Leaving San Diego

As I write this, I am packing my things, ready to move again to another place.

I am quiet and uneasy. All I'm thinking is "I don't want to move again..."

Screw this whole setup. I have been saying goodbye so many times to friends every time I leave for a new city. I left Florida and said goodbye to one of the best friends I've known and to very good people there, and now, I have to say goodbye again to the friends I have made here in San Diego.

Why is it that whatever it is you're trying to avoid, that's what life gives to you? Goodbyes, goodbyes, and more goodbyes. I have said it so many times, I sometimes don't know who I am anymore... And no matter how many times you do it, you never get used to it.

/endwhine

Christmas Update

My roommate showed me pictures of the waitress that I talked about in the last post. How I remembered her that night and how I saw her sober today are quite different... Let's just say she's not someone that would be my type. lol. Makes me realize how booze changes your perception. Gonna be careful next time...

[Yahoo Voice]
Yahoo Voice... Love this technology. This enables me to make cheap calls back home and to friends that I haven't gotten in touch. I am using this a lot of times now. Makes my family feel even closer.

[Identiy - The Game Show]
There's a game show here in the US where one contestant will have to guess the identities of 12 strangers. They can be airline pilots, wrestlers, violinist, etc. On one episode the contestant was a Filipino from San Diego. I would say it was a very exciting episode. The URL is: http://www.nbc.com/Video/rewind/full_episodes/identity.shtml and choose the episode for December 19.

[Quote of the Day]

Girl: I think.... we should have sex.
Guy: Can you be my girlfriend?
Girl: But I don't even know you....

Christmas Post

This may very well be my Christmas post, so...

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL!

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[Last Night]
My friend decided to go to Hooters last night and I decided to get drunk. He does not drink, which is good for me, as I won't need to drive (lol). Anyway, we were there, and we had some good conversation. About how lucky we were being software engineers at a time when those are in high demand. Thank god for the Internet revolution.

So, I was starting to get drunk, and this waitress was socializing with us. I guess it was the alcohol talking, but I started flirting with her (lol). Anyway, she was an attentive waitress, so we just gave her a good tip (about half of the bill!).

After that, we got back home, and I slept like a log. Now, I have this frggin' hangover...

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[Job Search]
Finally got a job. The supposedly "december lull" of job recruitment was far from it. Thanks to the hot job market, recruiters have been calling me left and right. I was hoping to get another job here in California. The weather here is simply amazing. Unfortunately, circumstances landed me to this software company farther north. My only complain regarding it is that I'll have to move interstate again.

I think I'll learn a lot from this opportunity. I'm excited at the prospect of knowing a lot more than I know now. I hear this company have Internet applications and desktop products. Heck, they even have a gaming console product. With all these different products, I hope they're not overextending themselves. Anyway, this place where they're based at, Redmond, WA, I hear it is pretty cool during summers and relatively warm in winter times.

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[Hospitalized]
I had a health scare about 10 days ago. I was rushed to the hospital emergency room. It all started when I began feeling intense pain in my lower abdomen. I later learned it was cramps. After that, the cramps went up to my chest. I felt my lungs being squeezed and I couldn't breathe. My air passage was becoming tight, and I was having a hard time talking. The pain was excrutiating and I felt I was gonna faint. Thankfully, my roommate was present at that time, and he called 911.

Paramedics rushed me to the hospital where I stayed for 4 hours at the hospital. Thankfully, the doctor said it wasn't something really serious. They referred me to a clinic and I was on my way back home.

Then a few days later, I suddenly started having the same symptoms again! WTF?! This time, we just drove to the hospital. The symptoms die down after about 15 minutes of pain by the way. So, by the time the nurses checked me, my vital signs were ok and was placed in a "low priority" queue. Other people were being called before me, and after 3 hours of waiting, I finally decided to go home instead.

More updates on this later, as I have to clear some more information on what's really going on. But so far, I haven't had any bouts of it. I thought it was related to another incident of food poisoning, but I doubt it. Suffice it to say, that it's not something serious.

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[Be Yourself]
A lot of people would advise "be yourself". And it's a great advice. Be yourself. It's just two words. But I think a lot of people fail to actually realize what this means. It's easy to understand the words, and understand the advice conceptually. They have an image of what it looks like and they feel they're doing that.

But to actually *live* this advice, it's an entirely different matter...

At least that was the case for me. I thought I knew exactly what this advice meant. It was a simple concept anyway. But when I realized a few days ago that "I wasn't being myself", and it was followed by the other realization that "It was ok to be myself", my entire body relaxed.

For me, it has something to do with being in a different culture. I have been here in America for about 4.5 years now. That's a pretty long time. In that time, I have tried to "be one of 'em" (i.e., Americans). It meant I had to re-learn a few stuff. However, I realized that I can never be completely like 'em. I will always be a Filipino.

That phrase's message, "I will always be a Filipino", reverberated through my entire body. Because it is followed by "You can stop trying to be something else." What a relief! I didn't need to be someone else. I can just be me...

Follow Up... Kinda

So yeah, after that colossal firing that happened in our company the week before, what I had feared has indeed happened. In other words, I'm back to looking for another job.

Before we get to that, I watched this show that I really liked, the Beauty and the Geek. It pairs one geek with one beauty and they try to win against other pairs. There have been two seasons of it so far and I've thoroughly enjoyed them. And I'm looking forward to the third.

Actually, I have another reason why I can't keep it out of my mind. There was one scene that I keep on remembering. When I saw it, it felt so... innocent. It was somewhat weird for me to feel for a scene, but that's how it felt.

The scene was in a contest where the beauties were asked to make a home made rocket. And one of the beauties (which I later found was Lauren Bergfeld), threw her materials in the air. I didn't know if she did it because she won the contest or from frustration, but there was something with how she did it...

It was so innocent... She looked like she was having fun... regardless of what was happening around her. It didn't seem she cared and that she was having fun in that moment. If someone would ask me what "living in the moment" looks like, that's definitely the picture I'll give. It was so innocent, unfortunately, it was also fleeting.

... Anyway, I think I'm gonna talk about my job search next time. I just wanted to get this out of my mind.