all the weather, all the time

low 60s since we came back. the only consolation is that the sun is at least shining, but it is very disconcerting to see people wearing jackets. i am getting depressed just thinking of winter. there’s still fall to look forward to but with this temperature, winter will surely be a bitch.

***

meanwhile, luck is not giving me break for the online lottery tickets to shakespeare at the park and lining up at 5 ayem in the cold is just unthinkable. but it seems i will have no choice, lest i pass away the chance to see anne hathaway with some girl to girl action in the flesh, tongue sucking and all. the things we have to do for shakespeare.

***

louie with all his plans is at new york already and has slept at the house for a night. we had a couple of pitchers of the piss being sold as beer and onion blooms talking about stuff, about life in the province and new york chicks. we had a laugh when the topic shifted to advertising, from basic to mccann to tbwa. it made me think that he is the one person from the business that i’ve met who has the biggest balls of them all. he may not be a genius (and he doesn’t claim to be in his thoughts, actions, and words) but he has some major cajones. i hope his dreams really fly and i swore that i will do what i can (be it cooking lunch or ordering beer or preparing the sofabed) for it to at least take off.

***

we talked about supposed or self-proclaimed geniuses in the philippine advertising industry and agreed that all of it are just masks for insecurity, lunacy, and lack of breeding by maledukadong parents. i don’t know if it’s a provinciano thing but we both share the belief that the way one behaves at the office reflects the way one was raised at home. and yet…

***

email alerts and junk mails are already speaking of fall previews. now i’m really in the mood to drink. fuck the writing and whatever it is that needs to be done.

traps

the first thing i noticed is how everything is clean, how everything is manicured, how everything is displayed. even the currency uses the font eurostile. it instantaneously made me miss manila, the quiapo and divisoria parts where crossing the street would get you killed if your mind wanders a few feet from your body.

we did the tourist traps because, frankly, there is nothing else to do aside from officially making the word beer a verb.

by the time i saw the trash of new york, only did i wake up from the stupor that is canada.

the first two photos are the best reasons to go to canada – extreme irony alert.

and the rest are the places that robbed me of precious time i could never, ever get back.

now it’s time to bake some major voodoo, sayeth the oven, while outside, the weather is being fast forwarded to fall.

into the land of angry women

i would rather spend the long weekend on a beach upstate. or at the jersey shores. or just staying put watching the fireworks if it doesn’t rain. there are also other options that includes hauling ass outside manhattan. like vegas. or new orleans.

but the missus would rather go and exorcise some ghosts.

and i’m all for exorcising ghosts.

so bags must be packed once again and passports secured and off to toronto we go.

that city where both anthony bourdain and andrew zimmer hasn’t even filmed a single episode. i’ve read both time out toronto and lonely planet toronto but aside from blank screens, there’s not a squawk adventure.

but.

there’s maple syrup and some angry vaginas. think allanis and her spawn, avril.

you oughtta know it’s complicated.

exorcising.

joy, and by extension, me are supposed to be in toronto today had the market not shifted. and it’s not that we are so set to go to toronto but when the wind has changed, all she got was a letter that cancelled her job assignment with the explanation and i quote “…because as you know, the market has shifted.”

this after she has resigned from the manila office.

coming home from a 23-hour shoot to find your wife crying while your gout is having a field day is not an experience worthy of saving in one’s brain hard drive. i was tempted to reply “…yes, we understand, but as you know, we’re taking this shit to a labor lawyer named jovito salonga.”

well, we did sort of sent the firm’s partner and the human resources manager a letter listing all sorts of inconveniences from giving up the apartment lease to liposuctioning our savings account for the visa application. including taxi and meals and desserts and the occasional, okay, all movies showing that month tucked under the meal and the taxi expense. we even padded it with the cost of selling three parcels of arable land in the province, a dozen cows, a fish pond, a texas breed of seven prized cock fighters, and three harvests of 45-days chicken because we have pinned out hopes of making it to canada. and she got a hefty sort of settlement which i spent no time in spending.

but still she was jobless.

the happy ending is that she immediately sent that day – i must have drank 3 gallons of coffee to stand upright by her side – an email blast to all corners of the world from london to milan to johannesburg to new york and all replied to send her an application link. from the same firm or its competitors.

so a week after, we are pretty much set that jologizing new york will happen anytime soon. and she even got  a consultancy stint at smart telecom which, aside from the relaxed IT company atmosphere, seemed to be hemorrhaging so much money they have to invent names like summer and back-to-school and emergency bonuses (smart is also the only philippine company that’s not in the pharma business to give its employees a proper health benefit to rival europe: all things health related are free – from doctor exams to prescriptions – no matter how long it would take and no matter how much would it cost. your smart ID is your health card. last aside since i only got this from reading why americans are iffy about health care: the only way for healthcare to work is when the pay-per-visit is taken out of the equation because, since that doctor is not earning on your visits he would rather get rid of you immediately and the only way to do this is to make sure you get well ASAP and stay healthy.). it also gave her an idea of her true professional worth.

now. a year plus after, we will be setting foot in the office that dumped her. and speaking of dumping, all i ask is a chance to be given access to the executive washroom. insert evil laughter here.