Blessings 112910

1. Holiday! Which not only means an opportunity to rest, but an opportunity to run errands too!

2. Me-time: finally having the time for a foot spa (after 6 mos!) and derma (after 2 mos!)

3. Finding books that I've wanted to buy on sale (20% off!)

4. Surviving Day 1 of no sugar & no carbs - which means, I managed not to eat the box of doughnuts at rehearsals or go crazy walking through the mall

5. Leisurely commute. Commute are hardly ever leisurely anymore due to always being pressed for time as well as it being the holiday season.

Blessings 112810

1) Learning I achieved a first in company history: size of bonus vs duration in the company.

2) Looking, finding and delivering pasalubong items on time! And being happy with what I purchased too! Phew!

3) Silver lining: waking up suddenly with an anxiety attack thinking I was late to a meeting. But it's a blessing because I was able to go back to sleep knowing I had a few hours of nothingness ahead of me before my next meeting. WOOHOO!

4) Still maintaining friendships with people I've known for a really long time.

5) Silver lining: Seriously worrying about spending too much recently. But it's a blessing because it's a reminder that I've come a long way from last year where my financial worries were not about spending too much, but rather, about finding enough.

Chocolate Oranges

What's this?

Hmmmmm...

*BAAAM*

Nom nom nom...

Thank you Dani for my orange-infused (& orange-formed!) chocolates from Terry's & Thorton's. Delish!

Blessings 112510

1. Learned that a few of us will be receiving a surprise treat at the end of the month.  My second since I started! Grateful that my hardwork is being appreciated at all levels, and am excited to bring it to the next level.

2. Client forwarding an email exchange between their company's 2 marketing groups, sharing between themselves how excited they were about the material we were going to produce and exclaiming how much they enjoyed working with us. Grateful to be part of a team who does inspiring work and to work with people who appreciate what we do.

3. Silver Lining Moment: thrown off (put off rather) by an exchange with someone. Blessed as it helped me recognize that I shouldn't allow anyone's actions to drag me down, dictate how I feel or set the tone for the rest of my day.

4. Coming home early. While I brought work home, glad to have the opportunity to come home and see my family still awake.

5. Expecting to only find purchases I had agreed to having purchased, blessed to have a Mom who bought me something extra anyway

Stalone's New Playmate

Mom called me about a month ago asking me if I wanted to avail of this promo that was being offered to her - some Blackberry Mobile model for some amount paid over so many months with no interest. I did my research and it was a pretty good deal -  the minimum amount wasn't so bad, and the phone itself was getting a lot of good reviews from friends who had the same phone. I began daydreaming about how it would help boost work productivity and really began considering availing of it.

Then a few days later, for no apparent reason at all, I decided I didn't need it: the money could go somewhere else, and I would survive at work w/o one.

A few weeks later I saw that a friend was selling a QWRTY nokia phone. Ever since I had left my E71i in a cab years ago, I had always dreamed I'd get one again someday. Could this day be it? The phone was hardly used, it was a great model and the price was pretty good!

Few days later,  for no apparent reason at all, I decided I didn't it: my phone was perfectly fine. 

Then about 2 weeks my phone started acting up. With too many messages it wouldn't register the person's name in the inbox and every once in a while, reception would get incredibly wonky. Not so good for someone who communicates for a living. 

Didn't stress about it too much though as I figured the phone would last. 

Then a week ago, my tito called me. His office had given him a new phone as a secondary line and for one reason or another, he preferred not to use it. He called asking if I wanted to switch phones with him. 

So now I find myself in possession of this pretty white thing, and couldn't be anymore grateful :) Meet Jean-Claude. Isn't he purty?! 

Always so amazed at how the Universe works. Never ceases to amaze me. 

photo credit: http://nokiae72whiteedition.com/index.php

Blessings 112310

Despite a number of things I needed to accomplish today, I spent most of the day in a daze. Not the floating-on-clouds-daydreaming type of daze.. but rather, the zoned-out-zombie kind of stupor.

I can think of a number of of reasons for the low energy:

• Got home from work at 3:30 am, only to be up a few hours later
• Pagod carried over from a few hours of sleep the night before that
• Exhaustion settling in after the adrenalin of meeting a deadline and delivering a big project 
• Overwhelmed with work and not knowing where or how to start

On top of being an unproductive day, I dampened my mood even more by beating myself up for having "wasted" what could have been a more productive day.

Then I got thinking about perspective. That eventually led to a light-bulb moment, wherein you are able to take universal nuggets of wisdom and suddenly apply it to your own life. 

So I saw the silver the lining. And saw that negative experiences can be as potent a blessing as a great one. So let me rewind and recount my day of unexpected blessings:

"Got home from work at 3:30 am, only to be up a few hours later" 

is a blessing because 

it means I am dedicated and passionate about my goals

"Pagod carried over from a few hours of sleep the night before that" 

is a blessing because 

in exchange for precious rest hours, I glorified God through song 

and spent quality time with my siblings

"Exhaustion settling in after the adrenalin 

of meeting a deadline and delivering a big project" 

is a blessing because

it means I had the opportunity to pour energy 

into a something that would affect people positively

"Overwhelmed with work and not knowing where or how to start"

is a blessing because

it means I am being trusted with more work 

and now have more opportunities to learn and grow

 And yes, while I have generally been tired, I am grateful to have a body that warns me when I'm pushing myself too much. So yes, while I may have had an opportunity to be more productive today, I am grateful for a stress-free day and the chance to breathe in-between big deadlines.

Blessings: 24 Oct - 20 Nov (Part 1)

While waiting for my work files to upload, I decided to finish updating my facebook albums.

Now while THOSE are uploading, thought I'd post something new here. Had no idea a MONTH had already past since I last did this exercise!

Anyway, here are a few I noted the week of after I got back from my trip to Vietnam / Cambodia, as well as a few more from the last week:

Trip related:

1. 

Lower forex and thus spending less than what I expected to spend when I had to buy a flight last minute.

2.

 Getting to Cambodia safely despite several bus breakdowns. 

3. 

Despite initially wanting to bus back, glad we ended up staying an extra day in Siem Reap where we spent the whole morning just recharging and lounging around the hotel. Didn't realize how exhausted I had been till I had the opportunity to sleep for more than 4 hours! lol

4. 

Exploring sites and sounds of Siem Reap & Ho Chi Minh. 

5.

Special mention goes out to seeing the amazing temples around  Siem Reap such as 

Angkor Wat, Ta Prohm and Bayon

6. 

Having lucked out with all our hotel and food choices. 

simple serendipity: crunchy chocolate milk

I used to mix up powdered milk with Milo and snack on that dry. But as powdered milk is no longer a food staple at home, Milo is now taken by itself.

Other chocolate milk mixes like Swiss Miss I love hot.. but Milo? Milo I take cold. I love how the Milo clumps on top and leaves a layer of crunch for you to spoon up or catch while your jugging it down.

Try it! It's good stuff I tell you.

2:00 am Update

• It's nearly 2 in the morning and I'm still in the office with 3 colleagues
• There are 4 accounts being worked on in parallel this evening (ehm.. morning): 2 books that are at different stages but both of which need to go to print this week, crisis management for 1 cinema ad that needs to go out this Friday and an AVP & brochure concept that is being presented on Friday.
• I have a signage and wayfinding presentation tomorrow that I haven't studied for yet.
• To officially end my work day, I have emails I need to respond to and project statuses to update and time tables to generate. Not to mention that non-work commitments I need to attend to. 
• My eyes are so painful I feel like pulling them out. 

In other news, I did see a number of Facebook status' this morning that talked about being grateful, etc, etc.. so yes, while I may sound like I'm complaining, I'm very grateful for the opportunities to push myself, learn and grow. 

Just thought I'd blow off some steam before diving back into work.