The Farmer in the Dell

He was...

there when Enterworks started.

He was there when we had our ping-pong and darts tournaments. He's a very good player even.

He used to burp loudly and that made us laugh.

He used to speak his son's name, "Vincent", in a deep voice over the phone.

He used to listen to Enya and 90s local rock music.

He used to get all the ice from the freezer.

He used to travel with me on our way to Fairview.

Sadly, he no longer with us. To Bambie's family and friends, our heartfelt condolences.

FarmVille vs. Barn Buddy

Can't decide which one to choose for your gardening fix? I'll help you out.

FarmVille is created by Zynga, the gaming company that brought us Vampire Wars, Mafia Wars and Texas Hold'Em Poker. Barn Buddy is made by TheBroth, Inc. Both are still in beta stage so let's give 'em some lovin'.

Before you can plant your first seed in FarmVille, you must create a farmer first. That part is fun. I made mine with dreadlocks!In Barn Buddy, you are given simple instructions: you must first buy seeds, plant them, take care of them and then sell them. You have watering can for dry soil, insecticide for bugs and herbicide for unwanted weeds. The glove is for harvesting. The storehouse is where you keep your crops. When you sell your crops, you can even announce it in Facebook as a status update.In FV, your crops grow faster. Unlike in BB where some plants could take a day or two to reach their potential. But then again you can always buy fertilizers to speed things up.

Now let's talk about the crops. In FV, aside from the usual crops, you can plant rice, take care of trees, buy buildings and even animals! But I give props to BB for creating more realistic looking crops.Both games want you to interact with your Facebook friends. In FV, you can have your friends as your neighbors. You can visit their farms and perform tasks for them. But the thing is, the task is given in a small dialog box and you just need to click a button to accept the offer. And that's it! Wham, Bam, Thank You, Ma'am! In BB, you can visit your friend's farm and actually water their drying soil, remove bugs or weeds or even steal from them.In BB, you can customize messages that you show whenever a fellow farmer does sumpthin' in your farm. Like in my case, when somebody removes a weed, I display this message, "I twittered Yaya na to do that later". You can be as crazy as you want ;oP

Verdict: I enjoy Barn Buddy more 'cause it's much simpler to play. Even my nephew, Lance, an 8-year-old kid enjoys playing it. When your fella farmer needs help, you don't just click buttons, you actually do sumpthin. The plants look more realistic too. If you wanna know more about Barn Buddy, here's my old post.

Do Penguins Fart?

It's the End of the Road, Sam

I think this is the second season's bestest episode. So many freakin' things going on with all the characters!

So that's how William Compton used to behave around his kind. Sex was wild and bloody messy. Total opposite of how Sam makes love. Too bad his partner is keeping sumpthin' from him. You just can't trust a woman with deep scratches on her back, no?Since Bill is still tied up with Lorena, I'm pretty sure that Jason will perform some heroic deed to save his sister from the crazy Newlins. I think Godric will make an appearance again this Sunday.

It's good that Tara saw the different side of MaryAnn. Our bull lady gets cranky in the morning especially when there's no hot water. Teehee.

Too bad we only have one scene with Jessica. She's hot in that one scene though. And I think the ladies are soooo digging Hoyt now.

I don't want my dog to die so I'm praying for some miracle to save Sam. Uhm, where the hell is drunken Andy?

Hapee Berdey, Kuya!

I wish you and your family good health. I hope that you get more web design projects. Mag-treat ka naman! I hope that you'll give Lance, Fiong-Fiong and Disney the best lives they could possibly have. Kayod lang and tyaga.

I ♥ Apple

I don't usually blog about work but this time, I'm really happy that I get to use some of my Adobe knowledge again.

More than a decade ago, I was trained by DPSI (that's the local training partner of Apple) in some of Adobe products like Photoshop, Freehand, Illustrator and MacroMedia Director. That was my first taste of the Mac products. Fell in love with the Apple right away. Love the graphics so much. I also dreamt of owning one but I thought before it was only for the rich and famous.

I got the chance to teach professional artists who wanna do some photo editing or illustrations. Sometimes they show their appreciation by giving me gifts ;oP

You don't know how much I enjoyed that phase in my career.

Fast forward to the present. I'm now using Photoshop and Illustrator again. Plus, I will be creating interfaces in Visual Studio. I'm also studying WPF so I can make really nice Windows objects. Sweet!

Meet Bruno

While having lunch at Pancake House, we noticed this cute dog wearing eye-catching shoes. Of course, I had to approach the owner to take a photo of the dog. She offered to take my photo with her dog instead. Sweet!

Hapee Berdey, JR!

Today's Ogz's birthday. To his close friends and family, he is called JR. We celebrated it at CenterStage and of course, there were singing and drinking involved. Laughter was provided by Racquel. She's effin' hilarious!

Huskee, My Barn Buddy Doggie

Got my wish today! I now have a dog in Barn Buddy. I named her, "Huskee". She does nuthin' all day but pace back and forth. I wish she knows a trick or two though. She can't wait to bite the bums of ruthless bandits. I know who you are, guys! *shaking my raised fist*There are a couple of ways to get your own pooch. If you have 40 grand, you can buy one. Low on cash? You can actually use your credit card to buy credits. A dollar will give you 4K worth of credits. That means, you will be paying 10 bucks all in all. Uhm, I'll pass on that, thank you. Second, you can invite your friends to play the game. If 10 friends install the application in Facebook, voila! you get a guard dog instantly. That is pretty doable ;oP

Barn Buddy

I started playing this farming game in Facebook today. It's quite simple to play actually.

You are given 1K worth of coins and to start your farm (buy some seeds). Since you start from Level Zero, you're only limited to buying turnips, carrots and corn. As you level up, you get more options.

Your plant goes through different levels of growth. It's exciting when they are already full grown and you can make money out of 'em. Also, you can buy some fertilizers to speed things up.

While waiting for your plants to grow, it usually takes minimum of 3 hours per level upgrade, you can visit your friends' farms and take care of 'em too. You'll be rewarded with coins for doing a good deed.

There are times when bugs invade your crops. Don't worry, there's a spray for that. When weeds grow beside your plants, there's a spray for that too. When your soil gets too dry, you can water it. Nice, no?

You can also be naughty and steal crops from peeps or put weeds/bugs to their plants. If you don't want this to happen to you, you can get a dog to guard your farm. Be careful though (I found out only today) that there are people who set up bugs/weeds for other peeps so when they kill 'em, they level up pretty quickly. You know who you are, ladies! ;oP

One thing nice about this game is that, you don't need to be logged in all the time. You can check your farm every now and then to see if you have weeds or bugs or if it's harvest time already.

I don't have a green thumb so playing this game is the closest thing I've gotten to having one. Trust me, it's addicting!

My Bacon Fix

While looking for a place to have brekky (arrived at work at 7:08!), I walked towards Jollibee in the old Greenbelt. I passed by Pancake House and decided to eat there instead. Been craving for bacon for some time now.

When I checked their menu, they don't have a meal that has bacon, egg and fried rice. What they have is a meal with bacon strips, toast, hash browns and egg. I asked the waitress if I could substitute rice with the hashbrown and toast. She checked with her supervisor and she said no. Bummer! So I chose to have their beef tapa meal and got some bacon on the side. I requested the egg to be cooked sunny side-up and with toasted edges.

My coffee arrived first. After like 10 minoots, my meal arrived. I asked the waitress to put my beef in a box since I won't be eating 'em anyway. I only wanted my bacon.
Verdict: Bacon is cooked perfectly alright but it wasn't as tasty as I wanted it to be. The garlic rice was crappy. It wasn't fried rice. It's just steamed rice with fried garlic. I hate that! Also, the coffee refill ain't free. It costs, like, 70 bucks! WTF!

Guess Who's Back?

I noticed right away that this episode looks like one of those episodes reserved for Valentine's Day presentation. Everyone seems so happy with their partners. We have Sam and the new love of his life, Daphne (who happens to be a shape-shifter). I have a feeling that their love affair will be short lived though. Then Terry & Arlene. Tara & Eggs (not too exciting anymore). Hoyt & Jessica are just the cutest couple (I thought they would do sumpthin' else involving the phone). Of course, there's Sookie & Bill.

Let's talk about the new character, Barry. Shouldn't he be more happy to find someone of his own kind? I hope we get to see him again sometime soon.

Jason finally got lucky inside the LoDI. He'll be surprised once Sookie makes her surprise visit there. It would be fun to see these two in the middle of some vampire action.

Is it just me who thinks that the photo of the young Tara, Sookie and Grandma Adele looks sooo Photoshopped?It's nice to see the "alive" version of Eric. And finally, we get to see Godric (so Dave Navarro-ish), who happens to be Eric's maker.Speaking of makers, guess who's back to stir things up? It's Eric's maker, Lorena. She knows how to make a grand entrance, eh?

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Reached TriNoma at 3 in the afternoon. Plenty of time to kill for the 5:25 screening of Harry Potter. I went up to the floor where the cinemas are located. There's a short queue of moviegoers on the online reservation section.

When I was a person away from the ticket booth, I unfolded my reservation printout. I almost screamed when I saw the date--July 16th. Checked the date on my iPhone. It's already the 18th. WTF! I remember going to SureSeats and making my reservation on the 16th but I was pretty sure I chose today's date to watch a movie.

When it was my turn, I handed my paper and kept my cool. Then the lady behind the desk said, "Sir, you can't use this anymore." I asked why. She pointed out the date. I acted like I only found out just that second. "Is there anything you can do about it?" and I gave her my puppy dog face. She asked what time I prefer and I answered anytime soon. She looked at her monitor, pushed some buttons and the seating arrangement was displayed for me. I chose a seat near the center and far from the screen. Then she said, "190" that's the cost of the ticket for the THX cinema. Usually it's just 20 bucks lesser.

Bought some cheese popcorn & red iced tea from Taters and ran towards Cinema 7. After 5 minutes, the movie started. Whew! That was close.

If you've read the book, you may not get excited anymore because the element of surprise won't be there.

I miss the HP characters. The last movie was shown, when? 2 frickin' years ago? I'm really lucky to see Daniel Radcliffe live in Broadway last year.

The fiery scene where Gandalf...er, Dumbledore was saving Harry from the Gollum-ish creatures that came out of the lake was so LOTR-ish.

Malfoy looked so pale. He could audition for the Twilight series as one of the vampires.

Professor Snape's hair looks good this time. Not so wig-like anymore.

I'm on Team HermioRon. Love watching the scenes with them both. Emma Watson is pretty, no?

Is it just me or Cormac McLaggen (Freddie Stroma) looks like a younger Ryan Philippe?

I enjoyed the Quidditch scene. Did you know that there's a Muggles version of this game for real?

I forgot that this is the part where Dumbledore dies. When I was reading the book, I thought he'd pull a Gandalf-like stunt and appear once more at the end. And maybe we would hear him saying, "Ha-Ha!" a la Nelson from the Simpsons. But sadly, the Professor is so dead.

Bye, bye, Ruehl

My friend, Joy, told me about the news that Abercrombie & Fitch will close down their Ruehl division by the end of the year. Sad news for shopaholics like me.

Am happy to own a few shirts. Got them on sale. Otherwise, can't afford 'em ;oP

America's Favorite Top Ten Dancers

OMG! What an exciting group number from our Bollywood Bombshells. I couldn't take my eyes off Kayla!

In this episode, we get to see solos from ALL our dancers. I like Ade's, Jeanine's, Evan's and Janette's.

Kayla and Evan. I couldn't believe that Evan could dance in Kayla's shoes! I remember wearing Joy's during our Bahamas trip (uhm, it was for a contest, you know) and it was EFFING difficult to wear! Okay, back to the dance. It was good. Not great, but good. Kayla was beautiful during the spin. I don't see chemistry yet though. I don't see Evan as the romantic type. He looks sleepy. He could be in danger.

Janette & Ade. In this number, I enjoyed watching Ade more though. Been a fan of him since he and Melissa danced the Rhumba. It's nice to see his personality in this number. NappyTab even used his comb to hypnotize Janette.

Jeanine & Jason. According to Jeanine, Jason is not that hard to look at all day. I smell romance! So nice to see Travis from Season Two choreographing our beautiful couple. And this is my favorite number of the night! Boy! Jason is a lucky guy. First, he kissed Caitlin and now, Jeanine! We'll deffo see this number again in the finale. Amazing number. Nice song too by Jason Mraz.Randi & Kupono. I usually enjoy Paso Doble numbers but this time though, it was painful to watch. Randi looked heavy and Kupono didn't look powerful. These two could be in danger too.

Melissa & Brandon. I totally enjoyed their Broadway routine. This is one of my faves from Tyce.African dance was given to our boys. It was energetic and Evan was cute when he stuck his tummy out.

I Miss Luk Yuen

Kuya introduced me to Luk Yuen more than a decade ago. He asked me to try their halo-halo congee (their bestseller). That's also the first time I learned about his special concoction—a mixture of calamansi, soy sauce, chili sauce and ketchup. It tastes so good with all the meat in the congee!

And since I haven't eaten at Luk Yuen for a very long time, I decided to walk over to Glorietta 5 (that's their new location).

The place ain't that busy to think it's noon time. I was given a small bowl of soup and appetizer right away, along with their menu. I searched for the halo-halo congee and another favorite of mine, the Noodle Feast. I was shocked that the latter doubled its price already (280++). Anyhoo, I got myself some congee & fried meat dumpling and iced tea.I'm happy that the congee still tastes as good as the last time I had it. It still contains my favorite liver, pork balls, beef, some chicken, chicharon and fresh egg. I wish I didn't order anymore the dumplings 'cause the congee itself is VERY filling. I was surprised to see the dumplings' size though. I expected them to be smaller. The appetizer was good. The sauce was sweet & spicy. I wanted more ;oP

I give props to the service that I got. My glass of water was never empty. And the waiters are always roaming around. I hate it when you need one and you can't find one. By the way, they don't have service charge so tipping is a must.

I learned later on that they don't accept credit card payment unless your meal costs 250, at the minimum. Mine wasn't so I just used my charm ;oP

ColorGenics

Just by picking out first your favorite colored cube down to your least (there are 8 boxes), this site will tell sumpthin' about your personality. I tried it (thanks, Patty, for sending me this) and here's what I got (about 80% accurate): "Much of the time you are preoccupied with things of an intensely exciting nature. You need stimulation and variation with all matters pertaining to your life. You want to be regarded as an exciting and interesting personality being able to charm and influence others. You use powerful strategies with predictable outcomes so as to avoid endangering your chances of success or undermining other people's confidence in you.

You are feeling very vulnerable at this time. Nothing seems to be going in the right direction - business wise, private-life wise, everything. You need some emotional security and an environment which could possibly provide fewer problems, but the way you are feeling you can't be bothered even to make the effort.

It's the old old story - I am misunderstood - my partner (be it in your private life or in business) just doesn't understand me and YOU also believe at this time that you are being completely MISUNDERSTOOD by one and all. It then obviously follows that you naturally feel inhibited and not appreciated. It is perhaps because of this belief that you feel compelled to stand back and let the rest of the world go by. As for developing a firm relationship - inwardly deep down in your subconscious mind you are wary of even trying to get close to another person because you feel that if you open up your heart and feelings you are sure to get hurt. Since you are living in a society where close relationships are the norm, you feel that there is that need to conform, but any close relationships of any magnitude that you may have tried in the past have unfortunately left you without any sense of emotional involvement.

You are being unduly influenced by the situation that is all around you. You do not like the feeling of loneliness and whatever it is that seems to separate you from others. You know that life can be wonderful and you are anxious to experience life in all its aspects, to live it to the full. You therefore resent any restriction or limitations that are being imposed on you and you insist on going it alone.

You don't like authority and you rebel against all forms of limitation. You are your own person and you intend to stay that way and to get on in the world simply by your hard work and determination."

Try it yourself.

Reunited with Slimmers World

After, like, 4 years, I returned to Slimmers World. My walk from our office in Paseo to Salcedo served as my warm-up. I was also wet because of the drizzle.

I presented my membership card, signed my name on a piece of paper and was assigned a locker. If you haven't been to Slimmers in Salcedo, the floor area is shaped like an "L". On the shorter side, they placed the treadmills, steppers and the stationary bikes. The rest is occupied by the aerobics class (along with the women's locker room). On the longer side, you have all the equipments, weights and the men's locker room.

The 5-to-9-pm schedule is the equivalent of a rush hour traffic in EDSA. If you're not paying attention, you'll bump into a fellow client or get hit by an equipment. Yep, it's that effin' crowded and noisy! The stereo was on full blast because there's an aerobics class going on. Ugh!

My first half was spent on the stepper & treadmill. And then I focused on my calves, lower back and abdominal.

After my exercise, I hit the shower. Remember to bring your own shampoo, soap and slippers.

I'm really happy that I get to spend some time in the gym again. Tomorrow again.

True Blood costs 45?! (NSFW)

In this episode, it was revealed that a bottle of True Blood (synthetic blood) costs 45 bucks! Wow, that's expensive!

I adore Jessica. She's funny in this episode.

It's Tara's birthday and it's high time to finally taste some Eggs ;oP I love her reaction in the kitchen when Maryann told her to go flourish and never say no to herself. Maryann really knows how to throw a party, no? I must say that she looks beautiful in this episode.

So when Maryann does the shaking thing, she turns into that beast with the claws (the one that attacked Sookie & Daphne). You think her cook is the piggy creature? The guy in the middle looks like Steve Newlin, no? It's nice to know that Sookie ain't the only one who can read minds. We have a new character named Barry.

Kartell

While walking around Greenbelt, we stumbled upon this furniture shop called "Kartell". Immediately, I was drawn to this interesting bookshelf. I found out from their website that you can actually form it any way you want! Sweet! I told Ogz that it would be a nice conversation piece. We continued looking around. Colors everywhere. I noticed that most of their furniture are made of plastic.

I found this cute lamp that resembles a boy. His head is covered in the lamp shade. He must be shy 'cause in order for you to turn him on, you gotta flip his p33n. It's naughty, I know, but I like to buy it. Me = weird. I'll just have it facing the wall ;oP I found out later that there's a girl lamp too.