I attended my first face-to-face annual general meeting for the year today. What’s funny is that Covid is very much of a concern now as it was a year ago that the company had to swab everybody.

The venue was not far from my apartment so I was able to arrive at my gate early…BUT NOT actually. I saw my old kei car parked outside. It was the girls’ dad, he was picking up the red couch, the book case, and a side table that originally belonged to the old house. I went past our gate, parked my big car and waited across Robinsons Express. However, it was taking him so long (I kept asking the girls if I could come home) that I decided to go instead to the Uratex Marikina showroom, which is not far from SM Marikina.

And I got to try the mattresses to determine which firmness would be best for the girls.

I swear by the longevity of Uratex. My parents’ 6-inch foam mattress was still functional after 30 years but I had to throw it out because it was just sooooo old. My big grey couch made of Uratex foam is very much usable but I had to give it to Ate C because 1) it was too big for my house; 2) the cost of reupholstering it is the same as the cost of buying a new love seat from Ikea.

While waiting for the cashier to process my purchase, I checked out other home items from the showroom.

Good thing that I don’t have room in my new house for more stuff. This keeps me from buying more crap. You know, when you have a new place of your own (as in, your OWN), you tend to get high and the tendency is you will buy crap you don’t need.

After I finally got back home, I was answering chats and emails on my phone non-stop. I didn’t have enough time to lounge on my bed and I had to go back to my workstation and continue with the barrage of messages. And oh yeah, editing.

I wasn’t able to continue with the packing today. Sigh.

I am overwhelmed with the things I must accomplish this week and I am just chipping away at the surface. Which causes me to freeze and just end up curled in my bed watching cat videos on Instagram. I have so many things to pack and dismantle. My workstation is one of those that I dread dismantling because it’s just complicated. Too many wires and I must remember which goes where.

I have to attend a stockholders meeting of an F&B company tomorrow so I really can’t pack up my decent clothes yet. And I have to dismantle my bed so I can have the joints welded to lessen the creaking. I only had one side of it welded and I completely forgot to have the other side done. Now I am running out of time to do that other half.

I am running out of time for everything.

I’m meeting friends on Fri for a last drink here in the wine bar/craft beer place near my apartment. They were surprised that it’s already time for me to leave Quezon City. “It’s that soon?! Time flies by so fast!” We were just talking about this move in theory a year ago and now it has become a reality.

I’m also worrying about how I will transport my cats without them freaking out so much. The farthest they’ve been away from the house was when I brought them to PAWS to have them spayed. That was just a 30-minute car ride. On Tuesday it will be at least 2 hours (because we’re leaving at 9 am so traffic may be heavy) and I hope they won’t get traumatized by this. A vet high school classmate of mine told me to buy Feliway (pheromones) spray online to calm them down. The problem was I was too preoccupied with my prep for my Singapore trip and conferences a few weeks ago and I was so busy while I was there so I totally forgot to place my order. Local orders of Feliway need 10 days lead time because it’s on a pre-order basis. If I buy from overseas vendors, the items would arrive by 18 May, which is too late.

So I will just grin and bear my cats hisses and growling and hope that they won’t try to escape.

My classmate-vet told me to cover the cat carrier with towels to lessen stimulation from the outside environment. That’s one of the reasons why my cats freak out when I bring them to the vet—they get stimulated too much with the strange environment and the smells. My cats have become too sheltered that they simply refuse to explore the world outside, which is good in a way because we live right along a busy street and it will totally break me if they get run over by cars.

I’ve got too many things on my mind (work is also killing me) that I simply do not have enough headspace for other things. Blogging about this somehow helps me calm down as I am able to write down the things I must do in a logical manner. Without writing them down, all the things that I must do get jumbled in my head and leave me overwhelmed, causing me high levels of anxiety, which leads me to freeze.

My housemaid can only do so much since she’s pregnant but she’s trying to be useful. My kids packed their stuff but I really can’t rely on them much on other things like timing the defrosting of the fridge, disconnecting my gas stove from the LPG tank and making sure there are no leaks. Figuring out a way how to transport my plants.

Because I am a solo parent. I carry the weight of the world on my shoulders. By myself. I have no one else to turn to for help. It’s overwhelming.

Slipcover. Because. I. have. cats. They destroy couches. Enough said.

I wasn’t productive today at work because I was too busy putting things in their proper places in my house.

And I assembled this side table. I should have bought another one because when you can’t have a coffee table, side tables are needed so your guests can put their drinks somewhere nearby.

Underneath this side table will be one of the covered cat litter boxes I just bought again from Lazada. A desk fan will stay on top of this table. Because I don’t have floor space for a stand fan.

All my books fit on my floating shelves. Didn’t realize that the shelves were very deep. It accommodated all the books in my book case here in the apartment plus the ones in my room. And I’ve got more room to spare.

Yes, those are flower vases that I just put temporarily there. I have fake flowers that I just washed that I will bring over this Thursday or next week.

However, I need to rethink that plan. I. Have. Cats.

I tried rearranging the TV area but it makes the entire area smaller.

We didn’t get to use these much in the apartment because it’s too cumbersome to get them out of the boxes under the dingy cabinet under the counter.

I have a small house but I have a lot of storage. It would encourage me to buy more stuff 🤦🏻‍♀️

The girls’ custom-made loftbeds were finally assembled today as well.

They have enough space for drawers and a narrow closet for hanging clothes.

I’m so tired. After doing all these, I drove back to QC and arrived home at 9:47 pm. 🫠 It was too hot today to be doing anything.

I don’t have the energy to sort through my electronics crap. I may just shove them inside a plastic bag and be done with it. I’m so tired.

I now acknowledge that I have too many books. This is my last (6th) box of books.

The beds will be picked up by Transportify tomorrow to bring to a studio that my househelp will be living in with her boyfriend in Project 8, also in QC. I will be giving away so many things to help them start a new life together.

I am slowly dismantling my life I built here. It’s…I don’t know why I feel a bit sad. I knew this is just a transition house and I knew I won’t be staying here that long but it’s still a bit melancholic.

Meanwhile, we discovered another bunch of stuff that at the back of my mind I knew would appear. It’s the ex’s stuff stored in the closet under the stairs. Why it’s there, I don’t know. These are medical books, a book in his native language/script, books about how to get rich, and some souvenirs from Mexico.

I am no longer nice. I have no intention of going through the trouble of contacting him to send these back, even if one of the items include the jacket of his high school diploma. But I also don’t intend to keep these to be reminded of him, like having these souvenirs framed. Strong negative feelings are enough reminders.

My initial plan is to have a bonfire in my yard and drink wine with my friends to exorcise whatever evil ghost he has left in these stuff.

But then it hurts the bibliophile in me. So I will just drop these off to UP College of Medicine’s library and help some struggling med students.

Speaking of academe, I just found out that a newly discovered species of bristletail living in the rainforest in my hometown is named after my mom. The scientists submitted their findings to a systematic biology journal and named it after her. It’s so cool to be immortalized via a scientific name or via an asteroid or planet name. 😊

The species was named after Dr. xxx, an Academician of the National Academy of Science and Technology, Philippines, and a Professor Emeritus of xxx. In naming the species, the authors recognized the contributions of Dr. xxx in education and research in the field of ecology, particularly soil microbial ecology, and environmental science.

—The museum of natural history of my university

The reason why my neighbor in Unit D left after 19 years is because of termites. She said she wouldn’t have moved if not for the termites; she liked the location and it was convenient. However, my wayward landlady doesn’t maintain her rentals well. She always cheats her way into “repairs” and other landlordy duties.

So after my former neighbor left, it seems like the termites shifted to my closet that is just against the wall I share with Unit D.

I collected these Sweet Dreams pocketbooks that have been out of print for decades by scouring second-hand bookshops. I intended to pass these down to my girls because these are the type of books that high school girls read. If not for these books, I wouldn’t have been a writer today. Seriously. I became a voracious reader because of these pocketbooks.

And now the termites ate most of them 😭 They’re very hard to find now. I want my girls to start their romance book journey with these since the kind of young adult fiction I encounter these days encourage unhealthy relationships and wrong self-esteem lessons. Case in point: Twilight series. 🤮 Aside from the bad writing, the premise was all wrong and the dynamics—it was really unhealthy. I barely got through book 1. I read it out of curiosity because a lot of girls got hooked on it at the time Book 1 came out. But in the end I trashed it. It was pure garbage.

So now I have to search far and wide again to rebuild my Sweet Dreams collection and guide my girls with the choice of reading materials. They already graduated from Percy Jackson and Diary of a Wimpy Kid series so I think they’re ready for this. They refused the classics like Little Women and Anne of Green Gables. It’s ok, I’m patient. They will get there.

While I mourned the demise of my Sweet Dreams collection, I packed my other books like the fantasy ones, business books, journalism books and everything else in between.

I still have to pack my latest acquisitions that are on my wall shelves in my room. So far I have carted off four boxes to my car. I still have two more here in my room 🤭 Forgive me for being such a bookworm.

My dream of having a home library may no longer happen but at least I have enough cupboards to store them.

And if I still run out of bookshelves, I can always install over-the-door shelves. Art and books are going to compete for wall space in my house.

I had to cook all the food I had been harboring in my fridge within the next 10 days so when I defrost it, I won’t have to worry about which food items I must keep in a cooler while being transported. One of the best ways to empty your fridge is cooking hotpot.

And yes, my dining table looks different now. I planed it manually to remove the bumps. I just bought a manual planer from Ace Hardware and did it as I remembered how my father did wood planing. Then I applied “oak” wallpaper that I bought from Lazada.

I also bought a surface protector from Lazada since my dining table gets a lot of use and abuse. It now matches my cabinets.

So after lunch, my girls and I went to a craft store/hobby center in Marikina where they sell high-quality yarns of all kinds.

They bought yarns that Twin I will use to knit and Twin A to crochet to make scarves and beanies for my older sister. She travels to more temperate zones than I do. This will occupy my kids for four months since 7th Grade in their new school won’t start until August.

Marikina is nice in some parts, not the downtown though, which has super narrow roads—a characteristic of old towns.

After this, we went straight to Ikea to buy new cutlery, dinner and kitchenware, Trones shoe cabinet (to be drilled outside my front door), a glass side table, and art/photo frames. I will bring all these to our tiny house on Tuesday where I will work the whole day.

I plan to bring books and other small items. I must also buy a huge bottle of liquid floor polisher and wood furniture polisher (for my bedroom floor) because I had hired my mom’s cleaner to prep my place before we move in on the 16th.

I had put some paintings in frames that I will give away to my TV reporter friend who really liked the flowers and the sunset in UP Diliman. A housewarming gift since they have just renovated their condo. I have the original photo of the sunset so recreating the painting won’t be a problem.

This last one is tough. My mom didn’t like it but my manager did. She was torn between this and the forest painting but in the end she took the latter. My APAC boss got the freehand yellow flowers.

Tomorrow I must finish the curtains for the girls’ bedroom because I plan to have the curtains up when we move in.