Worried about the level of toxic chemicals and pesticides in conventionally grown food? My favorite Internet doctor, Dr. Mercola, lists twelve foods that need not be organic (these foods have the lowest pesticide absorption). These are:
1. Broccoli
2. Eggplant
3. Cabbage
4. Banana
5. Kiwi
6. Asparagus
7. Sweet Peas (frozen)
8. Mango
9. Pineapple
10. Sweet Corn (frozen)
11. Avocado
12. Onion
It’s a bit late but i’m making a post about my last day in the office anyway. That’s because among four companies I have worked for in the last decade, this last company was where I had the best despedida in my entire banking career. Not to mention that it’s where I had the opportunity to work under an uber nice and motherly boss (I can now say that without sounding like I’m kissing ass), an amazing and talented set of colleagues (you know who you are) and a company that, though far from perfect, was where I could finally imagine myself working until I retired. But. Let’s just say there are opportunities to be grabbed and dreams to be fulfilled.
I did not have one, but three despedidas! Boy, I felt so loved. Okay, actually, the schedules of the people in our department did not jive so there were three groups who organized three different goodbye gigs hehehe. The first one was an out-of-town trip to Balai Isabel in Talisay, Batangas. The second one was lunch with a couple of officemates at Mom & Tina’s, and the third one was merienda cena with the rest of the Corporate Banking people at our office floor.
Okay, enough with the ramblings. Pictures, pictures:
balai isabel pool, taal volcano in the backdrop
balai isabel foodie gone in a flash. the santol shake was supposedly good. sadly, i didn’t get to try it.
me and boo by the pool mini slide
bee and boo “swimming”
now you see them, now you don’t. the despedida lunch at warm and cozy mom and tina’s.
the merienda cena food. this photo is telling of our group’s loyalty to our clients hee.
a photo-presentation about me! this was such a nice surprise. see that small poster on the door? there were other blown-up posters on the wall of this conference room with my face super-imposed on the Good Luck Chuck movie poster (of course, they replaced ‘Chuck’ with my name as well). somebody spent the whole day making the presentation and these posters. a-ha!
But seriously, thank you guys from the bottom of my heart. I’m not fond of making speeches and I rarely show my crybaby side so this post was meant as a thank-you message to all of you. Kitakits and keep in touch.
The guy in the following email excerpt could be the next Rolito Go or Claudio Teehankee, Jr.
Rolando Go, a businessman-contractor was convicted in 1993 for the murder of 25-year old, Eldon Maguan, during a traffic altercation. After he escaped from jail during his trial in 1993, he was arrested in a piggery in Pampanga in 1996 where he tried to bribe the arresting officers in vain. He is serving a life sentence in the New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa and has since applied twice for pardon or commutation unsuccessfully. According to this Philippine Star news archive, he runs a lending trade while in prison.
Claudio Teehankee, Jr., on the other hand, shot Roland Chapman and Maureen Hultman at close range, inside Dasmarinas Village, Makati in 1991. The murder appears to be a random one as witness Jussi Leino, who was with Hultman at the time of the murder, testified that Teehankee came up behind them in a car and started asking for their identification. Clearly, he was power-tripping (Teehankee is the son of former Chief Justice Claudio Teehankee, Sr.) or else high on drugs as is thought by many. When companion Chapman asked Teehankee why the latter was bothering them, Teehankee shot all three, killing Chapman on the spot while Hultman died two months after due to brain hemorrhage sustained from the gunshot wound to the head. Leino survived the incident to be a major witness in the slaying.
Here’s the full e-mail regarding the scary experience of a mom inside the parking lot of the Ateneo campus in Loyola:
This happened to my sister-in-law just this morning at the ateneo campus. Alarming and I thought you would be wary too of this kind of people, especially driving mothers (like me). Wala tayong kalaban-laban sa mga lalaking ganito! Kilala nyo ba siya kaya?…….
Hi Ette, Something scary happened to me today at around 11:30 a.m. at the Ateneo parking area along the alternate road leading to Gate 3. I arrived at the area at around 9:00 a.m. The parking area was already full. However, I noticed that some cars were parked far apart from each other and that their drivers can be requested to move closer to each other to accommodate my small Honda City.
I approached the owner of a gray Toyota Camry with plate number UNY 220. He was sleeping inside his car so I tapped lightly and apologetically requested him to move his car. He refused to move, asserting that I cannot fit into the space. He told me to bother the driver beside him instead. I left him alone because I did not want to be a nuisance. The other vehicle was a van driven by a family driver. He was also sleeping, mind you, but he graciously moved his van. I was finally able to park but it was a very tight fit. If the owner of the Camry had moved as well, it would have been perfect. However, I did not want to bother the man who was clearly irritated.
At 11:30 a.m., I arrived at my car with the two boys in tow. I was so shocked to find the man owning the Camry to be waiting for me. As I approached, he opened his window and said, “PUTANG INA MO!” in front of my two kids and his son who was seated at the back of his car covering his ears. He continued his assault and said, “You don’t wake up people and manipulate them.” I told him in a calm voice that I apologized to him and left him alone because he didn’t want to be bothered. He kept on accusing me of being manipulative (I don’t even know why? It was just a request).
And this is where it gets scary. He threatened me and said that IT IS PEOPLE LIKE ME HE PUTS A GUN TO THE HEAD TO. I asked him if he was connected to the military and he said, “E ikaw, sino ka ba?” I said I was just a simple housewife. He then proceeded to call me stupid over and over again. I just let it pass because I didn’t want to provoke him. He has a PPSA (Philippine Practical Shooting Association) sticker at the back and he just might make good his threat. Luckily, I still had enough wits about me and was able to get his plate number and his picture through my cellphone camera.
I immediately reported this incident to Mr. Leoncio D. Miralao, Administrator of the ADMU Physical Plant. This person is highly volatile and I don’t want my boys, or any other child for that matter, anywhere near him. He might start shooting people if he gets into another altercation. What shocks me is that he is an Ateneo parent (a parent!) who should be reinforcing the Ignatian values that the Ateneo has been diligently drilling into our children. Furthermore, I’m sure the PPSA espouses responsible gun ownership and will certainly frown upon this member’s behavior. Attached is his picture and you should be well-advised to steer clear of him if ever you see him around Ateneo!
Unfortunately, the e-mail I got no longer contained the picture of the Rolito Go wannabe and the car. Can somebody with LTO connections ID the Camry license plate?
“Our athletes have so much potential. But we don’t even come close to the other countries like U.S. or China in terms of bagging the gold medals.”
“Hello. China sends its child-athletes barely out of their diapers to a rigorous sports camp. And our third world national budget for sports is probably only the budget of the American Olympic sports team for their socks.”
“Honga. Besides, the national sports budget is kapiranggot na nga, kinukurakot pa.”
“Which reminds me, did you see the news regarding the ‘fake’ Beijing opening ceremony? The series of footprint fireworks during the finale was inserted into the live TV coverage electronically. People all over the world who were watching it thought it was a real, spectacular fireworks show. Little did everyone know the entire she-bang was just created by a visual effects team.”
“Uy but they labored over that 55-second sequence for a year! Even the little girl in a red party dress singing during the Olympic opening ceremony was called a fake. Because the real singer is chubby and has uneven teeth daw.”
“Yikes, traumatic naman for the chubby-uneven teeth child!”
“What can I say. Fake it till you make it, ika nga, hehehe.”
“I feel so much better that I watched the Olympic opening ceremony from home! Fakes are sometimes better than the originals.” *snickers*
PAL is always my first choice whenever we fly domestic. This does not mean I applaud the airline’s quality of service (which sucks) but between PAL and Cebu Pacific, I have this nagging suspicion that the former is the lesser evil. Years years years ago, my brother and I flew Cebu Pacific for the first time and we had such a horrible experience. Our flight was delayed for an inexcusable amount of time and we flew in a visibly ancient plane with a malfunctioning airconditioning unit (we could tell because the temp alternated between ok and stifling hot).
The second and last time I flew Cebu Pacific was when I went to Hong Kong with a couple of friends a few years back. The touch down is supposed to be rough, I know, but during this particular flight, it was vomit-inducing. The in-flight dinner was served late and as the plane approached the runway, our food and plastic utensils flew askew (yes, for some reason we were allowed to eat during the final approach). The way the plane touched down you’d think the pilot was as surprised as us that we finally hit the tarmac haha (I remember one of my friends jokingly remark, “nagka-whiplash ata ako ah.”). I thought with the purchase of spanking new Airbus planes, Cebu Pacific has upgraded its service as well.
I write this post because Bee forwarded to me this email about somebody else’s nightmarish Cebu Pacific experience:
Ay, I lost my appetite for that iPhone unit from Globe. Never mind. Look at Globe’s crazy iPhone rates (iPhones set to be released this coming Aug. 22). I’ll just ask someone to buy one for me in the States or I can buy one from eBay and have it unlocked. It’s cheaper. And comes without strings attached too.
“The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches, but to reveal to him his own.” - Benjamin Disraeli
Dr. Tullio Simoncini, an Italian oncologist and author of Cancer Is A Fungus, explains how he was able to cure his cancer patients through the use of sodium bicarbonate, more commonly known as baking soda. Watch.
Thoughts:
1. The big pharma companies wouldn’t be too happy with this. Imagine spending billions of dollars for research on chemotherapy drugs and losing revenues to, of all things, baking soda?
2. Swiss Miss and I (who are slowly gaining reputations as quack doctors among friends and relatives, hee) still believe in the synergistic approach between modern medicine and alternative, natural healing. One cannot completely discount the medical benefits that either of the two schools of thought bring.
3. I like the way Dr. Simoncini expounded on his learnings about cancer in med school. He was often told that “cancer is a mystery.” And he rhetorically asks, “If you don’t understand it, then what are you doing to your patients?” Inay ko. Oo nga.
4. According to a December 2004 Clinical Oncology publication, the average 5-year survival rate among cancer patients in Australia who underwent chemotherapy is around 2.3% (In the U.S. the survival rate is 2.1%). The 5-year relative survival rate (without chemo) in Australia is 60%. Hmmm. A 2% survival rate vs. 60%? It’s a no-brainer for me. The 5-year survival rate for pancreatic cancer patients who received chemotherapy is zero. Swiss Miss and I wish we had known this when our Dad was first diagnosed with pancreatic cancer years ago. He passed away in September of 2003, a few weeks after he underwent his first round of chemo.
5. Here’s a link to an article of how one person was able to “cure his Stage 4 cancer” through a diet of garlic and pepper, which kill fungi and bacteria. He promotes the use of the HCG test developed by a Philippine doctor, Dr. Manuel D. Navarro, as an early cancer detector.
6. Which reminds me, I need to buy baking soda from the supermarket tomorrow. We use it as a deodorant in the bathroom (placed on a small bowl) and as a teeth stain remover.
One man’s list of must-see TV shows is another man’s bucket list. After his father passed away this spring, Jack Mannahan, 53 years old, of Shaumburg Ilinois, realizes how much he’s missed out on in his (TV) life. “There’s so much I have yet to experience, like finally catching up on the last couple years of 24. My life won’t feel complete if I never see what Veronica Mars is all about. And I need to finish about a half-dozen seasons of The Simpsons. Also I’m ashamed to say it, but I’ve never even seen an episode of that House show that’s gotten such rave reviews.” My sentiments exactly. Same reason why I quit my job. *grin* From the onion.
Tagged by Odette of little miss firefly. First time to get tagged, can you believe it? (Odette, you’re my first!) Henyhoo, here goes:
What was I doing 10 years ago?
Let me see. This was one year after I graduated from university. I was fresh out of the management training program of a universal-commercial bank and was about to start my career as a first-level junior officer in that bank. I had my hair cropped to a very short style so I’d look more corporate. I blew my first paycheck on a couple of business suits and a decent pair of working pumps from Landmark (where else could I stretch P8,000 in 1998?). The pay sucked, I had zero savings, the future was blurry but I remember being very happy. I was having a taste of how it is to be financially independent and I thought the world was mine to conquer.
