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Let's see now. Out of the original plans that I laid out for today, only one
was accomplished - the doing of laundry. The burning of DVR files will have
to wait for another time.

In other news...have you ever had moments when you look back at life and
wish you'd done things differently? Well, I had one of those today. Then
suddenly I was seized with the notion of writing down the resignation letter
I should have written back when I was working for a consulting firm, and
growing ever more miserable by the day. So I fired up my InsaneJournal
account, wrote the letter, set the entry to Private-Locked, and the
strangest feeling of relief came over me. As if the act of writing purged
whatever residual regret and bad vibes left over from that time, and finally
I can put that era of my life to rest.

I may employ this tactic if I start going into "what if" mode again. Closure
is a wonderful feeling if you've been dragging bad vibes around for years.

Yesterday I discovered that Dreamwidth opened their post-by-email option to
free accounts. *bounce* This now means I can use Gmail to post to all my
journals (Dreamwidth, LiveJournal, Wordpress, Multiply, Vox and Tumblr).
Yes, I am a journal ho. Everything that's not LiveJournal is a mirror,
because I have friends and relatives scattered over the internet who have
one account or another. Since I use Google Docs to type out journal entries
(less chance of entries being eaten by journal clients/web interfaces) this
works out quite nicely for me.

Tomorrow is grocery and medicines day. The planned itinerary is to go to
Mercury Drug Santuario, and then to the pet shop in Mandaluyong that sells
cat litter by the sack. I do hope they are open on Sundays. Then proceed to
Cash-n-Carry for the groceries. Before the supermarket, however, must drop
by The Generics Pharmacy and CD-R King. Hubby's wireless headset has died,
and therefore we must procure a new one. I should also get a Smart Bro
Prepaid card for reloading the dongle.

Afternoon naps from around 4-6pm are becoming a pleasant habit. *grin*

I have reviewed my knitting, and thinking of buying two balls of Mega brand
yarn in something to harmonize with the yellow balls I'm using up. The
ripple scarf I am working on is making good progress, it just wants some
other color(s?) besides yellow.

Still haven't found the book to read now that I've finished "Geisha of
Gion". Am wavering between "Queen" by Alex Haley, and "The Tale of Genji".
Or, it could be something different altogether. Goodness knows I'm not
lacking in authors in the "books for reading" cabinet!

Not much else to report for the day, except that Pebbles and Pepper were
introduced to the kitty playhouse this morning. Ramon and I brought them
out, Pebbles yowling mightily the moment his feet left the ground and Pepper
looking everywhere for Pica-mama. It was too funny to put Pebbles down on
the roof of the kitty house and listen to the yowling stop as if switched
off. Pica, knowing the kittens were safe with us, jumped up to be with
them, and Pie followed suit - only to dive down into the carton Ma's TV set
came in. I set up the carton to be sandwiched by the wall and the kitty
house, and there has been much jumping and pouncing about as a result.

So their introduction to the outside world went well. We will try this
again tomorrow.

Also, Sakki-cat had his face cleaned with kitty wipes and I actually managed
to shoot some antibiotic and vitamin C into his mouth on the first try.
Poor senior cat has been having a cold now that the weather has turned.
His face tends to look miserable, but he is as bouncy as ever, even with a
cold. So it's just a matter of persuading him to sit still long enough to
be medicated and cleaned up, and all is well.

Hm. It's time to bring in the coffee bean cats (Mocha and Latte). Then
back to online stuff.

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Today I took my Smart Bro Prepaid out for a road test. It's a USB dongle
that acts as a modem, works on PC and Mac and is impossible to configure for
Linux on PPC architecture. *grin* Well, I'm sure it's been done somewhere,
but I can't find it, and since the iBook is dual-partition, it doesn't
really matter in the long run. Testing area was Makati Med, specifically
Floating Island and the hallway of Dr. Gatmaitan's office. Got beautiful
signals both times, so at least I know that I won't be bored during Ramon's
monthly check-ups.

So thanks to that, I breezed through e-mail and feeds, and thus eliminated a
great deal of catching-up after I got home. What did I do with the extra
time? I napped, of course. *grin*

Hubby's and dad's checkups went well. Dr. Gatmaitan increased Ramon's Lasix
intake slightly, another 1/2 tablet on Saturdays. Otherwise, still the same
prescriptions as before.

Tried out the underground parking of Makati Med. Not bad - at least it's
not the ramp from hell that the old driveway used to be. Found a nice spot
near the elevator on B2, and Dad had a blast when we ran into the head of
the security agency - apparently he and Mr. C knew each other back in the
day.

After the hospital, we made a short trip to Le Coeur in Santuario to pick up
bread and chocolate muffins. Then home for a late lunch and back to normal.

Yesterday I called Citibank to ask about one of my gold cards that had
expired, and no new card had arrived. Apparently this was the card that was
upgraded to platinum status, and I'd forgotten to dispose of the old card.
Then I called Metrobank to ask if I could do the balance conversion thing
for Ramon's hospital bill, and they said yes, they could. I have been
endorsed to the proper party and should call back within 3-5 banking days.
Hoping that this works out; spreading that huge amount over a year at
minimal interest will be a good thing.

Papers were organized yesterday. Sort of. There's going to be a grand
filing of them sometime this coming week. For the moment, my most important
tasks for tomorrow are Dad's laundry, burning off DVR files, and working on
Christmas cards. No doubt the various collateral tasks will come to mind as
I get things done, and it's back to the usual pattern of life.

I was reading about this SMART
Bro netbook thing and decided to file the idea away for the future. It
would certainly be easier to carry around than the iBook+dongle combination,
but as hubby has wisely pointed out, there's no real need for it yet since
I'm not about to rid myself of the iBook anytime soon. Besides, by the time
I'm ready for one, the phone company will probably have put out a better
version or something.

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It's been a rainy day today. On again, off again - apparently there is a
low pressure area passing through, but not likely to turn into a typhoon,
thank goodness.

Let's see. Apparently the last time I updated was when Ramon got out of the
hospital from his latest bout with pulmonary edema. (Note to self: if caught
in time, and barring complications, expect no less than 2 nights in the
hospital.) Has anything much happened since then?

Nothing much, actually. Not in the medical drama sense of things. In the
"don't sweat the small stuff" sense, quite a bit happened, as is the way
when resuming a disrupted pattern of life. Typhoon Santi came and went the
day after we got home. It knocked out the power, but fortunately with our
genset, there wasn't much to fuss about. We did lose the TV and internet
for the better part of the day - it was back by around 10pm, I think.

So what's to do when there's no TV or internet? One reads, that what one
does. I finished Final Curtain by Dame Ngaio Marsh, a Roderick and
Troy Alleyn mystery. Then I went and started Geisha of Gion by
Mineko Iwasaki, and as of today, I am breezing through the book. My
"to-read" bookshelf is developing a satisfying gap between volumes. This
means my library will need sorting through to see which books I might want
to circulate back into the world once more.

One also updates paperwork. I updated all the expense logs. *happy dance*
I took down the stash of Christmas gift fixings and pulled out the gift
stash, so now they are in plain sight. (Note to self: create design for
decorating the front windows, so that when maintenance crew puts up
lanterns, will have extra hands to help.) Office looks like stockroom, but
that's to be expected until the holidays are over. I inventoried the
Christmas cards, and discovered that I had enough for everyone. True, my
overseas friends will be receiving vintage postcards in lieu of the
traditional Christmas scenes - but I believe in making the most of one's
stash. There's always next year for the Christmas scenes.

Let's see...hospital Wednesday, Thursday. Home on Friday. Typhoon on
Saturday. Groceries on Sunday, as well as purchase of Ramon's medicines.
Rest day on Monday...in which there was napping. Also, there was laundry.
Lots and lots of laundry, which dried by the afternoon and was put away the
next day with a feeling of righteousness. The weather appears to have
shifted, it is much cooler at night now. My knitted poncho, bought in
Baguio ages ago when I was a teener, is on the ready now; and Ramon's
cardigan is also on standby on the clothes tree.

Yesterday was Tuesday, so filled up the reserve jerricans with diesel for
the genset. Mailed some checks to charities. Paid a credit card bill (a
small one for a change). Picked up a 2010 planner from National Book Store,
a box of Christmas cards (for those remembered at the last minute), and a
few office supplies (that I still have to put away). Lunch at the Glorietta
4 food court. Bought one more weather strip at Ace Hardware, a new CFL for
the dirty kitchen (ZOMG the maid can now see the exact color of her cooking
now), and some extra stuff. Then home. Then nap. Then the usual online
stuff. Also bought a Smart Bro Prepaid - it's a USB dongle that gives you
wireless internet connectivity, just plug into the laptop, and off you go.
Will try experimenting with this when I bring husband and father to Makati
Med on November 6th. What I like about this is that (a) it gives a new
lease on life to my allegedly obsolete iBook, and (b) it keeps me from
yearning for a new netbook while finances are recovering from this latest
depletion (the kiss of the vampire, to use the popular metaphor - the monies
aren't quite alive, but they're not completely dead either).

Today was rest day, since we were out the day before. Continued reading.
Continued napping. Fiddled with internet settings. Managed the cats. Forgot
to take my vitamins, but all is well. Currently heating water for the
evening wash-up. Tomorrow is another rest day, but hopefully not as much
napping as today - will have to get things ready for going out on Friday.

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