If I didn’t go crazy before my APAC boss this afternoon and subtly threatened that I would go to the competitor if the company goes with its 6-month contract bullshit for non-office-based employees, she wouldn’t push the red button in London. Ghaaaad. Some calls and emails later, the global head said that there were some fuck-ups in HR that’s why our contracts were flagged again.
Ignore, she said.
I hate doing that to my APAC boss because she’s nice but my goodness, I need to stand up for myself and the rest of my team. I am underpaid compared to my peers in other news orgs. I am just sticking with this one because I like working from home, especially critical now that I am building my house and moving away from the city.
Let me just finish my house and I will revisit my options. I need to play hardball; if they would touch again our contracts, then I will have to ask for a much higher rate because the terms would be changed. The amount of work and the stress they are giving me should be compensated.
Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com
I was so incensed today that I procrastinated. My brain refused to function so I did a quick sketch to relax me.
I really, really need that week-long break. I’m already too tensed, my patience is running thin.
My gear for urban sketching.
Doing the new color swatches relaxed me, too. I removed the student-grade Tokyo Finds watercolors and left the higher grade ones from the same brand, with Winsor & Newton and Holbein thrown in the mix. I wanted to go to ArtWhale this afternoon to buy more half-pans but I had to bring Twin I to the polyclinic nearby to have her checked.
At the nurses’ station at 2ndF, waiting for Twin I’s name to be called to the pediatrician’s office. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Her temperature was elevated but I refused to administer the antigen test because she has sensitive nostrils = ridiculous nosebleeds. She was frequently urinating. So the pediatrician recommended some lab tests to check for UTI and also to check the cause of her severe nosebleeds (she lets out a lot of fresh blood, like lots). She had her nose X-rayed to check for polyps.
Waiting for our turn at the x-ray room. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Then she would be referred to an ENT specialist if there are polyps. She surmised—as a nosebleeder herslf—that Twin I has sinusitis that’s why she always has mucus in her nostrils. Later it hardens and then my girl frequently picks her nose to remove the hardened mucus, then irritates her thin membrane in the process, causing her nose to bleed. She saw that her nostrils were inflamed.
Anyway, lab test results would be out tomorrow but I would be attending this huge conference in Manila so I need to leave here at 6:30 am. Because the presidential security group will close the doors of the hotel promptly at 9 am—for security. BECAUSE DAMN THESE BUSINESSMEN, THEY INVITED MARCOS AS GUEST SPEAKER.
I don’t know how I can stand to be in the same room with this demon. He who wanted the people in EDSA strafed during the 1986 uprising. He who milked this country of billions when he was a senator and I was part of the investigative team who tackled the pork barrel case for my news org. I still have the photos of the evidence submitted to the anti-graft court in 2013.
I must shove my earbuds down my ear canal to block out his voice during his speech, which would be drivel anyway.
Stress level hit the roof before I signed off from work tonight. I received an email from HR regarding the contracts of my reporters and damn, here we go again…
I emailed my managers and asked them, why are we back here? If this keeps on cropping up, I will lose people. I also would be put in a precarious position and if push comes to shove, a competitor will love to have me and this company will just eat my dust.
Thank God for cats. They help me get rid of stress, albeit temporarily. They lower my blood pressure.
Here is Kimchi judging me again while I do my stretching. Photo by CallMeCreation.comAnd then she proceeds to mock me. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I don’t know how people can last long in this job. I remember an erstwhile bureau chief quit and asked to be demoted because she said she could not keep up. She just had a baby and there was no way she could balance being a mom, wife, and bureau chief. The only two good things about my situation is that I can work from home and I don’t have a partner. The rest are crap—in the sense that I manage the second largest if not the largest of newsroom in APAC just by the number of reporters I have. Moreover, I must be on top of the situation in 11 markets—five of them are very active whereas the others have only one or two markets (Aus and NZ) that they cover. I must monitor 11 laws/rules and regulations, 11 political situations with their own idiosyncrasies and only two markets use English as an official language—the rest are incomprehensible. AND YET I could not travel freely to these markets; I have yet to test the waters and push the envelope.
This day is just…😤
Meanwhile, a little victory due to our pushback against this Bible-thumping liar, history revisionist, and overall bitch apologist of the Marcoses.
And here are the feedback of some sellers. A friend who has a store on Shopee says this is all true. She lost customers. If there would be orders, it would be for an PHP80-item, hardly a thing that would move the needle. All the big spenders are gone. Nothing happened during 10-10 sale. She says she’s stuck with a high inventory and she couldn’t open a TikTok store or an IG store because that requires regular content. She has no room in her life for content since she’s taking care of her baby. She said this is not a matter of life and death for her since she’s just doing this as a “passive” income (her definition) since her active source of income is her online job. This boycott really hurts the sellers who are relying on Shopee for their main source of income.
Another stress-reliever of mine is planning my house.
Updated floorplan of my tiny house. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I probably have my dimensions wrong again since I’m not working on grid paper. But this is the latest layout that my contractor and I have agreen on. Just this morning, we reduced the width of the girls’ bedroom. I’m not entirely sure if I got the girls’ doorway right because I just based this on my conversation and gesticulation of my contractor i.e. there would be a corner there for their door and for my closet. But I couldn’t understand how my closet would not block their doorway. I must have misunderstood something. Anyway, I would be able to see once the partitions are up next week.
My girls prefer to have this shelving unit in their room instead of a full-blown closet because they want shelves and more shelves for stuff and books, not clothes. I have already bought them drawers for their clothes.
Photo from ikea.ph
On Friday I will pick up in Paranaque the Rockwool insulation/soundproofing for some dry wall partition to deliver to my construction site. That was an extra expense (around 22k) but I want this done well. If I can have granite kitchen countertops, why not have a soundproof partition wall?
This is how my future home looks like viewed from space…
Our houses according to Google Earth.
Yup, that entire forest at the back is my view. I will clear some of that in the near future when I’m ready to have my vegetable beds. That red encircled part of the red duplex is mine—at least the second floor part. On the extreme left in the yellow circle is the garage but that would be extended to be a communal garage to accommodate two SUVs and a sedan.
Let’s see on Friday if the house is already taking shape.
This is how fucked up we are. We still do not have a Department of Health secretary. The rollout for the boosters for children has halted. My kids are partially vaccinated (still no boosters yet).
Then we have a secretary of justice who lacks delicadeza that he wouldn’t resign from his post even if his 38-year-old son was arrested and taken into custody for possessing kilograms of illegal drugs. And he is one of the instigators/staunch supporters of tokhang—the war on drugs in which a lot of poor innocent children like Kian delos Santos were killed without mercy because of baseless accusation that they were drug users. Remulla’s son is not going to use the kilos of drugs by himself, right? And yet they insist he is no drug pusher/runner. Calls for Remulla’s resignation went unheeded. How do we know he’s not using his power to influence the case of his overgrown baby?
Only the rich and the powerful can get due process and always get away scott-free. This tweet from a reporter-friend proves that.
The Remulla son was arrested on 11 Oct. The news came out 13 Oct. They deliberately withheld the information until the rumors could no longer contain the information. When the story went public, the Remullas—who had reigned over Cavite for a looooooooooooooooooooong time, initially denied any connection.
And journalist Atom Araullo, like the rest of the rest of us in the industry, called out this special treatment.
WTF are we supposed to do???
I’m so tired.
Then we have police–even in civilian clothes–knocking on the doors of journalists’ homes in the guise of “following orders from above to ensure we are safe” after the death of journalist who is a vocal critical of Marcos and Duterte.
They’re really out there to intimidate us, to scare us.
My occupation in my insurance policies is WRITER. If I put JOURNALIST, my premiums would be higher.
I need more practice. My efforts are elementary-level, unlike when I was raging with emotions earlier this year. Twin I said, “Mommy, you must get depressed again to be able to draw again.” 😑 NO, THANK YOU. I don’t want to go back to that horrible episode.
Nope, I can’t go back to this state of mind and general well-being even though depression did help a lot in fueling the emotions in my drawings. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com
I took out my aging sketchbook and tried my hand again at fake urban sketching. I say fake because I’m not drawing onsite. Ah well, the first photo was done onsite but didn’t finish there.
I revisited this sketch of the view from Starbucks 7thAve, BGC. Added squiggles and more details. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com
This was sketched with pencil onsite but I finished this Rooftops Viewed From My Tiny House here at home. Practice in perspective and dimensions. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.comAS building a.k.a. Palma Hall. Practice in depth. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.comThis was sketched with pencil onsite, at UCC beside Raffles Hotel in Makati, when I downed three shots of Patron tequila in May. This is a combination of coloring markers and my sketching watercolors (student grade), hence the saturated colors. Those markers were the cheap kind so it didn’t come out well. The ones I wanted were Copic markers used by Japanese manga artists. Maybe I’ll buy those after finishing my house.
Since I’m better at pencils and charcoal, I think I should use color markers when drawing onsite instead of watercolors. I mean I should concentrate more on drawing details with pencils and liners and not rely on watercolors to make the drawing relatable. But Copic markers are expensive and prices on Amazon are unjustifiable to my wallet because of the weak peso. I think Zig Kuretake Scroll and Brush are a reasonable alternative and I’m ok with the Kuretake brand since my watercolor for large formats is a Kuretake.
I wonder how will I find time to draw more onsite…
Meanwhile, I will no longer buy student-grade watercolors because they turn out horrible when the paper is not the ideal one for watercolors (this sketchbook is not meant for blending by layering since the colors bleed). Some in my palette of Tokyo Finds are student grade and they didn’t blend well enough on this paper…
The colors bleed and don’t blend. Art and photo by CallMeCreation.com
Once I finish those student grade pans (or I can give them to my eldest nephew who also draws), I will replace them one by one with Holbeins squeezed into half-pans.
Only one more week to go before I take a week-long break. Wohoo!
My girls and their friend. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Today the girls had hung out with their two friends in UP. While I did my walking exercise, I let them roam around by themselves.
But before that we had a hearty meal as I grilled marinated porkchops. Because it was sunny.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
After we cleaned up, we fetched classmate #1 from their apartment nearby then we met classmate #2 at the College of Engineering where her parents parked.
It was a lovely afternoon. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
When I was on my second loop, I met my ex-boss/ex-editor who was also exercising with his son. He caught me chatting on my phone while walking and he asked, what’s that, work? I said, yeah, one of my sources was asking me a lot of questions about xxx because xxx is yyyy. We chatted for a bit and he said we should meet with other ex-colleagues before Christmas.
Photo by CallMeCreation.comPhoto by CallMeCreation.comI had my anthropology class here. That course was a waste of time. Photo by CallMeCreation.comIt was a good exercise. I hope I had burned the calories from the porkchop 😏
We ate at Snack Shack after and drove friend #1 back home. My girls were happy, that’s all that matters.
Meanwhile, Kimchi finally used the cat tower.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I was about to give up on it and was thinking of disassembling it to Frankenstein the other scratching post. Good that she tried it now.
I want to go back to drawing again after watching videos and scrolling through the IG accounts of @shoreditchsketcher and @mysquiggles. Perhaps tomorrow.
It now has four walls. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I left QC at almost 7 am this morning even though I woke up at around 4 am (because I slept before 11 pm last night). The drive was less than 2 hours at rush hour so it was surprisingly quick.
Driving on Skyway 3 North Ave. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I stopped at the flower vendors along the highway in my hometown and bought carnations for my mom and arranged Malaysian mums for my dad’s crypt. I visited his resting place first to bring the flowers before proceeding to my mom’s house. Then I checked the construction progress.
I have a huge front door. Photo by CallMeCreation.comThey’ve removed the old windows in this room that is going to be my room. Photo by CallMeCreation.comThen they patched it up with new concrete wall and new door opening.Photo by CallMeCreation.comFrom below. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
This staircase would be changed and moved so this area below would be my outdoor space, combined patio and further right would be the utility and laundry area. Eventually I can have this area covered once I raise enough money. But you know, one thing at a time…
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
In the future I can have this extended by building a deck. Just because.
I can also have this catio built too.
I built an Ikea wardrobe (Pax system) for myself using Ikea’s online planner. This will be installed just outside my bedroom door because, what the heck, I don’t have space in my room.
Or Brimnes wardrobe.
The Pax system I built using the Ikea online planner costs around PHP 32,000. I asked my contractor if his carpenter/cabinet-maker can build me something like this. He said he can have it made for less than 20k, minus the Ikea wire drawers (can be replaced with real wooden drawers, I guess?)
I worked for a bit, chatted with some sources, then left the construction site and then my mom’s house early to go around the campus. I watched the football players for a while. Oh how I wish I could still play. Nope, I’m too broken for that.
Photo by CallMeCreation.comZooming in. I used to be one of them. Photo by CallMeCreation.comTired, sweaty, and my make up is running down because I installed a towel bar in my sisters’ bathroom.
Then I went to have dinner at a friend’s restaurant while I waited for my sister-in-law (SIL) and my brother.
Photo by CallMeCreation.comBeef shawarma and yoghurt shake. Photo by CallMeCreation.comThen we had coffee and lots of talk. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
My brother didn’t join us for dinner/coffee because he went ahead to move in some of their stuff into their new townhouse. I forgot to take a photo of it but I took shots of Kuya P’s future room because it has a loft bed that I wanted to show the girls.
My brother’s house is nice and spacious since it has three floors, a huge garage (two SUVs can fit) but they will use the space further in to make it a game room and some kind of lounge area for the boys and their friends.
Kuya P’s loft bed and “office”. Photo by CallMeCreation.comToo claustrophobic for me. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
But then if you’re playing games, this could be ideal because you can confine the sounds. This can also help you concentrate on studying and eliminate external distraction. When I showed this to the girls, they said they will just have curtains to make their study area isolated from each other.
I left at past 9 pm and it only took me 1.5 hrs to get home in QC. With the moderate to heavy traffic. Not bad.
It’s past 10:30 and it’s still like this along Quezon Ave. 🥴 Photo by CallMeCreation.com
It’s already past my normal bedtime but I’m still wide awake because of the late coffee drinking (because I needed that for my drive). I’ve been up since 4 am. Gee, I’m running on caffeine and adrenalin.
While I was working today, I sold some stocks at a slightly higher price than yesterday. I will have the proceeds deposited in one of my bank accounts and then when I need to issue another check to my contractor next month, I would be ready. I decided to sell this time because it seems like stocks would be falling next week—the US inflation rate was higher than forecast. Despite this (which meant the US Fed will remain aggressive in its rate hikes of at least 75 basis points every FOMC meeting), the local stock market was up today; it defied logic. Good that I was able to sell. But I guess the local market was trying to go for a winning streak for the weekend before they digest the US inflation news—and they knew that stocks would be falling next week. The US Fed’s goal is to bring down inflation from the current 8.2% (the highest in 40 years) down to 2%. Just count how many rate hikes they would have to make—that would spill over to next year. They are really going to cut economic growth in favor of bond prices. That’s a lot of liquidity being mopped up. The housing market will go belly up if they continue with this.
A shopper walks past turkeys for sale in a grocery store on Nov. 11, 2021, in Los Angeles.Mario Tama / Getty Images file
So this will be another contagion. If people cannot pay their mortgages and buy food, then the this will redound to other consumer items. Global trade would…It’s 2008 all over again.
Those VCs and startups will have a lot of trouble raising funds. As they said, “winter is coming!” The abundant dry powder of yore—thanks to the super low interest rates as a result of Fed cuts in 2008 to save the US economy—is gone. Investors have become more tight-fisted quarter on quarter and they now refuse to fund untested startups even if they look brilliant on paper. The tech industry is first to freeze in this funding winter. The rest will follow. VCs and startups are scrambling to get funding before the year ends, before we officially enter global recession next year, before the world burns.
That’s why it’s critical to unload some of my stocks and VUL funds by November (until December, if I believe in Santa Claus rally–and I haven’t decided yet) so I can pay for the remaining balance with my contractor. After finishing my house and the expenses of moving, I will start building up my finances again by buying bargains. Since I cannot buy individual stocks anymore (and I don’t want to be penalized for insider trading even though I will not do that), I will just have to limit myself with funds like ETF, UITFs, and funding this particular VUL I will draw down from again (which I plan to (almost) empty by year-end).
Let me just recover a bit from this house then I will scrimp and save for a new car. I think by 2024 I would be ready, if the world hasn’t completely burnt up by then.
