Good night, Cubao!

Spent the day encoding, and then hanging out in M.'s cafe.

My sisters Remi and Alice, my two granddaughters Angelique and Aubrey, Remily and I had dinner at M.'s cafe's soft opening. Good food. Nice diner atmosphere too. It will be open 24 hours a day and offers an All-Day Breakfast on top of their meals. It also has a coffee corner and serves three kinds of coffee as well as fruit shakes.

Now Aubrey can have breakfast without anyone having to wake up early to cook in the kitchen. Not to mention my being able to have something to eat in the middle of the night.

The sky is a white, hospital bed sheet waiting for callousness to check in and receive its dextrose tube.

Do your best to make the seam between the fabrics of August and September smooth, clean, and visually pleasing.

Good morning, Cubao!

All home for the holiday!

Good night, Cubao!

Now 3/4 through the manuscript I am encoding but, after that, I am adding a dozen more short sections that were not in the published book.

Tonight is a perfect night for all of us to oversleep, since tomorrow is a holiday and the granddaughters have no classes.

Catching mere snatches of Gaslight on TCM, featuring Ingrid Bergman. Gosh, that house sure has a lot of statues, busts, blackamoors, and statuettes. The gothic acting cannot hold my attention, but Ingrid is, as usual, stunning here. To me, the only other woman who ever matched her beauty was Julie Christie.

The dust bin man came with more plants. I'm now thinking of Rita Hayworth in Dearly Beloved. ("If these flowers don't stop coming, I'll set fire to all of them!")

Do you know who the worst English speakers in the Philippines are? Rich people who never spent years studying or living in English-speaking countries abroad. They speak in sing-song English with pretentious Spanish accents that do not even exist in Spain, and sprinkle their speech with spontaneous Tagalog words deliberately mispronounced.

Still encoding my cyberspace book, but I am halfway through!

Sat at two consecutive Sunday lunches. First with Angelique and Aubrey. And then with Chito, Chevy, and Vinci after they arrived from the dentist's.

Gave the little grandchildren some more old children's books that I found while cleaning and two huge Lego sets.

After everything, I made myself a cup of tea. I think I love tea sets, varieties of tea, and tea things because they can represent time I spend alone in peace and in contemplation.

Incredible. The dust bin man dropped by again to give me more plants. These were turmeric a.k.a yellow ginger, and I couldn't say no. Went up to the roof deck to replant them. Since I was there, anyway, I harvested some gulasiman bato a.k.a. pansit-pansitan to make myself a salad with vinaigrette dressing to go with my lunch.

My bedtime fare last night was Minority Report on AXN. It was a movie I remember enjoying on the big screen years ago because of its awesome special effects and the cinematographer's imagination, which were jaw-dropping for their time. It was, pardon the analogy, a sleek Blade Runner. Watching it again on TV, I noted screenplay flaws:

--Why focus on a murder that has yet to occur if, during the police chases, all of those policemen are already getting killed long before the murder? Don't they count as human beings?

--Why are the precognitives a collective deus ex machina? Why are we faced with human, dysfunctional Greek Fates and Furies after all the technological barrage? Why are they production-designed to remind me of the brides in Bram Stoker's Dracula?

--Why does the entire movie hinge on a mere, Freudian slip of the tongue ("I didn't say she drowned.") as it does in many Grade B crime movies and TV shows?

I psychically tuned in to the writer's mind while watching the movie. It seems that the story was initially conceived to focus on PRE-SUICIDE, but everyone else in his company thought that pre-murder (pre-crime) would make more money. And I guess it did.

A long weekend for everyone, a normal weekend for me--if it seems like a weekend at all.

Good morning, Cubao!

Everyone at home.

Angelique and J. watched the last full show of a movie last night with Angelique's classmates, a requirement for their Behavioral Psychology class.

Good night, Cubao!

Good progress encoding my collectible book in cyberspace.

R. came and brought us three howlite pendants that she made herself. She also gave me a long, foot massage with her healing oil.

Since I was disposing of things I gave her a wand, two tins, an oracle, two framed panels from Spirit Questors Komiks, a magic mirror, and a pair of principal statuettes (male and female). Studio looking just a little bit more streamlined now.

Saw Portrait of Love on DIVA. Enjoyed the scenes involving art, sculpture, and photography. Unsure whether a metal tree covered with plaster as a final layer can win a competition, though. There is such a factor as stability.

Very threatening skies glowering over Cubao, with distant, rolling thunder.

Wild Garden

We stop going up to the roof deck at the onset of the rainy season. It is where Aubrey goes to read her school books and where I sit to watch the sunset in the dry season. There are sleepless nights when we just sit on the park benches for an hour or two. And, on New Year's Eve, we have a perfect view of the city's fireworks from the iron staircase landing.

A month after the arrival of the rains I peek into the roof deck to see how human absence has transformed it. Potted plants have grown into trees and vines have crept not only up the iron trellises but across the tiled floor. Weeds have bloomed into miniature forests--they are not the weeds that one sees on the roadside or in fields but lush, healthy, blooming weeds that have grown to be legitimate garden plants in themselves. The fruit seeds that we casually dropped into garden soil in the past have begun to sprout. There are plants we cannot recall having ever planted and having ever seen, and we do not know what they are and where they came from.

The rain fairies and the gnomes take over the roof deck at this time of year, and they make it clear to us that their idea of gardening and landscaping is so much different from ours. There is beauty in this apparent chaos. It is herbal, Victorian clutter so exquisite that I dare not touch or change anything. It is a Neverland of leafy shelters, crawler bridges, mossy pathways, gardens within gardens, and puddle lagoons which I would not be surprised to see inhabited by tiny mermaids.

How joyfully and quickly Nature takes over a park, a garden, a plant box, or even a single pot, even in the overcrowded metropolis! All you have to do is leave Her alone.

I like watching Reel DIVA movies because, despite all of the melodramatic conflicts each one presents to you, you just know that it will have a happy ending. You can also stand up, leave the room, make tea, have a snack, and send mobile messages at any time--and, strangely, whenever you come back to the screen, you have actually missed nothing.

The plus factors for me are the nice houses, interiors, and fashion.

The movies I do not enjoy are those with lots of children. Such movies seem to be about problems I do not have.

The best bargain for pets and plants happens when you are retired and stay home all of the time. Otherwise, if you go to work in the morning and come home in the evening, you cannot attend to their wants and needs.

Deliberately blocking traffic is a form of hostage-taking.

It rained in Cubao last night, at midnight, and it made wonderful music to fall asleep to.

The dust bin man asked me if I wanted any flowering plants. He is cleaning out someone's garden a few houses away--someone who doesn't want to have a garden anymore.

Half an hour later he came with a few cuttings, which I planted on the roof deck. They are very pretty. I made a mental note to ask a friend in the know what those white flowers are called.

And then the dust bin man came with more. And more. And more.

Help!

Good morning, Cubao!

A weekend for others, a writing day for me.

Good night, Cubao!

Watched A Family Reunion and Romantically Speaking on DIVA. Last week it was Coffee Shop and The Cookie Mobster.

Now it's back to Ci.

Now we all know that the traffic can be used as an effective weapon. It is as devastating as a handful of grenades.

Children have the right to come from school to a home that is beautiful, welcoming, restful, relaxing, healing, and nourishing.

Ever since I was in high school, commuting in the rain and walking in it under an umbrella were pleasurable experiences. What I enjoyed most was passing office and residence windows lighted from within by incandescents. They were magical lanterns in the dark to me, and always made me feel warm and cozy. I also felt that the people who lived within were nice and friendly.

Today our house has many windows--on the south side facing the street. on the east side facing the compound driveway. I light our incandescent lamps whenever it is raining. I sit by a window reading, writing, or knitting, from time to time watching the pleased faces of passersby. I know that that is how I looked like many years ago.

We are now all at home, thank God, and it is still drizzling outside.

Still encoding in cyberspace one of my books that is now out of stock and out of print, and has become a collectible. I'm editing as I go.

Afternoon rain in Cubao. It falls with fine needles, so that, as I look out my bedroom window over the computer, I see everything through delicate, transparent, white sheets of rain.

My sleeping schedule has taken an unusual turn, and I wonder how long it will last until the cycle changes again. I sleep 2:00 AM - 5:00 AM, wake up, without an alarm, and turn off the security lights, then go back to sleep and wake up 9:45 AM, also without an alarm.

Today favor friendship over romantic love. The former opens your heart to shine like a beacon to light the universe, the latter, a spotlight focused on yourself.

Know that, even as late as September, it is not too late to make this year one of the best of your life.

Keeping a globe in your study is a way for you to conquer the world.

Today is a day of rest for your business and ambitious endeavors. Do at least one act of charity.

It is impossible to teach a lesson to someone who is unwilling to learn and someone who does not believe in you. He will only become a rebel, and possibly will be the very person who will ruin you.

Whenever you disagree with someone, it is simply because his worldview is so different from yours.

The secret in doing a task thoroughly and well is in first accepting that every task is essentially unpleasant.

A scientist in the south is working on discovering regeneration, but he will not completely succeed in this lifetime.

Other people will take over his work and deny him credit.

Good night, Cubao!

Going to bed with Ci again.

Never wish you were in someone else's shoes. You can never tell what failures, illnesses, misfortunes, dysfunctions, or disasters he secretly harbors.

Control your temper by channeling all your negativity through a constructive activity such as art, a hobby, or any other form of recreation. Not doing so is the real reason why people die early. The absence of a constructive activity is an invitation for sickness and disease to step in.

Watched Killer Kids: Hail Mary on Ci.

Watching the second part of The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe on Lifestyle. Two parts are not enough to contain her life story. Loved the 60s sets and fashion, though.

Despite what other people think, once you achieve fame it never goes away.

If you do not feed the Hungry Ghosts, they play Hallowe'en tricks on you--gadgets go out of order, something breaks, another thing goes missing, and so on.

Now M. has painted the facade of the cafe black.

Your e-mail message:

"Hello Sir Tonny,

"...I come to you for help but not for me...but for a good friend of mine.

"My friend is currently in the Seminary pursuing a Master's degree in Theology and will be ordained a Deacon next year and probably a year after that he will become a Roman Catholic Priest.

"However, the biggest challenge here is as he has confessed to me 'LUST'. He wants so bad to be a priest but he accepts that he is sooo lustful.. he says he admires (sexually) every beautiful girl he sees. I have discussed options of leaving the seminary but he says he cannot handle marriage either coz he doesn't want the responsibilities that come with it..he so much loves the company of female youths and he believes that it makes him happy talking to them and complementing them about their beauty and how they respond to that. (which to me is more flirting..)

"Is there a way you can help/advise here?

"Thank you.

"________"

My reply:

Hello _______!

You need to explain to your friend that what he is experiencing is absolutely normal. Being in a seminary and working one's way to be a priest is no different, gender and sexuality wise, from being a bachelor in graduate school working his way to a non-religious career.  Sometimes men will feel that they are more lustful than others--it is not a question of trying to be less lustful, it is a question of being able to effectively use the right defense mechanisms: in this case repression, suppression, displacement, and sublimation.

He needs a safety valve in the form of some kind of preoccupation or hobby he can attend to while resting from his studies.

I have always believed that when men lust, it is out of a deep urge to create rather than to hurt, dominate, control, or destroy. That is why they sometimes end up as artists. 

Afternoon drizzle.

Doing my laundry while the granddaughters are still in school.

Still encoding a cyberspace book.

The first method in detecting spam is to check whether the English is grammatical, and whether it is business English.

Like most Satanists, most spammers are uneducated.

Good morning, Cubao!

A hot, sunny day.

Fed and watered the birds first thing this morning.

Good day, Cubao!

Spent most of the morning and the afternoon with sisters and cousins. Lunch in slow motion at a Japanese restaurant, in celebration of my sister Alice's birthday.

Making a mental note to AVOID that food stall in the Sitio Catacutan Food Court that serves superb, evil, yummy, crackling pork rind with pork meat. They cook it every other day.

Your e-mail message:

"Hello sir...  For these past few weeks ,I have been bothered sir by my ideas and thoughts. It had bothered me a lot. These thoughts came with a classmate in one of my class. He has this attitude of talking shot about you but still he could manipulate you in a way that he can make you think that he is just jesting around. But still he appears to have many friends around him and he looks happy, I do think that maybe I am just unconciously being jealous. Unconciously copying him . I cannot think of why would I do that maybe because has friends around him or maybe because u am just jealous. 

"Sir sorry if this may look petty but it feels like I have looked at the abyss and the abyss had stared at me . In my fight against the monster it seems that I have become one. My passion for reading and writing may have waned a bit because of this and it scares me a lot because I do love those things that they had been a part of me. A part of my identity or helped me have one."

My reply:

Hello ___________!

This particular problem is rooted in the fact that there is an apparent disconnect between your self-image and your social image. You created your self-image from childhood, endowing it with ideal traits, talents, accomplishments, and abilities, both physical and psychological. As a psychic I can even see him: a dashing man whom you fantasize sometimes as a movie star and sometimes as a star athlete.

When people encounter you in the real world, they respond not to your self-image but to your social image, i.e., how they really see you through their own eyes. It is possible that you do not like what they see, and that what they see angers you.

You have to come to terms with reality and look at your reflection in the mirror that other people hold up to you. You do not even have to give up your fictional self-image as long as you can always tell the difference between what is real and what is not. As a matter of fact, you could try making your fantasy self a protagonist in a novel, and I know that it will serve as a kind of catharsis for you. 

 

Good night, Cubao!

Still encoding another book in cyberspace.

You build and furnish a house to protect your body. You decorate it to nourish your individual soul.

That is why you are never really content living in a generic hotel room, no matter how many towels it provides and no matter how expensive it costs.

Dinner with Angelique and J. Aubrey arrived later from varsity volleyball training.

Two cups peppermint-flavored green tea.

Waiting for The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe on Lifestyle, not for the woman who portrays Marilyn Monroe but for Emily Watson, who is now much older and heavier but who played the petite, blind woman Reba McClane in Red Dragon.

Watched Killer Kids: Peeping Theodore on Ci, featuring the boy who grew up to become Tom Bundy, who was ALSO featured, as an adult, in Born to Kill?!

Flowers with subtle colors are on the way.

Sickness and death put in check not only the existence of the sick and the deceased, but of everyone.

He will be crowned king.

It is unethical for any system to decide what a person puts or does not put on a social medium. Anyone's files are immediately part of that person's personal unconscious, which, in turn, is connected to the collective unconscious.

Sometimes insanity is merely having an outlook in life so unique that no one else can deal with it.

I've now begun to encode another book in cyberspace. This one will take longer. The original version was more than a hundred pages long.

Done with moving two stacks of books from the lounge and the studio to the shelf in the antique cabinet, and it's looking good.

Everything else can go to D. now.

To me the most awkward moments on MKR are when the six judges partake of the contestants' dishes. The director and the camerapersons have no choice but to show everyone quietly shoveling food into their mouths while disguising their pleasure and displeasure. It doesn't help that they are mostly overdressed and over-made-over and that they glance furtively at one another from time to time as though plotting something sinister.

Truly, no other shot can compensate for these moments. That is probably why only two or three close-ups are retained after which, thankfully, the eating scene is over and done with.

So many more DVDs, so little time to watch them.

Granddaughters in school.

Discovered an empty shelf in an antique, glass cabinet that I can use to stow my remaining, wanted books on.

When atchays watch traffic advisories on TV and see that the roads are clear, they take it as a cue to get into their vehicles and drive out. That is why the roads are NEVER clear.

Heard the music alarm in my writing area all the way from my bedroom at 12:00 MN and at 3:00 AM again. I wish I were as precise and as predictable as my alarm. It's not as if I can't be, because I know that many other people are.

Good morning, Cubao!

One of the kitchen owners at the Sitio Catacutan Food Court gave me a plant cutting. She has a wonderful little garden. She not only cooks well, she has a marvelous green thumb also.

I immediately planted the cutting on our roof deck. I like caring for plants. They connect me directly to Nature.

Good night, Cubao!

Lit a paraffin oil lamp at the studio entrance to light the way for the Hungry Ghosts again.

Watched the Philippine telecast of the MKR final. I knew along who would win.

The winners: Sam and Frodo. They had the best teamwork, innovation, passion, persistence, and commitment. They were the only team that ventured into fine cooking as a magical journey. And so they successfully brought The One Ring and hurled it into the oven.

I love British, male friendships. True friends are not ashamed to give each other loving looks, hug each other frequently, and buss each other.

A house without live plants is inconceivable.

When human beings do not deal justice, Nature does.

Whenever it is time to watch my crush in the Chinese costume drama on GTV, my TV screen never fails to completely pixillate everything, and then the signal goes off.

Tony Perez's Art of War: One of the most annoying things to your enemies is not that you want to make a difference, but that you ALREADY HAVE.

Check out my cyberspace notebook 365 Notes on Love at tonyperezphilippinescyberspacebook26.blogspot.com.

He goes only with persons who have no sexual interest in him.

When he fires the gun the bullet will explode inside its chamber.

It is more mentally torturous to the public when people practice their rituals in private rather than out in the open.

It is never too late for the poor to pick up and pursue their dreams.

The copy-monkeys sink in the mire.

Lonely old maids with secret, wild fantasies make the worst classroom teachers of all.

The fat caterer is getting fatter, and finally meets her match in quickly deteriorating health.

A most kind cook in the Sitio Catacutan Food Court is encouraging me to take cuttings from her beautiful plants, for our roof deck garden.

The morning was gray and dismal, but now the rain has stopped.

Spirits don't like seeing or hearing negative words spoken out loud--curses, obscenity, senselessly hurtful statements--and these are the times when they violently react. They believe that these taint ether, and THEY DO. Whenever I see such words on the computer screen or hear them spoken out loud I turn on my psychic vision and see those words splatter like mud and soil all over the environment. It makes everyone feel like we are in a cesspool. So, no, I do not turn on my psychic smell.

It is one of the reasons why I am not on social media that allow young people to vent their anger on their computer screens.

Good morning, Cubao!

Making a list of house chores in order of enjoyability.

Good night, Cubao!

Six more passages and I'm done with encoding the text in my cyberspace book.

I hope I can insert the tiny graphics all of tomorrow.

When a co-worker laughs at your grammar, spelling, or pronunciation, it is because he or she resents your superiority over him or her.

Wishing that I had a Turbo Rocket set of knitting needles.

Still encoding my manuscript in cyberspace and almost done.

However, formatting follows.

Your Hangout Message:

"Good afternoon, Sir Tony. I just woke up from an almost two-hour long nap, and something unusual happened. It was almost always normal for me to wake up when my body isn't awake yet. I will simply just relax and get back to that relaxing state. I normally could see different angles than when I am completely awake. But this time, prior to the incident, I was dreaming about a certain celebrity family who is popular in the country. I was facebook-ing and their picture was the last one I have seen before having gone to sleep. So, I dreamed about them. What I saw was that how they are seemingly perfect on social media, there were imperfections in my dream. The parents were both vain, and the mom was sensitive. I was just playing with the second child. Since she had a fever, I was trying to make her happy and checking her fever once in a while. But then, what bothers me most in the dream was the celebrity took a video and each put on a mask. It was catchy and nice at first but the message of the video was a mockery to the dead. They were portraying a message that they were more powerful than the dead. I felt that something was really long in the video but I still chose to give a chuckle on the thought. It was rather disturbing. That's the time when I woke up. When I thought that I was completely awake. I could instantly decipher whether I'm half or completely awake. And, I really thought I was fully awake this time only to realize that I'm wrong when I blinked. I suddenly heard a scratching noise that is really deafening. I immediately thought it was my phone that was beside my head, under the pillow. Then there were voices speaking which I did not pay much attention to because while my eyes was closed, my vision was still there. It zoomed through the room. It felt like I was in a different time, coming from the far future. Also, the voices felt like computer voices. These were all simultaneously happening while I was reciting a prayer.

"Then I came back to my senses, and my head hurt. I apologize for the lengthy message. I just wanted to know if that was something unnatural, or if it was practically all just part of a dream.

"Thank you, Sir Tony.

P.S. I meant "I felt that something was really wrong..."

"______"

My reply:

Hello _____!

First, let me bring you back to the workshop I conducted many years ago, in which you were one of the participants. You already knew at the time that you had psychic abilities.You may have been afraid or reluctant to develop them. There were many factors involved: your religion, your desire to complete your education, and something that you never mentioned to me but that I saw all along--the yearning of your soul for you to be able to live a meaningful life in this world, to the fullest.

It was a time of great confusion for you. You were a devout Muslim girl enrolled in a "Christian" university. You were in search of an identity. Finally, your uncertainties were complicated by falling in love not once but more than once.

In your dream, the celebrity family is the unconscious, ideal family that you wanted to be and to have, replete with the necessary masks and insincerity that its members show the general public. Your psyche, however, is trying to tell you that this "celebration" via video--a method both of documentation and of detachment--is "a mockery to the dead." Yes, something either has already died within you or may soon die (you are still nurturing the sick baby and want it to live), and you must go through a deep introspection to find out what that is: a former lifestyle? a set of old values? ideals that you turned your back on?

While your hypnopompic experience may seem like an extraterrestrial visitation, it is not. It is your psyche, once again, urging you to acknowledge and embrace your gift of precognition. It is a gift that you need not announce to the world but can use, instead, to your own advantage and to that of your loved ones. It may be a valuable part of your true identity in the future, one that will not put you at risk, one that will not turn you into a hypocrite to yourself, and one that is very much possible without your having to sacrifice your own religion. 

Sunday, Sunday.

Science gives man hubris, because it makes him feel like a god.

Art may or may not make him feel like a god, but it does make him immortal.

Vindictive people do not believe in karma and dismiss it as superstitious.

It makes their karma all the more effective.

Still encoding my cyberspace book.

I love the term "cyberspace" because of its astral connotation. It makes me feel that I am encoding directly onto the Akashic records, and that some of it is accessible only to alien intelligence.

Good morning, Cubao!

Explored the Sitio Catacutan Food Court and discovered kitchens that are open on Sundays.

Pale, watered-down, inks are very subtle and pretty, and arouse most pleasant associations in my mind, but I have always preferred brilliants.

Sometimes I watch Taboo on NatGeo, and it never fails to have something that shocks me. It allows me to perceive myself as a tame, conservative person despite all of my eccentricities. I am comforted to know that I am not the most offbeat person in this world. But, maybe, that is one of the objectives of the show.

Good night, Cubao!

The MKR catch-up weekend is showing. An opportunity to observe the subtle undercurrents and dynamics among everyone.

I wonder why so many "ghosts" haunt their former places of residence, considering that, no matter how much I love my house right now, I have absolutely no intentions of haunting it after I pass away.

As to those who did me and my loved ones injustice, I can always haunt them in THEIR residences, not mine, before moving on to my next incarnation.

When non-conventional beliefs emerge and re-emerge, it is because traditionalism has become oppressive.

No single tradition can exercise control over everyone. The effort only leads to decadence and rebellion, as has been proven more than once in history.

Didn't throw away my children's and grandchildren's old, unused, school exercise booklets. I'm using them now as notebooks. I recall that, when I was in high school and college, I kept my unused "blue books" (examination booklets) and wrote poems and plays in them.

4:30 PM has become a favorite time of day for me. It provides me at least two hours to wait serenely for the onset of desk.

Last year, before I retired, this was a time of great stress. I spent it on the road, in heavy traffic, after an exhausting day at work. It was sheer misery.

Last night's bedtime fare: Evil Sister, Killer Kids: Frenemies, and Fatal Wives: Dally on Ci. Morbid as my nocturnal rituals seem.

Living in Cubao is most convenient to us--we are at the crossroads of two train lines and two main avenues, the commercial center is only two blocks away, and so are two wet-and-dry markets. Our rice and water supply and laundry services are in the neighborhood. There are a few bonuses too: the Sitio Catacutan Food Court is right across the street, making it possible for us to have a small lauriat at every meal; a bakery is right beside us; and the Castle of Baking and Confectionery, three block away.

Your e-mail message:

"Good day to you ___..Just want to ask something, a help perharps. We all know being antagonist is part of this world..But sometimes it really hard to bear those people who are not feeling good when they see others having and enjoying a good life...

"I intend to invoke my anscetors to pray for some guidance from them..

"Im seeking for your advice if what else is nesseccary in this kind of situation?

"Thank you Pai...May Godbless you and your family always..(and Im sure youre being always will....) :)"


My reply:

Hello __________!

I hope my answer may not come across to you as disappointing.

Envy from others is best ignored and left alone. 

Your ancestors and spirit guides are certainly already helping you.

What you do not see is that those who envy are already punished by the mere fact that they envy others. You do not see them undergoing the mental and emotional torture that besets them because they do not have what you have.

I believe that envy, as an archetype, is the first sin--not disobedience, for it is envy that leads to disobedience. Consider the archetypal stories of Adam and Eve, and of Abel and Cain. Consider also the fate of Lucifer. While others may say that his sin was pride, pride, after all, like disobedience, is also a result of envy. He envied his own Creator.

Envious people ultimately punish themselves. They never get what they want. Unless they change their attitude, they simply turn into black holes. 

So today I ordered four, five-gallon water jugs for our water dispensers. There is one dispenser on the ground floor and another on the upper floor.

That should last us about two weeks.

Good day, Cubao!

Still learning house admin. A distraction from writing and painting, but a most enjoyable one. It's like playing house. Maybe it IS playing house.

Whenever Vinci is in my arms, he launches into a monologue of baby talk, but I know that he is commenting on the things I have and is asking me intelligent questions about them.

Good night, Cubao!

How perplexing. I'm laying out, encoding, and formatting my new cyberspace book. I opened it once last night and once this evening. Already it has 16 page views--but I haven't opened it to the public yet, and I set it so that it would not be listed on Blogger for now and so that no search engines can find it for now.

Yes, I did click on "Don't Track Your Own Page Views". I always do.

Besides, when I click on "Overview", another country shows up as the source of viewership. And it's not the Philippines.

Back home.

Angelique arrived before I did.

As my three easels are now located where I want them to be and I have set aside five small canvases for a series I have in mind, I have to forcibly prevent myself from commencing painting. Once I pick up a brush, I never put it down. I become so obsessed with painting that I am unable to accomplish anything else.

The elves are now cooking in the cafe--not yet for the public but for themselves, since M.'s kitchen equipment is somewhat complete.

The cafe looks good enough to hang out in already, though. Last night the elves retired at 1:00 AM.

Did more clearing work in the studio. Set aside more books and random items to give D.

In the meantime Angelique must do groceries later today.

Meeting my younger son Chito and my grandson Vinci at the dentist's in a while. Chito is having a tooth extracted and having several teeth braced. He has never told me explicitly, but he seems to feel more secure when I am there with him during a dental session.

Delivery of one sack of Angelika Premium arrived this morning. It cost me P2,100 and the price seems to have doubled from what I remember. Oh well. One sacks lasts us two to three months anyway.

Happiness is never as complete as you want it to be because of two things: knowing your personal suffering and knowing that other people in this world are suffering worse things.

When you wake up in the morning without worry in your head and in your heart, and the world outside also looks that way under the golden sun, you forget exactly how old you are and are a child all over again, waiting to see its rosy future served up on a magical dish.

Painting is like cooking. You HAVE TO clean up immediately afterward.

Woke up and rose from bed in slow motion, a luxury that many people do not have. Moments like this are perfect for reflection and for recording one's dreams.

Even the Hungry Ghosts were trudging under raincoats and umbrellas.

First cup of black coffee.

Good morning, Cubao!

Drizzly all of last night and early this morning, but now the sun is out and shining again.

I was alone for the most part of the day, and so I began encoding another cyberspace book.

Good night, Cubao!

Passing up on all corny replays on TV.

Was planning to take night shots of the interior of M.'s cafe, but it's just too wet outside.

Benjie delivered Kichiro Mayuzumi's sack of dog food 5:30 PM.

Everyone home 9:30 PM.

A totally blissful day of doing nothing but enjoying being in every room in the house.

Two cups of tea and a glass of okra water.

Frequently watching Ci has made me distrustful of other people. This is fine, because I do live in an overcrowded metropolis.

Amazing how, in grade school, high school, and college, I felt inferior to classmates who were good in sports, leadership, public speaking, and obtained grades higher than I did, and that, today, all of those classmates are absolute nobodies.

Just realized that if you share a posting privately AND publicly, it appears twice in everyone's Notifications page.

Drizzly day in Cubao. Everything outside is wet, and the air is cool.

I cannot watch 47 Ronin more than once because of its depressing, heavy ending. (Yes, honor and glory can be quite depressing whichever way you package them for me.) Despite my being a Keanu Reeves fan I even refuse to buy the DVD.

I do like the ending line: "I will search for you through a thousand worlds and a thousand lifetimes until I find you."

His supporters are making him believe that he will win, but he will not.

There will be another extraterrestrial sighting in between seasons.

A true artist has no one favorite color, because he knows that each and every color is an equally valuable creation of God.

An artist who insists that he has a favorite color is a slave to his past associations. This is the foundation for a neurotic hang-up.

Prepare for a swerve.

Movies and TV DO INFLUENCE THEIR AUDIENCES.

The first thing they have an effect on is language.

There is a short bridge between language and thought, and another short bridge between thought and action.

Repeated action leading to satisfaction then creates a moral or an amoral value.

My bedtime fare: The Haunting of Bernie Kopell, the only episode in the series that I find interesting. It is set in Red Coach Inn near Niagara Falls.

Good morning, Cubao!

A quiet, relaxing day for me.

Caught the last 15 minutes of MKR last night, which is the only segment that counts.

I know of an atchay "art impresario" who will give credit only to artists with Fine Arts degrees. She probably hasn't learned that 90% of Fine Arts majors really have no talent, and that some non-Fine Arts majors are extremely more talented than Fine Arts majors. After all, she herself has no degree in Fine Arts.

If ALL Fine Arts majors were truly successful, there would be an art gallery in every square inch of this country.

In the last analysis, it is not what an artist paid for his tuition that counts. It is what you are willing to buy and hang on your wall.

Watched Breaking the Magician's Code: Magic's Biggest Secrets Finally Revealed last night. Most entertaining, exposing mainly 1950s - 1960s illusionists' tricks.

Question: Why do these people spend so much money to stage such elaborate tricks?

Answer: Because so many people spend so much money to be entertained by them.

M.'s cafe is looking quite gorgeous, if I may say so.

Good night, Cubao!

Taking a rest from house rearrangement tomorrow. Will probably take photos instead.

Benjie is going to Bulacan to buy Kichiro Mayuzumi's dog food. I don't have to reset the alarm and can sleep late into the morning.

Worried the whole day because we need to order a sack of rice and I didn't know whom to call and what kind of rice to order. Then Angelique came home from school and informed me that she has the number of the dealer Ivy used to buy from. Whew!

Ariadne Oliver of the Poirot series has influenced me without her producers even knowing it. I now wear two necklaces everyday. I rotate them, since I have many. It's fun matching them with each other and with the clothes I wear.

During house de-cluttering I came upon a lot of attractive, magical pouches of different fabrics. I set them side for future use. They make great jewelry containers.

Caught Killer Kids: Like Father, Like Son on Ci. Truly reprehensible. Thank God I am neither those fathers nor those sons.

Finally caught the first half of Wood Job! on RED. I'd seen only the second half months ago.

I thought all along that the protagonist was a practicum student. Now I know that he was making a major career decision, and that his paradigm shift is both dramatic and justified.

Once you rightfully own something, it is still really yours even if someone takes it away from you. It may not be in your hands, but it will always be in your heart.

"De-cluttering" (Night of Tuesday, August 18, 2015)

Events of the Day:

More work on house furniture and decor rearrangement. Studio looking good.

Four for dinner.


The Dream:

I am still reporting for work at my day job on Roxas Boulevard. Unbeknownst to my co-workers I am also working part-time at the Department of ___________, across the street. I've been neglecting that part-time job for some time now, and I decide to go there and check out my room.

There is a brief episode before I cross the street that involves the Spirit Questors. I have designated a deputy to continue meeting with them while I am away. I discover that my deputy has become close to the Ambassador.

Roxas Boulevard is flooded due to a recent rainstorm. I don't want to get my feet wet but I cross the street anyway.

Inside the Department of __________, my room is full of clutter. Everyone in this office, including the female office manager, is rather cold and indifferent to me. I look around my room and check out the debris of past projects and festival preparations that I'd been working on, among which, for some reason, are huge nuts and bolts. There are little treasures that I decide to keep. Among them is a leather folder pierced like tracery. I find other things that I thought I'd lost. I place these on the single bed. I decide to clean up. The work is tough but rewarding. In the end the room looks minimalist, something that seems to impress the office manager and the male office assistant who comes in and converses with me. The office assistant gives me black trash bags to put all the clutter I swept away in.

I discover a quaint, wooden door that leads to the back of the office building. It has an old padlock, but the door is open. I consider going through it to see what is outside.

I tell myself that I always clutter rooms and create a mess.


My Interpretations:

1) On the most superficial level, this dream is a Freudian residue of the day, since I've been working hard de-cluttering the house.

2) On a deeper level, this dream is a message from my psyche about my living double lives and double values, as reflected in my full time job and my part-time job in the dream. I end up neglecting one or the other. This includes groups such as the Spirit Questors. Other examples of my double living: my being a writer while being a painter, my being a father and a grandfather while being a bachelor, my perhaps ambiguous religion--one of my antique dealers is a Dating Daan follower, another a fundamentalist Muslim, and, while they bring to me whatever I want and ask for, they are completely mystified as to what religion I really practice, and I haven't bothered to enlighten them.

3) On yet another level, this felt like a star ship dream, especially with the unwarranted appearance of the Spirit Questors. I was guided once again into the star ship above our house (in the dream, the Department of ___________). I am being reminded by the captain of the star ship (the Ambassador) that there are certain tasks I still must accomplish and that I have been very negligent. The back door is an exit. It is open, but I do not go outside.

Gave the dust bin man some old crockery I no longer want.

Gave D. three more boxes of books and decor.

Gave Arvin all of my cardboard filing boxes. I used to have them in my studio, now he can have them in his.

There are two kinds of people to fear: intelligent people and stupid people.

Ever since I started frequenting the Sitio Catacutan Food Court in July I've been meeting our friendly neighbors. I'd never stopped and talked to them before I retired.

I am shocked to learn, however, that they know MANY things about me, including the time when I was in hospital years ago. I am unable to tell them anything about myself that they don't already know.

M. is having black vinyl tiles laid on the cafe floor.

Benjie and I are working on the house again.

The sales display has gone. The studio entrance is now being used. We therefore have three entrances (and exits): one to the studio, another to the aviary, and a third to the rear passage. Not to mention six fire exits on the upper floor.

Good morning, Cubao!

Went shopping for food at the Sitio Catacutan Food Court.

And, yes, I still want a traditional, British tea set.

Looking back at my long and circuitous journey of building and decorating our home, I realize that I took the superfluous way that others don't. I bought everything I liked and then simply eliminated what I decided I no longer liked or got tired of easily.

I did this because, unlike many others, I am not easily content. I want to have something for some time before deciding whether I want to keep it or not. I don't like asking myself "what ifs" such as "What if I'd bought that rare statue instead of passing up on it?" What if I had two refs instead of one? What if I had a huge painting that covered an entire wall? What if everything were in earth tones? What if I had steel, instead of wood, dominate a room?

Instead of asking myself, "What if I'd bought one in the other color instead?" I go ahead and buy all the colors I like, and then I decide.

Considering that prices go up quickly, my way frequently proved cheaper in the long run. Especially if things go out of stock and are no longer produced long after you wished you had them.

Besides, what I decide not to keep, I give away as gifts to people whom I love.

I've taken the most risks in building and decorating than I ever did in writing and painting, and I don't regret a single thing.

M.'s night elves are working inside the cafe again.

MKR is down to three teams. Of course I already know who will win the final, but I won't tell.

Actually you may know too. As the hosts mentioned long ago, the competition is all about EVOLUTION, not the mechanical repetition of favorite recipes.

A hint in viewing the episodes: Do NOT pay attention to the post-production inserts in which the contestants are commenting post-facto on what they were doing. Do NOT pay attention as well to the short, swift montages showing the contestants' emotional expressions. All these were deliberately meant to guide your expectations toward the wrong directions.

Chandeliers are bright symbols of dreams, ideals, and perfection.

Good night, Cubao!

Resetting my alarm again to let Benjie in early tomorrow morning.

There are two attitudes that can bring failure to your life: to believe that the world revolves around you and to believe that you revolve around the world.

J. picked up Angelique from university and brought her home.

M.'s cafe is looking good. It is being done up like a classy pub and goes well with Arvin's looking-suburban-London Artery Art Space across the street. The sleek lines and colors of Ducati Motorcycle Shop beside the gallery also helps. With a little more luck and a little more patience, M. will probably finally open for business before the month is over.

Gave D. half of the things and half of the books in our sales display. Benjie wanted something too. He asked for the two, neoclassical male nude candelabra.

I hope to clear the sales display tomorrow. The glass case will be brought inside the studio and filled with art supplies. We--and our guests--can finally use the side entrance to the studio.

A brief blackout 3:00 - 5:00 PM due to a violent thunderstorm. The glass sliding doors wrapped round our house paid off. It is bright inside as long as there is daylight outside.

I began writing when I was in fourth grade. I will continue writing through the day I die.

One does not have to be poor in order to be spiritually rich. One can be rich in material things and be rich in spirituality at the same time. It is a reflection of the optimum enjoyment of all of God's blessings. After all, not everything in life entails a choice between one or the other.

It is wrong to believe that the poor are spiritually rich and that the rich have no spirituality whatsoever. It would conversely follow that the poor who are wanting in spirituality have nothing, and that the rich who are wanting in spirituality at least have something.

Walk in balance. Always choose the middle path. If you are too much on the right, then you will have no right side. If you are too much on the left, then you will have no left side.

When the whole road is given you, take all of it.

Butz Aquino has passed away. My feelings are with his family. He was a former politician, but I will always remember him as an actor. His first TV appearance was in my teleplay "Paghihiganti Ng Isang Bata", an episode in the erstwhile Channel 5's series Malikmata and directed by his sister Lupita Concio. That teleplay also marked the first appearances of child performers Mark Gil (now also deceased), his brother Michael (Eigenmann), and our neighbor Anna Artemyak whom I never saw again afterward.

The last time I saw Butz was but a year ago, in the U.S. Embassy's Charles Parsons Ballroom, during the launch of the celebration of the 70th Year of the Liberation of the Philippines. He seemed quite healthy then, and I remember that I was very glad to see him.

"Ube Tarts" (Night of Monday, August 17, 2015)

Events of the Day:

Benjie and I did more house cleaning and furniture rearrangement today. I threw out a lot of stuff. I have come to the point at which I am no longer throwing away junk but things I have ambivalent feelings about. Very soon I will be confronted with throwing away things that I do like but must do away with, and must make difficult decisions.

Evening cloudburst, which Angelique barely managed to escape. She came home just as Aubrey and I were seated at dinner.


The Dream:

I am with my four sisters. We travel out of town to eat in a restaurant. Our eldest sister Lourdes orders a box of ube tarts to take home to her husband. The ube tarts look good. I am reminded, even in the dreaming state, of the Colette's tarts that we buy on our way to Los Banos from Cubao. They are so good that they sell out almost as quickly as they are placed in their glass counters early in the morning, and are no longer available by midday.

My craving is for haluhalo with ube jam. I order one ube tart as well, and I relish eating it.


My Interpretation:

When one cleans and rearranges one's house, one also cleans and rearranges one's psyche. One inevitably comes across items with old memories, photos from the past, and things long stowed away and forgotten. The storage spaces in one's house, therefore, metaphorically comprise the Unconscious.

This dream is a celebration of the major changes that I have made in our house. My sisters, who grew up with me, represent my past, my present, and my crossing yet another threshold to the future. My psyche is stressing the color violet as a healing color, as opposed to green. I see this because my brother-in-law, Lourdes's husband, is recuperating from an illness, and, in the dream, Lourdes buys a box of violet-colored tarts for him.

I upgraded to Windows 10 because it was foisted on me as a free service. I guess, I didn't mind, since I am 64 and who knows how many more years I have to go, and have established myself as a writer. My readers know that my subject matter is diverse and ranges from light to dark depending on what messages I wish to convey.

Without asking my permission, the upgrade automatically copied all of my files, installed features I didn't know anything about, and configured my settings, whichever those were. I recall that, some time back, it first showed me a checklist, and, on that checklist, I did not give them permission to access my data, my files, and my location, among other things, and I definitely clicked on "Make No Changes To My Computer". There was no checklist this time around.

Everything on my computer is ephemeral, intellectually and emotionally transient, and is a mere swatch of information for later use in a novel or painting. They do not comprise conclusive indications of who I really am.

When I buy a sheet of paper, I have every right to write or draw on that sheet of paper anything that I want. I also have the right to keep it, to revise it, to destroy it, or to post it on a bulletin board. Any bulletin board.

So is it with my computer. Especially since I paid for it in cash.

Good morning, Cubao!

Benjie and I are working on several rooms of the house today.

Endless house.

Gave D. a bag of miscellaneous items, a range hood, and an old TV stand.

Good night, Cubao! Sat up for MKR. Loved Ash and Camilla's Victoria house--antique exterior with completely modern interior! I also so liked that some of the contestants' houses had orange trees a.k.a bushes around them. I thought that I saw those only in Adelaide.

Maybe only I see it, but, from Day 1, it always seems to me that contestants are subliminally judged not only by their cooking talents but by their social skills as well. There should be a different set of judges per episode, judges who never get a chance to really know the contestants, but I know that that goes against the concept of the show.

I light joss sticks everyday to honor the morning, and the midday, and the evening.

Good morning, Cubao!

The granddaughters are in school. Benjie and I are working in different rooms of the house.

As for M.'s cafe, it is taking shape, slowly but surely. His elves turned on the lights last night and people came, thinking that the cafe was already open for business.

Good night, Cubao!

Resetting my alarm to let Benjie in early tomorrow morning.

Human beings with flaws are behind technology, after all.

Their first flaw is that they practice a specific religion and allow it to affect their work. They then become electronic sociopaths.

The computer is your slave. It should never be the other way around.

Never give in to the the people who operate technology and seek to control you.

Throwing out a dozen cardboard file boxes and a tabletop hanging folder set.

Unlike Teow Li, I don't have a regular jalanjalan day. I tried setting one--Wednesday--but, whenever Wednesday came round I would not feel like leaving the house for some reason or other. I go jalanjalan on impulse--almost as though my psyche would tell me when and where to go, but never more than once a week.

Tony Perez's Art of War: Know that your enemies are less intelligent than you are, have less talent than you do, and have less money than you do, if they have any money at all. Know that they perceive you to be infinitely more blessed than they are.

Otherwise they would not be your enemies at all, and they even couldn't care less about you.

Use this knowledge to full advantage.

Good afternoon, Cubao!

Home from our usual weekend lunch out with the granddaughters.

Good night, Cubao!

Making a long list of things to do tomorrow.

Your e-mail message:

"Greetings!

"Hello sir! Ako po si ___. Bata pa lang po ako, nagbabasa na ako ng tungkol sa mga Questors pero ngayong taon ko lang po nalaman na nagsusulat din po pala kayo ng fiction at well, sabihin na lang natin sir na na-adik ako. Hinanap ko po agad yung mga libro niyo.

"Natapos ko na po ang dalawang Sitio Catacutan, tinatapos ko po ngayon ang Cubao Midnight Express at kailan lang nakahanap ako ng kopya ng Eros Tanathos Cubao pero ko hindi po talaga mahanap ang Cubao Pagkagat ng Dilim. Sabi po sa akin ng lahat ng mga napagtanungan kong bookstores out of print na daw po, at yung publisher naman hindi na ako binalikan.

"Tanungin ko lang po sana kayo sir kung pwede ho bang makabili ng kopya sa inyo or kung hindi po, baka may alam po kayong bookstore na nagbebenta pa pong kopya? Please write more books pa sir! Bibili at bibili ako, promise! :D

"Maraming Salamat po!
"___"


My reply:

Hi ___!

Thank you for enjoying my works. They are out of print and out of stock, and the printed copies are considered collectibles. I have begun encoding them in cyberspace, where you can read them for free.

I have not stopped writing, and I never will. Google-search and check out some of my cyberspace books: The Pamela Quests (Volumes 1 and 2), Magic for Squares, Tony Perez's Psychic Exercises for the Spirit Questors, Ang Maluwahating Orakulo Ni Chuoko Kung Ming, among others.

There is also my novel Cubao Crossing, but I must warn you that it is a difficult read for the average person.

C. now owns three framed, original pen-and-ink drawings from Spirit Questors Komiks.

Gave _____ most of my shamanic and ethnic objets d'art.

Gave D. all of my superfluous bookends and country decor.

Sometimes, what you want and what you have are two entirely different things.

Decorative art can become legitimate art. All you have to do is create it with superb technique.

Silence and isolation are forms of voluntary poverty,

Voluntary poverty is not self-deprivation of the fulfillment of basic needs. It is the shunning of all material things that are extraneous to one's well-being.

The only writing on the wall is what you write on it yourself.

Spirituality is constant. Religiosity is not.

What is the point of going on a retreat if you will only terrify yourselves of the ghosts that haunt the retreat house?

Comfort always waits for you within silence and within solitude.

Every founder, living or deceased, disapproves of all atchay leaders who succeed him.

Do not search for teachers.

Do not search for students.

Search for the truth within your Self.

All of the front balcony planters are now complete.

Good morning, Cubao!

Benjie reported for work this morning.

Angelique has classes at university. I am poorer by a few thousands because we have to buy textbooks.

Good night, Cubao!

Today I managed only to clean out and reorganize the contents of the studio shelves and relocate a statue. Threw out one bag of studio files, but set aside to re-file a lot of reference photos.

Must rise extra early tomorrow to let Benjie in for the cleaning of the upper floor.

Waiting up for Angelique and J., who are attending an org party at the university where Angelique is enrolled in.

I know this does not sound like me at all, but I enjoyed watching the TV romantic melodramas Mr. Fiction and Love by Design on DIVA. Maybe because they were within the contexts of art, specifically writing and fashion, and they had good sets and props, which I can never resist looking at.