I left at 6:30 am arrived at 8:30 to my seminar this morning and I was still early by an hour. At least this was not a repeat of my 3-hr drama last week.

Note to self: avoid Monday morning coverages.

I got the stories I wanted and have arranged coffee dates in Manila, HK, and SG soon. 😁

I was with a colleague, B, who had to cover the same event. He was my junior and I was his editor in the paper where we both came from and I also recruited him to join our team when I jumped platforms. He often asked me if I could be one of his reference persons and I wrote letters of endorsements for him when he was applying for scholarships or trainings abroad. Long story short, we had a long history together so it was just natural for us to talk about so many things while we were working today.

We were chatting about his lifestyle right now, how he enjoys being a freelancer, with several jobs that do not tie him down. His philosophy now is, “I don’t wanna work past 3 pm. When I’m done, I’m done so I can do other things or rest.”

His last steady job burnt him out—he was writing 10 stories a day. I said why the heck did you even do that?! He said it was the nature of his beat/s and as long as there were stories, he can’t stop because—as GMA’s  24 Oras newscast says— di natutulog ang mga balita (because news doesn’t sleep). We were the last generation of reporters who didn’t balk at “borrowing” documents critical for reportage or learning how to read upside down because we couldn’t touch the document that was on the table of the source we were talking to. I still literally bodyslam the elevator doors so I can quickly do an “ambush” interview. Just today, I followed my source to his car because we were talking about something critical. This colleague and I are trained to stalk people and wait for hours for the opportunity to do a 5-min interview.

Why am I relating this? Because B told me the new generation of reporters he is encountering in the field and the ones he is training right now do not know how to do interviews, what to do during presscons, how to be enterprising, how to research for information or events to catch sources, or even research how a source looks like so they would know who to watch out for in large events. Or even a chance encounter.

“These are pandemic journos. They learned journalism in school when schooling was done purely online,” he said.

Some of the slightly “older” journos started their careers during the pandemic, when news was delivered to them via press releases or presscons were conducted online. For three years, that’s all the kind of journalism they knew. That’s why the new grads and the slightly older ones didn’t know how to cover—even register for an event!

“OMG! No wonder Tita M and I were the only ones asking questions during the XXX forum last week!” I exclaimed to B.

He said yes, we were the last journos who ask questions during briefings. When B left his regular job, one staff in a government agency that he used to cover said, “You know B, no one is asking questions during xxx briefing since you left.” 🤦🏻‍♀️

B told me this is the reason why news stories these days in every print/online platforms are copycats of one another.

Another young reporter asked where he got the story about xxx. He said, “I just got the data from this agency’s website but I won’t give it to you because it’s already there, it’s public.” These journos do not know how to do their research and to trawl the internet to look for news pegs or leads. 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️ I came from a generation where we do our rounds of government offices to sniff out leads. We befriend janitors, security guards, receptionists, etc to learn who came into the office of so and so. We would learn about the agenda, we would know who are fighting what. I taught these things to my students when I was still part-time faculty member about 10 to 11 years ago.

I think this strengthened my resolve to go back to teaching. We cannot have this kind of media landscape, where news no longer provokes us to think, to search for the truth, to ask, and demand accountability. I know the economics of media doesn’t make sense right now but somewhere, somehow there is a way…The New York Times showed us it can be done. Quality news reportage, exclusivity, and value-add command subscription. That’s how our company and our rivals make money.

It’s really sad.

I woke up at 5 am; for my body it has become automatic. I turned off the aircon and turned on the ceiling light in my daughters’ bedroom and told them to get up. I asked them if they want bacon, cheese and bread or bacon and rice for breakfast.

“Mommy, we don’t have school. It’s ____(name of the local festival)____ today,” Twin I said.

🤦🏻‍♀️

Gee… Now I’m fully awake and can’t go back to sleep. Precious sleep. 😴

---

Yesterday life was peaceful because it’s the mid-autumn festival so the whole of East Asia is off: mainland China, Japan, and Korea. I was the only one holding the fort because my Australian colleague had to sign off early, I think, to celebrate as well since she’s ethnic Chinese. Good thing only one story popped up, from the Philippines. Another one from Australia popped up late but a freelancer editor got it.

I was supposed to tick off my to–do list but Monday… My brain refused to do anything else. I was jotting down stuff while in a call (a regular one with editorial x commercial teams) when my Kakuno EF acted weirdly. Writing with it was rough.

I checked and it turns out the ink was already gone. Then I rapidly descended into the rabbit hole of fountain pens again.

I had tried to refill a clean, empty cartridge with the syringe on the right a few weeks ago. I ordered this from Lazada, thinking the blunt and larger needle was better. However, it turned out to be messy. It’s hard to draw ink, and when I push the ink out of the syringe, it produced bubbles.

So yesterday I tried the insulin syringe that I bought from Mercury for only PHP 13. I was a bit skeptical but I did it anyway. Well, well, well… It was so smooth that I was surprised that drawing ink was painless. Injecting the ink into the clean catridge was quick and it didn’t produce bubbles.

For only PHP 13. 😁

The PHP 50 syringe from Lazada was fiddly to use. I read that the ink catridge converter was much challenging to use so it was better to use the empty Namiki cartridges and fill them up with a syringe.

So there goes my productivity. 😝

---

I played with my outside kitties last night before taking a shower and going to bed. They are the sweetest little things. I will have them spayed next week and then later give them vaccines.

Kimchi is still growling at them whenever they try to enter my front door.

Let’s see if the two groups can adjust with each other. I really want to keep Socks and Gorilla out of the elements.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Viktoja Borison ✧.* (@viktojadesigns)

I had been contemplating about having a skylight in my kitchen because my house is dark even in daytime. But that’s stupid because my house is just one year old and here I am, thinking of new construction works again.

I guess the band-aid solution is to order and have an accordion screen door installed on my front door so I can have it perpetually open and let in more light. It has been a year since and I kept putting it off for some reason…ah well, Twin A got sick so all my energy and resources went into her care.

Which brings me to my dilemma now. I have a huge chunk of cash just languishing in my bank accounts instead of growing in investment instruments. I am holding on to it because I am so afraid of being unprepared for medical emergencies. I’m insured (HMO + health insurance for critical illness) but my kids are not. My job doesn’t include such things so I pay for everything in cash. Now that it seems like our saga with Twin A’s GI TB is not yet concluded, I have to keep cash accessible all the time.

I’m afraid that we would have to do the biopsy and go through that whole rule out lymphoma thing. But our discharge orders indicated that GI TB, lymphoma unlikely… So I’m holding on to that.

---

One time I jokingly said that my life can be divided into two parts: Life before watching Grave of the Fireflies and life after Grave of the Fireflies. It’s that earth-shattering for me. The worst part is, this movie is a true story of Akiyuki Nosaka.

This is a beautiful movie but I will never watch it again. It broke me. The only Studio Ghibli movie I will not watch again. I told friends that right after watching Oppenheimer, they should watch Grave of the Fireflies and see the polar opposites of the war.

Now that it’s available on Netflix, this movie teases me. Like it’s beckoning, “come on, you know you want to watch me.” But then, I’m in  an emotionally vulnerable position right now so it would be a huge mistake to try and watch this again.

I’ll just wait for The Boy and the Heron to pop in Netflix and have my Studio Ghibli binge later.

---

Twin I brought some classmates to hang out in our house yesterday so they could do home work. Some of them remarked that our house, albeit small, is lovely because it was homey. One of them wanted to sleep over to experience that homey feel.

Twin I said that girl has an unhappy home life so she gravitates towards ours. I feel bad for her so I told my daughter to invite her friend one of these days for a sleepover. I want her to feel safe and secure in my home, just as my parents’ home was to some of our friends when we were growing up.

My younger sister’s friend, C, stayed for a month with us when we were in high school. Her mom was sent to a psychiatric hospital while her dad…I think he was living with a girl friend or affair partner, I can’t remember exactly now. She had a terrible home life. In between staying with her cousins, she stayed with us.

My brother also had a friend who stayed with us during Christmas holidays. He didn’t want to go home because he had a messy family life.

I will keep an open door policy for all children’s friends who need a warm home. I may be a solo parent but I have enough love to give that makes up for the absentee parent.

---

After Typhoon Enteng/Yagi—which wreaked havoc here in the Philippines, China, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam—we are now facing endless rains again due to intensified monsoon weather. The southwest monsoon rains are being sucked northeast by incoming low pressure areas developing in the Pacific. We are now facing two potential typhoons in the coming week/s.

How are we to manage next Saturday’s check up with our IDS, I don’t know. Hopefully, the rains will not be intense because I plan to arrive at PGH very early.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Christian Lovell | PHR | CAREER COACH (@careersbychris)

They said this is the first step towards a healthy relationship with work–detachment from it. But how do I begin? How do I introduce myself to people when they ask? “Hi, I’m CallMeCreation and I’m a mother of twin girls.”

There are some shitty things at work that I just learned the past few days and I’m initially hurt and offended but later on I decided that I shouldn’t give any more fucks. That’s it, don’t give a rat’s ass. I shouldn’t be pressuring myself to outperform last year’s metrics anymore because I shouldn’t be chasing promotions and raises. If I want additional income, then it should come from another job or side hustle. That also should keep me sane.

I told Kr that I realized that when I told my colleague at my undergrad college in this university that I’m ready to start lecturing again, I was really just seeking an outlet to do things other than what I do with this company. Being locked up in the four corners of my room is damaging to my mental health since I just eat and breathe this company—that it’s all I think about. So when my boss makes me her punching bag, it feels like it’s all life has to offer me because my job just consumes my entire being, inside and outside of my home. I need to meet other people not connected to my job with this company. I need to touch grass again.

Kr said that’s true. That’s why even though the commute sucks, she was glad she has this side hustle of hers writing for TV because she gets to shed her identity and her life as a journalist for our company. She meets other people outside her main job. That she is able to get out of her condo and walk in the morning to take the MRT to the TV station. It’s her way to decongest her head. It’s like her meditation of some sort everyday.

Maybe I should take three units of teaching load next semester.

---

Made the trip to PGH yesterday to get the official reading of Twin A’s MRI.

She still has prominent lymph nodes, it seemed to be at the back (retroperitoneal and right common iliac lymph nodes), which our IDS missed initially but the radiologist caught it.

I checked with the fellows how did the TB test go. It’s still positive even after a year of treatment. However one of the fellows said, it’s normal to register positive for TB quantiferon even if you completed your treatment.

Twin A’s last day of taking her medicines was yesterday. 🥺

I have yet to schedule our consult because all IDS are having a national conference today or this week. Besides, Twin A is now down with stomach flu—as much as I tried to isolate Twin I and myself from her, it can’t be helped. We’re using one bathroom and even if I scrubbed the bathroom frequently, she will still get it because this illness is very contagious. I can’t have Twin A’s bloodwork done when she’s like this.

I am not sure if our IDS would still have the biopsy of the lymph nodes or just continue the TB treatment since there was no thickening of any lining, nodules or omental caking going on.

I am exhausted.

I didn’t know what to do with myself yesterday because I felt betrayed. By whom? I don’t know. This TB is really aggressive and there’s this nagging fear that this variant might be drug-resistant.

I tried working while having my late lunch at the mall. Edited two stories and looked for ways to cheer myself up before driving back home. I bought some groceries and Bread Talk for the girls.

I still felt like a deflated balloon. My sis-in-law told me to have a Karada massage/treatment also in Robinsons and the therapists are good. So off to Karada I went.

It was expensive at PHP 2,300 for a 60-min treatment but it was all so worth it. I felt relief within an hour while my two-hr massage last week didn’t do anything. The tension on my lower back and spine was released.

It was a momentary lift to my mood.

Then I walked into a giant Christmas tree.

I don’t know why I feel sad whenever I see Christmas decor. Like, wait, stop the time—I’m not ready yet! I feel like time is flying by so fast and I haven’t done anything much in my life. I haven’t reached any goals. Here I am, still in a limbo regarding my daughter’s health. I haven’t gone back to my gynecologist to continue with my executive check up. I haven’t figured out what to do with my life yet.

It seems like I’m just hobbling along.