Author Archives: admin

27 days without a car

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Primer. I need more dry days for the finishing and buffing.

Keeping my fingers crossed, praying for more dry days so the paint job will be finally done. The broken taillight will be replaced and hopefully I can take this home early next week before I leave for Singapore. ❤

There are still a lot to be done with this car: central locks and alarm, new carpeting, new tint, and sound system (but that is already the least of the things I must do). When my house is completed by December, I’ll start hauling my books and arrange it there. I found that when moving houses, the books are the most difficult to pack and unpack. I will be moving small items little by little so by May of next year, only the big ones will be moved. If the headwinds have died down and the economy recovers from this horrible stagflation, then I will sell this and get myself that new Toyota Avanza for minimal headache.

I’m still thinking if it’s still worth it to reupholster my couch or just buy a new sofa bed from Ikea. From a sustainability perspective, I should have my current sofa reupholstered so that there would be less waste. From a cost standpoint, I don’t know if it would be cheaper. Let’s see after I consult with the reupholsterer.

I think this would be safe from my cats. FYRESDAL Daybed with 2 mattresses, black/Ågotnes firm
Besides, Twin I also wanted this particular sofa bed and begged me to buy it for our house. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

Why would I want a sofa bed? I remember in high school and college, we had a constant stream of friends sleeping over at our house since we had five rooms that can accommodate them. I mean, all of us children had short-term (friends’ homes are far and they want to take naps in between classes and a comfortable place to study) and long-term guests (friends from broken families who needed to get away from the chaos of their homes; friends with no family to stay with during Christmas breaks). My parents made our home open to our friends and I want to keep that tradition. All of our friends had fond memories of spending time in our house. My friends spent their Fridays with me, watching movies in our tiny second floor TV area when we were in high school. In college, our house is where my friends spent and got rid of their hangovers.

I made sure that in the new plan for my tiny house, the kitchen will take the center stage as I will be providing a lot of food for hungry teenagers—and for my sister-in-law and cousin who love my cooking. I’m not an excellent cook but I do some dishes exceptionally well. My friend K and everybody else in my family love my potato salad combined with grilled fish or meat.

Hotpot with mishua tonight. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I’m excited about the my prospects for the next 12 months. I’m already drawing in my head the plan for the back garden and the front garden. I already have the laborers in mind and the things that should be done (compost pit, growing beds, flower beds, irrigation system, and movable chicken coop).

And this is the goal:

And no one is allowed to rain on my parade.

A colleague asked me today why can’t I just ignore those catfishers? I said, “because I’m bored.” I also want to release this pent-up fury through passive aggressiveness towards unscrupulous strangers. I want to hit and hit ’em hard.

I know this will backfire on me but I just want to get even with the opposite sex, even though it doesn’t really make sense. It’s not even apples to apples but doing this cools my deep-seated anger. I recognize that this anger is unjustified but can you blame me for harboring it?

My journey to healing is still long and hard.

26 days without a car

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This just happened this afternoon on my Instagram that is set on private.

This is how they catfish people and I read on Reddit that it’s very prevalent on dating apps.

On IG, these catfishers just message me out of the blue. But you just don’t do that to me—it’s just like walking into Mordor. I’m suplada so I just say it bluntly and stick a knife into you. 😂 Especially now that I have PMS and I’m constantly irritable.

And I did this to another random guy messaging me a few months ago.

And another random guy in February

Then they block me 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. They figured I’m not worth the effort. 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Ladies, use Google Lens to reverse-search the photos of these random men who message you out of the blue. One guy who messaged me I think last month used Korean model Dongwon Bin’s photos and he has been catfishing women since 2019, as I discovered on Twitter.

On Instagram
On Twitter

And this is the legit IG account of the model

I just keep blocking people. I’ve blocked a lot of men (and trolls and orcs) on Twitter, too. I do not delude myself into thinking that a person would be attracted to me with just one photo (since my profile is locked). So nope, go catfish someone else.

Some have tried on LinkedIn, too. One Indian guy was very persistent and kept messaging me to help him find programmers to recruit in the Philippines (and I assume he’s not dumb not to see I am a journalist and that I have nothing to do with IT). Dude, I’m too busy! He kept on messaging me until I blocked him. I entertain random messages on LinkedIn because that’s how I gain access to people I want to interview so I return the favor. But if you’re going to be like this, no, you get blocked.

You know, nothing is really genuine in this day and age. All lies, all fake. Even the people you meet offline. That’s the scarier part—it’s harder to judge people you meet in person who turned out to be fake and liars.

Talk about rough experiences 🤬

People who are worth your time are those who will find you even if you are living as a hermit deep in the woods (which I would be doing soon). They will find you.

And as previously stated, happiness comes from cats, not relationships 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

That said, I’m calling an exterminator. I can’t risk my cats and my humans getting sick because of vermin—just because the nextdoor unit is a cesspit.

25 days without a car

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And I’m going nuts.

I texted the car shop and the chief mechanic said they couldn’t do the paint job yet because it has been raining the past few weeks, which I completely understand.

Lord, please give me at least two dry days so my car paint job will be done. I don’t know how long I can stay like this, not being able to drive to places, even do a big grocery shop.

Meanwhile, my neighbors had Mochi/Whitey cremated today.

Goodbye, Kitty, love. Photo c/o my neighbor.
With paw print and glass for the ashes. Photo c/o my neighbor.

It was just so heartbreaking that he held on so we can be with him at the last moment before he let go his last breath.

I really do love cats. When I was growing up until my first job, I thought I was more of a dog person and my salary just went to pay for my dogs’ vet bills. Now that I’m older, I think my temperament matches more with cats. I’m an ambivert but my introverted side appreciates my cats’ aloofness and pretension that they do not care about me but in truth they’re really nuts about me. 😂

Like this lovely critter here. She again offered me another dead mouse outside my bedroom door.

Sushi, who is fond of giving me love offerings.

She had been making noise outside my bedroom yesterday morning, made sure I wake up so I can let her in my room. But when I opened my door, she refused to enter. I wondered why she went through all the hoops to wake me up then she’s not going inside my room 🤔 Only when I saw the dead mouse and acknowledged it did Sushi finally saunter into my room with a smug face. 🐱

I screeched and asked Ate C to clean up the crime/crime scene.

We don’t harbor pests in this apartment but because our neighbors in the next unit are really messy people, they already have a rat colony there and some of them had crossed over here. Hence, Sushi’s new preoccupation.

Their landlord inspected their apartment recently and saw that leftover Jollibee meals were on the kitchen counter with small rats circling around these. 🤢 That’s how disgusting they are.

I couldn’t put rat killers around my unit because of my curious cats. That’s what my other neighbors suspected that killed Mochi/Whitey. 😢 I’m still figuring how I could get rid of the pests without harming my fluffies.

Meanwhile, I don’t have anything else to keep me occupied today so I spent the evening learning to sing one song. 🤣🤣🤣🤣 Ghad, I’m so boring.

Ocean – Lady Antebellum

At least this is better than trying to amuse myself by chatting with strangers, like what some friends suggested since they themselves are currently doing the Bumble thing. Especially this lawyer friend of mine who has been in the dating circuit in Singapore. She went through so many scrapes now because of Bumble and it seems like she hasn’t learned anything.

Anyway, I still can’t do that because I just discovered that I am not completely out of the woods yet i.e. I still want love and attention, which is fatal as this would lead me to the wrong person/people. So better I keep to myself until I become numb and heartless.

Maybe I would be able to do that dating thing when I am already nonchalant about everything, which I doubt I would be. Ergo, no. I would not be able to do it.

I should’ve learned my lesson.

Fly, cross the rainbow, kitty

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Handsome boy.

We tried to save him. After an hour of syringe feeding him, I saw he was already hyperventilating and his eyes were dilated. He just waited for me and my neighbors to come back to him before he said goodbye.

He held on long enough so we can be with him before he departed.

He enjoyed being brushed.
Mochi/Whitey enjoying the lights

He loved to play with my legs and he always made himself cute, begging for attention. At least for the last few months of his life, he was able to live stress-free and enjoy the simple pleasure of no longer fighting for survival. He learned how to play with broken branches and tin cans. He loved sleeping in this shoe rack that we provided for him outside my door.

At least he knew what love was.

24 days without a car

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DO NOT SETTLE.

This is the message I got today from all the people I got to talk to this week.

Do not settle for a half-assed written story. The story I just edited, I admit, I let through because the reporter would not have any output for the week. But then the content editor put a stop to it, because it was half-baked. Full of fiduciary statements with no substance.

I should stop being nice.

Do not settle for less than a full commitment to a job that was assigned a long time ago. I have given my team enough lead time; they should fulfill their end of the bargain. I push for more benefits and their promotion, then they should step up as well.

Do not settle for fleeting attention. If you want a relationship with me, I want your full attention. I don’t come second or third.

Do not make excuses for people. I will not settle for someone who spews inconsistencies and lies. Do not settle for people with questionable character.

Stop being nice. I deserve more than what I was receiving in the past.

Daughter: Dumb guys go for dumb girls and smart guys go for dumb girls. What do smart girls get?

Dad: Cats, mostly

Ah, truer words were never spoken. Because we’re no longer settling, we get cats. Happiness are derived from cats, not relationships.

Meanwhile, I would have to push back my trip to S.Korea from September (two weeks) to October-Nov (one week) as this is the only break my bestfriend and another good friend would have in the middle of the first semester school year 2022-2023. They have already booked their tickets while I haven’t because of my crazy schedule. I’m not sure if this is a good time for me since I need to go back to Singapore by mid-November and as head of the region for my publication, I cannot NOT be there… Ideally this S.Korea trip should be in September but…oh well. It’s more fun to be with my girlfriends if I cannot read street signs. My best friend and I had died of laughter for 8 days when we were in Japan in 2009 so I would really want to take this trip with her.

I don’t know what crazy stunts I would be doing this time but for sure I will not, I repeat, I will not eat a live octopus.

23 days without a car

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I would have wanted to drive somewhere today but I couldn’t. I still don’t have a car.

My brain is not functioning today—you know it’s like a deflated balloon right now after the Adrenalin rush of yesterday. Imagine, I did not allow myself to cry yesterday and absorb the fact that I lost 300k because I needed presence of mind. I needed to engage with the scammer/s while I am working with the authorities. Whatever info I extracted from the criminals, I passed on to authorities.

crop male hacker watching desktop computer in darkness
Photo by Anete Lusina on Pexels.com

After my Nancy Drew-esque adventure, I disengaged, as advised by the lawyer of the anti-fraud team because my identity will be stolen if I lingered long enough. The case is now with the investigators. I already gave him the ID of the point person from the syndicate that they can engage with so they can do a sting operation.

After I recovered my funds, I slept for 9 hours. All the stresses of the previous day were released today and my brain is barely functioning now.

My friend from the media relations of AEV said she was in awe of my presence of mind and guts. I said, maybe because I am a reporter so I’m used to masking stress and can still function under duress (I received a lot of threats from the scammer’s side when I refused to do what they wanted to me to do).

This is an organized crime syndicate. I did a lot of research and discovered the same modus operandi had been going on since 2019 or probably earlier. I passed on my research to the anti-fraud teams and the NBI; I think they need Interpol for this one. As my friend-colleague told me, they have scam farms (akin to boiler rooms) in Southeast Asia, scamming people from China to Venezeula. I’m not entirely sure if these boiler rooms do the same phising as what was done to me (and at some point my mom, but then my mom has an excuse that she is not internet savvy while I don’t; i blame my lack of sleep).

Image from Mothership.sg

It’s like being on the investigative journalism circuit again, doing covert info gathering. After being fueled by Adrednalin for 24 hours (forgetting to eat and sleep), my body gave up and gave in to exhaustion.

I’ve been pretending to edit a story from Vietnam the whole day today but I haven’t progressed to the fourth paragraph.

The best I could do today was to clean my keyboard, which was full of cat hair.

Cleaning my mechanical keyboard that has brown switches. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Cat hair and dust bunnies from my keyboard. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I can’t complain. After the extreme stress I went through yesterday, maybe I deserve this break. Besides, Southeast Asia is dead today because of Eid al-adha.

And oh, I thank God that I also have the foresight to keep majority of my funds in trust accounts that cannot be withdrawn that easily as these require a visit to the bank branch. I also have split my ready-to-use funds into different bank accounts. Aside from *** (where I have like 6 accounts), I have *** and ***. I now have *** and ***, which I’m testing as a financial reporter for future reference. In case of fuck ups like this, I still have funds I could use.

Diversify, diversify.

Tomorrow will be much better. All is well.