In Glenda’s Path

Typhoon Glenda (international name Rammasun) gave us a taste of what it’s like to be in the middle of a strong typhoon. Measured by PAGASA to have winds of 120-150 kilometers per hour, thus the signal number three warning in CALABARZON area, it has reminded us to take such weather disturbance seriously.

In my three years of driving to Nuvali, this is the very first time I felt so much danger. I have driven a lot of times through strong rain but Glenda’s fury topped everything else so far. Thanks but no thanks to its combination of hours of heavy downpour and gusty winds, it blew away roofs, shattered windows, and uprooted trees regardless of size. And I almost became a victim.

Planning to let the storm pass I settled in our company’s sleeping quarters only to be awakened by a security guard who asked me to move my car ASAP. True enough, rushing to where I parked I saw that a couple of guards where already holding on to a tree that’s threatening to smash my car any moment. I was actually lucky as two other cars few meters away from mine got hit already. I owe those guards big time.

Having nowhere to transfer—the rain have slowed down that morning but the wind remained strong, so strong that it shook the car hard—I decided to head home. It was a very bad decision.

Picture by Jim Labuga.

Just meters after driving away, the wrath of the typhoon became more apparent.  What used to be a serene area, Nuvali has become a war zone.  I pushed my luck, nevertheless, by weaving in and out of toppled trees and even braving a foot-deep flood that stretches for several meters. I had to check the door sides while slowing making my way out of it to see if water is already seeping in.

I got past the Paseo intersection flood with the car still running perfectly although I was only able to drive barely two kilometers more. I got into a dead end of trees totally blocking my way so I conceded and turned back to the office to wait further.

It was past 10 a.m. when I got out of the office after I got a text from a colleague that they were able to pass through another route. I took the detour but I still have to maneuver cautiously with few other motorists between tree branches that could either scratch or dent our cars anytime we lose our focus. I reached home before lunch time thankful that wifey and kid were ok.

***

Power supply at home returned after 24 hours while Nuvali’s was fixed two days after the storm. During these days, the surrounding area have been dark and noisy due to the generators. I got back to parking at the same spot, this time with only a few surviving trees.  At least when the next storm comes, hopefully none anymore, I only have the lamp posts to worry about.

***

Mood: 2/10 Honks! (The plan today is to let Marcus step out of the house. He’s been in since cancellation of classes last Monday.)

Egg Hack

Someone this morning posted on Facebook  ‘The 22 Most Brilliant Life Hacks Every Human Being Needs to Know” but it wasn’t the title that captured my attention, it was the picture that came along with it.

Image from themetapicture.com.

 

Back in 2008 while waiting for Marcus and while waiting for an employer to get me out of bumhood,  I had all the time to try my luck in cooking my own perfect sunny side up.  So when I saw this I got excited (nope, I’m not saying it as egg-cited).

Today would have been the best opportunity for me to try this hack as Marcus was left under my mercy–wifey went to Batangas after breakfast–but I soon realized that I need a big onion as shown.   So as I have imagined our day, kiddo and I ended up eating my own version of corned beef omelet for lunch which he enjoyed anyway.

***

Days ago, out of nowhere Marcus asked me while on our way home from school, “Daddy, why can’t you cook?” Ti abi.

***

Mood: 3/10 Honks! (The selling resumes tomorrow. Hope the bike behaves this time.)

 

MyPhone Rio: A Cheap Phone That Doesn’t Feel Like One

 

Fresh from the box.

 

Choices of smartphones nowadays are overwhelming and the decision to buy one isn’t as easy as it was ten years ago. Back then, anyone just has to have either a Nokia or a Motorola to get a bang for their buck. To own anything less than the two popular brands means to expect a mediocre product ready to die soon.

Such was the case why when my Nokia smartphone started acting up more than a year ago. I had a hard time picking a replacement but the ambitious me was aiming for an iPhone or a Samsung or a Sony. Every now and then as I look at my aging 5800 XpressMusic I would wonder what I would eventually end up buying. But the ever changing smartphone models have made my dream harder to achieve. And then there’s also the aspect of budget.

So when the trusty Nokia finally stopped working early 2013 I made a tough and humble decision. I bought the cheapest I can have, an 800-peso MyPhone. It has a VGA camera, a radio tuner, it doesn’t have snake. It was probably the basic of the basics. Since then I haven’t turned back and surprisingly, I was happy holding and using it around other people. My officemates have joked around that it doesn’t fit my OIC position while my wife said that I should get something more decent. But I never gave in to the pressure. I was contented with it although every now and then I would still wish having a smartphone.

The day came when wifey made that wish come true. On our wedding anniversary, as I proudly handed to her a Tomato swap watch, she retrieved from a secret place somewhere inside our house a nice solid box containing what would become my second smartphone, however, it was neither an iPhone nor a Samsung. It was a MyPhone Agua Rio.

Reading my thoughts she immediately said that it’s only cheap and (stressed) that she saved for it. Yes, I had an idea but not at the level of P5000—she soon confessed. The phone exceeded my expectations though. It actually didn’t feel inferior, it even works just like those Samsung phones Marcus and I have been playing with at an Abenson’s appliance store. Our kid has tested the Agua Rio—if he could write now, he could write a better phone review—and his tiny fingers have checked most the apps. He gives this new phone a thumbs up. I couldn’t agree more. This is a really cheap phone that doesn’t feel and look like one.

Thanks to the ongoing product war among the giant smartphone brands everyone from every market niche reaps the benefits. What most of us now consider a lowly brand—remember that Samsung used to be one—has potentials to compete with rest. And this is where MyPhone seems to be headed if it continues to innovate and respond to consumer feedback. Good luck MyPhone, hope the next one comes with a better earphone.

***

Mood: 2/10 Honks! (

How to Quickly Align Text From PDF to Word

The afternoon schedule of my kid has given me the time to continue reposting old blog posts that I have saved using Feedfabrik. Without this application I would have lost everything I wrote since 2006 when I made a boo-boo during a WordPress upgrade about two years ago. (It’s a blessing in disguise though as I have discovered a LOT of embarassing grammar lapses.)

Copying and pasting, however, from PDF to Microsoft Word creates an alignment problem which I have been patiently dealing with for weeks already. Realizing that I have barely achieved a significant percentage of repost–my Feedfabrik proof PDF file has more than 1200 articles–I finally turned to the internet for help. Someone out there must have had the same issue. I was right.

Thanks to Superuser.com, I found the answer to my problem. And it’s a very simple one.  Shown below is a screenshot from my MS Word that shows the same set of text from my PDF file.

Don’t mind the excerpts, I’m about to edit it.

Upper half of the picture is how it appears when text is pasted directly from the Feedfabrik proof.pdf file.  Looks easy to align, right? But if there’s a thousand pages to deal with, trust me, it will drain anyone out.

The lower half of the picture is the way to go and it’s done using a neat trick from Superuser.com which I simplified below.

1) Copy text from PDF.

2) Paste text on Google search box (I assume this will work with any other internet browsers).  Do not worry about the length of the text, it doesn’t matter as the next step will get everything back.

3) Use CTRL+A (or CTRL+X) to copy every text you pasted on the search box.

4) Paste text on MS Word.

Take note though that if there are multiple paragraphs being copy and pasted, each paragraph has to be manually separated from the other. But this is something I can handle unless there is another trick to solve this.

Now where was I? Ah, December 22, 2006. Hmmm, bad grammars.

***

Mood: 3/10 Honks! (Still with runny nose after four days. I hope I’d be better tomorrow.)

Crystal Anniversary

Dear wifey, time flies but my heart stays with you. When we exchanged vows  I never counted the years that followed and I cannot believe that it’s already 15 years since then.

Through thick–or fat–and thin we held on. We’ve already experienced richer or poorer and sickness and health. We’ve seen better and worse of each of us–like carelessly and shamelessly passing gas while together. Yes, I’d say that indeed we are already crystals, we can see through each other. I pray to God that we remain transparent, that we remain un-shattered.

Happy anniversary again, wifey. I love you.

***

Mood: 5/10 Honks! (Will pass watching Transformers. Sore throat on this special day.)

No Humpy Dumpy

It’s exactly a month ago when we picked up our cat from the gas station and contrary to popular belief—which is by the way one of the greatest fears that I know my wife and I have kept from one another when we rescued the kitten from being a potential road kill—the house doesn’t not stink. There’s no dreaded Humpy Dumpy smell.

Humpy Dumpy was once a popular snack here in the country. It is one of those snacks that taste good but smell funny or weird. Almost everyone before would agree that the best description to it is that it smells like cat poo. I don’t know if it was the reason it eventually got pulled out of the market or if it is because–I just realized–its name brings a lot of pun. Humpy. Dumpy. How can the manufacturers make such oversight.

Here by the way is the TVC of Humpy Dumpy. See if you can also identify the commercial models.

***

There is one reason the house didn’t stink. Or at least that’s what the three of us believe. The litter box. Truth to be told, the only idea I have back then on how to toilet train the cat is to spread a newspaper in one corner of the house and expect him to identify it as to where he should dump. It worked before for our bully guest so I had high expectations it would work for the kitten. I was wrong.

It’s a good thing that even the kitten held on. The first day was uneventful–he didn’t dump which made us wonder when and where it is going to happen. Luckily, my in-law who has cats living with them inside their house told me to get a litter box. I’ve heard of it but never knew what it was and what it does.

So I went around, asked a pet store about it, and I was told that a litter is just actually sand. I rushed back to our place and I just knew where to get one–our neighbor was renovating their house and they have a pile of extra sand outside.

Lo and behold, the kitten used the litter box. It was like a miracle happening right it front of me when I saw him dug in and sit as if he had the litter box since birth!

***

We made a mistake. Few days after our son proudly named the kitten Oggy, we learned from the internet that we got a female. Thus the change of name to Mittens which is a namesake of the Stampy’s cat. Stampy by the way is Marcus’ favorite source of Minecraft tips on YouTube.

***

Mood: 2/10 Honks! (This cat talk makes me hungry. I can smell lunch from the kitchen.)

 

Safer Roads With House Bill 4160

Everyday I pass this area where pedestrians merrily cross the street as they end their day. It is a sight of perfect harmony, students and some of their teachers alike go together to the other side of the road to wait for their ride home. But what do I find so wrong in this picture? They are jaywalking.

The area has been an accident magnet. I have seen countless times serious–worst so far was a man flying like a ragdoll after being hit by a closed van–incidents that could have been totally avoided. So I was very thankful when the local government finally constructed the overpass about five years ago but sadly it didn’t take long for people to start jaywalking again.

I was so curious with the unpopularity of the overpass so I checked it out during one of my early morning runs. Other than the graffiti-filled sides, I found out that there there is really no strong reason for pedestrians not to use it. I couldn’t help but surmise that most are just merely lazy to take the stairs and lack the discipline to use the pedestrian overpass–sadly including teachers in uniform of the nearby school.

Fortunately, we still have lawmakers who keep themselves busy. Just this week I heard about House Bill 4160 that two house representatives have filed. The new bill seeks to include traffic safety in the basic education curriculum of students from elementary to high school. I am now keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that the bill gets approved and strictly implemented soon.

***

To be fair, I see possible reasons when jaywalking instead of crossing a pedestrian overpass (or underpass) is acceptable. Firstly, there have been a lot of overpass wherein homeless people have used it as their shelter–some considered not temporary–and they are usually suspects in snatching and robbing those who pass by the overpass. A well-lit and guarded area should keep them away from it.

Then there are those who are physically unable. For overpass without an elevator or escalator, pedestrians such as pregnant women, the frail senior citizens, and the handicaps won’t be able to use it without assistance. Now how could they safely cross the other side on their own? It would take considerate drivers to discern and let them through. And that is another part of the story.

***

Mood: 3/10 Honks! ( Almost noon, Marcus just woke. His class starts in few hours.)