Belated Happy Hearts Day!

Got this from a forwarded e-mail. Haha!

Kung Hei Fat Choi!

the dragon passed by our floor last January 26 :)

Hehe. Super late post. :D

It was my first time to witness a dragon dance. Sa office pa. Aliw. We hung ang pao envelopes from the ceiling, which the dragon "ate" one-by-one, in an order determined by a feng shui expert. (Pag kinain ng dragon yung ang pao envelope mo, swerte yon para sa'yo.)

Happy Year of the Ox! Sharing the 2009 'precautions/predictions' write-up for the Year of the Pig people (which I got from my officemate):

"Though the year of the Ox may not be a fantastic year for you, it will be better than the year of the Rat. There will be strong indications of movement. This will imply that you might be moving house, running around to get things done, travel frequently overseas or even relocating to other countries. No matter what might be the case, this is going to be a busy year for you. There might be some obstacles such as having direct conflicts with people and having to find yourself fending on your own. The good news will be that there will not be many people who will deliberately try to hinder you from your goals. Due to your tight schedule, you might neglect your health and will tend to fall ill easily. There will also be indications of being attacked by animals. You will also need to pay attention to your elders’ health and safety. Apart from neglecting your health, you might also not put in enough time to spend with your friends and family. Due to this, the bond between your friends and family might weaken and this might cause unhappiness and dissatisfaction of your behavior from your friends and family. If you are in a relationship, this will also cause tension. Your wealth luck is below average. Your expenses are high but your sources of income will not seem to increase correspondingly. You should try to maintain a low profile this year and be conservative in your approach. Pace yourself in terms of what need to be done and take breaks in between. This will enable you to prolong your stamina and not get burnt out."

Hmm... "indications of being attacked by animals"? Yikes.

Calvin and Hobbes 090122

Nursing a cold now. :-/ I hate having a runny nose.

FreeCell update: Just finished game 726!

Nine for 2009 -- my 2009 checklist

Lazy Saturday again. Aahhh... :) I spent time in the kitchen earlier today. I cubed some canned almond jelly for our lychee and almond jelly dessert. What do you think?

Uni-Mart in Greenhills lang yung nagbebenta ng canned almond jelly. (Got this tip from Atty. Anne, my former employer's in-house legal counsel.) You can find it the the section where the canned green jelly is sold. Otherwise, you can make some from scratch, using powdered almond jelly. Using canned saves you time though. While chopping, naalala ko bigla yung 'Ploning' (local movie starring Judy Ann Santos)... In 'Ploning', lychees were served only during special occasions... Nothing special naman about today, except maybe that I finally finished my 2009 goals/checklist. Nine for 2009. Mostly travel plans. :D Sharing:

1. Batanes. Parang Europe daw ang Batanes. Sana mag-sale na ulit ang Zest Airways.

2. Dumaguete-Siquijor. I'm booked already for Jan.30-Feb.1! Yay! Going with OH Mel. I'm thankful she's kaladkarin. We're travelling together again after 9 years, when we visited Iloilo and Guimaras in 2000. (Haha! Diarrhea memories of the Iloilo-Manila boat trip are starting to come back to me.) Asenso na kami ngayon kasi via plane na kami to Dumaguete. Dumaguete-Siquijor, anyone? You're welcome to join us. Puntahan natin yung witchcraft village sa Siquijor. :D

3. FreeCell 20,000. 'Finish all 1 million FreeCell games' is on my bucket list. I just finished game 722. According to my calculations, I have to finish around 18,500 games per year if I want to reach the 1 million mark by age 80. Let's see how far I'll be na by year-end.

4. Graduate school. Start on my MBA na, while a part of me still wants to study.

5. Learn how to cook adobo.

6. One hundred ten pounds!

7. Run a marathon. Nicole's tito is organizing a marathon for Tubbataha for March 22. I'm just waiting for the final details from Nicole. The shortest option is a 3k run, that's what I'm running. :D Taralets!

8. Save more.

9. Taipei. Maybe in July or August. Birthday gift to myself. I'm trying to get to know Asia, one country at a time. :)

Spanish bread and hot chocolate morning

I woke up today to a cool Manila morning. :) Mom left some Spanish bread for breakfast so I heated a couple and prepared some hot chocolate before I read the morning news. (Aside, hot chocolate and hot cocoa are apparently different, according to whatscookingamerica.net. I still prefer using 'hot chocolate' though.)

I learned from Tita Moje that hot chocolate is better if you drop a small piece broken off a dark chocolate bar into your drink. Didn't have dark chocolate so I tried milk chocolate. (Stole some from my brother's stash of Droste. Hehe.) It didn't have the same effect though--dark chocolate is better, it makes your mug of hot chocolate richer; no noticeable effect with milk chocolate (maybe I should have put in more?) but I enjoyed my drink anyway. Yum.

Ever wonder why Spanish bread is named such? I know a naughty explanation pero yun ba talaga? Anyone who knows, please leave a comment. I googled na, but got nothing. However, I came across a blog with step-by-step instructions (and photos!) on how to make Spanish bread, here. Spanish bread kanina was from Fortune Bakeshop, maybe someday when I'm more adventurous (and less lazy) I'll try my hand at homemade Spanish bread.

hand-painted plate by Charina, mug from kumpareng Chris and kumareng Clarisse :)