Tentative Gourmet

* First sentence from "Kitchen Confidential" by Anthony Bourdain

Don't get me wrong: I love the restaurant business. I practically grew up in a restaurant. My father had a tiny deli along Bleaker Street. I'd walk there everyday after class to help him clean up. I remember the fragrance of fresh tomatoes and smoked salmon.

But I can never run a restaurant. You see, I have this problem with food.

Stubble til the End

*First sentence from "The Vintage Caper" by Peter Mayle

Danny Roth took a final dab of moisturizer and massaged it into his already gleaming cranium, while checking to make sure that his scalp was innocent of any trace of stubble. At this age, women no longer notice your chiseled jaw or washboard abs; they only pay attention to the luster of your scalp. A radiant glow on a man's head is a sign of good hygiene, after all. One can never use too much moisturizer. 

He notices a bit of growth near the back of his right ear. We can't have that, can we? He murmurs. A while back, he had decided that he would rather not show off a receding hairline, nor highlight it further by combing over a few sparse locks. That would remind him too much of his Uncle Tristan, who insisted on plastering what little hair he had left over his ever-growing bald spot, then tying the rest at his nape in a pathetic tiny ponytail. That man was never quite bright, was he? Nor was he good with the women. He picks up the razor and begins to nip at the stubble. 

In Sophie's World

* First sentence from "The Google Way" by Bernard Girard

Hiring the best people is usually very expensive. This is why I haven't been accepted in any of the companies I've applied to.

Sophie feigns a slow, patronizing nod to an imaginary employer. 

"I'm so sorry to hear that, sir." She murmers, just barely able to conceal her bemused grin, "Of course I understand that you cannot possibly afford my skill and expertise. Yes, I will consider you in the future when your financial capabilities have improved."

Yes, that must be it. I, Sophie Underwood, am too expensive because I am the best on the labor market. That's why all these law firms have turned me down politely - because they're too embarrassed to admit their lack of funding.

She sips her Venti cappuccino thoughtfully as the usual hoard of yuppies in pinstriped suits bustles past. 

Poor lemmings. She muses, Imagine having to work your way up from the bottom of the food chain. And apparently, horrible shoes are the staple at the last rung of the corporate ladder. 

List 6: Things That Don't Go Together

1. brown and black
2. Manny Pacquiao and politics
3. thesis all-nighter and driving
4. after-toothbrush taste and orange juice (ick)
5. me and any sport involving balls
6. rubber Crocs and any other piece of clothing
7. laptops and coffee
8. Superman and kryptonite (okay, dorky, I know)
9. Americans and the rest of the world
10. flaming Bacardi 151 and Oreo cheesecake (trust me, it can only end in disaster)
11. commuting and new closed shoes
12. white socks and black trousers
13. math and my entire family (it's a love-hate relationship)
14. my friend and her boyfriend (and yet their relationship prevails)
15. coughing and burping (simultaneously - it's a horrible feeling)
16. Manny Villar and his "tunay na mahirap" image
17. Donald Trump's head and his toupee (though most of the time, they at least try)
18. romance and common sense 

Artist Date: Fern Gully

Today I was down and out with dysmenorrhea so I decided to go waaaaay back and do cheered me up as a kid. I had a cup of warm tea and watched one of my all-time favorite films, Fern Gully. Okay, so I never used to drink tea - but our laser disk was pretty scratched up from all the times I watched that movie. I even learned to use the laser disk player just so I could watch it everyday. 

Fern Gully has been on my mind lately, ever since I saw Avatar. Although the premise must have been used in other films and books before, this childhood favorite was the first to pop in my head. Watching the movie again, I realized the similarities are uncanny - even the plot is similar. I wonder if James Cameron consciously used Fern Gully as a peg, or if his inner child just kicked in and subconsciously fed him the story of an obscure animated film while writing Avatar. 

I guess Fern Gully has been one of my biggest inspirations as a kid. For a lot of kids in my generation, this movie may have formed our earliest ideas about environmental protection. And it may have actually worked. I like to think Gen Y is more environmentally aware then previous generations were when they were young adults and teens. That's something Avatar can only hope to achieve for the next generation of wide-eyed youth. 

List 5: Awkward Things

1. saying goodbye and realizing you're still going in the same direction
2. seeing someone who recognizes you and not knowing who they are
3. pugs
4. toes - they really are awkward body parts, aren't they?
5. prom
6. when your parents talk mushy in front of you
7. trying to pronounce the menu at a French restaurant 
8. zits on your armpit
9. seeing your professor at a party/club
10. watching love scenes in a movie with family
11. spelling the word "awkward"
12. trying to talk at the same time
13. being interviewed by someone with a heavy foreign accent
14. other people's status messages that reveal way too much about their love lives

List 4: Things that should be big

1. Laughs
2. Celebrations
3. Highways
4. Kitchens
5. Font sizes
6. Gestures of kindness
7. Open spaces for wildlife
8. Dressing rooms
9. Hearts
   
10. Dreams

List 3: Things that give a clean feeling

1. mouthwash
2. Japanese tea - or any kind of tea, for that matter
3. confession
4. warm showers
5. pedicures
6. biking
7. swimming 
8. hiking
9. salmon sashimi
10. removing your bra after a long day
11. facials
12. mints
13. Disney movies
14. baby powder smell
15. fresh laundry smell
16. wet grass smell
17. that stuff you squeeze into your nose to unclog it during a cold
18. high school nostalgia
19. abstaining from pork
20. fresh bed sheets

List 2: Things that Make the Heart Beat Faster

1. exercise
2. coffee
3. zombies
4. some drugs
5. my mom's diabetes medicine I accidentally drank once
6. pop quizzes
7. American Idol results
8. reciting in class
9. extemporaneous speech
10. my alarm in the morning
11. those dreams where you feel like you're falling
12. roller coasters
13. Johnny Depp
14. meeting HIS family
15. being told you're loved
16. admitting that you're in love
    

List 1: Elegant Things

1. chiffon dresses
   
2. Grace Kelly
3. gifts wrapped in Japanese paper
4. first slow dance on prom night
5. ballerinas
6. lace
7. English Breakfast tea in the afternoon
8. Imelda Marcos (yes, she was corrupt but that woman had style)
9. Princess Diana
10. Prada
11. that ever-versatile little black dress you'll never let go of
12. wearing absolutely no makeup
13. Julia Child in the kitchen
14. confidence
    

people, places, objects, actions, situations, events, etc.

I Never #6

I never danced ballet again after I stopped in Grade 3. Everyday I had to go, I would drag my feet and act like it was the most horrible thing ever. I pretended like buns and leotards and tights were torture devices. But secretly, I enjoyed it and I'm pretty sure I was good at it. I'll never know now. I guess I just never knew how much I enjoyed it until I stopped. Now I'm too old to start dancing again...what a pity. I guess I'll just have to live vicariously through my niece for now, whom I intend to get into tights as soon as she can walk.

I Never #5

I never got to say goodbye to Lolo. I spent the whole morning in the hospital and left for a few hours after lunch to go to school. When I got there, my brother called and told me he was gone. I never got to tell him how much I loved and admired him. I never apologized for losing his poetry notebook in Grade 3. Last All Soul's Day I didn't get to visit him in the cemetery - a week later he visited me in my dreams. I guess I have a lot of explaining to do when I see him again in the afterlife.

Sorry, Lolo.

I Never #4

I never want to have to choose between family and career, because I want them both equally. On some days, I picture myself as a stay-at-home mom. Others, a career-driven powerhouse climbing my way up the corporate ladder. I find it so unfair that typically women cannot choose to be both, but I guess that's the price we pay for being the fairer sex. Someday things will change, and I'll be one of the first to prove it's a possibility.

I Never #3

I never drive drunk.

But I do sometimes have to drive exhausted.

I get the feeling it's just as - or more dangerous.

Coffee may one day save my life. 

I Never #2

I never went to a poetry reading before. I expected the speaker to be pretentious and to use literary jargon like "aesthetic" and "parallelism". Fortunately, whatever pretense he may have had was lost in translation . The poet was as a poet should be - he put only the best words in best order. Unfortunately, I could not say the same of the audience and other members of he academic community present. 

I never #1

I never wanted to go to DLSU. UP was my dream school from childhood. My parents went to UP. My brother and sister went to UP. Most of my cousins and uncles and aunts and grandparents on both sides graduated and (in some cases) worked in UP. I'm a purebred maroon-blood. 

But fate has its way of laying a massive golden egg somewhere off the well-beaten road to distract you. My scholarship was that very shiny, almost kitschy-tacky egg that got me tripping over my feet (not that I don't already do that that on a daily basis). 

But I never expected to fall in love with La Salle. And all the wonderful people I met. And the exciting, complicated, messy life of a Lasallian what with the campus politics, short breaks, trimestral system, dress code, incessant flooding and cold classrooms. I will never know what it would be like to be a Fighting Maroon (what is that??) or a Blue Eagle or whatever, but I will never regret the road I picked.