I came to think about how technology paved the way for people to express and make their names on the internet. Some personal sites or blogs can be compared to products in the market, to TV shows, etc., where they brand themselves with a logo and target a specific group of audience. Technology also paved the way for people to showcase their talents. Seeing online portfolios or galleries  makes me feel  that the people who made them really love what they are doing.But above all, I really appreciate technology for paving the way for people to express themselves to the world.

This is actually a “cycle” for me. Time comes when I am inspired and eager to release my ideas and emotions, and time also comes when I do not have the time or I am just lazy to do so. Because of this, those “projects” were just shelved (somewhere). I’ve been thinking about them recently and realized that some of them have been shelved for more than a year now.

What I want to do now is maybe list all of them and at least try to do it. But I hope I have the time to do them.

I can say that I wasn’t productive last Saturday as I waited for typhoon Santi to leave the Philippines. The wind was blowing hard when I woke up and there was a power failure in our place until Saturday noon. We were also preparing for All Saints’ Day the following day.

The weather was fine last Sunday though it was really hot outside. We go to the cemetery every first day of November. It’s actually a day to remember our loved ones who passed away, at the same time, a day for family reuninon. It was a tireful day, not to mention that I needed to go to work the next day. (Well, I had no choice but to go to work. But I would still prefer to just stay home and rest)

When I arrived home on Tuesday night, I was schocked by the news that my grandma’s sister, Lola Roseng passed away. We were just with her last Monday when she visited us in the cemetery. Like any Filipino would do, we welcomed her by making “mano”. I didn’t expect that it would be the last time that we’ll see her, so I am really shocked and sad up to this moment. She is a part of me since she is always around whenever we have family gatherings or when she would visit my grandma once in a while.

We will surely miss her but I hope that she will rest in peace and happiness with our Lord.

It’s been months since Yahoo announced the closure of Geocities. At first, I wasn’t much affected nor shocked with the news. But when Geocities totally closed last October 26, 2009, I then appreciated this old friend of ours.

I first successfully launched a personal site through Geocities’ free hosting. It gave people a venue to express themselves. Who will forget URLs such as www.geocities.com/(Yahoo User ID)? Those were the days when we are so amazed of marquees, animated images, etc.

I still remember back when I was in college when I used to save my webpages in a floppy disk and then go to an internet shop to upload or update my site.

Blogs started to become widely used because of it’s easy customization and updating, though there are web applications right now who are offering instant websites. But I think blogs are much widely used nowadays.

Still, I feel grateful for being part of the Geocities generation. It served as the first medium in the web  for me to express who I am.

I really looked forward for last Saturday as me and my high school friends planned to go on a videoke night. I started the day early since I have to go to work in the morning. My original plan was to work the whole day of Saturday but one of my college friends invited us to watch a fashion show in SMX. I decided to join them since it’s free. I left the office at around 2:00 in the afternoon.

I arrived in SMX at around 3:30 pm. It was just right because the doors of the hall opened for the audience at 4:00 pm. I just knew that we’ll be watching the collection of Edgar San Diego when we arrived there. I actually don’t know him at it was my first time to watch a fashion/modeling show live. We waited in the hall for 30 minutes before the show started. The show ran for 30 minutes.

After the show, my friends decided to eat in Don Henricos. I actually did not anticipate it because I will still go to a videoke party that night. I also had a late lunch that afternoon. But I had no choice but to eat. Not to mention, the food were really tempting.

After eating, we then parted ways. I was with my friend JohnJan. We waited for the rest of our high school friends after watching an amazing fireworks display. Afterwards, we headed to Music 21.

It was the much awaited event of the night. Everybody was excited to sing and dance with full energy. It was an unforgettable night full of laughter. And as expected, time ran fast. How I wished we could extend for few more hours but we had to go home since it’s nearing midnight.

But the night did not end there because we still returned to MOA to cool down. To my surprise after we bought mineral water, I saw a familiar face near me. I pretended that I did not see him. I do not if he saw me as well.

We had to end the day since it’s past midnight.

The next day, I went to my officemate’s house because she asked for my help for their computer at home. I am really not an expert in fixing PCs but I am somehow learning from my experiences. I tried my best to fix the PC but unfortunately, it really needs to be checked by an expert. But honestly, I found the experience good. I was in their house for about 5 hours, but I did not see her as an accounting manager, but rather a loving mother. I just can’t explain the feeling but I appreciated her after sharing stories with her yesterday.

I came to think that I would love to have bonding moments with a person alone. I mean with no other friends around because the conversation is only between the two of us. It’s actually a different kind of bonding. But I do not mean that I do not want to be in groups. For example, if I am to go out with my high school friends, I want us to be complete as much as possible.

Though I did not find time to rest well during the weekend, I still had the energy to come to work this morning after my experience last weekend. It was a mixture of different emotions but it made me realized a lot of things that makes me move forward as a better person.

Based from Ang Pinaka’s “Ang Pinaka Pasaway na Facebook Users”, which is also based from CNN’s “The 12 most annoying types of Facebookers”.

I had fun watching Ang Pinaka’s episode yesterday about the annoying Facebook users. But I found out that they just got it from an article by Brandon Griggs from CNN website. Anyway, to add a personal touch to the list, I’ll be admiting if I am guilty of the following annoyances in Facebook.

12. The Chronic Inviter
Not guilty! Haha. If ever there was a time I sent an invitation, I am sure that I just made a mistake in clicking the invite or the send button. These are users who keep on inviting his/her friends to try the game/application that he/she has just tried.

11. The Obscurist
Guilty! These are users who usually put mysterious or hanging status/quotes. Well for me, sometimes what you want to express is best expressed in that way.

10. The Paparazzo
Not guilty! The paparazzo users are those who post pictures and keep on tagging others especially when the pictures of the people that has been tagged are funny. Well, I’m not gulity because I am lazy to tag my friends.

9. The Crank
Guilty! Haha. These are users who usually complains in their Facebook statuses. Oh well, for me, it’s a way of releasing hatred.

8. The Lurker
Not gulity! These are users who seem to be out of circulation in Facebook but you’ll be surprised that he/she has been reading your statuses regularly.

7. The Sympathy-Baiter
Guilty! These are users who seem to ask for symapthy from their friends. As I mentioned in item #10, for me, I don’t find any problem if someone will use FB to express what they feel. Actually, I like reading personal posts in FB. Yeah, sympathy baiters might be seeking attention. And if it’s a way for them (us) to feel not alone, then I don’t see any problem with it.

6. The Bad Grammarian
50/50. I know I am not an expert in English, but I always make sure and try to have correct grammar, especially when I know that I’ll be posting something that can be read by many.

5. The TMIer (Too Much Information)
50/50. It actually depends on my mood. But I also try to set a limit on what to share and not to share. There are still things about me which I want to keep private.

4. The Town Crier
Guilty! Whenever there are breaking news which you want to share to many, obviously Facebook is a good venue to do it. I don’t see anything wrong with it, just as long as the news comes from reliable sources.

3. The Friend-Padder
50/50. Of course, I don’t add friends whom I really don’t know. But I do add schoolmates in the past. Haha. This gave me an idea of filtering my FB friends to my real friends.

2. The Self-Promoter
Guilty! But actually I don’t find no problem with it if you want to promote yourself in FB. Actually I love it, not only for myself, but for others who are doing that too.

1. The Let-Me-Tell-You-Every-Detail-of-My-Day Bore
Guilty! Actually I don’t find any problem with it just as long as it doesn’t sound boastful. It’s called “status” and people can put anything they want there. Twitter and other life stream applications can also be linked to FB, that’s why we can see most of our friends update their status once in a while.

Anyway, we always have the option to hide updates from users or applications if we get annoyed by them.

BLOG ACTION DAY EXPLAINED

Blog Action Day is an annual event that unites the world’s bloggers in posting about the same issue on the same day on their own blogs with the aim of sparking discussion around an issue of global importance. Blog Action Day 2009 will be the largest-ever social change event on the web. One day. One issue. Thousands of voices.

WHY CLIMATE CHANGE?

Climate change affects us all and it threatens more than the environment. It threatens to cause famine, flooding, war, and millions of refugees.

Given the urgency of the issue of climate change and the upcoming international climate negotiations in Copenhagen this December, we think the blogosphere has the unique opportunity to mobilize millions of people around expressing support for finding a sustainable solution to the climate crisis.

MY PART

The topic of Climate Change is hot in the Philippines today after our it was hit by two of the strongest typhoon in the history – Ondoy (Ketsana) and Pepeng (Parma). We did not expect that they will cause massive rains that caused floods, landslides, and deaths.

I may have posted this a lot of times but I do believe that climate change has really something to do with these kinds of calamities. And whether some people do not believe in it, it is just right to take care of mother earth because whatever we do to her will have effects on us. If we do good things for her, then she will give back to us more than twice of what we did to her. Otherwise, if we do bad things for her, then surely, we will feel her wrath.

Little simple ways of loving the environment when put all together is really a big thing. I hope everybody will start acting now before it’s too late.

Welcome to the third installment of “My Blogged Life”. I had been really busy recently that’s why I felt that days passed by so fast. It’s because of my scheduled presentation yesterday. I’m glad that it’s over that’s why I somehow feel light again today. But it ain’t over yet because I have to report again by the first week of November. What I really want to do now is go on a vacation leave… but I am not going on a grand vacation. I just want to do the things that I want to do right now.

My officemates booked a trip for Cagayan De Oro this coming November. I am still thinking if I will join but right now, I am more on not joining due to some personal reasons.

Maybe we don’t realize that Christmas is fast approaching due to typhoons Ondoy (Ketsana) and Pepeng (Parma). I still don’t know how majority of the Filipinos will celebrate Christmas this year. But I hope that the spirit of sharing will be felt more this year, especially those who are in need.

I was shocked when I read the news that Stephen Gately died already. I became a fan of Boyzone during the times when they were really famous that’s why I felt sad for this news.

Back to “work” topic. We are going to implement a new telephone system very soon and this is one of the reasons why some sites, such as Facebook and Friendster will be blocked in our office. I think that it is reasonable enought but I also feel disappointed with it. Of course, because I am a Facebook user and I understand that we employees just log on to these sites to somehow release stress from work.

Today, we are celebrating the World Teachers’ Day, just in time when most of the classes have resumed after they had been suspended for one week due to Typhoon Ondoy (Ketsana).

Schools usually have their own teachers’ day, but it’s nice to know that there is a day that this is being celebrated simultaneously all over the world, and personally speaking, I am happy for this. It is just right to give our teachers this day to appreciate and thank them for all their hard work, patience, and care for their students.

We might see or hear from the news about teachers mistreating their students, but still in general, an image of a teacher is being respected. For students out there, I understand if you will hate them for giving you hard assignments and examinations, but based on experience, I appreciated them when I reached and finished college.

I can say that I am lucky enough to have good class advisers back when I was in preparatory, elementary, and secondary levels. They were really like mothers and father to me. And with that, I want to thank all of them, as well as the other teachers who’ve been I’m under to.

Teachers have really a big part in molding a person’s success. It’s a responsibility that has been assigned to them (aside from the parents of course), so I hope the Philippine government can give our teachers the proper compensations that they deserve. If we come to think of it, this problem might be one of the causes why the quality of education in our country gets lower. If we give our teachers the proper compensation, they will be encouraged to love their jobs more. Aside from seeing it as a profession for our teachers, we actually see it more as a passion. It seems that they really love what ther are doing even though their work is really tireful.

Thank you dear teachers for eveyrthing you have given us!

Almost all of us did not expect the extreme damage done by Typhoon Ondoy (Ketsana) when it hit the Philippines last Saturday. What’s worse is that while trying to recover from Ketsana, we were all threatened by Typhoon Pepeng (Parma) as it approaches the Philippines. Yesterday, it made a landfall in the province of Cagayan.

These experiences really taught us a lot of lessons, but I’ll share some of the lessons I’ve learned.

1. Global Warming/Climate Change. I joined Greenpeace after watching GMA’s documentary “Signos” and “The Inconvenient Truth”. These two documentaries opened my mind to the issue of climate change and to the effects it may cause to the earth. I hope we’ll start loving mother earth more after what happened.

2. Love of material things. It made me realize that material things are really not that important. I mean, there is always a separation between the “needs” and “wants”.

3. Filipinos are naturally hepful especially in times like these. They give whatever they have and whatever they can. Aside from that, Filipinos really love their families.

4. Let’s not forget to pray to Him.

Aside from the “good” things, I would just like to express some of my disappointments.

1. I hate people who are taking advantage of the situation, most especially the looters.

2. I hope that politicians and celebrities who are helping the victims are really doing it from their hearts, and not because of personal or political interests.

Anyway, I like to give credits to the “unsung” heroes. I know they are many and their stories inspire us and make us feel proud as Filipinos. I know each one of us wants our country to recover from these nightmares. I hope that we continually help those who are in need until they fully recover. I feel for those who lost their loved ones.I hope Typhoon Melor would not hit the Philippines.

Just like the sun in our Philippine flag, I hope that it will shine again to bring big hopes after the storm.