It rained last night; I didn’t know because I was knocked out last night after our late grocery shopping. I just woke up to a wet balcony. May is a month of hot weather peppered with rains that make everything more humid.

A maid whose wake is being held in the chapel near our place died of a heatstroke (sounds like heatstroke to me) a few days ago, my mom’s cook told me over lunch today. The weather has been unbearably hot that I don’t find it surprising.

They say that we will be having a super El Niño this year, so that means the southwest monsoon/typhoons will be more unforgiving. Makes me think twice about installing solar panels that may just get peeled off by a super typhoon.

Speaking of maid, our cleaning lady isn’t coming in so I’m stuck doing loads of laundry and house cleaning. It’s already 3 pm and I haven’t cleaned the bathroom. 😭 Instead of resting on weekends, I spend my off days just cleaning. 🫠

I’m putting this here so I can remember the books I should to buy.

We had a copy of The Art of War by Sun Tzu but I didn’t grab it when I split from the ex-husband. I’ll see if I can get the rest of these from second-hand bookstores.

BUT

It’s so ambitious of me… As if I have time to read books. I have stacks of them here by my bedside and on my shelf above my bed. 😶 Still unfinished or unread. 🤪

I attended an event last Monday while I (*think*) was shedding virus all around. I started sneezing late in the afternoon as I gathered contact details of people I want to interview.

Then the next day I was down with flu. I struggled editing two hard stories so I wasn’t able to write my own.

By Wednesday I was completely useless. I just slept the whole day. If I was wake, I just stayed in my bed and spent my waking hours doomscrolling or watching Youtube videos. Good thing it was Eid al Adha holiday so I didn’t have to worry about work. My brain couldn’t handle book reading. I was just completely bedridden, blowing my nose incessantly, taking in a lot of cold tablets, drinking water, going to the bathroom. Repeat. Food was taken care of my mom next door so that’s a load off me as well.

My flu vaccine must have worn off.

I asked for personal time off next week so I could have my check ups with my gynecologist and my endocrinologist. Have my flu vaccine again. Then probably go diving one last time before the monsoon rains come.

I tried to watch all Christian Slater movies in the 1990s. I endured Robinhood because of him. My heart was broken by his movie with Marissa Tomei, Untamed Heart.

I think I was the president of Christian Slater fan club in school. 🤣

The seasons are changing. We’re in between scorching summer heat and the habagat (southwest monsoon) so the weather is a bit temperamental these days. The morning was hot as hell so I did the last few batches of laundry (cleaning lady is still isn’t coming) after Twin A and I went to the weekend market.

After a much-needed shower, I saw that the skies are turning grey. That means I have to take some laundry drying out in the open back under the roof. This makes me a bit sad that I haven’t gone back to Anilao to catch the last few days of summer.

Maybe I should take a personal time off in the first week of June. 🤔 Go diving again on a weekday.

I was at the World Trade Center yesterday (and today) for the food expo, looking for people to interview. I was able to do two interviews yesterday and follow up others in the coming days. But I got rejected, too, yesterday and today. After 30 years of doing this, it still stings. That’s why I don’t think I will last in sales.

But as another reporter told me:

You know, I just have to rhink that it’s not me who they are rejecting but rather it’s my publication. They’re not ok with providing info, while others are willing because they stand to gain something. Rejections mean I tried to look for stories, that I did my job…

Maybe because I put too much effort in chasing stories that I couldn’t detach myself from my job. I feel like rejection of my efforts is a personal rejection.

Or maybe I’m just perimenopausal. 🫠

I just learned two days ago that my friends in our HK office got retrenched. Some high-level people, too. The owner is highly leveraged that the banks aren’t happy with refinancing his debts. So the owner has to cut some more, straight to the bone, to appease the creditors.

For a moment I panicked and I had been asking God, why is that I don’t understand what he wants for me? Why aren’t my job applications moving forward? I was asking for clear directions but I feel like I can’t hear Him. All I get is the message wait.

Then this appeared on my FY:

I have to be patient and not panic.

My coverage in Clark was almost wasted because the US embassy hostaged the whole thing.

For the “official” presscon, the embassy made the PH government staff ask us the questions we planned to raise. The damned embassy, however, filtered them and they — officials of both governments— only answered the most benign questions by giving us motherhood statements.

And to think I came all the way from Southern Luzon for this?! I even spent my own money for a hotel stay in QC so I won’t be groggy the entire coverage because the presscon is 175 km from home.

In my anger, I stuffed myself with sisig during lunch. Bad for my health, I know. But I was upset.

All the other reporters around me were also grumbling, saying that we could just have done a Zoom presscon if we couldn’t even ask our questions, in the way we want these to be asked. We just wasted our time, gave up sleep, and sacrificed our entire working day for this when we could’ve done something else that would have given us one or more stories instead.

The staff members of the two PH government agencies who were also former journalists understood our frustrations. They begged their officials to grant us interviews on the sidelines. They cited my case that I came all the way from Southern Luzon for nothing.

So the officials relented. The US govt official gave in.

We got stories.

Horrible coverage that left us exhausted.

On Sunday afternoon, I left my house to check in at Red Planet Cubao. I didn’t want to go on an out-of-town/Manila coverage without proper sleep.

Red Planet is very near the first apartment where my ex-husband and I lived about 25 years ago.

I am very familiar with the area. Even before Gateway Mall came into being, I was already there. I walked to Farmer’s Plaza everyday to ride the MRT going to Ayala Ave because my office (an IT company) was at LV Locsin building. Then later, I took the jeep daily (near Mercury drugstore) going to QCity Hall to get to work when I was still with a government agency along QC Circle. In the evenings when I was finishing my master’s degree, I rode the jeep in UP Diliman going to Philcoa and from there I rode another jeep bound for Cubao/Alimall.

When I became a reporter, I walked daily going to the LRT 2 Cubao Station, got off at Legarda Station, walked to Doroteo Jose LRT 1 Station. I then got off at Vito Cruz Station, took the tricycle or pedicab to reach the BSP complex. I was covering DOF and central bank then. That was the time before the elevated walkway from D. Jose Station was connected to Legarda Station. 🫠

My cheap shoes didn’t last with all the walking I did back then. I was able to buy a car when we already lived in Pasig-Cainta area because we already had a two-car garage by then.

Araneta Center has changed so much since 2001 when I first got there. But it still the same — Aurora Boulevard is still dingy, the girlie bars are still there. The constant feeling of being unsafe never left me. I became hyper-aware once I stepped back into Cubao because being stupid can cost you your cellphone or your life.