Still tired... And overweight

I'm still inexplicably exhausted every morning when I wake up.

There are fewer idle moments. Moments I used to hate but now I crave.

I have just accepted the fact that I am overweight. I'm getting too fat too fast. Now what am I to do?

Eating has become more than just a necessity for me, it's a pastime, a celebration, a way to break the stress.

The unrelenting forward momentum of work, school and life always push me to the next meal. Eating is the like an aspirin to a headache. It relieves the discomfort, but the source is undeniably still there.

Life isn't slowing down. In my efforts to be "competitive" and yet still enjoy life, I've pushed and strained myself to my limits... That's when I eat.

Lunch break and merienda are welcome events that "pause" the work tasks of the day and dinner time is the climax.

The thing about dinner time is that's the meal where there is no time limit. It's not like breakfast where I'd be in such a hurry to get to work, or lunch where I have to eat in an hour and a half or less. Dinner time at the end of the day has no succeeding event save for sleep. I take my time and indulge in the home cooked meal before me. That's where I gain the most weight: eating 'till I'm about to burst then going straight to sleep.

I don't set aside time to exercise regularly anymore. Going home late from work discourages any sort of activity at night. The weeknight jogs I used to take are now a thing of a past as staying in the office way past 7 has become the norm... No one is forcing me to stay most of those times. I guess I have to learn when to stop working, to stop pushing myself to do more at work.

I have to stop this weight gain and get some more exercise. The workout might help with my constant tiredness too. So here's what I'll try to start doing.

1. Go home early. If its past 7, it can wait 'till tomorrow.

2. Eat heavy breakfasts and light dinners. At least on weekdays. Saturday and Sunday are cheat days.

3. Exercise! Simple exercises in the morning and ab ripper few times a week. Jog once in a while and contemplate getting a gym membership.

4. Watch what I eat. Less carbs, sugars and deep fried food, more vegetables, fish and lean meats

5. Sleep early. Never stay up past 12 (except for Saturday nights!)

I should print out this list and hang it somewhere. I think I have to remind myself of this.

Going to try eating fresh lumpia for lunch alternating with "Che Che" food and baon and let's see where it goes. That's the easiest thing to start with.

Already squeezed in an an ripper routine tonight, I'll try another one after tomorrow.

And now it's late, so I should sleep. Only had one serving of dinner at 7 and I've been holding myself back from eating the entire night! This is the hardest thing to do on the entire list!

Lord grant me strength! Operation diet!

Very Tired

I'm always very tired lately.

There's always a lot of things to do and a lot of things I want to do... But there isn't enough time anymore.

I want time to myself, time to do nothing at all... But that would be irresponsible... It's either I'm spreading myself out too thin or I'm not that great at life. Or this could be a health concern, I don't really know.

Work is getting more demanding. That's a good thing actually.

But school is just becoming tedious, I'm starting to remember how much I hated school back in college. I guess I just don't find it as exciting or as meaningful... Yet. And I guess that's what makes it so tiring. I spend the good half of my Saturday at school, effectively forfeiting my weekend. The only thing I get to do is eat dinner.

I really have to lighten my schedule next semester.

My legs are always aching and my head gets really heavy sometimes. But the worst feeling I get is that I'm always hungry.

At church last Sunday, the reading mentioned something like " if your hand causes you to sin, then you must cut off your hand...".

Maybe I should cut back on something?

Abandoning the Social Networking Ship

Multiply finally released my content. 

I'm downloading all my photos as I type this entry and I just finished exporting my blog posts to this new blogger site. I'm actually thinking of re-posting some of my older photos on facebook... just to remind people of how carefree things once were.

Feels weird exporting everything and then importing them again somewhere else. Its like getting on a lifeboat and rowing away while looking back at a perfectly good ship in calm waters. Pointless and "necessary" at the same time. Pointless because multiply isn't really sinking that fast, the captain just drilled a hole in the hull; Necessary because I *have* to make sure I preserve everything. The previous generation had scrap books... I have multiply.

Kinda makes me wonder when and how facebook will face the same fate.

Why would facebook die? hmmmmm....

1. a new layout so "radical" it would make timeline look as good as the original FB profile. It would be soooo bad that people would just jump the boat and get on twitter, pinterest or even *gasp* tumblr

2. hack of the century. passwords, photos, personal info... ALL of it hacked, bastardized, deleted and scattered across the web. The combined complaining power of the world's facebook populace would spawn  a GLOBAL court hearing : The people of Planet earth vs Facebook

3. It just stops working and no one knows how to fix it. The ghost of Steve Jobs rumored to be seen in fb data centers around the world.

4. Facebook data grows so fast that it outpaces the production of digital storage. People will start getting "failed" messages on every status update, like and poke to the point that the data centers around the world just explode. Afterwards, people step out of their houses for the first time in decades.

5. Facebook decides that other Social Network sites are becoming more popular due to focused and/or niche services. They then decide to go a) SEARCH ENGINE b) ONLINE PHONEBOOK/DIRECTORY c) WEB HOSTING d) PROFESSIONAL NETWORK ala Linked in e) ADULT DATING SITE

6. Zuckerberg retires early, he makes so much money that he realizes he can just quit now and live with all the earnings he got. Company culture then spirals out of control as he is soon followed by senior employees leaving facebook to be run by a bunch of interns resulting in either one (or all) of the above

Would they let you back it up?

1. probably with some kinda cool shit like XMLAsdvha69 or something. you can even export to friendster, reddit and 9gag

2. Just for $199.68, you can buy a facebook tablet that has ALL of the recoverable data from your account. Its basically just a tablet that shows your timeline and you can click the stuff on it. Its waterproof, dirt proof and solar powered. It can act as your digital tombstone for when you finally log out from the world.

3. ... or maybe they'll take all your data and sell it to some stalkers, pedophiles, perverts and telemarketing companies to pay off for whatever debt they accumulated and to pay for zuckerberg jr's college fund.

I should really be sleeping now, i've got work tomorrow and midterms on saturday. LOL

hello first Blogger Blog post! hope you dont leave me too soon! lololol!

Farewell multiply

I can't sleep, it's always difficult to sleep every Sunday night. I'm in bed now, typing on my phone while I think about what's going to happen to multiply.

I never thought multiply would take down the social side of their site. It was the thing that built up it's popularity: virtually unlimited photo sharing. It was a big deal back then, point and shoot digi cams were becoming cheaper and people took literally hundreds of photos at parties. Multiply was the best way to share those photos and "extend" the experience with comments and replies. Facebook limited photo albums to 50 at a time back then, that was something multiply had an edge on. Multiply even had "faceboxes": the precursor to facebook photo tags. You could box the face of yoir friends in photos not unlike facebook tags today. It just never really caught on back then, unlike the way tags are done now

Then it didn't innovate much from there.

There were new "shareable" media things. Like links, blogs and videos. Then you could share audio. I remember a time you could download songs from multiply, people would rip their CDs and post their favourite songs. Then it became an illegal way to download music. Some copyright dodging later, multiply made it so you could not upload certain types of audio files.

After photo sharing. There was the market. People started selling on multiply, using photo albums to display their goods. Multiply just formalized it with the marketplace we have today by organizing vendors, certifying some, improving fulfillment etc. But it's all just "cosmetic" for me, its the users that made that. Not multiply.

Then there's multiply premium which was an early form of a cloud service. It allowed users to save and download High res photos. You had to pay extra though. I don know the exact price, but it was fairly affordable as a lot of people subscribed. I'm not a fan of the "freemium" model. With people as price conscious as Filipinos, most of them will abuse whatever they can get for free

Now it's all going to be gone soon. Memories from late highschool to early college are going to be taken offline. What about all those fun conversations with my friends? How about my photos and blog posts? It'll all be gone. It just saddens me.

I hardly ever log in to multiply nowadays. In the end, it's not personal preference that drives people to a social networking site, it's popularity. The more of your friends are on it, the more likely you'll go there.

Facebook now owns the "general" SNS pie with twitter a close second while niche sites like instagram and pinterest (even friendster) try their best to find their place in the ecosystem. Multiply is just commiting social suicide ( no pun intended)

Multiply is my scrapbook of my teenage years. It's also a place where I write to let go of my feelings and inner conflicts. With multiply killing the social side of their business. Where will I write?

I hope they make a way for me to export my content to a blogspot or something.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'll miss multiply. It's a reminder of the joys of simpler times and an online haven I retreat to. I just wish multiply would have done something to try to revive it instead of going all "marketplace" on me. There aren't enough people like me left I guess.

I'll miss you multiply, I hoped youd be there forever. But we cant have everything, right? Thank you for all the joy and relief you've give me in the past 6 years. I'll always remember you

"Dont do anything you won't be comfortable with"

"Don't do anything you won't be comfortable with"

I'm typing this as i take a sh*t on the toilet. I'm totally comfortable with that, which is why i can do it. There are other things however that aren't so easily done. The opposite is high stake gambling or *gasp* the stock market *un-gasp*. I'm not comfortable placing large sums on something based on chance. Hence i don't do them, I place my money in mutual funds instead. That's an investment decision im comfortable with.

Rarely in my life have i encountered "hard decisions". I've made a lot of decisions in my life. Some of them very important. Its just that most weren't that hard. More often than not, when coming to a cross road, the journey leading there puts me in a certain mindset. I'm so convinced (or I've convinced myself) that one decision is the right one for me that when it's time to cross the bridge, all i have to do is cross. Take for example college. It all boiled down to UAnP and ADMU. An important decision: choice of college and course can lay the foundations of your career... or at least land you your first job. I easily picked ADMU over UAnP. Though i admit i was very interested in going to UAnP with their smaller population, more focused teachers, dynamic courses and optional 5th year master's course, i picked ADMU. Why? Its near, i liked the Management Economics course description, Papa studied there, a lot of friends were going there, and its along the "very cozy at the time" katipunan avenue. See? important decision, but easily made. I was totally comfortable with the idea of going blue and white from green and white.

(i'm off the toilet now btw)

Sure i did regret choosing Ateneo during my college years. I even contemplated transferring to UAnP. But i stuck with it because i knew the Ateneo name carried alot of weight for fresh grads (despite the questionable faculty at the jesuit campus). It took me sometime to think about, but i convinced myself that staying had its benefits and again, the decision was easily made.

My decision to stay bore fruit during my first job fair. I got in to the Sun Cellular Management Trainee Program. I wanted an MT program because its a good way to move from my lolly gagging college life to the "professional life". My fellow MTs were people i got along with, like a freshman's college block, we were each other's support system and I generally enjoyed working in Sun early on. My decision to persevere 4 years in Ateneo's brutal social hierarchy and endure it's egotistical faculty was an important decision that i was happily comfortable with. 

Lots of things at work happend. It became more and more depressing as i struggled to create any meaningful output. I was in "New Business", a team dedicated to finding new ways to offer products, services or earn revenues for Sun Cellular Postpaid. It entailed understanding business models, networks, systems, financials and business case analysis. I met with lots of people from all over the world and discussed ideas on how to partner up or create the next GSM service. It got tiring after a while. The telecom business is a big and heavy business. I spent a year and a half exploring new business and though it was fascinating, it wasn't fulfilling. I wasn't able to launch anything successful (but i still received 3 promotions over 2 years which isnt that bad). The negative side effect is all my efforts are internal to Sun Cellular, theres nothing i can brag about in my resume since everything i worked on was "confidential". So my next decision was whether to 1.) stay and persevere like Ateneo, 2.) Request for a Transfer 3.) Leave SUN and search for more meaningful work that'll beef up my resume.

I chose option 1.) mostly because i was so accustomed to the work and New Business couldn't afford to lose another team member. It wasn't a hard decision. I thought about it alot and chose to cling on to hope as they do in movies and books. Eventually though, after the MVP's acquisition of SUN. Things were starting to look up. Projects that were "Sure to be approved" were lined up and i was a part of them. Important decision, comfortably made.

Just to top off that story, My boss put me in line for a transfer to the more mainstream Postpaid Marketing Department. I won't be able to finish some of my cooler projects. But at least mainstream business will help me learn a lot and really contribute to my marketability as a future hire elsewhere.

My perseverance seems to pay off for myself now doesn't it?

here's a snippet from an earlier post

http://megeh.multiply.com/journal/item/115/Another_long_weekend..._ends

"My former boss said to me before he resigned: "when you grow old, you make decisions for your family and not for yourself". (referring to his decision to resign a job he liked and look for a more "rewarding" job) Ever since he said that, I started doing anything i want with my life. For when (and IF) the time comes that i choose to settle down, all my choices won't be for me anymore, but for those i love (CHEESY SH*T)"

Right now I'm faced with the first real difficult decision in my life. And the decision isn't just about me, its not just for myself. Past important decisions were easier to make because i alone would carry the consequences of those decisions be they good or bad. I would just have to man up to my decisions and move forward without regrets. But when someone else's life will be greatly affected... its a whole new ball game for me. For the first time in my life. There is no comfortable decision or alternative. Either road i take could spawn something i could regret later on. This is like the first time i encountered risk. The Risk of making a mistake that could scar the both of us.

What do i do when you aren't comfortable with anything?

Lonely day meditations

the frightening reality is that we all die alone

i spent most of the day alone. I'm sick with tonsillitis for over a week now. I'm dedicating his weekend to rest and recovery. I won't get rid of this infection if i tire myself at work everyday.

so im here in my room just facebooking and playing on the PS3. I finished Starhawk 2 days after i bought it. I cant say that i like the multiplayer though. Unlike most other multiplayer games i've played, Starhawk really needs you to communicate with your teammates. In mass effect 3, its possible to stomp around ignoring your team mates and still be fist place. Call of Duty Pros can mop the floor with the other team single handed, same goes for uncharted 3 multiplayer and co-op. But in Starhawk (and maybe to some extent, Battlefield 3), the scale of the battles really makes each individual player's efforts small. Building your base is impossible on your own. my team was owned on the first two games because we couldn't get our act together. Everyone was trying to build what they want then blasting off to do whatever they wanted. But the other team was smart. They saved up money to build up forward bases and tanks. Then bombarded us from well fortified positions. We all counterattacked in small ways. Doing sneaky one man rocketeer stunts and starhawk strafing. But it was in no way done in a coordinated strike the way our opponents did. Yes, we did what we wanted but it was no match for other team's siege strategy. As a contrast, not everyone did something particularly fun on the other team. Some went resource hunting and repairing,  others did the building and some did quick bike and hawk strafes to get to the flag while only 2 tanks were active at a time while the rest supported. Theoretically, everyone on the team could have been rolling on tanks since the forward base was set up, but they didnt. Everyone did their part, even if it wasnt the funnest thing to do. In the end, they won. I never set a foot outside my base.

That was long. but the point i wanted to bring out is that sometimes, for a certain goal to be reached. Somethings have to be done for the greater good, for the long term and all that jazz. So its not really a matter of who your doing it with but more of you guys all doing complimentary actions for the group goal rather than personal preference.

Its a simple concept which im sure most people know and understand. But when putting it in to practice, it can be difficult to execute.

Growing up i've adjusted to a certain philosophy of doing whatever i wanted regardless of other peoples opinions as long as i dont hurt or offend anybody with it. It made me a bit... weird... since i liked and did a lot of things that weren't that mainstream. So i kept to myself when it comes to my hobbies. I dont particularly enjoy basketball depsite the large social benefits one can get by playing and following basketball nor do i particularly follow TV series which got really popular as i hit college. So in the end, i dont really "play" well with others unless it involved eating food which everyone does anyway and it doesn't help with the "greater good" principle either.

Hence the starhawk dilemma. I just wanted to do one man operations like i do in most games but that clearly wont work here. You really have to stick to the team strategy to make the team win. Sticking with a solo strategy will just make you lose alone.

'

I'm in a certain situation now that really stresses this concept of "doing things i may not prefer to do but must do for a greater goal". Though i do want to attain the "team goal", the "things that i have to do" or rather "things that i've been told that i have to do" don't make sense to me. My disagreement and refusal to follow these mandates has derailed us from the attainment of the team goal. Note that these "things i have to do" were not specified by me but by my partner.

Now the question must be asked: Am i wrong for disagreeing? Or "do the things i have to do" wrong to begin with? Do i disagree because i dont understand? Or because i do not accept?

These are the things i dwell on now. Life is full of things you have to do. You may not like them, but if you want certain things in life... to be successful, to be healthy... to be happy, you have to do anything and everything to make them happen.

Do i leave this team? or do i stay?

Failure

Haven't been chalking up any wins these past years. Ever since college, its always been a struggle to rack up any achievement of any kind. 

Achievements that matter... I mean, yeah sure i graduated... but almost everyone did... so that really doesn't count. Yeah, I graduated with a minor in enterprise development because i was part of the SOMBA (school of management business development program) but I hardly got by. Incorporating was real hard, plus I barely scrounged up all the legal stuff. On top of that, the business wasn't sustainable even though on paper it was. As a leader, i failed to make it anything other than an excuse to get a "minor"

Then the start of my working years. Scored a management trainee program at SUN Cellular... seemed like a great opportunity at the time. Though I am learning alot and exposed to a great number of things, most of it is very industry or even company specific. I do alot at work, and go home late almost every night, but work these past few years is "superficial" at best. "Marami akong ginagawa, pero wala akong nagagawa". What I mean is that although I do my part of the work at SUN Cellular, I've yet to significantly contribute the the company's business. I'm afraid this experience is eroding the base of my now cloudy career path. It's strange... sometime ago, early on in my job, I seemed to idealistic of what I do and the goals of my work. Its almost two years and those are unrealized.

There are a couple of other things i tried... Franchising for one. Wanted something small and easy to manage on the side. Put up a small Ice Scramble booth in Shaw boulevard, right in front of JRU. It was a grueling process of finding the right franchise package and location for the business. On top of that, negotiating with Franchise company was unnecessarily difficult.Ending up in arguments with our contact. Even then, I was optimistic. I found a high traffic location that wasn't too far away with a land lord that was really accommodating. Everything seemed right... but lots of shit hit the fan. Sales were slow, my one and only employee was an asshole. Even when we started the booth very early on in the scramble trend, things just didn't. We closed up shop with a net loss and hardly any sales were made. I wasn't comfortable losing money that way.

Today i attempted my first marathon today. Got injured on the 25th kilometer. A classic case of runner's knee. Despite the program i joined and the training I did. The 25th km ended it for me. I attempted to limp my way to the finish line. But the race organizers stopped me on the 36th k. "Cut off time" they said.I can confidently say i have the stamina for this. I wasn't tired. My injury stopped me. And because of that, today I chalked up another failure. I'll continue to run after I recover from my injury and try to redeem myself. Maybe I can complete the run united series (at least the 21K runs)

I'm now trying my hand in investments. Going to try investing in the PSEi once the market corrects itself. I learned about investing in indexes after reading "A Random Walk Down Wall Street" by Burton Malkiel. Its not really to make a killing though. Its just supposed to create a nest egg for me in the future to supplement my other investments in mutual funds. I hope to God that these decisions won't kill me like my previous ones.

Needless to say. I'm really down right now. I need a win in my life. Something to say that I am doing something worth doing. I need to think this through. Is this the so called "quarter life crisis" i'm going through? How do you deal with something like this? I need to win, I need to win bad

Typos

Wheneve it type something here in multiply... ang daming typo. LOL Spelling errors where i pres "o" instead of "i"... shit like that. Then it totally changes the meaning of the work or just makes it look downright stupid sounding.

I dont proofread this stuff, i just rant a click "save & publish". Only when its posted do I see (or other people) see the typos. once tweeted something and typed the word "by" when i really meant "buy". dafuq, that tweet made no sense.

When its up there in the internetz, someone's bound to see it until you edit it. Its like that with a lot of things really... once you post something wrong... it stays wrong until you edit it... but theres always a change someone see that mistake... and that mistake can have an effect on people... 

Thats something you can't really edit away easily