Althea Writes Here

I have given in to invites and opened a Facebook account. Add me up at alricardo@yahoo.com. :)

Last Saturday was yet another one for the books. I am still in the process of getting my digicam, so I don't have pictures of my own, but it was very much well-documented by my friends, and loads of pictures and a couple of videos are up in their Multiply accounts. If you're among my Multiply friends, look for the pictures in Candy's and Razel's accounts. Our fantasy selves; photo taken by Louie. I wanted to write a lengthy post about the triple birthday celebration of Heizel (she turned 32 on October 21), yours truly (turning the big 3-0 on October 29), and Louie (turning 27 on the same day as mine) with the guysguys (my MFA classmates; that's our unofficial name, yes we have an official one and it's a long story), but it's 2:04am and I have gym at 8am tomorrow, and I can't do that magical, fun Saturday justice writing about it like this. A quote from that day, from a suddenly fatherly Dr. Cirilo Bautista to Heizel, who sort-of-lamented her age

D ear Learner, By the way, this amuses me no end: the French cow says “meugler” and the English cow says “moo” and the Filipino cow says, “unga.” That's pronounced [oo-ngah], in case you're interested. :) Apparently, animals have their own language too. ;) I first learned this in my Spanish lessons. The American dog says “bow-wow,” the Filipino dog says “aw-aw,” and the Spanish dog says, “gua-gua” What does the French dog say? (It's either we're becoming friendly, or I'm running out of things to say!)

We don't have these a lot. In my case, most days are vanilla (I like vanilla just fine, though), but once every so often, I get to sit back, settle back in my chair, or hug my pillow in my bed, and think, "Wow, I've just had the perfect day." And I'm satisfied like extra-creamy, but miraculously sugar-free, choco-strawberry-banana ice cream laden with also-sugar-free chocolate syrup. Yesterday was one of those days. And again, it all happened because of a single yes from the heart, even if my mind was already in the running for a "No, you'll be too tired." A couple of weeks ago a batchmate in the Advanced Leadership Course (ALC) I took last June sent out text messages inviting people to help out in an orphanage in BF Homes, Parañaque. He needed people to step in for the houseparents while they took their Foundations of Leadership Excellence (FLEX). I'd been wanting to staff for FLEX and ALC for a long time, but my work schedule is always