Updated Blog

I finally got to update bits and pieces of my blog. Blogger has improved a lot with its templates and edit tools that you really don’t need to do much. I’m no designer, thus, I was contented with the templates that blogger has to offer. After picking a red themed template, all I had to do was pick which fonts I wanted, what size, and viola, it’s done. But to add a bit of personal touch to the design, I created a very simple header. Took me a while to create it, had to revive my photoshop skills a bit too, though I used paint.net this time (I’m all for freeware now). The result is a bit better than a regular text, but I think there’s still a lot to improve. Maybe when I get blessed, for some reason, this late in the game of life, with some creative juices, I can finally turn this thing into something.

Next, to update and fix my labels!

Detox

I’ve been feeling quite unhealthy for quite some time and while reading through Patty Laurel’s blog, I stumbled upon Juju Cleanse. It’s a cleansing / detoxifying take for us folks who eat anything from deep fried food to sweet chocolate delights. I decided to try out Juju Cleanse as I heard some great feedback around it, and out of curiosity as well. And I wouldn’t mind the health benefits that it’ll give.

I ordered a Level 2, One Day Juju Cleanse. I picked it up from their pick up place somewhere in New Manila area. It comes packed in a nice bag.

The juices below, numbered 1 to 6 from left to right.

The detox process is easy to follow.

There are set times that you would need to drink each bottle. The bottles are numbered so you wouldn’t be confused as to which one to drink. You can learn more about the drinks on their website.

Detox Adventure

My detox adventure started out on Saturday morning with a tea provided by the Juju Cleanse team themselves. Tastes really good. I was sipping it while I was still doing my early morning Saturday work.

Afterwards, on to drink #1 – which is just by looking at the color, is a concoction of various green veggies. I didn’t like this much. Perhaps I’m not a veggie lover as much as I thought I was. The last few gulps were the hardest. You just wonder why the bottle just doesn’t get empty! The bottles are huge by the way.

Drink #2 is the red giant. This wasn’t so bad, but be careful, it stains though.

Drink #3 again was the veggie concoction. For some reason, this third drink tasted much worst that the first one. Very difficult to finish.

Unfortunately for me, the days prior was hectic so I ended up sleeping pretty much the whole afternoon (catch up on sleep!), which meant, I skipped two drinks during my sleeping beauty time!! It’s so hard to catch up, especially if you need to drink the greens!

Take note though that at this point, it’s dinner time already, I wasn’t even hungry at all. And I was, surprisingly, feeling refreshed. I don’t know if it’s psychological or not. So far so good.

I ended up drinking another bottle, before I went back to sleep. To sum it all up, I only finished 4 of the 6 bottles. Too bad. I should’ve chosen a better date to do my cleansing. Lesson learned for me was that when you’re going to go on a strict regimen based cleansing diet, be sure you’ve had a good night sleep the previous night. But other than that, the following day, I wasn’t as hungry waking up, and I wasn’t feeling bloated like I have been the past weeks! I’m definitely going to try this one out again.

Quick Pampanga Trip

We were thinking of doing something different to celebrate our parent’s wedding anniversary last May 27. They were suggesting going to Baguio, but that’ll entail a couple of days off which our schedule (mostly mine and my brother’s) won’t permit. But they didn’t want to just have lunch wherever in the city, so for a change, we decided, why not go to Pampanga and try out their food there? It’s supposed to be a haven for food lovers anyway! And thus, after a few google researches, we decided on a few stops in Pampanga.

Aling Lucing’s Sisig in Pampanga

Located in Angeles City, this small carinderia eatery is known to be the origin of our favorite and very popular dish - sisig! It’s supposed to be a must go to place in Angeles City. Although, we did warn our parents that this is not your typical restaurant and not to expect too much. From the pictures we found via google, it looks like a simple carinderia.

Aside from sisig, they offer different foods as well, but no order necessary. As in a typical eatery, you pick your choice of food from whatever’s available in the buffet food warmer containers. I think my mom picked a few from there but our main goal was to try out the sisig. If I remember correctly, a plate of sizzling sisig will cost you around 170 pesos.

My verdict? It was good alright, but I missed the crunchiness that perhaps, a Gerry’s Grill sisig would have. Nonetheless, this is probably still a place that you’d still want to drop by to due to its historical significance. After all, it’s supposedly where sisig originated!

Kabigting’s Halo Halo

We were thinking of either Razon’s or Corazon’s but we ended up at Kabigting’s. It’s located in Marquee Mall (Ayala mall), just by the NLEX Angeles exit.

Pampanga is known for their halo halos. According to what I read on various blogs, although there are various popular halo halo shops across the province such as Razon’s and Corazon’s, all of them share the same concept which is different from other halo halos. It is that they limit the sahog to roughly around four different ingredients only. The simplicity makes everything way better.

In my opinion, what makes this halo halo quite different from the other halo halos I’ve tasted is because of its pastillas ingredient. It is good, but it made the treat a little bit too sweet and creamy for me.

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Aside from just eating, we were planning to visit a few cathedrals and churches in the province too. Unfortunately, I had a terrible headache, and it was way hot anyway, so we just decided to go home and just save those for our next trip there. Based from my research, there’s still a ton of places to visit in Pampanga. Can’t wait for the next trip!

Lush

I’ve always seen and smelled the Lush store in Shangrila for ages but I never once attempted to buy one item from them since they opened shop in Manila. Lucky for me, a lush soap was the giveaway of my friend’s bridal shower last Tuesday night.

The smell, as expected is quite strong. The box in itself smells quite good as well, I gave it to my sister to use as a gift box for her “friend”. Anyway, so I decided to use it yesterday and am I impressed with it. The smells clings to you after you shower and the texture feels nice when using it. Two possible drawbacks though, mabilis maubos, and it could be quite expensive.

Let’s see how it goes after a while, and perhaps, maybe I just might buy from there again (in between safeguard soaps!).

Why I watch Corona Impeachment Trial–Reason 1

My work hours permit me to watch the on going impeachment trial scheduled every Monday to Thursday, 2 pm onwards. As the trial is coming to its conclusion, I’d like to share with everyone one reason why I watch this trial: It is Educational

Majority of those who watch this trial are non lawyers, which makes this televised proceedings quite interesting to those, such as me, who is quite curious as to what happens inside a court. Regardless of whether this is what happens in reality, or this may just be a special case of courtroom drama, one would still learn some things from this “show”.

Below are a few of the youtube videos that I found, that gives us a few bits and pieces of why there is still something we can get out of this trial.

1. What is the definition of a witness?

- A person who perceives (via 5 senses) and have to be personally be present at the scene of the crime

- Listen until 0:50 to get Senator Santiago’s explanation / definition.

Watch: 0:00–0:50

2. Impeachment is neither politcal and neither judicial in nature.

Impeachment is quasi politcal and quasi judicial. Quasi means – almost, but not exactly

Senator Santiago: “Thus rules of court do not apply totally to this proceedings, but lie to the discretions of this court.”

Watch: 0:20–1:07

3. The presenting lawyer of a witness must be bound by the admissions and statements of the witness presented by him/her.

Senate President Enrile: “That is the rule of trial. If you studied your trial technique very well, that’s the rule.”

Watch: 0:00–3:28

4. Excessive Entanglement

Lesson #1: Define excessive entanglement:

Excessive entanglement is a term of art in constitutional law that is applied in cases involving the separation of church and state

Lesson #2: If you’re not sure of what the meaning of a word or terms are, don’t use it! Keep it simple!

Watch: 01:55–03:14

5. Practice Diligence!!

Watch this video – it’s well summarized by the GMA News.

Negligence is not an excuse!

There are a lot more, if only I could find them amongst the thousands of youtube videos about the the impeachment trial.

You see, although one would say that this impeachment trial is a waste of taxpayer’s money, if we look at it from a different perspective, there’s still a lot we can get out of this trial. Good or bad, I cannot say. Good because we are learning about these judicial proceedings, bad because perhaps, now politicians know now how to be extra careful with their corrupt ways! Might be harded to catch them the next time around. And I guess now we know that it’s hard to be the enemy of no less than the president of the Philippines!

Reason #2 coming soon.

Twins at 2.5 months old

I haven’t really been in the mood or even inspired to write here in my blog for the past weeks or so, thus, I will simply write about two of the N things that are making me happy these days…

Last March, there were two new additions to our family, Gillian and Gail. And how fast time flies by, they’re now almost 2.5 months old, and getting chubbier by the minute. I can only imagine how fun (and probably annoying as well – dahil sa kakulitan nila, just like their big brother Grant) when they grow up.

No favoritism daw but Grant insists he loves Shobe Gail more.

Apps

Finally, after four years, I’ve been given the much awaited tech rollover, which means, I have a new laptop to replace my very reliable (but old) work laptop! And with the new machine comes with a freshly installed operating system, which means, I can start setting up my applications again, and finally organize my files and documents.

In line with this, I’ve decided to list down the must have applications I usually get for my computer and hopefully, the readers will be able to get something good out of the list below. 

1. Launchy is a must have utility for your computers! It’s a key stroke launcher that’ll save you a ton of time finding applications, files, documents, etc. All you have to do is index your file system, and launchy will be able to find it and you can do your search on the fly. If you don’t have this yet, you better get this now! Once I started using this, I got hooked!

2. FreeCommander is a file management application, which for me, is a very good replacement of the windows explorer. The best thing about free commander is that you can have two windows explorer-like windows at the same time. With that capability, you can easily click and drag files from one location to another, without having to change directories all the time. It sounds confusing, but it’ll look something like this:

3. Notepad++ is a great replacement for the ever lovable and simple notepad. This time, it offers you tabbed functionality, highlighting capabilities, etc. It definitely lives up to its name of notepad++.

4. 7Zip. If you want to zip and unzip pretty much anything, then get 7zip. And it’s free!

5. Google Chrome. I used to love firefox but when google chrome came out, and when I tried it out, I didn’t go back. Perhaps it has something to do with the usability and simplicity of the design. The feature I enjoy the most is its ability to do instant search in the url area of the browser. And for some reason, I feel like it performs better than firefox.

By the way, all these are free!

The applications I listed above are my must haves for any of my machines. But when it comes to work, there are a few more applications I would add to the list. Java SDK, Eclipse, Putty, Outlook (dreaded emails!), etc. But these are usually dependent on the type of work we’re doing too. Maybe I’ll have a separate post for my work related applications.

With this list, I hope I was able to share something useful to all. Feel free to share your must have apps as well!