HaloScan is Down

I'm happy and eager to be back blogging but it seems HaloScan (my comment box) is currently down. Sorry for the inconvenience everyone. It must be another temporary glitch and hope HaloScan will be back to normal very soon. For the mean while, please leave your messages/comments on my chat box. Thanks!

Router Problem

Edited: May 15 @ 2:37 p.m.

Update: The technician from Digitel came here a few minutes ago. I'm so glad I received immediate assistance. It turned out my DSL modem was not compatible with the router that's why I had difficulty installing it. The technician was kind enough to change my existing modem and after merely minutes, the router is already working. Problem solved. :)

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I bought this wireless router and tried to install it last night. I followed the instruction carefully. It seemed easy because once you run the CD (comes with the router), it gives you an easy to follow step by step procedure. I successfully fulfilled Steps 1-9 but upon reaching Step 10, the router failed to detect Internet connection. I will call Digitel customer service tomorrow to request for some assistance. Crossing my fingers that they can help me with this problem. I'm just not the techie type.

A Rather Rude Remark

Yesterday was first day of Yohan's enrollment but hubby and I weren't able to make it to his school so we decided to do it today. Jules, Yohan and I also made plans of watching a movie after enrollment.

Just today when I was enrolling my son, the guard told me, "Ma'am lalo po kayong tumataba (Ma'am you've gotten fatter)." Ouch!!! It somehow really, really, really ruined my day. Did he seriously believe we're close for him to say that?! I think it was utterly rude. I neither smiled nor frowned at him but I acknowledged his remark by saying, "Ah, ganun ba (Is that so)? I didn't bother to know if he had an answer to that. Well, it's true, I gained a lot of weight but to come from someone I'm not close to irritated me.

There's this saying, "If you can't say anything nice about someone, it's better not to say anything at all." Do you agree?

Good thing, the teacher handed me Yohan's report card and 2 awards so my day was saved. More on this happy note in another post.

The Moon - A Lost Opportunity

As a child, I remember how fascinated I was watching a lunar eclipse for the first time. It was funny how my nanny told me of the story that the moon was being eaten by an invisible giant snake. Being so young, I thought it was true until I learned about eclipse in school.

I heard that there was going to be a total lunar eclipse tonight and it was going to be visible in the Philippines. I even took note of the time the eclipse was supposed to start (6:08 PM) and end (7:22 PM).

After eating an early dinner, I asked my husband to accompany me outside. The sky was covered with clouds and couldn't see the moon and the stars. We went to the village clubhouse (located at a high point) hoping to see a glimpse of the moon but there was none. The sky was heavily cloaked. I was a little disappointed.

According to the news, people from Luzon, Philippines failed to see the eclipse tonight because of cloudy skies brought about by the rain. Other areas in the country were lucky.

The next visible total lunar eclipse (with totality visible here locally is concerned) will be on June 15, 2011. Between this eclipse till the June 15, 2011 will be some partial and penumbral lunar eclipses only. source

Wednesday Heavy Downpour

The rain was pouring hard this morning. I woke up at 4 am as usual. After taking a bath and getting dressed, I looked at my sleeping son and hesitated to wake him up. I listened to the radio for a while hoping classes was suspended but there was no announcement from The Dept. of Education so I woke up Yohan for his morning routine.

We didn't ride with the school service today. Jules drove us to school because he had badminton training near Yohan's school. We were on the road when I heard the suspension of classes in NCR. We're not part of NCR so Yohan had regular classes despite the heavy downpour. If he didn't have a scheduled exam, I would have let him skip class today.

I feel sorry for all the students who had to go to school despite the terrible weather for nothing. The annoucement from Dep Ed came too late. Students were already on their way to school. They should have announced it several hours earlier. As usual people pointed fingers. Dep Ed said it was the responsibility of the mayors to make the annoucement in their respective areas. Late announcements such as this one have always been a problem. When I was young, I experienced countless times that I went to school only to find out classes were suspended. Announcements were always late. Apparently, the system hasn't changed over the years.

After long hours of continuous rain, many areas in Manila are flooded. Good thing, Dep Ed learned from today's mistake and announced earlier this evening that classes are suspended tom in NCR.

I know many moms who will have a lot of free time to go bloghopping tom. :) As for me, I need to go to bed in a few minutes because Yohan has regular classes tom.

Before I go to sleep, let me share this lovely message I received from my friend today:

On a hot day in a village, all the people decided to pray for rain to come. Everybody came to church but only one boy brought an umbrella. That is what you call FAITH. All things are possible in HIS time.

Keep the faith! May you have a blessed day ahead.

Grrr!!!

I like having food delivered from time to time like Jollibee (Filipino counterpart of McDonald's) for instance. There's a store just outside our village and if I call in for my order, I get it right away. Very convenient.

But what I hate about it is when they call the house (since my number is in their data base) during inappropriate times of the day (e.g. 8:00 a.m. , 2:00 p.m.) to ask if I want to order something. Geez! I know their number so they need not call. Fine, it's probably a marketing scheme to entice repeat deliveries but do they have to call so early. One time, I was so irritated because I woke up very early (after a late night) just to hear someone at the other end of the line asking if I want to order breakfast. What a terrible way to wake up!

Then just a while ago, when people in the house were having their naps, the phone rang and again it was Jollibee. This time I asked politely if they could please stop calling the house because if I want to order, I would gladly call them. I got an apology and hope they got the message this time.

Ouch is An Understatement

I was with my son, Yohan and my pet labrador, Bruno at the playground yesterday. I was holding Bruno's leash on one hand while sitting on the bench. I was happily watching Yohan playing when suddenly Bruno dragged me. He saw a cat and got excited. Bruno is quite a big dog and he is very strong! I'm thankful that I didn't land on my face when he dragged me across the street. I wished that stray cat didn't turn up all of a sudden. As a result, one of my fingers got entangled in Bruno's leash. Ouch! I didn't blame Bruno. I should have been more alert knowing there were stray cats in the area. But my poor finger! My third finger on my right hand is swollen ... an angry red and it hurts while I type. But I just couldn't stay away from my computer so I'm typing slower than usual. Life!

updated (11:28 pm): Original title: I Blame It On the Stray Cat!
I decided to change the title after I received a comment from Gattina. She's a nice lady and has a passion for cats. She's right, that cat was just minding his own business. I just feel quite sore and a little cranky so I thought of pointing my finger at that innocent passerby who made Bruno go crazy.

HaloScan is Acting Up

Hi everyone. Some of you may have noticed that after typing your comments and hitting enter, an error note comes out on HaloScan. Rest assured that I received all your comments despite the error message because I tested it myself. I left comments on other HaloScan users and I seem to get the same error message.

Hope it's a temporary thing and HaloScan can fix it soon.

Thanks for all the advices on my new template. I really appreciate them. I'll work on it as soon as possible. To tell you the truth, I'm contemplating on using the new templates of Blogger. I would love to have the Labels feature that lists all labels that you have used in all existing posts. It's not possible in the old template. I'll experiment on it on my "test page" blogger and see what happens.

Oh No, Not The Sniffles

I have the sniffles.

I hate being down with a cold because my head hurts and I can hardly breathe. Now my throat is beginning to hurt.

:(

Halo Scan Down Today

I've noticed that HaloScan is down at the moment. It has been experiencing some down time lately. Just in case you notice that the comment link is missing, it only means HaloScan is undergoing some difficulty. Pls. try posting comments a little later. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Thank you for dropping by.

Back to L

Oh my, i'm back to size L again. I fell in love with this white blouse at Kamiseta while shopping at the mall earlier. I thought I was still a size medium but when I tried it on, it didn't seem to fit right. So with a heavy heart, I asked for the next size. To add to my poignant distress, they ran out of large sizes. The sales clerk offered to call two nearby outlets to check if they have stocks but apparently they ran out too. Gosh! It certainly wasn't my day. T

The scale confirms it. I gained a whopping ten pounds. *sobs!* I lost fifty pounds during the last six months only to gain back ten pounds. Tsk! Tsk! That's terrible.

That's it! I need to go on serious dieting. I need to. I have to! So after feelind depressed about that blouse thing, i decided to buy slimming tea. I hope it works. *crosses my fingers*

I also bought my diet allies ... whole wheat bread, canned tuna in brine, oatmeal and some yogurt. After losing fifty pounds, I became a slack ... went back to my softdrinks and junkfood spree. I'm now regretting those glasses of coke and bags of chips.

I was very ecstatic to drop down to a medium size but it seems short lived. I'm now back to a size L. Damn my uncontrollable eating habits.

Feeling depressed about my weight gain, Jules asked me if I wanted to enroll for some badminton lessons under his coach. He has always been encouraging me do to so but I always found an excuse. Now, the timing is right so I finally agreed. Badminton is a great form of exercise and it will probably help me shed some weight in the process.

I noticed a weird expression on Jules' face when he realized the things that we need to buy before I start my lessons:

• badminton racquet and shuttlecock


• badminton shoes and bag


• sport shirts and shorts

I guess he's thinking about all that added expenses this month. :D

E-pass Glitch

The reason we got an e-pass is to be able to pass through SLEX tollgate with ease as the computer electronically deducts the toll from the account of the motorist. In contrast, manual tollgate payment takes up more time because the motorist has to surrender the toll card first to the tollgate collector then it is swiped on the computer to determine the amount of toll fee. Payment is then handed over to the collector and if it is more than the allotted fee, the appropriate change is given. The collector then presses a button to release the horizontal bar to let the mororist pass.

These manual steps are conveniently skipped by an e-pass tag holder. There is one exclusive e-pass lane at the SLEX. You will not see anyone manning this booth because the computer takes care of every tollgate transaction. An e-pass tag with sufficient funds will register a green light and the horizontal bar automatically lifts to let the motorist pass. The computer also reminds the motorist if his e-pass is below the maintaining amount when it registers a yellow light. E-pass tags could easily be replenished in PNCC offices.

The exclusive e-pass lane is supposed to be a free flowing lane but this is not always the case. There are times when the traffic in this lane is stalled due to ignorant or abusive motorists. Some claim that they mistook the e-pass lane for a regular lane because it was their first time at SLEX. Others say that didn't see the tollgate header sign until it was too late. The rest, on the other hand, just try to squeeze their way through the e-pass lane to avoid the long queues on the regular lanes.

All it takes is one ignorant or inconsiderate bloke who wants to take advantage of the e-pass lane and it becomes a sea of irritated, horn-honking drivers. Since the e-pass lane is electronic, the horizontal bar will not lift as long as the toll fee remains unpaid. If a non e-pass holder attempts to access the lane, chaos! It has to be manually overridden in order to let the nuisance non e-pass holder pass through the tollgate.

As a matter of fact, we had the unfortunate time of witnessing an e-pass violator a while ago. It was an old red 1993 Mazda. It was infront of us on the said lane. We noticed that the horizontal bar did not go up when it was supposed to. Waited for a few seconds and as expected cars behind us starting blaring their horns as a protest to the hold up. A few more minutes and it became a horn frenzy. It took several minutes before an operator took hold of the situation. I saw the driver of the red car hand over a P500 bill to the operator. To my dismay, the money was handed back to the driver as is and the bar was lifted. Hey, that wasn't fair at all! He should have been given a warning to discourage a repeat action. The least that the traffic officials could have done was let the nuisance motorist pass to clear the obstruction and ordered him to stop at the side for a some reprimanding. But that was not the case. Imagine he caused traffic and then he was able to pass the tollgate without paying a cent!

How can people like him learn the importance of following the rules if he could always get away with his actions?

Wheel Cap Pilferage

Darn it! Someone stole one of our car's wheel caps (not actually sure if I got the term right -- i'm referring to the centerpiece of the mag wheels). Not again! We also lost one of the wheel caps of our previous Honda Civic. It also got stolen. I can't believe it could happen twice to us.

Just noticed today, when I was about to ride the car to take my son to school, that a wheel cap was missing. It was probably seized during the stealth of the night while my husband was playing badminton at Lipa. He parked the car just outside the court where he regularly plays.

Sometimes, what seems to be a safe parking area could prove otherwise. Theives seem to randomly pick an area to do their atrocious deed. It's appalling to think that some people are reduced to this kind of illegal act because of the economy's downtrend. Poverty is not a ticket for crime and yet, sadly, some people are inclined to dip their hands in unlawful acts because of extreme poverty.

With a heavy heart, I looked at the hollow area of the mag wheels ... an empty space ... an eye sore. There is a dire need for wheel cap replacement to bring back the aesthetic balance.

Well, at least it's easy to replace. Looking at the bright side, at least it wasn't the actual car that got stolen. That would have been a tremendous disaster.