Everybody's Free To Wear Sunscreen

I tried writing a couple of hours ago but I couldn't find any truth to write about. I have been under some stress regarding my life and my future, and I have learned many things on how to deal with the stresses and move on. However, at this point in time, my mind's a blank at 3:37am in a computer shop. SO, to compensate for my lack of eloquent philosophizing, here's a song I like for its simple honesty.


Baz Luhrmann - Everybody's Free (To Wear SUNSCREEN)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ladies and gentlemen, of the class of '99.
Wear Sunscreen.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.
The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.
I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth.
Oh, never mind.
You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded.
But trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.
You are not as fat as you imagine.

Don't worry about the future.
Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum.
The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind.
The kind that blindside you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.

Don't be reckless with other people's hearts.
Don't put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss.

Don't waste your time on jealousy.
Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind.
The race is long and, in the end, it's only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive.
Forget the insults.
If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old love letters.
Throw away your old bank statements.

Stretch.

Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life.
The most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives.
Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don't.

Get plenty of calcium.
Be kind to your knees.
You'll miss them when they're gone.

Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't.
Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't.
Maybe you'll divorce at 40, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary.
Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either.
Your choices are half chance.
So are everybody else's.

Enjoy your body.
Use it every way you can.
Don't be afraid of it or of what other people think of it.
It's the greatest instrument you'll ever own.

Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your living room.

Read the directions, even if you don't follow them.

Do not read beauty magazines.
They will only make you feel ugly.

Get to know your parents.
You never know when they'll be gone for good.
Be nice to your siblings.
They're your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should hold on.
Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were young.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.
Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.
Travel.

Accept certain inalienable truths:
Prices will rise.
Politicians will philander.
You, too, will get old.
And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.

Respect your elders.

Don't expect anyone else to support you.
Maybe you have a trust fund.
Maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse.
But you never know when either one might run out.

Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will look 85.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it.
Advice is a form of nostalgia.
Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it's worth.

But trust me on the sunscreen.

Bird friends

I've written this a long time ago, maybe my 4th or 5th post-to-be, but I've never been able to publish it, only today. Read on ...


There's these two maya birds outside my room window. They're on the window sill opposite the building I'm in, and since no one lives in that other building, nobody goes there to clean up or do any maintenance. I think those two birds have been there since before November, if I'm not mistaken, and it seems like they're here to stay. They are marvelously precise. I've been checking up on them (like they were people) and they never fail to nest at 6:14pm on my watch. Just about the time the sky turns dark orange during sunset and it's dark enough for them to feel secure "going home". In the morning, while I type my journal entries, they leave their nest at precisely 6:14am. Biologists would call this a circadian rhythm. All living things follow it or experience it, like you and me. It's all the events that happen to an organism within 24 hours and the observable patterns that form from observing succeeding 24-hour cycles.

In my case, I eat, sleep, go online, talk on the phone, run some errands, and sleep. In a nutshell that is.

In the case of the birds, they leave their home at 6:14 in the morning. I have no idea what they do for the 12 hours during the day. They probably go find food or join other birds at "work" or merely chirp each other songs to get the day by. Afterwhich they return to their nest at 6:14pm on the dot, and start sleeping through the night. If you check the window sill, it's already collecting loads of oxidized maya droppings forming a trickling pattern of white residue from the sill down to the bottom of the wall. The weird thing is, there are no "homy touches" to their tiny nook, no sign that they consider that part of the building their house. On the same building, I observed up on the 3rd floor, there's an old air-conditioner without it's metal casing, so much so that you can see the "innards" of the mechanism. A family of maya birds have been living in it for quite some time now, and you can see that the cavities are lined with little mounds of grass and soil. I bet they've even laid and hatched fledglings there. But with the one opposite my window, there seems to be no trace of "settling down." Which brings me to a conclusion formulated about 3 days now ... the birds opposite my window are having an elicit affair. That's the only plausible explanation I have. They only meet up precisely at 6:14pm and leave as early as 6:14am. What they do on that window sill within the 12 hours they're together is probably a secret from all the other birds. And who knows, maybe during the nights when I'm burning the midnight oil, it is likely that they do their little bird dance and other maya mating rituals that I'm not aware of. If so, how come they don't have children yet? Is there some sort of natural avian birth control method? Are maya birds firm believers in safe sex? Or are they merely barren?

Whatever the ethological reasons there are, I probably won't know or understand at this point. But somehow I'm glad they're beside my window. I don't feel so alone when I work at night.

Damn. Those birds lead more interesting lives.



NOTE: The birds have since been gone after the cold months. They were replaced by the aircon that used to be in my room, only now I have a newer air-conditioner in my room. It's all just crap over there.

Potent Potables

As I'm typing this, I'm also downing a bottle of crisp, cold Miller genuine draft beer. Don't mistake me to be an alcoholic because I'm not, though right now I feel I desperately need something to make me fall asleep faster than trying to count sheep in the middle of the night. I'm a couple of centimeters to finishing up, and even if this is only the first bottle for the night, my face is starting to feel tight and somehow, instinctively, I feel my blood pressure rising gradually. I fear looking at a mirror for I know exactly what to expect of myself -- all flushed, my face pinkish red like an Eskimo's and my eyes bloodshot like a day-old fish's. According to my friend, the tolerance to alcohol is a mental thing. He says that it really doesn't matter how much beers you take in to get you drunk, as the amount YOU feel you can take in before losing it in a brawl or ejecting your dinner in a fountain-like vomitus projectile. I'm not much of a drinker so I don't really know if this is true or not. I think it's both. There's a certain limit to "toxicity" for each individual but a bit of an attitude may also influence being "under the influence".

(I've just finished the last shot)

Believe me, I'm not one to spend nights unsobering and wasting my money away, bottle after bottle, over cold beer. LIke most of the young crowds herding up in malls, I'm more of a coffee person. Most of the time, coffee's a lot more expensive, especially if you get those icy cold mochaccinos that come with ice cream or jelly. Don't get me wrong, they're delish, but sipping house blends from each shop is more my thing. So far, I find Manila Hotel fresh coffee still the best at P50. Freshly ground then cooked up right after, the aroma is incomparable, the taste very easy on the throat, and the bitter aftertaste is very minimal since it's medium roast. Annoyingly, the refill comes as the WORST brewed coffee in my list. I'd rather take those instant ones they have in sachets. The refill is over-cooked and bitter, kept dripping and reheated for hours in open air. There's also the expected sour aftertaste when coffee's been heated for too long. It totally destroys the whole 1st cup experience. I'm not much of an expert in deriving taste and texture though, but in the Philippines, most blends consist of arabica. Seattle's Best house blend is okay (in Tomas Morato) because it's also smooth and slightly nutty. In other branches though, the house blend tastes like that of other mainstream coffee houses as Starbucks or Coffee Republic. Everything's too diluted. The flavor's lost in all that water, and when I try to find creamers instead of milk to make the coffee more creamy, there aren't any available. The frappuccinos, I find, are too sweet. I'd prefer drinking those blue label, milk tea imports from China sold in 7-11. Perfect taste.

If you're a real coffee connoisseur though, you have to try my Dad's very own blend. It's a mixture of local and foreign blends that he combines himself. He buys the beans from many different places and grinds them himself. He uses a coffee expert's espresso percolator for full flavor and freshness. The taste is unprecedented. (Too bad I'm leaving Baguio in the day after tomorrow, though I'll take some with me back home.)

Tomorrow we'll be buying some longganisa and ube jam for my visiting aunt. It'll be a long day in the market.