emperor benedict this is just wrong:



but more so this one:



but i have a sense of humor, so i've been laughing like crazy............
  ¶ 4/30/2005 11:43:00 PM 0 comments

  happy ads there's this ad for budweiser that just passed across the TV here at work... ahahahaha... ads should always be funny. you askin me to part with my cash? r u kidding? so that's why ads should always be funny.

so. there's this dork out with friends in a zoo. he lays down his bud(weiser) at a nearby rock and teases a chimpanzee with a banana. of course the chimp wants the banana. so he makes the chimp reach. sideways, up and down, dancing till the chimp screams.

he glances back to his friends. the woman hides her face in shame. the man laughs hysterically. the guy with the bud turns back to the chimp and guess what the chimp's holding... and making him reach and jump and dance just to get... he even hit his head on the cage's bars, ahahahaha. ...

two more hours and i am off for the weekend!!! :-) have a good one!  ¶ 4/29/2005 08:35:00 PM 0 comments

  mugs rule i gave my supervisor a coffe mug today. she says i was too sweet, and... so... what kinna leverage can you come up with that? my aching mind, still reeling from an overnight flight from california, equated,

sweet
candy
too much candy is bad for you.

"i hope your teeth rot," i said, because i remember someone telling me that when i thanked them. i'm so going to hell, ahahaha. but i really like making people happy.

and coffee mugs are becoming a current hobby. everything that i collect has always been started by my dad somehow - stamps, letters, cards, photographs and coffee mugs. but i think he wanted the mugs coz he liked to drink coffee, ahahaha.

one of these days for my birthday, i'm going to set up a registry of nothing but just mugs. the thing with that's there's no such store that offers just coffee mugs, the collectible kind. hmm. just mugs? kinna a catchy name, no? hmm -  ¶ 4/27/2005 11:02:00 PM 0 comments

  chocolate and counterpoint as if i weren't already distracted enough, a pr volunteer agent gushes she's going to pay me in chocolate for a little more info on how the wire service i work for works.

there is a chocolate festival in remote suburban long grove at the end of the month, and of course they want more coverage. more coverage is free publicity. free publicity means freeing up more funds for other activities. other activites for sponsors to contribute to, like sending chocolate to media outlets who give you the time of day. more publicity means more people might think of coming to town. the more people come to town for the festival, the merrier for the small town's budget. voila.

so i told her, if you are someone willing to pitch something to a writer up in her ears in paper - and she's only started her shift a mere two hours ago - you should put it all in writing, preferably:

WHAT IS GOING ON
WHO IS INVITED
WHO IS GOING TO BE THERE
WHAT TIME
WHERE
HOW DO WE GET THERE
WHAT IS YOUR CELL PHONE NUMBER because we usually get lost in the suburbs and will need directions to your event.

and then we'll decide whether we should drive out there to see.

trying to decide whether a story is interesting enough to pay attention to takes two seconds and costs very little (time, i should say. costs very little time). so pitch away, i say - it's a lot better than us having to dig around for news. you don't want to know what we find sometimes.

some writers will hurry up and hang up the phone because they want to go back to work (or blogging, ahahaha), but i try to be different. pitch all you want, and don't worry that i ain't got all day - i'll let you finish. i like stories told without concurrent counterpoints. they're pretty rare. :-)  ¶ 4/22/2005 04:29:00 PM 2 comments

  stratosphere a.m.

this is what dawn looks like when you spend it in the air between cities.

photo by sarah jane i.  ¶ 4/21/2005 10:54:00 PM 0 comments

  deflective i've been assailed by yet another crazy person. no, this one isn't one of my friends: this is a total stranger, someone i thought never existed and yet voila! there she is.

i don't mind provocative surveys that insist on shredding my psyche to bits. i'm used to that. i take comfort in that i can always sue the person for emotional damages later on. (read: i'll return the favor; i'll curse you too. i gotz lotsa rabbit entrails just waiting for bloody torment.) i just wonder why, why, WHY ME?!

here is the source of my current, passing anguish:

Hi. As you are the owner of a xanga that belongs to a writing or poetry Blogring, I’d like to ask you a couple of questions. I’d greatly appreciate it if you respond back.

The question is: Why do you own a blog?

Specifically, why do you own a xanga? How do you recognize this constructed online universe? How do you mediate between your blog-universe and everything else outside it- that is, how do you mediate between the personal and the public?

Why do you blog? Does it exactly have a purpose? What meaning do you give to it? Self-expression? Reaching out to others?

Has blogging affected your life in any way?

If you post written work, how have people responded? Have received useful critique and feedback which improved your writing skills?

Thank you for your time.

PS. If your browser is Firefox or Netscape, please post in the Mozilla-friendly xanga.com/missing_by_a_mile

this is a real comment on a real blog... well, if xanga is for real. AHAHAHA!!! hay.

it's like asking frickin me, why do you breathe?
eat?
eat chocolate?
drink caramel macchiato coffee everyday?
bite into a tomato mozzarella and pesto focaccia sandwich?
return to the buffalo blue cosi sandwhich just coz of their awesome, salted bread?
worship parmesan cheese over soft italian bread and olive oil?

use the italian restaurant's table's protective paper tabletop to sketch ideas because you're too lazy to take out your journal?

use the italian restaurant's table's protective paper tabletop to sketch ideas because you're too lazy to take out your journal for fear the olive oil and parmesan stink will stick to it, therefore making you sacrifice $20/plate everyday now, instead of once in a purply-blue moon like a normal consumer?

dangnabbit. sometimes people just like to slather on their graduate studies angst on you. i'm no guinea pig! i'm clueless as hell! same as you!!!

and so i went,

hi, miss by a width of a hair - i don't own that blogring. i just participate in it the same as you. :-)

your questions are provocative, but i am hardly the person to ask. you yourself own a blog on xanga - why do you write in xanga?

i think the question that needs to be asked here is why do we write? and then we can go on from there.  ¶ 4/20/2005 05:27:00 PM 0 comments

  benedict 16th

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger is Pope Benedict 16th! love that pomp. listen to those cheers, ahaha. he said he trusts us to pray for him. really cool. :)

world youth day this year is in cologne, GERMANY, and it will be SO COOL to go!!! ahahahaha... it's in the summer... i ain't got much time... or resources... i'll think about it!!!

VIVA IL PAPA!!!

  ¶ 4/19/2005 11:52:00 AM 2 comments

  new pope watching CNN right now. i was supposed to do boatloads of errands, but i guess they'll have to wait for now. i want to see who the new pope is.  ¶ 4/19/2005 11:09:00 AM 0 comments

  hotel rwanda

my mother's way of helping the world is making sure her daughter's finished her laundry.

"take out that load, and i'll help you fold," she just said.

we'd just finished watching the best picture nominated "hotel rwanda," and it is as sugarcoated as can be expected. after all, you can't expect sheltered folks like my mother to digest it all in one sitting. you have to break news of one of history's bloodiest and most overlooked - to put it mildly - chapters in history slowly. like tourists inside the bus who left early, we all don't know what's going on. it has to be told little by little.

so my mother started pointing out joaquin phoenix, and in the middle of him protesting his editor that they need to leave the hotel to film what's going on outside, she asked where else did he star. "the village," i said, and asked her to please watch for a moment. she fell asleep in the middle parts.

but only because the film told of the slow build-up to until the UN left the hotel altogether, that part when the belgians came and talked to colonel olive (nick nolte, "the prince of tides"), who then threw down his sky blue beret and huffed past hotel house manager paul rusesabagina's family. "they're not going to stay, paul. they're not going to stop the slaughter," oliver said. [ view clip ]

which is basically what happened. "it was a big miscommunication. no one in the UN would believe it was genocide. no one in the US would act," my sister said, who studied these things passingly as an international studies undergraduate at depaul. the film did quote president clinton expressing his concern that the violence was escalating, it did feature a couple refugees at the hotel turning down the radio when western broadcasters started stammering what calculations it took before violence could be classified "genocide."

but all that didn't matter. what mattered to rusesabagina and his family and his hotel's staff, was that they survive another day, another hour.

the film's web site is doing what any other movie web site would do - promote the film. "when a country descended into madness... and the world closed its eyes... he opened his arms... and created a place... where hope could survive." [ main ]

when you consider the myriad other films of one man buying jews to make unuseable silvercrafts, or of a choir of women surviving the southeast asian jungle to live out a world war, "hotel rwanda" is another one of those stories.

but for people like my mother, who'd had just finished brushing her teeth and now sits waiting on the edge of her sofa, asking her daughter to fetch the laundry so she can help in the folding is the best, most immediate beginning to be expected of her. "one of my patients is rwandan," she said before the film started. this is why she requested i rent the film for her tonight, and we watch it at around midnight, her after-work entertainment in place of CNN or some other movie.

well. time for me to fetch the laundry.  ¶ 4/18/2005 03:04:00 AM 0 comments

  attempting speech in distance
i had nothing to do with these shopping carts, i found them this way.
fine. don't believe me.

i just read the following to a friend in dallas:

One cannot begin to write properly in a café.

One interesting conversation after another folds itself over you so that the din succeeds in actually making your head throb.

The instrumentless bandmember shuffles to music stuck in his ears, and that's all you become attuned to - his careless conducting of invisible vibes, turning in time to a tune only he can hear. He suddenly stops and puffs his flavored cigarette, cinnamon, the smoke still white in the 8 p.m. Sunday night.

Strangely sometimes when you start tuning things out, the café's soulful sax jazz jam becomes intrusive when just a moment ago you and your friend were chatting, you could barely hear over your running typing. All you were attuned to were her words, “Please don't tell.

“He's proving to me that Conner is such a jerk. He can't stand the other guy,” she said, to which I replied, “Well, of course he can't stand a rival, even you. If someone else were after Jake, you'd be jealous too.”

She laughed. She agreed, “I might be jealous, depending on how they were behaving.”

Which reminds me of another girl who vented about her jealousy in an online journal, of all places.

“Damn girls! Stop flirting! It makes you look cheap!!!!!”

To which I wondered, when is it flirting and when is it just friendship? Where's the boundary that would show people whether you had already crossed the line of physically expressing one's most ancient, natural feelings?

Someone's smelly cheeseburger is also wafting its way toward me. EWWW. Didn't I just bound and cast all fried things away from me?! It is almost 9 p.m. This café never closes, but it's definitely time to catch a train back to the house.

and i realized just how much i miss reading work aloud in class. the first tangible reading i did in class last semester was from richard wright's "native son." the images of a family fighting didn't stick to my head as much as the experience of reading something out loud. i noticed the "stop" signal in pencil at the bottom of the page several short paragraphs prior, and didn't realize it again until i met it at the end of the paragraph, the end of the first scene of significance. i stopped and could have exploded laughing - i read a whole page without stopping. the whole class was quiet. we moved on to another story.

wright's writing cadence is different from everyone else's, and of course you'd delight more in reading your own sentences aloud. but before that class, you'd succeed in throwing me off the rooftops first before making me read anything out loud in class. i read that whole passage out to a friend whose example i used, to ask for her permission, to which she readily gave. the words from my mouth flew easily and fell just precisely, like the grooves of a vertical bridge locking snugly in place, opened to let boats and hobbyists pass through.

for one interview with harrison ford for george lucas, ford argued with lucas, saying some lines looked good on paper, but you can't say them out loud. which is true, for network news and at certain instances in the movies - like how the millenniunm falcon can't yet just jump into hyperspace because, essentially, if rushed the engine will go kaput (star wars 4, "a new hope"). difficult sentences can be said, and often the listener will get it anyway.  ¶ 4/17/2005 08:44:00 PM 2 comments

  attempting prose in traffic

One cannot begin to write properly in a café.

One interesting conversation after another folds itself over you so that the din succeeds in actually making your head throb.

The instrumentless bandmember shuffles to music stuck in his ears, and that's all you become attuned to - his careless conducting of invisible vibes, turning in time to a tune only he can hear. He suddenly stops and puffs his flavored cigarette, cinnamon, the smoke still white in the 8 p.m. Sunday night.

Strangely sometimes when you start tuning things out, the café's soulful sax jazz jam becomes intrusive when just a moment ago you and your friend were chatting, you could barely hear over your running typing. All you were attuned to were her words, “Please don't tell.

“He's proving to me that Conner is such a jerk. He can't stand the other guy,” she said, to which I replied, “Well, of course he can't stand a rival, even you. If someone else were after Jake, you'd be jealous too.”

She laughed. She agreed, “I might be jealous, depending on how they were behaving.”

Which reminds me of another girl who vented about her jealousy in an online journal, of all places.

“Damn girls! Stop flirting! It makes you look cheap!!!!!”

To which I wondered, when is it flirting and when is it just friendship? Where's the boundary that would show people whether you had already crossed the line of physically expressing one's most ancient, natural feelings?

Someone's smelly cheeseburger is also wafting its way toward me. EWWW. Didn't I just bound and cast all fried things away from me?! It is almost 9 p.m. This café never closes, but it's definitely time to catch a train back to the house.  ¶ 4/17/2005 08:42:00 PM 0 comments

  hear, speak, see... nothing
hear, speak, see... nothing
Originally uploaded by ulanmaya.

dc friends.
i dunno.
ahahahaha.

  ¶ 4/16/2005 05:26:00 PM 0 comments

  mickey Ds turns 50

the old rock n' roll mcdonald's is gone and in its stead rises this huge, 2-storey restaurant and museum. around this mcdo is the hard rock cafe, rainforest cafe, an 8-floor sportmart and excalibur club. mickeyD turns 50... and is still alive. wow. what an odd miracle.

i can't eat mcdonald's food anymore - i mean, my first-ever job was at a mickey d's. although one of the funnest workplaces, it made me the humungous whale that i already am :-(.

i would come back to the house everyday for six months smelling of burgers and fries, making my siblings beg for me to bring them leftovers. ewww. i wouldn't give this food to my worst enemy, that would be like holding a gun to their head. "eat! eat! EAT, mine enemy! it is the surest way to be rid of yooooooo!!!" i thought of all the food we made and the food we threw, and it just grosses me out. fat is the safest ingredient in those things, people. trust me.

ok, so don't trust me. just watch super size me, or read fast food nation instead.

for some americans living elsewhere in the world, mcdonald's is the nearest they can get to "home." but isn't that more of a starbucks thing? - i'm kidding. the golden arches are the first most visible symbols of globalization. i digress.  ¶ 4/15/2005 08:12:00 PM 0 comments

  Lijiang Postcard #208
Lijiang Postcard #208
Originally uploaded by mcdhz's postcards to trade.

if i had the chance, i'd jump to china in a heartbeat. but only if i had the ability to come back to my reality without missing anything there, either. hehehehe.

  ¶ 4/14/2005 03:34:00 PM 0 comments

  ergkh

it is turning out to be a crazy week. the icing on this cake is that i think i've misplaced my W2 tax form. taxes are due on the 15th. i am hoping my wednesday tomorrow will be quiet like the inside of a hospital wing at midnight.

  ¶ 4/12/2005 11:27:00 PM 0 comments

  skirt frenzy

i tried on the mixed stripe skirt, liked it, but decided to pass. i have only one other such skirt, in that fabric, and it is enough.

i couldn't find the tuscan tulip skirt but i posted it here because it looks nice... ahahaha . there was a similar dressy type skirt there, but in all black. it was layered, bunched up a bit and could have been the bottom part of some prom dress. i liked how both these skirts remind me of spanish-inspired prints and laces. hopefully next time.

the manzanita i was sooooooo lucky to have come across. i was like, finally, a skirt i won't be embarrased to wear at work!

anthropologie is my new favorite expensive store. yes, it is girly, possibly a little over the top girlie, a french cliche, a corruption of influences nonanglo-american, and i think the founder is female - who else can perfectly pitch and invite mostly women into the store - the men were checking out the books, ahaha - but my goal was to find clothes that can morph from work serious to casual day out.

one particular skirt that they don't have on their web site stayed with me saturday night till dreamtime. i couldn't get it out of my head when i woke up the next day, partly because the skirt was in a color i liked and mostly because it was on sale.

i gave in. sunday in the midst of errands i stopped by anthropologie and raided the sale section. i came away with the skirt that haunted me, the manzanita, and a couple others. i am so pleased and excited to wear those skirts not just to work but also to various events.

but don't be fooled - spending power isn't really all that. last november my high school friends and i had a chance to go to las vegas for our 10th year anniversary. to get to a certain free show of neptune, the mythical greek god of water, we had to cross several halls of a casino's high-end underground malls. it was the first time i would actually see those high-end stores that i've only read about in american magazines growing up in quezon city. i thought those didn't exist! ahaha

"do any of these stores actually make money?" my friend ali asked, looking at a hideous dress that looked like torn rags barely stitched together. the prices would make you think they probably make the half month's rent of the place. and it is las vegas - you can just believe anything about everything in that city. people can loose their minds, souls, bodies, along with their finances, there.

yesterday las vegas didn't occur to me while i raided anthropologie's sale section, i only thought of the situations and places i would wear these skirts. so i grinned and turned and replaced two other skirts back onto their racks. sometimes it really is just nicer and much more fulfilling to just look.

  ¶ 4/10/2005 05:40:00 PM 4 comments

  paris

one of these days i am going to paris and stay there for a long time. i can't say for good yet because i really want to go see how manila is right now. i really have no reason to go back - aside from family. and yes, i'll admit it, the writing culture, both literary and journalism. but it is a world i could never fit in. thus, if i were to be a stranger of the world, i might as well be somewhere i totally might not be able to relate much to.

how arrogant of me to disregard chicago. the city has done me nothing but good, actually. i have even yet to truly penetrate the writing culture here. i have written and contributed much, but only in marginal ways. i keep on listening to folks who refuse to pay the price to even try.

maybe that's exactly what i need anyways - to travel, and stay there for lengths of time. to travel, and meet and learn about various cultures and ideas. to be disciplined and acquire courage to be trimmed - and even i get tried of these monologues.

but today, today was a perfect, sunny day. the dark is descending now actually, ahaha, i have to head back to the house soon. i'm at chicago's gold coast neighborhood - it is GREAT to finally spend some time here. i actually just wanted to go to a starbucks, and here i am. :-) i need to do some work, and i like to people watch, but i don't want to be obvious about it. i didn't realize that this cafe has its own resident loonie ahaha - or maybe he's just friendly, and we the customers of this high-end starbucks think he's a character.

he is a man in a black trench coat and black leather zorro-like hat that was doing poses for a sketcher who indulges him. when i took this seat by the window, the man started posing more and joking, the people outside him obliging him. and then he entered the store and leaned close to my shoulder. the sketcher actually sits on an outside bench directly before me, so he can just say he was looking at her sketch, but you kinna wonder because he can just ask her to show him. he changes position to my other shoulder, and sits at the couch near this bar. interesting, isn't it?

the man's companions leave. he sits quietly for a while, stands up, and, pensively, follows their direction. i wonder how different are we, in that i write for strangers to read, and for free, while he might have been in theatre, but there's no show tonight.

i miss talking about dreams and possibilities. i miss being honest about them. i miss getting the real shattered into me, because it means the possibilities remain limitless, and i can start again.

when i go to paris, i want to be a whole person by then ahaha - i want to share it with someone. that's a city i so want to see, and i am going to save it for last. there are a hundred other places and possibilities to consider for the meantime.  ¶ 4/09/2005 08:20:00 PM 0 comments

  ulanmaya on msn there is a saint set aside especially for web communications. truly, because i was granted this:

ulanmaya on msn

may i use it well.  ¶ 4/08/2005 11:09:00 PM 0 comments

  miffed!!! i tell ya an event that i would have TOTALLY fudged excuses for to attend had passed a mile way over my head. ERGKH!!!! you have no clue how desperately ANNOYED i am at the whole deal!!!

*distracted by work. work, work, work! want, want, want! arghhhhh!!!*

ok. it is an hour and several jokes later and the anger is still searing my veins, but no good can come out of demolishing a dam of frustration about missing a key event like this.

i should lighten up.
imma call a fellow writer.
i emailed this article's writer. i hope she replies back.

i need more non-writer friends.
actually, i have enough of those already. this is why i so wanted to go to this event!!!

i'm annoyed because i'm supposed to have mastered the art of not missing a thing! how much more delusional can you get?! :-(

about fudging excuses, i needta get on my acting gear. i can't lie very well, i think. but i'm still annoyed!!! :-(


Filipinos make news in NY
Posted 08:59pm (Mla time) April 02, 2005
By Carissa Villacorta
Inquirer News Service
Web page

Editor's Note: Published on page C2 of the April 3, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

NEW YORK-Filipino and Filipino-American professionals working in New York media companies met for the first time at a cocktail reception hosted recently by Consul General Cecilia B. Rebong at the Philippine Center in Manhattan.

Searching for Filipinos working in US media, the Consulate General found over 50 Filipinos and Filipino-Americans in such prestigious media outlets as CNN, Reuters, Associated Press, ABC-7, CBS-2, Bloomberg TV, MTV, CNBC, Time magazine, Newsweek, Businessweek, New York Times, Newsday, Barron's, Village Voice, Fortune magazine, People magazine, Rolling Stone magazine, Oprah magazine, ESPN-The Magazine, Elle D‚cor, Fairchild Publications and Conde Nast.

The media practitioners were joined by diplomats from the Philippine Embassy in Washington, D.C., the Philippine Consulate General in New York, the Offices of the Trade and Tourism Representatives, and the Philippine Mission to the United Nations. Editors of Filipino-American media and selected community leaders also attended the intimate celebration.

Many Filipinos are aware that there's a sizeable presence of Filipino medical and health-care practitioners in the US. But they may not know that there is quite a number of Filipino professionals on the editorial board of leading international publishing and production companies. As the New York affair showed, the Filipinos who write, decide and report the news are definitely newsworthy themselves.

Philippine Ambassador Albert F. del Rosario, the guest of honor, briefed the media members on key developments in Philippine relations with the United States.

"Our discussions with the media guests were congenial and constructive," he said, adding that the achievements of the Filipino mediamen empower and give honor to the Fil-Am community and the country.

Former New Jersey Mayor Robert Rivas said it wouldn't be long before he'd cease being known as the first Filipino mayor in the Northeast region as more Filipinos become mayors in the US.

Connection

"Everyone in this room is connected by similar experiences, values, histories and aspirations," said Rebong. "In their current roles, our Filipino mainstream journalists have the avenues and capacities to help each other in their individual goals, as well as contribute to progress of the Filipino and the Philippines.

ABC-TV production assistant Monica dela Rosa said, "It was such a great event. I was happy to meet my fellow Filipinos in the industry."

When the evening ended, guests took home Philippine-inspired gift bags from Tatak Pilipino, a Filipino heritage store in New Jersey. The bag contained Neni Sta. Romana-Cruz's "You Know You're Filipino If...," a Philippine flag, dried mango treats, a Philippine trade and investment CD, and a tourist map of the Philippines.

The impact of the meeting will go beyond the walls of the Kalayaan Hall and the island of Manhattan.

In the end, one realizes that being Filipino reflects on everything a Filipino does, including journalism. And if Filipinos do their work with passion, integrity and responsibility, they give honor to themselves, their work and their country-even if they don't make the headline.

E-mail the author at cvillacorta@gmail.com  ¶ 4/08/2005 07:10:00 PM 0 comments

  godspeed the public part of the funeral mass has just ended. it was a beautiful mix of majesty, sacredness, street emotion, democracy, and everything that the church has stood for and fought for and practiced and showed since its inception 2,000 years ago. it is wonderful to see how smoothly vatican officials have distributed communion to the hundreds of thousands of faithful. it's wonderful to hear them so satisfied that despite physical discomforts in the crush of humanity, there are no mass riots and they chant their hearts, "santo subito."

giovanni paulo
JP2
we love you.
thank you.  ¶ 4/08/2005 05:59:00 AM 0 comments

  all pope all the time a colleague joked, "if i see a dead pope on the cover of my paper again. ..."

we all laughed, because he is, after all, still dead. tomorrow, we're going to cover places where people are watching coverage of the pope.

naturally. this is how today's news is. kinna like a snake eating its own tail. you're not at the center of action, but you're expected to cover your own back yard, because the lives of normal people are, after all, still important.

in the old days, they used to write tomes of novels about life's minutiae and titled them "ulysses" and "portraits."

but then again, they also couldn't travel to the moon and wirelessly practice storytelling via electronic pulses literally plucked from the air. our tools have improved beyond measure, but our stories haven't.

john paul II wrote something about this as well - when i find it, i'll blog.

---

Pope John Paul II funeral viewing gatherings:

Five Holy Martyrs Church
4327 S. Richmond St.
(773) 254-3636
2 a.m. funeral vigil

The northwest side Jesuit Community Center in Portage Park also has a 2 a.m. funeral mass and viewing scheduled.

Loyola University Chicago
Stella Maris Chapel, second floor of the Mundelein Center
6525 N. Sheridan Road
11:45 a.m. Celebration of the Eucharist

DePaul University telecast, Holy Father’s Funeral Liturgy
All Morning (continuous re-broadcast)
Lincoln Park Student Center
DePaul Center, 11th floor
There will also be a funeral mass, St. Vincent de Paul Church 1010 W. Webster Ave. Contact: Richard Balentine, 773-325-4869.

POPE JOHN PAUL II MEMORIAL MASSES:

April 8, Romeoville: Polish-language Mass at 6 a.m. St. Andrew the Apostle, 530 Glen Ave.

April 8, Bensenville: Trilingual masses at 7 p.m. at St. Andrew the Apostle and St. Alexis, 400 W. Wood St.

April 9, Champaign: St. Matthew Catholic Church. 11 a.m. 1303 Lincolnshire Drive.

April 10, Wood Dale: Bishop Joseph L. Imesch celebrates a memorial Mass. 1 p.m. Holy Ghost Church, 254 N. Wood Dale Road.

  ¶ 4/07/2005 10:20:00 PM 0 comments

  the blue on this pix sucks!

well, that's no one's fault except mine. i coulda taken it in natural light, but nooooo... i hadta rush into a starbucks so i can take out the card and oogle at its beautiful blue and take a pix to post online, forgetting that starbucks is lit with lampshade-happy yellow light bulbs.

feh. that's not even blue. i dunno what color that its.

otherwise, the postcard trade is doing great! got a couple more cards in the last two days, one of them from the cool film 'krieger und die kaiserin' (the princess and the warrior). will post them soon.


try surviving a head-on collision and choking in your own blood.


yay! for elevated train tracks.   ¶ 4/06/2005 07:54:00 PM 0 comments

  who wants postcards? :-)

i collect postcards, been collecting them since 1995. but i only have like 20 or so from people and from buying some good ones here and there in my travels, ehehehe.

if anyone wants to trade with me, send me a postcard from your city, inscripted (write something about the view on the card), and i'll send you one from chicago. postcards mailed within the u.s. are 23c. postcards mailed to overseas from the u.s. are 70c, or two 37c stamps. click here for a photoalbum of what i have. (but i still have to upload more into that album.)

please email me so we can swap mailing addresses, and if you have questions.

uh, please allow at least a week for me to reply and send your card, ahaha. but i promise to reply - i'm never one to not reply to an email. let's start trading!   ¶ 4/05/2005 11:00:00 PM 0 comments

  it is orange day in illinois!

pao_on_thin_ice (10:04:27 PM): hi
ulanmaya (10:09:33 PM): hey paolo! how r u
ulanmaya (10:09:34 PM): sorry
ulanmaya (10:09:36 PM): i was at another desk
ulanmaya (10:09:51 PM): ooh - who's this girl on your IM?
pao_on_thin_ice (10:11:03 PM): oh geeez
pao_on_thin_ice (10:11:06 PM): a friend
pao_on_thin_ice (10:11:10 PM): nothing going on
ulanmaya (10:11:10 PM): oooh
ulanmaya (10:11:16 PM): ahahahaha
ulanmaya (10:11:25 PM): ok if u say so
ulanmaya (10:11:36 PM): how r u
pao_on_thin_ice (10:14:17 PM): im okay how are you
ulanmaya (10:19:03 PM): it is orange day in illinois today
pao_on_thin_ice (10:19:09 PM): i know!
ulanmaya (10:19:14 PM): ukranian victor yushchenko is in town
ulanmaya (10:19:26 PM): and the illini are down 2 from n.c. ahahahahaha
ulanmaya (10:19:34 PM): THEY ARE DOWN TWO!
ulanmaya (10:19:37 PM): how can that be?
ulanmaya (10:19:43 PM): that's supposed to be impossible
pao_on_thin_ice (10:25:11 PM): awww
ulanmaya (10:26:49 PM): they lost?
ulanmaya (10:26:51 PM): how can that be?
ulanmaya (10:26:53 PM): pao?
ulanmaya (10:26:57 PM): how how how?
ulanmaya (10:27:00 PM): ahahahaha
pao_on_thin_ice (10:27:00 PM): i dont know
ulanmaya (10:27:05 PM): we're so deflated right now
pao_on_thin_ice (10:27:08 PM): i dont follow cb
ulanmaya (10:27:12 PM): and five minutes before i get off work, too
pao_on_thin_ice (10:27:24 PM): be careful on your way home
ulanmaya (10:27:43 PM): the 2005 ncaa championships should read "Illinois: 2005 NCAA Champions"
pao_on_thin_ice (10:27:53 PM): i know
ulanmaya (10:27:53 PM): not some UNC blue people
ulanmaya (10:27:54 PM): ahahahaha
ulanmaya (10:27:59 PM): blue looking type green colors
ulanmaya (10:28:03 PM): not clear like orange
ulanmaya (10:28:08 PM): orange is a cooler color
pao_on_thin_ice (10:28:09 PM): haha
pao_on_thin_ice (10:28:11 PM): dont hate
ulanmaya (10:28:22 PM): u can't blame me!
ulanmaya (10:28:29 PM): u can't blame a hurting person like me!
pao_on_thin_ice (10:28:29 PM): haha i know
pao_on_thin_ice (10:28:33 PM): haha
pao_on_thin_ice (10:28:34 PM): awwwwww
ulanmaya (10:28:42 PM): the pope is gone, now the championships are wrenched from us!
ulanmaya (10:28:46 PM): it's not fair!
ulanmaya (10:28:52 PM): i give up!
ulanmaya (10:28:57 PM): goodbye world!!!!!!
pao_on_thin_ice (10:29:39 PM):

  ¶ 4/04/2005 10:34:00 PM 0 comments

  things they warned u should do #513,667: do show up at college job fairs even if you already have a full-time gig. you'll stand out like an aged cousin calling you to come down from the fruit tree, but you'll deprive yourself of prospects if you don't.

don't you wish you just had that ability when you were starting out the rat race - to see the future? i went to a communications job fair at my old school last thursday, just to check it out and to finally meet and leave my resume with the magazines and radio stations i said i would contact last year.

it was a chilly thursday, so i wore my specialty: winter gear. black skirt, tall boots, a collared shirt that was characteristically tight in the middle but long on the arms, spilling an inch past my lucky blue sweater, and blue urban outfitters skirty trench coat. i made the other kids in the elevator squirm with their gray and black all over the place.

so i fixed my stare into the steel elevator doors - they can't be scared of shortie me. i exited first and shed my coat because i already felt awkward with my messenger bag.

the fair was unbelievably successful. i was so pleased! :-D i came relatively early but brought only five resumes, so i ran out. prospects were bleak last year, but they were better this year.

what a difference a year makes. nothing much has changed, actually, just that i travelled more last year and started blogging more regularly. i also started writing real stuff, and was given more responsibilities in the office. i must be insane to be looking for an extra job, i thought, on top of everything i already do, but who am i kidding - i need moolah.

tomorrow i have to make one of my first callbacks, as well as write thank you notes to everyone whose emails i could get a hold of. i was really glad i just went to the job fair - it gave me a chance to look at my portfolio. most of my clips were new this year, allowing me to provide another fat one. i don't think i stood out like someone's mama, but it sure felt like it. i learned it is always a good idea to never miss a professional opportunity, however unlikely for prospects it could be.

the best part is that i learned to relax - in a job fair setting, everyone is nervous about everyone else in that kind of environment already. if you try too hard, it shows, at least, it shows on me. and it just comes across funny. ahahahaha. especially on me.

there was this WLS (ABC channel 7 radio) recruiter who was constantly rearranging piles of handout paper on their desk, that when i approached his open, interested face, he chatted but immediately referred me to a woman, who seemed just as jittery. they were great! offered me a ton of info where else to look. which made me wonder whether to be discouraged because i don't think they realize that when someone appraches their desk, they're hoping to work for them, not a nameless entity. which is a really bad thing to blog about because the nameless entity is actually a reliable, insiders-only-know-about-them type gig, and might actually let me do what i told them i wanted to do, that is, write. (and be paid for it, i mean. when i go back to gradschool, the time when essentially i start from scratch once again, then i can consider working for them for free.)

"those (writing) jobs are really hard to come by," the lady said, "i mean, no one leaves those jobs. they open up when someone dies -"

and well, yanno. they told me to look somewhere else, which is a lot from the overworked upper crust - contacts are just as great as a job offer. i don't want someone dying just so i could seize the chance to work there. i'll try what they said, but i'll try again next year.  ¶ 4/04/2005 03:11:00 AM 0 comments

  the pope didn't do much. all he did was work on the things he already had - a chance at education, and he did that well. a chance at a hobby, and he played and acted in theatre well. a chance to change the lives of his fellow poles, and he did that well.

he didn't reach very far, either. by working on his own country, he was able to hasten the formidable communist movement's demise from poland, starting a chain of events that eventually led to the fall of communism from eastern europe. he forgot about the millions applauding him when someone came to kiss his ring or offer him an embrace. pictures show him a human being relating to another, he just happens to dress formidably.

he took stock of his own person when he made his visits. he is aware of being the first nonitalian pope in over four centuries; he made several visits to his home country. he used this fact of his life and his stamina to reach out to catholics worldwide, going to neighborhing european countries to remind them of their nearness to each other, visiting far-off continents to remind them they aren't cut off and so different from the church at all.

he used his gift for words and languages to address his audiences in spanish when in latin america, french and german when in europe, english everywhere else. he used his gift for eloquence and delivery in his numerous letters, addresses, meetings and homilies.

he used his faith to acknowledge his humanity and to pray and to keep believing. at holy name cathedral saturday night, i picked up this prayer card printing one of the pope's prayers:

prayer for vocations

holy spirit, eternal spring of joy and peace,
    it is you who open the heart and the mind to the divine call;
    it is you who make effective every impetus
    towards good, towards truth, towards charity.

your 'inexpressible groans'
    rise up to the father from the heart of the church,
    which suffers and struggles for the gospel.

open the hearts and minds of young men
    so that a new flowering of holy vocations to the priesthood
    may show forth the fidelity of your love,
    and all may know christ,
    the true light of the world
    to offer to every human being
    the sure hope of eternal life. amen.

links:

• archdiocese of chicago
• for more info on the priesthood, contact fr. joe noonan at 847-970-4845 or visit chicagopriest.org.
• the holy see (the vatican's web site)

  ¶ 4/03/2005 03:08:00 AM 0 comments

  in passing friends, john paul II has died. from cnn reports, that he had been "responding correctly" to prompts for his attentions, it seems that he was conscious of his surroundings and actions until the very end. the vatican press office states that he died in his apartments, just as he said he wanted. he died 1:37 p.m. chicago time, 9:37 p.m. rome time. he was 84.

my regret is that there won't be any more admonitions of "go to sleep!" after a vigil mass, no more jokes of "wake up!" for sunday morning world youth day mass, no more eloquently-written stories and letters that very hopefully and joyfully encourage youth to believe, to take chances, to travel, to learn, to pray, to be not afraid.

but no, some of the church's songs still lack the power and energy exuded by youth. :wry:  ¶ 4/02/2005 02:31:00 PM 0 comments

  still around down with cnn

with a foggy brain i wake and follow the babble of cnn to check on the pope.

"pope's body will be placed in a triple-lined casket," said the graphic on the bottom of the screen.

"AHHHHH!!!! NAMATAY NA SIYA!!!!"

my sister ran from our mother's room. "namatay na siya?"

"NAMATAY NA SIYA!" my hands keep my face from falling apart. my voice couldn't form the words, "namatay na nga ba siya?"

my sister, eyes transfixed, "... di pa?"

the t.v. announces, in future tense, "the election that follows will be secret... the window of the apartment will open, and the new pope will introduce himself. ..."

online, "Vatican: Pope has fever, still responsive. ..."

"AHHH!!! CNN sucks!!!"

---
race to kill 'em all

everyone (all the mainstream media outlets) killed yasser arafat at least once, including the AP. our comfort is that reuters killed him off first before we did.

with the pope, the entire AP cautiously tread as if the office floors were made of broken glass. your trying to be helpful is misconstrued as blocking someone's way. when news broke that the pope's condition worsened the deeper the night turned, everyone became cranky. when you turn cranky, the jokes come.

but the pope, like always, beat the world to the best tease, "i'm not dead yet!"   ¶ 4/02/2005 01:52:00 PM 0 comments

  prayers, please
photo from world youth day 2002, sunday closing mass, toronto, canada.

the pope is the only faraway superstar-type person that remains of interest to me. st. peter's square in the vatican is crowded with people, most of them praying, some of them might not even be christian, and are just there out to partake in something intuitively historic.

my friend t wouldn't want me posting this letter of hers online anywhere, but i will anyways, because she expresses a careful honesty in this particular letter that, at the moment, i can't duplicate. please join us in praying for the pope, so he'll traverse this latest passage of his life with the same victory and grace he's always shown the world.

hi, folks--

i just wanted to ask a prayer request. i guess sometime today the pope had heart failure and while he's still alive, things don't look good as he would always recover before. i know not all of you are catholic (or even christian), but there's something about you that makes me comfortable to reach out.

i know the church and the pope are not perfect, but it has a lot more to do with relationship and identity than it does with dogma. if you could take a couple seconds to keep him in your thoughts or prayers and those of us who are hurting, that would be priceless to me.

peace,
t  ¶ 4/01/2005 04:26:00 PM 0 comments