What Would You Do With 741M?

Apparently someone from Luzon won the lottery already.

Sole winner of 741 million pesos. Are we drowning in zeros yet?

This lotto madness has driven the crazy into so many people. Lines outside lotto outlets every Saturday we reaching roundabouts and turnarounds; it made me wish I franchised a store earlier. In the past few weeks, those stores probably made a killing!

But seriously, what would you do with that kind of money? A million bucks endowed to a single individual (redundant much?) is unfathomable to me already, what more THAT? (*points up*) Where would that kind of money go? What bank would accept that kind of account?

But then again, why dwell on useless up-in-the-air questions like those when it's not your happy problem? It's only one person's concern now, and I'm sure he's hiding somewhere in the Cordilleras already trying to escape from the clutches of relatives looking for balato. Personally, I wouldn't want that big an amount looming over my head. I'd be happy with a miniscule million. :)

Two Stops Over

Channel surfing over the long weekend has its perks! Here's my latest channel surfing discovery.

Two Stops Over is a show about photography and the subjects being photographed. Last night's episode featured extra special athletes. I say extra special because they're truly individuals worth looking up to. The layman would call them disabled, when in fact they're likely to be more able-bodied than 90% of the country's populace.

Check out the site linked above to know more about the episode last night, telling you it's inspiring.

Kind of makes me reconsider photography.

R.I.P. Jekyll

When we revived our home aquariums back in July 2008, Jekyll was one of my very first fish.

He's a pretty Ryukin. I got him for 50 bucks from a nearby fish store. He was part of a pair. Of course I named his partner Hyde. Hyde's big, he's the king of the aquarium today, the biggest fish in the tank. Jekyll just never grew to be as big as Hyde.

Jekyll had a tiny tiny tail, so disproportionate from his fishy body. I always joked that he made a silly put-put-putting sound when he swam. He had permanent lipstick on, I think he's a tranny that way. And I love him.

I found Jekyll stuck to the air filter of his home. He was sucked in and couldn't get himself free from the filter's hold. Glad I'm as old as I am now, because if I saw that back when I was 10, I'd be traumatized. Poor baby was still alive but barely. Yes, I cried. I cried over a fish. A fish I've had for more than two years.

I transferred Jekyll to the "retirement" fish bowl. It's where I transfer all my sickly fish so they can die in peace, away from the botherings of the other fish in the tank. Jekyll stayed in there, belly up, for the evening. He must've passed away during the night, because when I woke up to check on him at 7 in the morning, the retirement bowl was cleaned out and he was gone.

Days like these make me wonder why I get pets anyway. Only end up crying at the end of it all.

Take 5 in...

5 hours!!!

I am so looking forward to my unprecedented 4-day long weekend.

What to do, what to do? Besides run, that is. ;)

Strays.

You know what breaks my heart? Strays. They make me feel helpless.

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Went on my usual run last night and on my first round I came across a precious bundle of fur. It was a kitten! Scared, untrusting, wary, obviously cold, looking so lost. I swear I heard my heart break in two.

But I couldn't stop. Tiny kitten and I were on the sidewalk of a main road in QC, it was 6:30 in the evening and jeepneys were flying past us like there was no tomorrow. It wasn't the most ideal place to suddenly imbibe St. Francis of Assisi. So I kept on running.

2nd two took me by surprise even more because suddenly, Tiny Kitten had a sister! Or a brother. Didn't stop to check on their gender. But they were two all of a sudden. The new addition was even smaller, but was a bit more friendly than the first. I think it noticed that I stopped in my tracks when I saw the two of them and tentatively approached with a few kitty steps. I was sooo tempted to just grab both of them, stop my run and bring them home.

I've done that before. Suddenly coming home with a kitten, puppy or chick. I never resisted the urge to care for something so tiny and helpless, and my parents could never say no to me when I insisted I'd take care of them. Because I did. Milk, food, toys all came from my allowance (of course with a bit of begging from Papa) and all my time in the world. When I had a stray in the house, the stray took all my time. It'd be the first thing I check on when I wake up and be the last thing I see before I go to sleep.

I can't do that anymore. Bringing strays home have repercussions and I've had to deal with a few back in the day. Fights with other pets in the house, turd everywhere, scratches and bites that I'm almost a hundred percent sure was rabies-free and never meant to hurt... plus my parents won't appreciate a grown woman like me bringing strays home. Don't think my eyes have the same Puss-in-boots effect anymore.

So I had to turn away and keep running. I almost stopped by the first gated house I passed to ring their door and tell any soul in their to take the poor fluffies in for the night. I was making the perfect spiel in my head already, so whoever answers the door won't be able to say no. By my 3rd round, I had it down pat. I was ready.

But I never need to say it out loud. On my 3rd round, a lady was walking away from the kitten's "area." She had given them food! They were happily stuffing their faces with whatever she put out and she was walking carefully away from them, as if to make sure nothing interrupts their meal for as long as possible, not while she's around.

My spirit soared! There were still good people in the world, and this simple act of kindness proves it. I'm so glad that this woman had more courage than I did. Granted she had one major advantage over me, she lived in the area; unlike me, the strange running girl with nothing but an iPod to her name. But still, for her to prepare them their meal, step out of the house and watch over the kittens was a priceless gesture of love and care. And I'm so blessed to have witnessed it.

Our world faces so many problems, we've got so much more to worry about other than stray cats and dogs, but it warms the heart to know that there are still people who care about the tiny homeless souls that roam our city's streets. It's the little things like this that make me believe there's hope for us yet.

Stuck In The Office

Freak rain. If there's one thing I hate about Quezon City, it's what it becomes after freak rains. I am stranded in the office, waiting for my driver to maneuver his way out of the horrendous traffic caused by the sudden afternoon down pour's flash floods.

*sigh*

I wish I was home. I wish I just ran today instead of wasting another opportunity. I wish I was anywhere but here, doing anything but waiting.

For me, waiting is such a waste. Waiting is short of doing nothing, it's just sitting in some obscure corner, watching minutes burn slow death because you can't frikkin' do a thing about it. It's why I can't sit still. My brain no longer sees waiting as the patient person's way. It's why I'm writing this entry now.

Such a shame how so many see waiting as part of the process. I'd rather do something than wait idly by. Rather write, rather run, rather clean up or organize or work.

Egads, I hope against all hope that the traffic on QC roads evaporate like a trickle under the Sahara sun. There must be something done with this Metro-wide problem, motorists and commuters shouldn't be left at the mercy of flooded highways.

First things first: fix the danged drainage system! Clear up the canals, get rid of the squatters under the bridge (relocate, men!), and you get rid of the flash floods. 2nd, get rid of the suckes who can't drive in the rain! You slow the rest of us down. Shape up or ship out, there are TONS of public means of transport to travel by. 3rd, get me friggin' home. I'm getting cranky and I've got a full day tomorrow.

I wish I was home already! :( Freak rain, I hate the freak everything else you cause... Including the freakishly insane me right now.

Nature Vs Nurture Vs Power of Context

Been reading The Tipping Point for a while now, it's my new falling-asleep book but that's not to say I don't find it interesting or that I'm not learning anything from it.

Learning a lot, actually, and of course so much of the knowledge imparted is useful to my chosen career in marketing, but also in life overall. I'm on the 3rd rule of the tipping point: The Power of Context, which says that a person's actions and decisions are affected by the environment s/he is in at the moment: an above average student with honest principle ethics will still cheat on a test if provided the right atmosphere and circumstance to do so; a normally quiet and conservative employee will turn into a hedonistic evil maniac if put in a sudden position of power and allowed to lord it over minions he is provided with.

This gives a step beyond the normal psychological study of Nature versus Nurture. Nature talks about genes and history and in-the-blood traits that define a person into a character. Nurture on the other hand covers environments and routines that become ritualistic and ingrained in daily life; how a man grows into a street rat after living a life in the ghetto. BUT, the power of context defies all this be saying, in as much as it would be easier to box a person into a certain type of cubbyhole, people react differently when put into different kinds of situations.

I remember writing an entry about different hats back in my days of multiply blogging. I was wondering how it seemed so easy for me to switch for being the good daughter diligently watching a ballet concert with my parents to the girl hanging out with good friends in some obscure bar in the middle of the metro all in the same night. Granted I don't radically change into a wild woman turned loose from the clutches of the overbearing mother and father (one being my parents are NOT overbearing and two, I have no concept of what a "wild woman" does anyway) but there are subtle tweaks that naturally play into my personality when I hang out in different places with different people. I thought it was because I have hats that turn me from being one person into another in a snap.

I understand better now, that my hats are influenced by the direct environments I put myself in. For example, the normally happy and animated me immediately goes away when I'm put in a totally awkward situation, like in a room full of people I have absolutely have nothing in common with. The "search for co-loner" hat is automatically put on and I try to find a place in the room; nothing center of attention, nothing with a spotlight, just me, a drink and another soul who probably wasn't fitting in.

Context is powerful because it has the ability to change a normally dormant side of us into one that's immediate and fully functioning. Heck, context turned a silent man like Bernard Goetz into a multiple murderer. Of course nature and nurture still play their major roles in character and personality formation, but oftentimes we forget to look at situations on the here and now. The power of context reminds us that nothing is absolute, nothing is set in stone and nothing is certain. Everything changes at a drop of a hat, and those tiny boxes we like to stereotype others in are blown away.

Still reading and learning from The Tipping Point as I write. Looking forward to reading more of Malcolm Gladwell's genius in Blink!, Outliers, and What The Dog Saw.