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I couldn't think of a suiting gift for my daughter; so I decided to open a savings account for her instead. I know there are a lot of things she needs right now, but nothing really that special. I want to give her a very special gift since this will be her first Christmas; and a savings account would be pretty special. It would be something she can use and benefit from, years and maybe decades from today.

I want her to be able to pursue whatever she want in life, as long as it will make her genuinely happy. In a way this could pave the way towards her future ambitions.

I'd give her material gifts but I am hesitant, since I don't want her to turn out like me who finds comfort in material things. Despite what society feeds (or should i say sells) us on a daily basis, I want her to learn contentment and be happy with herself for who she really is.

In a society who's cynicism knows no bounds, dreams and ambitions may very well be our only release to save our sanity. I guess the best gift we can give our children this holiday season is a brighter and stable future, and perhaps point out our mistakes/flaws to them so they may learn and maybe correct them within themselves..

Against my better judgment I attended our ("their") company's Christmas party last Saturday. It was as I expected it, I tried my best to learn something from the situation but being a hypocrite was harder than it looked. I can stomach a lot of things, I can compromise my virtues if it were necessary but trying to be a part of something such as "that" company (or similar firms) is too much to ask. I find it appalling to act in such a way in order to gain their favor.

I asked myself if it was necessary to play nice just to get paid? The truth is out there, We dislike each other to say the least, why can't we just be civil towards each other and drop the act of being concerned? It's the bane of my working life... I hate politics all together, but in some instances it can't be avoided... I just think office politics can be avoided or kept at a bare minimum.

Is it a result of people with way too much time on their hands? Or is it a pre-requisite in almost all levels of society? The later would be a cynical response, though as jaded as people are today I guess it may be true. I ought to to find a release from such constraints if I want to leave a positive and happy existence.

Everything has a price, but I refuse to buy into the idea that I have to stoop to such levels in order to attain financial stability... there must be some middle ground. If there weren't then life would be utterly boring wouldn't it?

I got a new freelance gig from some IT company in Libis last week; it is my first mainstream "paying" project in several years. Though I must say, despite my choice to welcome the challenge I am not as enthusiastic about it as I anticipated myself to be. Things turned out a bit different from what I've assumed them to be, especially winning in the 10th Philippine Web Awards.

It's been my goal in the past to be recognized, garner praises from the internet surfing public, and acquire mainstream projects. Though now that I got a taste of it, it isn't "all that" after all. I like designing and developing web applications, though I do it because I am driven by the idea that I am making something important to me... though lately it's been all about the money.

Now I realize why I am still doing this porn gig and putting up with my employers... the work is relatively easy and the money is fast, and I get more time to spend on things I actually want to do. Lately I've been busy with proposals and what not but I don't feel the passion in doing it. Though i feel passionate towards my other non profit projects because they mean something other than money. I know most people wouldn't understand but life is short, and I want to spend my time doing the things that make me genuinely happy. Even if it means putting up with fucked up employers, odd jobs, and enduring constant insults to my intelligence; if it means I can do the things I love doing then so be it.

My grand mother tells me (on a regular basis) that I don't get along with people, for the most part that is true. The reason being is that I speak what is on my mind; unfortunately most people don't wanna hear the truth, hence my situation. I don't wanna put on a facade for people to like me, I am who I am and there's no changing that. I'd rather have a hand full of friends rather than a neighborhood of acquaintances.

I learned something very important today as well: most of my friends who enjoy their jobs don't have big paychecks. This reinforces the thought that there are still a few people out there who don't slave over money.

Much to my surprise, I won the award for Best Personal Website in the 10th Philippine Web Awards 2007. What started off as a way to boost my domain name's traffic and page rank, turned out to be something inspiring. I wasn't expecting to reach the final round much less win, since my last 2 attempts in the past 9 years didn't even made it into the semi-final rounds. ^^v

I wanna say thanks to the people who signed the my guestbook, I really appreciate the complements and encouragements; I also wanna say thanks to my daughter Yz who was the inspiration for the Project Typecast design. Lastly thanks to my peers and to the award giving body, Media G8way.

2007 has been a great year for me with regards to my career, primarily because I've found my identity with regards to my designing style and what I really want to achieve in my career. Winning in the 10th Philippine Web awards was just icing to an already delicious cake. Not to mention my other project Kabuhayang Pinoy is slowly taking flight. I'm looking forward to 2008 with new ideas, a renewed senseof self esteem and lots of inspiration.

With that said, I hope I, and my fellow Filipino developers keep pushing the limits of our imagination and just keep on doing what we love doing with passion. I believe that if we keep at it eventually recognition and monetary opportunities will come our way; if they don't atleast we spent our time doing what we love doing, and maybe in the process inspired other upcoming developers/artists.

I got into a conversation with my grand mother over dinner, which got me thinking. The gist of the conversation were: job security, which I don't have, employee benefits which I don't have either, and other things I think I should have but don't. It's no secret that I work in the porn industry, the money is fast and easy, relatively speaking. Though most companies only offer dismal benefits to their employees especially in the industry where I am right now; no unions, security, picket lines or what not. I try my best to save as much as I can for the future; and I know bitching to the people I work for won't do me any good... like I always say I am not paid to think, ...only to follow instructions.

Which brings me to these questions: what is life after the porn industry? How long will this gig go on for me? and will I, have saved enough money and resources when this gig is up?

At the moment I can only speculate, save as much as I can and hope for the best. I just hate the uncertainty of things especially when it involves finances, since I am also thinking of my child's well being. I don't have the luxury of time as well given my handicap.

The shit just hit the fan for my computer and data yet again. I brought my 74gb raptor to the office yesterday to work, since we didn't have electricity in the house. When I got back from the office I plugged it back to my computer, then my girlfriend nudged the board, after which my b0x restarted and never booted again. After trouble shooting for an hour, I decided to reformat the drive; since the mobo seemed to be unstable already after numerous power cycles. To my surprice the C partition was fucked, all the data was fucked as well, so did the shit I've done over the weekend for my client...

Now I've just about got my shit back to were it was, and started to redo the shit I lost, among other things. Am pondering whether to replace the drive once and for all, or try changing the mobo as well. I can't find an affordable replacement for my raptor so I'll be settling for a normal SATA 7200rpm drive, and maybe crank up the memory to 3gb of fast DIMMs.

Personally I think it's a fucking waste of money to change more parts... I guess when it rains; I'll just take it in strides and hope for the best. Hopefully I can get a deal on the replacement parts.

I just bought myself a new stock of protein supplement yesterday. Fortunately I found a seller on ebay selling a 10lbs bag of the brand I use for a relatively affordable price. It set me back 4300PHP; which would probably have been twice the amount I paid for, if I bought it at the mall. At first I was worried about the authenticity of the supplement, but after asking around, the general consensus was that it would be unlikely to have fake protein supplements, since the demand for it isn't high for it to be pirated. It may be smuggled, directly imported or old stock, which ever the case it's still affordable. Eating healthy now a days is getting more expensive, so I wanna get the most affordable products if possible... which reminds me of a neat slogan I heard off the "Kenny Rogers Roasters" tv commercial:

I eat right, so I can eat more

Since I heard of it I started to take the philosophy to heart, and started training a bit harder and watching the stuff I eat. I still wanna munch down on burger and other delicious stuff in my old age and retain an active life style; so I try to take better care of myself.

I know several people who waste their money on gym memberships, lousy diets, weird contraptions, and medications to get into shape. I try to tell them that it is more of a change of lifestyle, and not something you can acquire overnight. In a world where almost everything is instant, people tend to delude themselves that there is always a shortcut to everything, but the sad truth is that sometimes there is just no substitute for hard work.

Anyway that's it for today, I gotta rest my back now since I pulled a muscle yesterday while working out. Note to self: never forget to stretch properly before working out.

If you have to much money on your hands, no one to text or just wanna help me out please vote for my site in the Philippine Web Awards through SMS. Before I go any further, each vote you cast via SMS will set you back 2.50PHP; you can cast as many votes as you want. To do so type in:

WEBBYS VOTE 83

Send it to 210 for SMART subscribers and 2973 for GLOBE subscribers. If your vote was successful you should receive a confirmation text, which should read something like "Thank you for voting for Project Typecast" ....yada yada.

Consequently you can also vote online by going to the Philippine Web Awards site, register, then cast your vote, this is free, but a bit of a hassle. For those who are willing and to those who did vote for me, I really appreciate it and thank you. Know that you have help some random guy and made yet another company richer via their SMS profits.