Tag Archives: blog

Updates

A book blog and a new theme

I figure since it’s still January and it’s the best time to start fresh on new things, it’s the best time to open a new blog.

A little backgrounder: I’m not much into niche blogging. I tried it before, with a NaNoWriMo blog, a Pinoy Big Brother blog and even a WYD Sydney blog — both in an attempt to put a place for some posts and to monetize those blogs — but none of them ever stayed with me long enough to give me significant earnings or be as important to me as this blog. I have no patience to be a tech blogger because as much as I’m a techie, I’m not too techie to start a blog for it, and there’s no other topic I know of that feels like a good topic to blog about all the time. So no niche blogs, except for my fiction blog and this cryptic blog for hopeless romantics/cynics. Out of all blogs, this is the only one I really earn from, too.

Sometime last year, I got into some kind of blogging drought and I filled this blog with more book reviews that it looked more like a book blog than a personal blog. I didn’t mind, but I think some people did…and I felt really bad for making this blog deteriorate in content.

Since it’s 2010 and I want to challenge myself and I doubt my determination to do a Project 365 like some people I know, I thought of just starting a blog on something that I know I wouldn’t stop doing this year, which meant I would probably be writing about it more this year. Wait, did that make sense? What I meant was, I decided to start a blog on something that I write a lot about here in Refine Me, in an attempt to put those posts in a proper place and to give room for this blog to be the real personal blog that it is.

So anyway, this means there will be less blogs about books here because the book posts will now go to…*drumroll*

One More Page - my book blog!
One More Page – my book blog!

Image is fuzzy, huh.

Anyway, yes, all book-related posts will now go to my book blog, One More Page. I mentioned this in my last post, but I think I need to plug it again just for kicks. :P This is where all book reviews, book related squee-ing and news will go. If you’re a book blogger, or you just love books, be sure to visit. :)

But that doesn’t mean I won’t be blogging about books here every now and then. I mean, I’m practically inseparable from them already so it counts as “personal” right? Right!

On another note, have you noticed anything new for this blog? Shiny new theme! Yay! I was getting tired with the last one, so here we go. I didn’t design this one, but it should work for me. Like what we say at work: if someone else can do it for you, let them. Or something to that effect. :P

So there. There’s still another blog that I’m thinking of doing but I’m still not done thinking about it. I also want to set up a lifestream or something, since I did buy tinamats.com that redirects here. Hmm, let’s see, let’s see. :)

Dear Diary

First Week of 2010

It’s been a while since I last posted. I am supposed to be translating some reflections right now, but instead, I’ve been setting up a new blog for the past few hours. Yes, this is me procrastinating. I kind of hate it, but I couldn’t stop it.

So before I go and start translating (yes, I’ll cram it in a bit), let’s see what happened in the past days of 2010.

Wakes and Birthdays.
The first weekend of 2010 had me going to two events that celebrate life: a wake and a birthday party. My teammate’s mom passed away a day before 2010, and it was really a sad thing. I can’t find the words to describe the pain, possibly because I don’t know the pain of losing someone close to me. And I pray that I don’t get to experience it anytime soon. :( The wake taught me, once again, to treasure the people around me, especially the ones I love.

The next day, I went to a surprise birthday party for a friend that we organized. It was a fun, fun, fun party, because the surprise was (almost) complete and we had a grand time screaming like it was the fans day that it was. :) Oh, and my friends and I fell in love with Grimace — look how cute he/she/it is when he/she/it sat down like a purple…well, poop? :)

Grimace! :)
Grimace! :)

After that party, it seemed like everyone will be getting surprise parties this year. Hm, interesting. Would this be the year I’ll get my own surprise? Who knows? Let’s see. :)

Work, work, work
It’s back to work, too, and good thing we don’t have too much work this week, yet. It’s proving to be a very challenging year, though, but it’s going to be fun. :)

Bad moods galore
I experienced the worst kind of mood swing last Tuesday, and until now I still feel ashamed of it. I snapped at a ton of people then, and I didn’t feel like talking to anyone at all. :( I figure it was just hormones, plus lack of sleep…and probably some other stuff, and every girl gets into a mood swing every now and then. I hope it doesn’t happen again, though.

Holiday fats begone!
I was serious in workout again this week because of everything I gained last Christmas. I wasn’t sure if my results were good for the week because I didn’t get to lift weights as much. So I was ready for less than stellar results for last Thursday, but surprise surprise: I lost all my holiday fats. :D My muscle mass went up, so there’s no change in the overall weight, but still! FATS ARE GONE! Wohoo~

Thesismates Reunion

This was us 4 years ago
This was us 4 years ago

Met up with my thesismates last Thursday before Ramie left. It was also the first time I went to Trinoma too — cue loser music here! :P Trinoma was an okay mall, I didn’t get to explore it yet, but I’m sure there are no outdoor fireplaces there. I don’t see the need, anyway.

Spent Thursday night eating and chatting with the three important guys in my school life. :) It was nice to talk to them and catch up and realize that, well, other than being thesismates, we are good friends. It didn’t feel like we haven’t seen each other for more than a year — and I guess that’s real friendship there.

Next big event for us (and for other blockmates, I guess) is *drumroll* Ramie’s wedding! It’s not until the end of this year, but I’m sure it’s going to be one big highlight of the year. :)

RPM, Baby
Earlier today was my second time to do RPM class — cycling class for those who aren’t familiar with the class — and even if I felt like fainting in the middle of the class, I managed to stand up at all parts of the class that needed standing. What a work out. I plan to master that class. :P

One More Page
After much thinking and realizing how much book posts are eating up my space here at my personal blog…I finally decided to set up my own book blog: One More Page. I’ve had a couple of posts inside already, so why not drop by and visit? :)

This blog would mean that there would be less book related posts here…which means I should get posting more…er, personal posts here.

That’s my first week of 2010 so far. I really should start working on my translations already…so I shall end my post here. How has your week been so far?

Updates

Goodbye to the Kapitbahay

Today, I sadly close one of my blogs. Goodbye to the Chismosang Kapitbahay (pbb2.refineme.org).

Why am I closing my PBB Blog down?

  • I am so late in the news about Pinoy Big Brother 2 already.
  • I hardly have time to update it anymore because of work and other things I have to do.
  • I need to do a clean-up of my space in my domain to make room for other projects.
  • To be totally honest, I am finding PBB Season 2 kind of boring. I actually don’t mind missing it anymore, because nothing interesting is really happening.

Maybe I’ll do another one next time, for the next season, when I have more time. But for now, I’d settle for watching it, reading from the site and reading some of the PBB Blogs out there.

Till then. Goodbye Chismosang Kapitbahay.

WWW

2007 Philippine Blog Awards

I’m kind of late in blogging this…but better late than never!

Philippine Blog Awards 2007Early in my days of webdesign, when I was all so into cutesy pink kawaii stuff (Now who remembers that word? :P Kawaii!!!), I joined this site competition thing called The Site Fights (or was it something else? I think there was something like this called The Royal Rumble…wait, that’s wrestling… or The Site Rumble or whatever. Haha I might be wrong), where you join, your site gets evaluated, and once you’re in, there are different levels where you have to get into until you get to be TEH ULTIMATE SITE FIGHTS CHAMPION! Or…something like that. ;) To get into the different levels, people would have to vote for you and the winner with most votes will go to the next level while the rest will remain there. I remember getting into the second to last level, but I couldn’t move out from there because there was this site that looks so…um, kawaii, that everyone votes for it more. And it’s hosted on expages (I was hosted on gurlpages back then :P)…how can she beat me?! Arrogance aside, her site was actually quite…cute. Cuter…er, more kawaii than mine that is. Imagine lots of pink sparkly things, small iframe to hold her tiny text and shaking links…you know? Oh, and everyone still thinks the “Me, You, WWW” is still teh coolest thing for site navigation back then. ;)

When I realized that I might never move out of that place, I gave up and didn’t want to work on it anymore, until I moved to another host and forgot about it altogether.

But that’s not my point. The point here is…the 2007 Philippine Blog Awards is totally different from this. ;) I quote:

The Philippine Blog Awards aims to recognize notable FIlipino-owned blogs in their respective niches. With topics ranging from the arts, culture, technology and politics, Filipinos have become more abreast because of the fast growing blogging industry here and abroad. The Philippine Blog Awards is a venue to showcase notable blogs with quality content that engages readers from around the globe.

As Shari and Darwin said, this isn’t some contest you join and you’d get a blinkie to display on your site. No, no, this is bigger, better and more exciting, especially when you see the prizes! A trophy is better than a blinkie, yes? Of course.

And that 30GB iPod Video again. Lord, will this be my chance? Pleaaaase?

Nominations are open until February 28, so go and nomitate the blogs you think are worthy of winning the best in the these categories. :)

From the Blog Parteeh ’07 to the 2007 Philippine Blog Awards…2007 sure is shaping up to be a great year for the Pinoy Bloggers. :)

Dear Diary, Techie Geek, WWW

Speaking of…

Wow, it’s already February. Where did January go?

My thumb hurts. I’ve been texting the entire time since the time I commuted from the office just to finish off the free SMS of the test SIM cards I brought home. I am only at my first SIM which still has 30+ free SMS and I have about three more to go.

What shall I do for that? Anybody want a textmate until tomorrow lunchtime? I just need to send messages to someone until it runs out…but I’d use those to get a good conversation. :) My textmates right now are silent…I wonder why? Did they get tired of my texting? I hope not. Or is the signal just weak?

Speaking of SMS, I just heard of Globe’s new scheme for their Unlimited SMS service, and all I know is that people are going to complain (in fact, I got a message earlier about boycotting this new scheme), especially for those who bought a Globe SIM just because of their Unlimitxt service (namely, me). Comparing the highest and longest rate for all day unlimited texting, the old Php50/5days is now Php80/4days. From Php10/day to Php20/day! That’s not right. Okay, so they also have the unlimited day and unlimited night texting…say I turned the Day Unlimited, that’s Php30 for 2 days, and then Night Unlimited, that’s Php20 for 2 days…that’s Php50 for only 2 days! HELLO?!

Sorry, I just want to rant.

Speaking of phased out…the floppies have flopped. I remember playing with some speed-reading programs and decathlon games on our PC from time kopong-kopong days (translation: PCs with green and black screens running on MS-DOS :P), but that’s with mini-floppy disks, the one you can fan yourselves with and get a considerable amount of air. What I do remember about the microfloppy disks (3.5″) is that my brother and I used to play Jeopardy and Prince of Persia in my dad’s borrowed laptop. That’s with the black and white screen, still running on MS-DOS. :p I remember owning a lot of 3.5 floppies for backup of files, school work and even up to college, passing it for machine projects! I don’t know how to feel about it saying goodbye, since I hardly use diskettes anymore (too many corrupted diskettes and files lost because of mishandling…how sad). But it sure has a lot of “fond” memories associated with it somehow.

And speaking of memories…here’s something that would put the Blog Parteeh ’07 into the memories of more people: Bo Sanchez‘ Preacher in Blue Jeans episode of the Blog Parteeh ’07, featuring interviews of Jun, Noemi, Aileen and Sorsi, plus Marcelle‘s magic show for Bo. :) Sorsi told me after she was interviewed to get myself interviewed too, but I’m not much in front of the camera. I’m more of the behind-the-scenes person…but still, I was mentioned there! :D Now go watch it; I can’t embed it here without losing the text after the video.

Speaking of can’t…my test SIM that I’m supposed to be emptying of balance is not receiving any text messages. I can send, but I cannot receive anything at all. No wonder my textmates are now silent. Argh. Now how can I get rid of all those free text tomorrow?! All day texting until 5pm?! My poor thumb! :(

Maybe this means I shouldn’t bring “work” home.

Speaking of home…I better hit the sack. I want to get to work early tomorrow so I can get out at 6:30 for a blogger’s dinner at Makati. :D Good night everyone!