It’s really sad this had to happen just before Christmas. While we all ready ourselves for a festive Noche Buena, our brothers and sisters in Cagayan De Oro and Iligan are left homeless and some are even missing. A lot of families are torn apart. Some are lucky to be rescued, but others have already been lost to sea.

My family had been affected by 2009′s wrathful typhoon Ondoy (Ketsana). We lost a lot of treasured belongings. Our bungalow was a wreck. Worst of all, we lost a lot of canine friends who passed on one by one from drinking flood water. But we’re still very lucky. We survived, and we eventually recovered.

They say Sendong is worse than Ondoy — the death toll just keep on rising. For someone who still freaks out at the sight of rising flood water, I can say without bias that what happened to my family is not even the tip of the iceberg for those who lost their families and homes to Sendong.

Let’s help the survivors of CDO and Iligan recover. Details here.

For Metro Manila residents, you can send donations through LBC Foundation. That’s what we’re doing.

See? Even my dog Shantee is helping pack stuff for the survivors :)

I was planning to write a long memorial for my blogger friend, AJ Matela, but I couldn’t. One post just couldn’t do it justice.

Thank you for all the memories, badet. I will never forget you, and how you always gave me stomach gas from all the laughter and bitch moments we shared. I will miss you, but I’m also glad you’re at peace and free of pain. I’m sure you’re now teaching those angels up there how to party, and chasing unicorns so you can finally have one of your own.

From now on, every time I see a rainbow, I’ll think of it as you checking up on us (pwede ba namang mahuli ang badet sa chismax?!). You are now my Rainbow Brite. Farewell, my friend.

** AJ’s family needs assistance. Please visit 1000 Volunteers for AJ to find out how you can help.

I didn’t have a totally “tomboy” childhood. I loved Voltron, but I liked cute cartoons too. The Smurfs is one of them.

It was quite lame watching The Smurfs for a Friday night date with my husband — far from romantic — but hey, it’s not often those little blue creatures get to be on a live action flick. Besides, it just goes to show how much my husband loves me — he endured an hour and a half of cuteness! :D

Aside from our yaya who reveled in those quiet moments I’m glued to the TV, my sister also spent a lot of time watching cartoons with me as soon as she was old enough to. The Smurfs was one of our favorites cartoons.

I learned about the Smurf toys being included in McDonald’s Happy Meal from my sister. I made it a point to collect every one of them, with the main obstacle being: I rarely eat fast food nowadays. I haven’t had a burger in almost a year, and the most I’ve bought from McDonald’s are chicken nuggets and fries. But my family likes fast food. And that made collecting all eight toys possible.

The toys are now displayed beside my work computer. They’re quite a relief to see whenever the going gets tough at work (so cute!). But best of all, they’re a welcoming reminder of how my family — my husband, mom, dad, and sister — all made an effort to get Happy Meals instead of their usual orders for the past few weeks just to let me have my Smurfs. :)

Work had been so draining lately… It seems like I can’t even find the time to even think of anything not work-related. So while waiting for a client to send me feedback on a project we’re working on, I’m going to spend these precious break hours to write about something totally un-work-related: Lion Voltron! :)

I’ve always been a Voltron fan girl. I used to spend afternoons glued to the television hoping for the Voltron Lion Force to air (I hated the Vehicle Voltron, it had too many crew members and the storyline didn’t appeal much to little kid me), while my yaya made use of these moments to breath and relax after a whole day of chasing me around. It was a show I really, really looked forward to — it was such a favorite that I remember putting on the manipulative kiddie charms on my Dad just so he’d buy me my own copy of the show’s video tape.

You can just imagine my elation when I found out that NickToons will be doing a reboot of the show. I’ve been following the plot summaries on the Voltron forums and watching episode teasers in YouTube for weeks now… And so far, I’ve been liking the new series. I’m not that crazy about Voltron to try and reconfigure my iMac so I’d be able to watch it on the Nicktoons website. After all, I did wait for a new Voltron for more than 20 years… I think I can handle waiting for it to come out on DVD :) Continue reading this entry…

A year ago, we had Ondoy. 2011 had just began, and we already have two natural disasters that shook the world: the New Zealand earthquake, and the Japan quake and tsunami. Nature is unleashing its fury. The weather is also becoming so unpredictable that you start to wonder that maybe, the Mayans were right.

I guess that’s probably why movements on natural resources conservation have been gaining popularity. People are finally beginning to realize the importance of taking care of the world we live in, and conserving our resources that are slowly drying out. The Haribon Foundation for the Conservation of Natural Resources (or Haribon Foundation for short) have long stood and fought for this. They’re an organization dedicated to the conservation of Philippine biodiversity, aiming to build a constituency for environmental issues that will prioritize conservation actions on habitats and sites, based on solid, scientific and socio-economic research.

This year, Haribon Foundation is one of the four beneficiaries of Globe Run for Home, a yearly running event organized by Globe to raise funds for charity. I’ve always supported this run since its first-ever event, and I’m really glad they included Haribon Foundation — an organization I’ve long considered to be the “nature heroes” of the Philippines. Continue reading this entry…