I've missed so much posts over the holidays but with so much happening around and nothing much at the same time, I don't think we can blame anyone, including me, for this. For one, the pandemic is still ongoing here in my place and we still don't have vaccines for it of decent or good quality here 'til now. The rest of the world, especially the west and even Japan are getting vaccinated already. So there continues to be this fear and anxiety of going out unless we want to contract the virus that's already mutated in several countries and continents like the UK and South Africa. As for there being nothing much at all going on---a lot of us are still stuck at home either working from home or mostly doing nothing at all so, yeah.
Heaven knows I have a lot of stuff to post on there but the lack of tripods around here keep me from really posting and no matter, I have stuff coming in over the next few days that has to do with that. Ugh. FINALLY! We'll be doing A TON of catching up over the next few days, weeks and months or so. Yay!
Meanwhile, let's catch up on some of life's going-ons today and see what I'd been up to since the holidays until now and a few other things that you might be seeing on this blog in the next few weeks or so.
A regular, slightly uneventful but family everything-laden holidays
My holidays are usually spent with family. That's just how I roll. It's how everyone goes on here in the Philippines because we're a family first country. And the Philippines wouldn't be it if there was no feeling of family or community in here.
It goes without saying, then, that I spent my holidays---all of Christmas Eve and Christmas day, my granddad's birthday last December 28 and New Year's Eve and New Year's Day---going back and forth from the city to the country side, 30-45 minutes away from the said city with my younger brother at the wheel of the Ford pick-up. Present in the drives is my cousin from the United States who's studying in college here for the time being and sometimes, my mom and dad. In those occasions, it's mostly me, my grandparents, brother, cousin and parents in my grandparents' home. It harks back to the old days when I'd go home there with a lot of family to spend the weekends when school's out for me here in the city so it's really just super nostalgic, yeah. That's basically 8 people spending time together in one huge, two-tiered house in the countryside still mostly, adequately socially-distanced from one another so it's been a kind of safe and healthy celebration of the three occasions somehow.
Of course there was a lot of food had, there's Noche Buena on Christmas Eve and Media Noche on New Year's Eve, and cake and ice cream on my grandad's birthday. Just...your regular, simple holiday and birthday celebrations. They only became closer to a party when we zoom called everyone in the SoCal and another family member in Texas so it's been so fun catching up with everyone so far, even just, digitally.
There were no trips to the beach even if a lot of it is just a stone's throw away. Well, just a walk or hike away, anyway. Nor was there a trip to the nearby waterfalls made like last year's so that's quite a bummer. These are usually what I look forward to when I'm in that place, Jasaan. Which reminds me I still have to take someone's offer to take me to the sandbar on there I've only been to once just for R&R-ing, professional beach bumming. I miss doing the latter this whole time we've been on the longest ever lockdown from all over the world. Yay, Philippines! Nay. It sucks to be here when you can't do the very thing people do here all the time: swimming, sunbathing and picnicking in really pretty, picturesque beaches and pools of the lot of resorts we have here and oh, backpacking to islands one has never been to which I had been planning for so long pre-pandemic.
But anyway, how about you? How did you spend the holidays this year?
An equally, slightly uneventful few weeks of January 2021 at home, of course!
....because, really, what else is there to do when you can't backpack to an island you've never been to like Bantayan Island in Cebu and a few others?
I don't really have much to update on here because there's really nothing going on save for that catch-up with the best friend on discord one time early into January 2021 and me, joining my first Cupsleeves event for the Pentagon maknaes (the youngest members of the boygroup, Pentagon, namely Yuto, Kino, and Wooseok). so there's really, really just the in-betweens. Now's the time to start counting how many times I write really on here and you can even play the drinking game to it. LOL.
And this brings us to...
....the tiniest, most miniscule, simplest In-betweens
This pandemic period and it's accompanying, quite lengthy lockdowns have got us staying home, working from home, and even re-examining and reconnecting with ourselves at home. This has all been about self-discovery, a lot more self-love and should we be living with others like I do, spending more time with both extended and immediate ones. It's definitely a time for the in-betweens, the simplest kinds there is---those tiny details we tend to forget actually exist because we're too busy with the big things pre-pandemic like travelling, working away from home to earn our keeps and more.
So yes, basically late 2020 and 2021 is also all about the tiniest, easy to ignore and forget they exist in-betweens for me, namely:
- the ongoing addiction and attachment to Dutchmill's Soy Secretz in Chocolate Hazelnut. I buy about 4 solo boxes of it every two weeks or so. Maybe almost every week...hmn...
- there's also the attachment and obsession with cans of Mug Rootbeer. Sometimes, it's the whole bottle but mostly just the cans because I get them with Soy Secretz from Savemore, Capistrano, yeah.
- in connection with the latter, I really like pairing 7-11's mushroom sisig siopao with Mug Rootbeer too. As someone who's not huge on caffeine---I only drink black coffee either iced or with bread on hand to dunk into it, very sparingly---I like Mug Rootbeer because it says on the can it contains no caffeine...so...yeah.
- ....on January 26, a day early into Pentagon Kino's birthday, I celebrated his birthday with the cupsleeves and A LOT of really fun freebies I got from SunriseBlissPTG on twitter. I registered for the cupsleeves event (CSE) and bought and paid for my cupsleeves and very fun inclusions or extras last December 2020 and received the package a day after Yuto's birthday so since I missed Yuto's birthday, I made sure to celebrate Kino's instead. Here's how this one went below:
- ....in connection to the one above, I'm also currently, very much addicted to toast. Mostly it's avocado toast but it could also be just regular toast. So addicted to it that I'd even eat toast or lunch and dinner. lol.
- ....then there's the attachment to Burger King's plant-based burger meal, yep. I'm planning to get some more sometime soon. It's either this or 7-11's mushroom sisig siopao. lol.
- ....finally got to use my Sampleroom account! Here are those that came in the mail from last December 2020's transaction with them:
I'm usually not big on mainstream products since I have Human Heart Nature but because of Sampleroom PH, I finally got to try some I'd been eyeing from Watson's and some others. St. Ives is definitely a brand I can get behind. I love the soothing mask and the scrub is definitely fun to use 1-2 times a week! The Hygienix wipes are handy when you're travelling or out of the house for stuff. The only thing I don't like about Sampleroom PH however is how long they take to approve reviews. Mine still aren't approved until now and I don't think they'll ever approve those. Ever. I live in the south, well away from the NCR so I can't hand in the reviews at the allotted time they've given because it takes weeks for the products to get to me here---thanks, covid 19-caused delays in delivering packages---so yeah, I think this is one kink in their systems they need to fix. Some of us aren't exactly from the NCR so it'll take us more time to review stuff.
It's against their regulations to have two accounts on there but I've signed up for another because I doubt I'll ever get my points back from them, ever. Heh.
- ....journaling and datebook planning again, yay! I just have to have some photos printed out in some small sizes or so for the latter, yeah. I'll work on that one sometime soon. Tools of this trade include the Coffeebean and Tea Leaf planner I redeemed last December 2020---got it in fun light pink so yay~---and the Human Heart Nature Thrive journal. The journal is an anniversary one I'd been meaning to get way, wayyy back but I couldn't really get on with the price so it took me until the beginning of this month to decide to get it. It's buy 1 journal get 1 free so it's ALL GOOD.
The only qualm I have about this one is that some pages of it have biblical quotes in them. I'm agnostic and am more of a lapsed, non-practicing Roman Catholic---mostly an apatheist now---so I can easily ignore them. It comes with coloring pages but I'm not coloring them because I'd tried that before with the Bo's Coffee creative journal thing way back and I found out I'm not really into coloring stuff so yeah. And the dotted lines give you a lot of freedom to do anything with it. It's actually why I like this journal. When it works, it works.
- ....buying or stocking up on a lot of vegan stuff from shopee.
- my current favorites on this are:
- Jack's Produce Vegan Sardines in tomato oil/sauce, it's also available in chili oil, rice bran oil and corn oil
- Veg-E Tapa, also available are frankfurters, sausages, choplets, meat/meatloaf style ones, and hamburger (the one I used for the vegan burger above). I saw that the store I got this from has the vegan isaw ones so I might try that one next.
- and rereading a lot of my favorite Nora Roberts short stories. The ones she published on Silhouette anyway. My current favorites to reread: the Night Tales' Night Shift, Night Shade and sometimes, the Night Smoke...I've yet to get Night Shield and I saw someone on ebay have this so we'll see...hmn... oh and her Donovan Legacy's Entranced. I love Sebastian Donovan on there and like him among the three Donovan cousins so there's that. Ah...I'm looking to get the fourth one, Enchanted, too on ebay since I saw someone has this there too. I'll wait until I can justify actually getting those along with some three books of Sara Shepard's Pretty Little Liars I'd been eyeing, oh and a Washington Irving short stories book.