To start, allow me to extend my thanks to Ms. N (name withheld til further notice) and her very cute gift for my pet dragon, Gorbash. To my understanding, she recently had a trip to Davao and was sweet enough to buy this "necklace" for my green water-dispenser-watching reptile.

This would count as my first physical present since the "rejuvination" of my blog and I can only wonder what else is to follow in the days to come.

Gorbash loves it.

According to the green one, the necklace makes him feel special, the way a dragon would feel after choosing to work with one of the Knights of Solamnia. When I reminded him he was more of a cartoon dragon, like the other one who lived by the sea, Gorbash merely sneered at me and reminded me, "Dragonlance already does have a cartoon too."



Guess I should have known better than to try and tell off a dragon.

On a related note, I've been getting quite an unexpected amount of support on my attempt to do Nanowrimo this year. There are a bunch of others (such as Rocky who is writing The Interrogation) who are also working on theirs, so here's hoping we all succeed this year!

Actually wrote up the second chapter yesterday hitting the 12k word mark, but after a quick re-read, I realized I hated it and scrapped it all together. So now, I've been typing away again and am closing in on the 10k target for the week. It is funny how giving yourself a deadline the way Nanowrimo has approached this challenge really does engage one to write. It has an almost reality-show feel to it, knowing there's such a limited amount of time to accomplish a given task. Frankly, I'm hoping that Surviving Manila: Risen Threat! actually does pleasure people, whether or not they're into the whole zombie genre. While there have been many other attempts to do a Zombie-thing in the country, most I've seen sort of feel like they're just the typical Hollywood zombies transplanted to the Philippines. I'm hoping my take on them has a much more distinct local feel.

Recently had a reunion with some of my old officemates from ABS-CBN Global. It was really nice seeing them again and it does kind of make one realize how much time really has passed. Our quick hellos and kamustahan eventually lead to lunch at Proud Mary, a nearby quaint little restaurant with good food, and soon the topic of discussion shifted to them asking me about my current relationship and all its joys and wonders.

Life is like that, I guess.

One needs moments of reconnecting to remember how far one has gone in life. And one needs to embrace the opportunities to be thankful for all those who made each day of your life special.




Anyway, enough with blogging today.

Them zombies are waiting to be written down. Here's a teaser of the next chapter:

KaQoH was not always named KaQoH. There was a time as well when he had a much more ordinary name. Like almost everyone else in the world, KaQoH once had a first and a last name. But after the events that transpired with the coming of the zombies, the parent given legal name KaQoH once answered to no longer seemed appropriate. The ordinary name no longer seemed acceptable for someone who had accomplished great things. And the greatest among them was gaining control of the Shaw station. Among the thirteen Metro Rail Transit stations, the Shaw station was the seventh station. The very station that stood at the center of the line. KaQoH foresaw during the initial days of the zombie attacks that the Metro Rail Transit would eventually prove useful in transporting people without having to risk the obstacle course of abandoned vehicles and the deadly hordes of hungry dead. Controlling the very center of this said line meant being able to push a level of influence and demand upon those who wanted to get from one point to the other. While others slowly began to realize the importance the stations would eventually achieve, KaQoH already gained control of the Shaw station, secured all access routes to the street and nearby shopping establishments, and had begun hording a sizable amount of possible weaponry to defend the station. While he was not in any means a man skilled in the ways of the fist, KaQoH had a knack for swaying people’s leanings. While it seemed easy to assume this was a skill gained from years of being bullied as a child, the more practical reason most people who came to seek for shelter in Shaw station listened to KaQoH’s words was because he was the only one that day who had the full set of keys to all the locks at the station. It isn’t hard to sound convincing when the only means to secure doors was in your hands.