After six months, I finally made an effort to organize my kitchen better. I realized I had difficulty cooking because my prep space was too crowded.

But before I tackled my counter, I tamed my tea/coffee cabinet with the help of jars I bought from Wilcon Depot a few weeks ago. Now my teas—flower, oolong, green, infusions, milk tea, specialty like the Christmas Edition TWG and Gryphon Artisan–and coffee are now organized so searching for the beverage I want is no longer like an Easter Egg hunt.

I’ve been meaning to get a pretty tea kettle to boil water on top of the stove but I realized I’m too busy to even keep an eye on a tea kettle to keep it from boiling over. 🫣 So nahhhh, I have to stick to ugly utilitarian automatic electric kettles and hot water flask like the one above to keep water hot all day.

Then I pushed the toaster and microwave oven parallel against the wall instead of having it diagonal in the corner to have more prep space. It was good that my contractor insisted on the 90cm width for granite counter instead of the standard 60-70cm because it gives me enough elbow room even if my appliances are permanently out and not hidden away in cupboards like my air fryer and Instant Pot.

I also removed the purified water jug off the counter after I was able to buy a narrow steel shelf from Ikea to demote it there.

However, I was too lazy to cook dinner for my girls so I just bought roasted chicken after church. I just attacked the jamon Iberico de Bellota that I got as a late Christmas gift.

Had it with oven-heated pan de sal and cheddar cheese—et voila! Dinner.

I just can’t be bothered to cook during my rest day.

Ampon was yowling like crazy outside my door. When I entered my bedroom, she climbed the emergency exit balcony and yowled louder. I had a feeling she was about to give birth that’s why she wanted me around her.

Let’s wait for the others…

OMG! I have too many cats! 😱

We’ve got four! Three black and one orange.

Once she’s cleared by the vet, I will have her spayed.

This is my 17th year attending this annual event.

I’m sleepy now. Will continue…💤

My girls and I + older sister are in a hotel near the area. I could have just driven back and forth from my home in the province but I spent unnecessarily for my girls’ happiness.

You see, they miss their dad. Yes, he should have exerted more effort but he is an incompetent narcissistic fool, so he doesn’t. He doesn’t want to spend money on gas and toll. My girls wanted to celebrate his birthday with him. So I told the girls to ask their dad to meet him halfway by going to the Mall of Asia and have a date there while my sister worked on her laptop in our room and I do my reporter business outside.

My journo friends said I’m too nice, he sucks. Yes, I know. But I’m doing this for my girls because I don’t want them to feel deprived of their parent even though he should exert more effort. I uprooted them, which made it more difficult for him to see them. But the counter to that is, even the time we were just 2 km away from him, he didn’t see them that often so…🤷🏻‍♀️ It’s really on him.

Anyway, once they become adults, they would realize that he is the one at fault while I did more than my share of what I should have given. I’m bending backwards so that my girls can see him.

Idiot.

I just felt bad when Twin I one morning went to me and said she dreamt that her dad got sick and died. And she woke up crying so hard. I felt so guilty. I just told her to ease her worry, call him.

Ghad, why does it have to be the children? He could just call them everyday. They can message each other via FB messenger every minute. There’s no reason for them not to communicate 🤦🏻‍♀️

Some people are just…

Despite my negative feelings towards my company, I’m still working like a dedicated employee. I had calls, wrote a scoop, then drove to Makati for a meeting with a source who flew to Manila earlier this week.

As my sister said, do not let your reputation suffer just because things are going awry. I have to be a good and reliable journalist until the very end. I don’t want temper tantrums now to haunt me in the future. Keep my dignity intact. I’ll never know who I will cross paths with again in the future. Don’t burn bridges.

While waiting for the world-infamous traffic jam to ease, I browsed around the nearby mall. I saw Art Bar. I couldn’t help myself… 😭

My toxic trait is I keep buying expensive tools for my hobbies, thinking I have time to indulge in such. 😶 Like this brush is more expensive than my dinner tonight. 🤦🏻‍♀️

I worked late into the night yesterday, digging through stats upon stats to prove my point. I crafted an action plan to save our asses. While other bureaus also have issues, the most affected is my own bureau because 1) they don’t understand the region; 2) they don’t care to understand the region; 3) the overlords in the west think what works for them would work globally. Fucking hell no.

I worked on the stats, all the metrics, and analysis this morning but our APAC boss could not understand why Southeast Asia is like that. I had to explain clearly why. Good thing I always talk to our readers and a host of other people who are wheelers and dealers in our midst so I have a good grasp of what’s going on.

At the same time, I was chasing two stories, blasting emails and four of my messaging apps were open so I can ask around. I have yet to draft those stories. On top of that, I had to edit stories from different parts of Asia.

And I got blasted again by my manager for directly emailing our public speaking trainor, asking her if there are available trainings because I will be hosting our event once again in April. My manager said, next time she has to be cc’d in all communication I would be doing. 🤦🏻‍♀️ I said I just responded to our trainor’s email sent in September, when she told me to email her back when the turmoil has died down (my daughter’s health issue—at that time I wasn’t sure yet if it was TB or cancer). Prior to her email in September, I had reached out to her because at that time I had to explain why I cancelled my trip to HK and skip the training.

Why is it that everything I do is wrong?

I’m staying for a bit because I haven’t found a viable alternative employment yet. The interviews with other companies have dried up. They have found people to fill in the positions I applied for/interviewed for because I stubbornly stuck with this job, thinking things will settle down and would be alright. Because I genuinely like what I’m doing.

And because I’m a single parent, I can’t just quit. I have bills to pay, children to send to school.

I just have to grin and bear it until the right job comes along.

In the meantime, I just have to do my best to make it smooth sailing for the rest of my team.

I want to cry. I’m super tired.

I am not losing my job, I just hate our parent company. The feeling is still the same as the one conveyed below:

I told my manager that if management pushes through with their plans that they have wanted implemented since last year, then I would be leaving. I told her I’ll be looking for another job.

If they push through with it, then the 10 years I devoted to the company were not appreciated.

I need to devote my time to finding a new job or finding freelance gigs that would allow me to earn more than my fixed income now.

It’s hard.

As the military guys would say, making the bed would be your first accomplishment of the day, which would start the ball rolling. It would also discourage WFH people like me to lay on the bed because it would get ruined. Plus the view of something neat and orderly would keep my mind clear and not be distracted by the chaos of hastily strewn pillows and sheets/duvet.

A neat workdesk would also help me have a clear head while I forge through my tasks, most of which are back-to-back calls today.

One of those calls would be with my manager and another one with our APAC boss…

Keep my temper/motions in check…

I had dinner in Nuvali with one of the veterans “of the other side of the fence” earlier tonight as he consulted me about several things. One of which is a sort of social impact and sustainability projects that he wants to pursue before he dies. So I promised him I will connect him to some of the key people in my network in the academe plus my mom. And another is the Aeta community that I had been helping together with a fellow journo. I already told Ayala Foundation about this one but I have to devote time on this so that I can connect them and help them chart the future of the collaboration. I have to make that trek to Tarlac one of these days.

Along the road while I was driving to Sta Rosa, I was thinking about how to lie low from my current job. I realized that if management is successful in changing my grandfathered contract, then all my stress and frustration are not worth it. I am thinking of just stepping down from my managerial position and just go freelance with them and do other things. Now the question is, can I afford to have variable income every month when I am sending two kids to a private school for the next five years?

But I’m enjoying the journalism aspect, I said. It is facsinating to learn about new things everyday.

But at what price must I pay for staying, this friend asked me. The fact that you got hospitalized last month for too much stomach acids due to stress and unhealthy living is already a sign that you have a lot on your plate, he said.

Needs a lot of reflection.

I should have done my prayer and fasting two weeks ago as my week-long meditation exercise to start the year right.