I have a Blog Parteeh hangover

29 January 2007     •     12 Comments
Tech Things

No, I didn’t get drunk. I only had two bottles that night. Spare me.

I just can’t get over it. The Blog Parteeh was a success! Between you and me, the turnout went way beyond my expectations. Everybody seemed to have fun 🙂

I finally met the authors behind the blogs I visit, made new acquaintances and saw old friends (well, not really that old hehe). And I also won a GMA mug and a limited edition Star Wars DVD collection (Episodes IV-VI) !!! The mug I won in a raffle draw, but the DVDs… I’m a long-time Star Wars fan, but I didn’t intentionally win it 😛

I spent the afternoon of the party going up and down the elevator receiving Parteeh guests (Abe, Manong Guard, and I had some bit of quality bonding time haha), so I really didn’t have much time to sit down and eat—and pay attention to this contest Jayvee was hosting. I left my saucer full of chicken wings, rolls, Filipino dessert stuff (assorted kakanin), and sandwiches with my dear husband Marc, who was there to help me with the Committee tasks and represent our company, SheeroMedia. But every time I returned from my elevator ride, my food miraculously disappeared! What the heck, my food probably just grew brains and walked themselves straight into Marc’s stomach.

I was about to take a bite off my chicken wing after an elevator trip when I heard Jayvee call my name on the microphone. They had my site’s screenshot up at the projector screen. WTF? I had no idea what I was supposed to do. Jayvee told me to just talk about my site. But he didn’t tell me how long. So I prattled on and on about this blog, saying whatever that came to mind. I told people to stay away from my archives, not to call me Kutitots (hey come on, do you want to be called a “flea”?), and how Jayvee and Abe encouraged me to monetize my blog. I was running out of things to say, so I finally asked them if I could go.

Then Jayvee told me I won the Star Wars DVD collection for the simple reason that I was able to go a bit over the 3-minute time limit. Surprise, surprise! I actually got a DVD collection for talking too much 😛

If there’s one thing I regret about the Blog Parteeh, it’s not being able to talk to everyone. I’m really sorry I wasn’t able to talk to all of you there. But I’m more than happy that our hard work paid off (gazillion yays for the Steering Committee!!!), and people enjoyed it. This is by far the best bloggers’ get-together ever!

My deepest thanks to Mae, Migs, Noel, and Gen. I don’t know what I could have done without you guys—I truly appreciate what you’ve done to make the on-site registration run as smoothly as it did last Saturday 🙂

Thank you to our sponsors. I think it’s pretty obvious why we should thank them, right?

My fellow Steering Committee members—we rock! Hehe. Carlo—did you know how you’re first person who was able to make me go online in Yahoo Messenger? I haven’t logged on in months! 😛 Markku and Marc Macalua, thanks for the “sticks!” Markku, dude, send me my pic please—I’ll remember that FOREVER!!! Jayvee—no, Little Mermaid was my first ever DVD 🙂 Noemi, Jomar, Rico, Juned, Migs, Will, Jun, Kevin, and Sasha—you guys rock!!! Abe—I’m so glad you let me and Marc have a part in this! And most of all… I can’t thank my dear husband enough for being my rock and support (not to mention my “brain” when mine was becoming too tired to function) every step of the way. When are you taking me back to Divisoria, hon? *Gail bats her lashes as she asks this*

Thank you to everyone who took part in the event! Your pens and bags gave me the perfect excuse to do some Divisoria shopping. Haha. Seriously though, thank you. The party wouldn’t have been a success if it weren’t for your participation. 🙂 I’m currently collating the list of bloggers who were able to make it to the party—link loves coming soon!

Damn, I’m proud to be a Filipino 😀

And so the fun begins…

19 January 2007     •     14 Comments
Tech Things

Get your gears ready for the first biggest Filipino bloggers’ party ever held offline! This won’t be the usual Eye-Ball where nerds just stay in one place and talk about geeky stuff. Really. It’s going to be fun!

We got games and raffles where you get a chance to win uber-cool prizes. You will even get to take home a bag of goodies! And best of all… There’s free food! But of course, there will be free drinks too… We wouldn’t want anybody choking to death now, would we?

So. Here’s the invite!

k-blogparteeh07.gif

What: Blog Parteeh! 2007
When: January 27, 2006 2:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
Where:
6th Floor (Poolside Area)
Classica Tower 2 Condominium
HV dela Costa St., Salcedo Village,
Makati City 1200

For more details, check out the official site of Blog Parteeh! 2007. We’ll be updating it often during week before the event, so be sure to visit it regularly!

This event is sponsored by: Sheero Media Solutions, MyJournal Philippines, FeedText, Inc., Migs Paraz, A Bugged Life, The Blog Herald, b5media blog network, About My Recovery, Pinoy.Tech.Blog, Enthropia, Inc., Krispy Kreme Philippines, GMA New Media, Awesome Philippines, Codamon.com, Boracay.com.ph, Recipes.com.ph, WebMaster.com.ph

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A call for blogger volunteers!

18 January 2007     •     4 Comments
Tech Things

As you all probably heard by now, there will be a major bloggers’ party this coming 27th of January, Saturday. It’s going to be called, Blog Parteeh! ’07. Beats me where Abe got the name, but this is probably one of the major parties by bloggers for bloggers ever (so far, at least). Details will be out within the week before the event, so please make sure that you keep your ears out for the official announcement. We’re working our asses off for this—we need to be sure that registration for you guys will run as smoothly as possible.

Anyhow, I’ll be heading the Welcoming Committee for Blog Parteeh! ’07. Right now, there are just three of us doing the work (me, Marc, and Juned). But I’ll need at least two or three more willing souls.

Here’s a rundown of the committee tasks:

  • Collate final list of registered bloggers, special guests & sponsors
  • Create ID tags for all different attendees (this will be sponsored by SheeroMedia, so basically, what you’ll be doing is to match the existing ID tags to the owner at the Registration booth)
  • Manning of the Registration Booth at the venue
  • Handing out of schwags, giveaways, game materials (pencil, paper, etc.)
  • Documentation including pictures of individual bloggers & group pics (Juned will be coordinating this part)
  • Serve as Communications HQ to coordinate messages between committees

What you get out of volunteering? Aside from having a special committee ID tag, you’ll get first dibs on all the hottie bloggers at the Registration Booth and have the satisfaction that you’ve been one of the good souls who helped make camaraderie among Filipino bloggers stronger. So how’s that for an incentive? 😛

Anyway, if you’re interested to join my committee (I just need two or three more), leave a comment under this entry that you want to be part of it and I’ll get back to you through email for the details.

Curtain-making for extremely busy people

17 January 2007     •     3 Comments
Family Stuff

Ok, fine. I’m exaggerating. Again. Hehe. I’m a very busy person, but “extremely busy” is too strong a description for my being busy. I’ve got quite a lot on my plate right now, but I still have time for household stuff (it’s not like I have a choice, you know).

Last week, I’ve been very bothered by our windows and the makeshift “curtain” we have on one of them (it’s just a piece of cloth tied on the window edges). My cousin who was home from Canada had told me that she wanted to drop by and see our little house, though she wasn’t really sure when. My in-laws have already visited our house with that god-awful cloth “curtain” during my sister’s birthday party, and lucky for me it was already dark. The jumbled up cloth for a curtain was really embarrassing, but my thrifty husband didn’t want to purchase curtains from the department store because they were expensive (which is true, actually).

Since those curtains (or lack thereof) were really bothering me, I took it upon myself to do something about them. I was getting desperate, some of my blogger friends were coming over to visit—I had to do something. And quick.

I was lucky my mom had a roomful of really nice cloths (before her stroke, she was fond of sewing stuff). Back in high school, I was taught how to use a sewing machine—with tutorials from my mom, of course. I can say that I can operate it quite well. Unfortunately, my mom hasn’t touched her sewing machine in about two years already (last was before her stroke), so it wasn’t operable without doing some serious repairs on it first. Needless to say, I had to do the sewing by hand. Read more

My almost two months of Housewife-hood

15 January 2007     •     2 Comments
Family Stuff

My mom used to run a flourishing flower shop business at the same time as my dad’s photography studio during my early childhood. But when my parents decided (with the consent of my late grandma) to have the place rented out to a bank, my mom seized the opportunity to become a full-time housewife.

I remember resenting my mom a bit for this decision—I felt we became poorer because of it. We had to let go of my mom’s workers (who have always made me feel like a princess) when the shop closed up, and moved to a smaller home (or “cozier,” as my mom used to describe it). We still had our two housemaids, but the loss of the flower shop workers who used to be all over our house (my mom’s flower shop used to be part of our house) was a huge change for me that I really felt that we were already very poor.

What I also could not understand was why my mom had to be the one doing our laundry when we already had two maids to do the housework. That actually “confirmed” my conclusions that we became poor (I even got to the point of telling my mom that maybe we should borrow money from my grandma). I was so afraid I would have to stop my schooling. Since then, I vowed to myself that I would never be dependent on my future husband and have my own business so our children won’t ever feel poor. I would never be a housewife—I’ll just hire a maid.

But when I look back now, I can see that it was just childish paranoia. That event wasn’t our “hardest time,” it was only transitional. Comparing it to the time my dad and I had to find ways to pay for my sister’s hospitalization (psychiatric treatment here in the Philippines is very, very expensive if you want the best), I would have to say that we were still pretty well off then. I guess I just didn’t want to accept the fact that my mom was no longer a “business owner,” but “just a housewife” doing housework instead of managing a business.

I guess that’s also the same reason why it irritated me when somebody calls me “Mrs.” during the first few weeks of my marriage. I always had the notion that a “Mrs.” is attached to the concept of being “just a housewife.” I didn’t want to be just somebody’s wife, doing “wife things.” I wanted to be my own person, a person who has her own career or flourishing business. Read more

Five things you probably didn’t know about me

10 January 2007     •     8 Comments
Daily Dose

Hehe. Is that title totally vain or what? Sorry, but I’ve been tagged by Juned 😛

The 5 things people don’t usually know about me:

  1. I have a ridiculously long full name. When I say long, and I mean really long: Abygail Josephine Aherrera Dela Cruz. That’s my maiden name. If you want my married name, it’s Abygail Josephine Dela Cruz-Villanueva (it got even longer). Very few know about my full name, and I don’t write it unless I really needed to (mostly legal docs and stuff). I still can’t forget the irritated guy behind me at the line of the customs at the Hongkong international airport—he was complaining that I was taking too long. Well, it wasn’t my fault that the Chinese customs guy typing my name on the computer was taking his time spelling my full name! Heh.
  2. I flunked Microeconomics three times. And I haven’t passed it yet. Really. I’m considered an undergrad till now because of it. I don’t really know why, but I have some kind of an aversion to that subject. There’s just something about this subject that I don’t really like.
  3. I have a “mojo” frog. A real, dead, soaked-in-formalin frog in a sealed jar. I’d take a picture and post it here, but after witnessing the same reaction from every person who has seen it (Abe’s was probably the most “controlled”), I decided not to. This was the very same frog I dissected in high school (sophomore year, to be more precise, you can just imagine how old this frog is). I don’t know why I kept it, I guess I just enjoyed playing with its insides that much (kidding!). I remember that we were supposed to make a report out of the dissection, and have our own illustration of the frog’s body parts. Since I was too lazy to draw… Well, let’s just say this is the reason why I started using Photoshop as artistic tool. So yeah, this frog is very sentimental. Even if it is about 10 years old already.
  4. I can ride a bike like (or sometimes even better) than a guy. My dad and his friends used to go up mountains for motocross, and of course I was jealous. My dad had always been my idol (and still is), so I liked imitating the things he did when I was a kid. He didn’t want me riding motorbikes (he said it was un-ladylike), but he did let me ride a bike. I was so bent on imitating my dad that I was able to ride a two-wheeler bike (no balancers! You know, the BMX type?) at the age of four. Even my mom (who’s totally against manly sports) admits that I can probably ride a bike better than most men 😛
  5. I don’t know how to swim. Seriously, I can’t. I never finished learning how to. My parents enrolled me at the Ayala Alabang Country Club for swimming lessons when I was around four years old, but it was just too far from where we lived (we’re in Quezon City, for crying out loud). I never continued my swimming lessons, so I never learned how to swim.

I’ve been blogging about serious stuff lately, this is such a refreshing change. Your turn guys! Continuing the chain, I tag thee:
Sasha Manuel
Noemi Lardizabal-Dado
Bimbo Isidro
Kevin Codamon
Markku Seguerra

Site Review: Traveler’s Joy

10 January 2007     •     3 Comments
Tech Things

No, my blog hasn’t turned into a review site yet. It so happened that the two were sent almost one after the other. I’ve been a pretty lazy blogger lately anyway—I really don’t know what to make of the Kutitots redesign (well, there goes the bloggies!). I’ve been planning to enter the new design in the 2007 bloggies, but the deadline is already tomorrow so forget it.

The following is a paid review through ReviewMe for Traveler’s Joy.

Maybe I’m a bit biased when it comes to the light blue and orange color scheme, but design-wise, I can honestly say that they did a good job. The soft tones set the “vacation mood,” making you really look forward to your honeymoon. Since in the design of the site is already good, I decided to focus on its functionality.

I was a bride myself about a month and a half ago, but I never really experienced signing up for gift registries. My job dictated that I stayed at home (my work is home-based), so I didn’t really have the luxury of going out and signing up for registries at the mall. I don’t know why, but most (if not all) registries here in the Philippines require both the couple to be physically present at the shop to sign up.

Luckily, the site owner allowed me to create a sample account in order to test the site for my review. Read more

Site design review: CardroomSupply

5 January 2007     •     2 Comments
Tech Things

Once again I apologize for the seemingly lack of updates. A lot has been happening the past few days, and I haven’t really gotten the time to sit down and blog—a cousin came to visit from Canada, my sister celebrated her 21st birthday, a new template for Kutitots is underway, and Marc decided it was time to do some very minor (but work-intrusive) renovations on our house. So yeah, I probably won’t blog if I wasn’t requested to. Heh.

The following is a paid review through ReviewMe for CardroomSupply.

k-cardroomsupply01.jpg

I wasn’t really planning to take this review. I thought I had to review some Poker product, and between you and me, I’m not a gambling person. Though a few of my cousins play this game (without actual money involved), I honestly have no idea how it works. Good thing that the review requested of me is of the site’s design, and not of the products. Read more

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