2011 New Year’s Resolutions Soft Goals

i don’t normally make new year’s resolutions but for 2011 i’ll make an exception.

Get back in shape.

disc. i’ve been addicted to ultimate frisbee since 2005 so i don’t know how i was able to live without it for around 7 months last year. since i’ve already signed up for the Bangkok Hat next month and booked tickets for Boracay in march, my self-induced hiatus is going to come to an end. it’s time to strap on my cleats and spend some time sweating it out under the sun!

hooping. last year, i ordered a hula-hoop and some hoop-dance dvds because i was interested in hoop-dancing. but after trying it a few times i tucked my hula-hoop away. after watching some awesome hooping videos on youtube i realized, no pain no gain.

here’s what i have so far:
waist hooping ✔
hip hooping ✔
chest hooping – ouch!
lift ups and corkscrews (basically moving the hoop using my hands) – ouch!
looking graceful while doing it – needs work

i’m far from anything remotely close to presentable buuuut i will commit to this. my soft goal for this year is to be able to chest hoop and do the lift ups and corkscrews consistently. hopefully the gracefulness will come naturally, eventually. haha!

bikram yoga. i’ve always liked yoga. it makes me relax. i tried bikram yoga last year. after the first session, i thought “hmmm… this isn’t for me.” but then i took a second class and i fell-in-love with it. now only if i could get over how expensive it is! i’m seriously considering signing up for the 630am class since it’s cheaper but then it’s a 630am class so i don’t know how i’ll manage that. this week i’ll be testing to see if i could wake up at 6am when i normally wake up at 8am. eeek… wish me luck!

Travel.

be it somewhere new and exotic or somewhere familiar, somewhere local or international… i hope 2011 has some great adventures in store for me!

Take pictures.

it’s such a shame that i haven’t been in the mood or inspired to take picture. with approximately 16 cameras in my collection (i’ve lost count) and a box full of film i really should be shooting more. there’s a blog post i read somewhere (will look for it then link it here) that challenges photographers to load their leica with only B&W film for an entire year and shoot with it. so this year, i’ve decided to load my Fed3B with B&W film and to lug it around. the goal is to finish one roll of film a month. of course, i’ll still be using my other babies during special occasions or trips.

Get organized.

my room’s a mess. my office desk is a mess. my life’s a mess. ay teka, paano nasingit yung huli? haha! anyway, i need to stop being such a pig and start fixing my stuff. first order of business… buy cute organizers! hahaha!

Blog more.

wordpress has this cool new challenge for 2011 to either post something every single day or post something at least once a week. i’m joining the postaweek challenge. here’s to hoping i can keep this up!

Climb a mountain. Cliff-jump.

this has never been part of my bucket list and i never thought it would be. but while watching some kids cliff-jump in samal island during a beach trip earlier this year, i was surprised that i actually wanted to try it myself. i didn’t then because some lady was trying to get me and my friends to pay Php10 for the beach view. duh? siya may ari ng view? hahaha! anyway, i hope i don’t chicken out when given the chance to jump. then again, letting go has always been an issue of mine. ;p

Learn a new piano piece and master my old ones.

no idea yet what my new piece would be but these are some of my old pieces that i want to re-learn and master this year:

• The Summer of ’42 by Michel Legrand
• Gravity by Sara Bareilles
• The Swan by Camille Saint-Saens
• God Help The Outcasts from Hercules

there are a few others i’ve actually started learning but never really finished. i need to find some time to rekindle my love affair with the piano. piano skills, please come back to me!!!

headlock

my brain has been going a hundred miles a second, running from one thought to another in a snap of a finger without the sign of stopping anytime soon. crap, it’s been too long since the last time i’ve been this confused and i don’t like how it’s making me feel.

i’ve always been a cautionary person, never one to take risks. i’ve always been too scared to ride a roller-coaster, learn how to surf, sleep with the light off when i’m alone or even just jump into a pool. somehow the fear of getting hurt weighs more than any amount of curiosity I feel. the same goes with me and love.

A Quick Goodbye to 2009…

yes, i do realize we are already towards the end of the 3rd week of January, maybe a bit too late to be waving 2009 goodbye but you can’t blame a girl for being busy. and i can’t really welcome 2010 without saying goodbye to 2009 first. so here goes… (and yes, i just copied this from last year.

DRINKING BUDDIES OF THE YEAR?

nina, mela & the frenchies. partying and dancing till the wee hours in the morning were a big part of my 2009. nothing makes me feel older than going to a club nowadays, so many kids. but when i’m with these people, i really couldn’t care less about anyone else.

YOUR SONG FOR 2009

Mr. Brightside – The Killers

this song came out earlier i do realize that but i grew to love it so much in 2009. here’s a pic of me and nina looking at each other and singing… it was only a kiss! it was only a kiss!… during the spirits ’09 party. 😉

DATE AWARD

nina – my constant companion, partner-in-crime and my other half. we spend so much time in each other’s company that people constantly ask if we live together. hahaha!

HIGH POINT OF THE YEAR?

watching Wicked at the Orpheum Theatre in San Francisco!

Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I’m through with playing by the rules
Of someone else’s game
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It’s time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes: and leap!
 ~ Defying Gravity

 

LOW POINT OF THE YEAR?

i guess that harrowing experience with Ondoy.

BEST HOLIDAY

i really thought i’d only have the 3-week US vacation as my only trip for 2009 since i would be consuming all my vacation leaves for it. luckily i was still able to fit some more trips specifically 2 trips to boracay and 1 to iligan. i was also booked for a bacolod trip but wasn’t able to go because of work.

if i have to choose which one was most memorable i would say it was the boracay halloween trip. i met a bunch of new friends and bonded with both mela & nina. it was a crazy and yet laidback fun trip. we plan to go there every halloween from now on. 😉

BEST MOVIE FOR 2009

500 Days of Summer. for this…

Glee was also one of the biggest highlights of 2009 for me. love love love it!

VALENTINE’S DAY DATE

i really can’t remember. probably went out with nina to some club or somewhere. but yeah, my love life for 2009 was zip, zilch, zero, nada.

WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR NEXT YEAR?

• Bangkok Hat 2010!!!
• Planned trips to Boracay, Siargao, Palawan, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok. yey!
• Rekindle my love affair with the piano.
• Go on beach trips as much as I can.
• Another tattoo.
• Write more.

Hmm…. Yan lang maisip ko for now. Will try to make my 2010 list early next year. 

MOST STUPID IDEA WHEN DRUNK

ahhh… yes… sorry can’t really broadcast that out. 😛

MOST MEMORABLE FIRSTS

Oh, I have a few of these!

• something to do with the most stupid idea while drunk category.
• river tubing in cagayan de oro. we capsized in the “washing machine”, that was an experience.
• surfing. i was able to stand on the board but it’s not for me. next time i’ll just watch while my friends surf.

BIGGEST CHANGE OF THE YEAR

not getting drunk at parties anymore. after that awful work party experience i had in 2008, i’ve actually learned to stop drinking at a certain point. i’m proud to say that i got wasted only once in 2009. in my opinion, a big big improvement from 2008. 😉

NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION

Live. Love. Learn. 😉

GENERAL FEELING FOR 2010

Be gentle, 2010! 

they do say that bad luck comes in threes, right?

well, i really hope it doesn’t or else i’m definitely f*cked. 😦

bad luck moment #1 a.k.a. ms. klutz yet again!

three weeks ago i sprained my right ankle during ultimate training in legaspi park. i already know i can be pretty klutzy without even trying but i haven’t been injured since i started playing ultimate frisbee. my mom was so concerned when i started playing ultimate that she told me during one conversation that i should be careful when i play because i have a tendency to trip on myself even while walking. i once sprained my ankle while getting out of a cab in front of our gate.

but as i was saying, i haven’t been injured in quite a while. i’ve suffered a few spills while playing ultimate, got shin splints by wearing cleats on hard ground but so far i’ve had a pretty clean slate on the injury aspect. my right kneecap was dislcoated prior to my sports debut, during an intense game of pop your opponents balloon during college. stupid parlor game! 😦

while i would prefer that you think that i was sprinting or jumping or attempting to do a layout to catch a disc, i really didn’t sprain my ankle that way. i had just finished a drill and was walking back to the line when i stepped over a pretty big hole. i heard a crack and found myself lying down on the grass. for a moment i thought i broke my ankle ‘coz the pain was pretty unbearable. i spent the next 4 days at home with my foot elevated, alternating hot and cold compress therapy. by the 4th day, my ankle wasn’t as swollen as it was previously and i could walk with minimal pain so i decided to go ahead and play on sunday. i got through, but looking back now i think it was just the painkillers i drank earlier that day. the 2nd sunday i played on it was bad because i twisted it again. now it’s still swollen and hurts when i run on it or wear high heels. argh, hassle talaga! i’ll have to get this checked up because it may be something else. hopefully it isn’t though.

bad luck moment #2 a.k.a. ewww… i don’t want to make swimming in the baha!

i attended today’s games in ACC but didn’t play because of my bad ankle. actually i could’ve drank painkillers and played but due to a last-minute gimmick last night, nina & i ended up sleeping over at joy’s condo. i wasn’t able to go home to get my ultimate gear anymore. good thing i left some clothes over at joy’s condo which i was able to wear earlier today.

it was a hot, humid day but it started raining at about 2pm. we were having late lunch at congo grill west gate then. we left at around 4pm. i hitched a ride with pia and was at manila by around 5pm. i then took a cab to my place. it’s normally just a 30-min ride from pia’s house to my house but it took me about 2.5 hours today.

there were flooded areas everywhere! and when i say flooded, i mean water-above-the-knees flooded. this isn’t the first time i got stuck in a flood. back in september 2006, i actually walked from south super highway to my office in the island in the middle of the road because the flood water was that high. this time, floodwater was already seeping into the floor of the cab. we tried different routes to get to my place but we kept encountering high floodwater everytime. it was pretty harrowing. all i could do was close my eyes and pray that the car won’t stall in the middle of it all.

<insert phone pics> (i took some pics on my phone but i’m too sleepy to post them tonight. perhaps tomorrow.)

i was actually considering walking from marcelo st to my place in the rain but i decided against it because: (1) i didn’t have an umbrella; (2) i was wearing a lowcut green dress; (3) i had some of my favorite film cameras with me; and (4) it would be really gross to walk about 25 blocks in knee high, dirty floodwater. i was really lucky that i got a really nice cab driver. he was more concerned in getting me home than the damage the floodwater was doing to his car. the restaurants of banawe were such a welcome sight to me. i breathed a big sigh of relief when we finally got my street.

i’m so thankful that my cab driver was great. i’m sure a lot of cab drivers would’ve let me go down instead of take me home. needless to say, i tipped him a riduculous amount of money. i really do hope he got home safely. 

it stopped raining already so that means i’ll have to go to the office tomorrow instead of working from home. hassle! 😦 i really hope i don’t get sick after today’s quite unexpected adventure.

oh no, there’s another one!?!

they do say that bad luck comes in threes, and i’m so not looking forward to finding out if it’s true. a badly sprained ankle, getting stuck for 2 hours in floodwater, being single since birth, what else can the universe throw at me? okay, okay,  so i just added the last one because i added the first of a series of friends’ weddings coming up in the next few months.  😛 waah, hopefully bad luck moment #3 is not going to be so bad. it wouldn’t be so bad if good luck comes my way next, too! hahaha! 😉

cosmopolitans + scotch = friendship with an ex

a couple of nights ago, while doing my usual bedtime routine which consists of scanning channels before settling on one to fall asleep to then adjusting the sleep timer to 20mins, i was able to catch an old episode of sex & the city. in this episode, carrie was wondering: “In mathematics, we learned that “x” stands for the unknown. “a” plus “b” equals “x”. But what’s really unknown is: what plus what equals friendship with an ex? Is this an unsolvable equation? Or is it possible to transform a once-passionate love into something that fits nice and easily onto the friendship shelf? I couldn’t help but wonder… can you be friends with an ex?“ later on throughout the episode she comes to the conclusion that cosmopolitans + scotch = friendship with an ex.

i’ve never had an ex-boyfriend, having been a member of the Single Since Birth Club since, well, birth. however, i’ve had another type of ex: the guy-i-was-in-love-with-who-didn’t-quite-love-me-back type of ex. one of them is in Beijing now and the other one is someone i see at a regular basis. it sucks when an “ex” is part of the same group of people you hang out with. we’ve both become adept in the civil department, not really addressing each other unless completely necessary and if we find our eyes meeting we just quickly avert them as though nothing happened. once in a while, a smart-aleck-y friend would send a well-placed barb our way which we both would ignore. it’s become a comfortable situation, after a fashion.

recent events, namely the possibility of him liking a new teammate (yet again!), have got me thinking if it’s possible for us to be friends again. it shouldn’t be too hard to imagine being friends with him again considering we were pretty close once.  even after the “breakup”, we still remained to be close, sometimes going out for coffee and discussing random stuff in our lives. but then something else happened which changed our dynamic and it hasn’t been the same since.

a close friend of mine congratulated me recently when i told her that i had chatted with the guy-who-liked-me-but-i-didn’t-like-back during the exciting and emotional (for me) match between Nadal and Soderling. she said that it was great that we can put the animosity aside and be friends again to which i replied that there was no animosity just a lot of awkwardness (and sometimes irritation) on my side. yes, it is a two-way street. sometimes you get hurt and sometimes you hurt someone else.

so what happens when a great love, or maybe just a passionate affair, ends? can two people transform from being intimate lovers to just good friends? i honestly don’t know the answer. i think it depends on the situation and the people involved. i believe that time can heal most, but not all, wounds and that eventually we all forget. As Joan Didion said: “We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forgot who we were.” (and because i don’t know how to segue into this link, i’ll just post it as is and hope you’ll be intrigued enough to click it. :P)

perhaps someday i’ll be able to have coffee and laugh over fun memories with an ex. perhaps we’ll always be tiptoeing around each other. who really knows, right?