing the best they can to give us what is due us. It is just that there are other factors (read as other bigger bosses) who'se influence reach much further whose intentions are more on the "bottom-line moolah" mindset than the rest of us.

Anyway, I made one cartoon which I felt was a "in-your-face-honest-opinion" on what sort of Unity truly exists in the workplace. Although I did not specify that it represented my office, I definitely did imply that is happens that way more than most would expect. One can't really hold on to altruism when surrounded by carreer and wealth focused competitors.

As expected, it was shot down. "It only speaks of one side," one of those in-charge mentioned, "There is honestly, but I feel it ignores the fact there are some groups in the office that do show unity. Why not illustrate those?" Personally, I felt like she was off-track. I mean its like me making a cartoon to represent the health of a person dying of, say, A.I.D.S. and being told my brutally honest representation of his emancipated self doesn't do justice to the fact his left ear and his right tit are still healthy and ruddy!

Promising not to compromise my artistic sensibilities and my personal beliefs, I told them I will make a new one (rather than "revise' the first one which I felt had no need for such revisions) which still resonates with my beliefs. Though it was far more.. harmless, I still felt it did convey what I wanted to say about Unity. I mean, it shows it can be done (and implies it isn't there yet), but the need to strip away the individual to serve the rest isn't an easy task.

Anyway, here they are.
I mean, I worked hard on them. I want others to at least appreciate them.


Unity #1

Unity #2

Keeping sane by treading the thin line
When you work in an advertising agency, even one as small as the one I work in, there are just some days you have to dance around the less sane route to make sure you'll stay sane in the end of the day. The constant flood of workloads, rushed projects, revisions and new requirements can overwhelm even the most stoic of men in the workplace.

So when our Boss, Miss Beth, got back from New York City with a bunch of Victorian inspired masks as pasalubong and my Dad got back from California with the rechargeable battery kit which we needed here at work, two merged into one for a funny antic that just demanded to be done, lest we burn away our sanity and begin singing the Pamela-Otso otso song acapella.


I tell you, it is on days like this that I forget how over-worked and under-paid I am and recall how great it is to work in an environment where people don't solely exist to backstab you, and your boss is a human being who knows you are one too.

Ironic, I know.
Nearly caused a fire at work today. Bought some microwavable popcorn, and followed the instructions on the package, setting the microwave on High for four minutes. Then, waited. Before I knew it, tufts of smoke rose from the popcorn bag and filled the machine faster than you could fart.

Worried, I reached into the microwave, tossed the smoking bag of popcorn into the sink and doused it with generous helpings of water. With a fog of over-cooked popcorn and butter filling the room, I quickly opened the doors and prayed the sprinkler system wouldn't kick in.

Thankfully, it didn't.

Last thing I would have wanted was the sprinkler systems to engage and me being seen as the culprit of over Php 300,000 of computer and electonic equipment that would have gotten damaged. Or worse, the files that could have gotten lost.

All for a damn bag of popcorn.

(insert "Fire Drill" irony here)

I want to go home.
:-(

Joining the Wolves I wonder
Heard on the grapevine someone's been spreading nasties about me.
I wonder if old friends who aren't friends have suddenly gained new allies.
Damn.
Move on....

FIRE DRILL!
It was a typical over-worked day when me, Ma-an and Ricky were presenting to Miss Beth a new concept proposal for an advertisement when we heard the sirens of firetrucks and ambulances gathering nine floors below us. Peering through the windows, the three of us commented on how there seems to be a shoot ongoing below, and how some people might confuse it for the real thing.

Then a security guy came up to us and told us, "Ma-am, Sir... baba na raw po kayo. Fire drill na po."

The Fire drill had begun. And we had never heard a single alarm.

I GUESS IF IT WERE A REAL ONE, PATAY NA KAMI
To their credit, we were informed as early as two weeks ago that Fire Drills will be conducted in the ABS-CBN Compound. But thanks to the overload of work, I claim innocence for forgetting it was to be done on our building that day. What I could not accept was the fact that this damn huge building worth most likely millions of pesos with its air-con systems, its wonderful office spaces and the like had fire alarms that couldn't be heard by those inside the stupid building!

Well, you can't blame me for being in a pissed off mood.
To lighten my annoyance, I grabbed my digital camera and followed the throng of other employees who, like me, would be already dead had this been a real fire. They really have to get those alarms replaced.


We walk down the ten flights of stairs (we were on the ninth floor, but some great architect thought it would be fun to add an additional flight between the ground and the second floor to make sure we exited at the OTHER end of the building.) and joined the mass of cars and irritated commuters whose travel around our compound were delayed by the sudden throng of sirens, fire engines and annoyed employees.







Click. Click. Click. Not wanting to be in a foul mood for the remainder of the day (considering it was only 10:30a.m. at that time), I began going around and getting my officemates to laugh and smile and jump around for pictures. I mean, hey, we're the group that's supposed to be already dead right? We laughed at the other non-employees who were still in the upper floors and were wondering what was going on. We cried for them to jump. We called out to them to escape certain doom. And we laughed, and laughed and laughed.

All in all, it went well I supposed, other than the point we were all dead, everything else went well I heard. The rescue team had some showing off to do and the big bosses were happy that the fire engines actually arrived in time (well, that's cause they were scheduled to show up. I'd love to see them respond to a call they don't know is a drill.) They were all smartly dressed, none in sandals or slippers. Not a single one with messy hair or unkempt and unshaven.

I guess when things have a touch of showbiz, everything really is made to look perfect.

After that, Gabby Lopez headed up the steps, which for everyone pretty much meant, "Time to head back to work." And so we did... moving back into the building like a mass of trained lemmings ready to serve until hunger, exhaustion or piracy saves us from over-worked experiences.

WHOOOOO!!!!
Got a net-book published! Well, its a 4-page thing, and it was for a contest, but hey, I LOVE the way they laid out the article as a pdf file. Hehehehhe, now I can claim I was published!!!! Check it out, you can find it at www.nocturnis.net Yep. Its a scenario for Changeling: The Dreaming for the Time of Judgment storyline.

Happy Visits
Had some guests over the week at work. Though the toil of laboring over commercials, product advertisements and the like can be taxing, it is on moments like these that the load feels less painful to bear.


The charming and witty Broderick.
An old friend of mine back in college named Brod visited me at work last Thursday. We chatted about old times, about money and about having to find the right job and all that jazz. It was funny how when we were trying to recall all those people whom we used to spend hours with in the university were suddenly all so out-of-touch with everyone else. Some, to my knowledge, maintained ties with their own little cliques. Others, sadly, chose to detach themselves from everyone else. And then there are people like Brod and myself who just want to catch up on old times and chat around with friends.


Posing beside a Gem.
Gem worked with us back when I worked on my first commercial for a brand called Sarimanok One. Back then, I was still wondering how well she could pull off what we were expecting of her considering unlike the other commercials I had worked on with my Creative Team, Gem wasn't some numerous-digit talent of ABS-CBN. Still, her audition showed immense promise and her perkiness just won us over.

No regrets at all. Now, she is pretty much THE face of Sarimanok One, and thanks to her over, 1 million long distance minutes were actually consumed by customers in barely two months time. She also appeared in That's Entertainment in the past and was in the "Hot Hotta!" Coke promo commercials too. I'm happy to have met her and I am happy to have been part of her working life. What's best is when we bump into each other, its like two best friends meeting all over again and realising how much there is to talk about.

Fire-Drill and nothing's burning...
...but our deadlines. Pictures and some anecdotes on that next time. I left my pictures at my office computer.

Had an argument with a friend today
Well, more of a discussion that transformed into a sort-of argument when we hit a snag on something we had different views on. Though the specifics are no longer important, the following things were stuff I believed in which I chose to stand by.

"Love isn't something magical that lasts forever.
a large part of it is a choice.
a choice to make it work out in the end.
then, it becomes magical.
because then, you and your partner are making it work, without even thinking it.
Love is a constant sharing, understanding and compromising.
Its not a perfect state that you have to hit or miss.
That "perfect state" is the idealized love
unconditional - within the bounds of realism.
if it weren't, you'd then imply that a woman bashed by her husband nightly should never try to change him.
there are a limits to everything.
but if you work on making love work, then those limits disappear.
like if that abusive husband really wanted to change and the wife really wanted to make it work out, then the unconditionalness of love begins to appear.
and if you both constantly try to make it work out, meaning find time to spend for each other, be honest about times you might not be able to.. then you are building an unconditional love that will be the ideal love spoken in poetry and written in songs.
working it out doesn't mean there are problems. it simply means you are finding ways to make one life work for two people who have separate lives. its sad how some people have turned compromise into an ugly word."

I don't think I lost any friends by believing in this. And I have no reason to stop seeing him as a friend. But I do hope he realises that everything I said was meant to help him see that his choices make a difference and do affect other people. His life is his own, after all.

Someday, I wonder if I'll be standing at that very same spot he was at. I wonder if I'll find myself struggling to find clarity in my own heart. For now, though, I am happy to be able to admit that though my own life may be fraught with troubles and insecurities of my own, I am at least clear as to where I stand when it comes to love. And I am willing to live this life I live.

Except on those times I feel horny as hell, damn it.
(thank God for perseverance. And very very COLD showers.)

Got listed in a blog today unlike any other
Calling itself Filipino Comic Book Portal, the blog features a huge list of links to existing Filipino comic creators. Grabe, this is a really good idea and I do hope it gets featured somewhere soon so it can help the struggling local comic "barely an industry" grow someday. Good work, Woofydogg! You should get a medal for this!

I'll probably add you as a character in one of my own works as a show of thanks. :-)

And another!
Also got listed in Abono which was a second pleasant surprise. Well, that's what I heard from a friend online. Of course, if it turns out I wasn't and my friend Nthan15 just imagined he saw my name there, okay lang yon. I'll just embarassingly have to live with this post for the rest of my life. Heheh.

Maybe I am slowly getting to where I hoped as far as local comics are concerned.
Maybe I am slowly earning recognition for my work.

Ah...
Or maybe I'm just choosing to be happy even if deep down I know I'm barely "a toe" in as far as being a real comic book artist/writer is concerned.

Grabe, Idol ko ito.
Makes me wish I had the comprehension of mathematics, animation and creativity that this guy has. My God... talk about really cool website design and artistic approaches.

Oh, I was talking about this site.

Finally got END GAME.
Yep, the great alien-sodomy-victim kept a copy of the book for me. And the really cool housemate of mine helped foot the rent for the month, giving me just enough financial leeway to purchase the last book of the remarkable Orpheus series.
Astig. Now if only my players would last long enough in the game to get to End-game.
Hehehe.

Something wicked comes this way? Oh, you don't know the half of it!

Sometimes I wonder

Should I just try priest-hood?
Or castration?
Or maybe start looking for some sex toy to keep me sated?

It fucking hard.
Nuff 'said.