CANcer taught me...

How to cook ramen... 

Cancer will take away everything from the patient. One very visible of that is the appetite.

Though not right away but I can see that gradually, the patient will one by one turn her head from her used-to-favorite food.

Out of desperation, I cook Japanese-ramen-inspired noodles. Mati called it noodles from Japan.

I liked it. I think they liked it too. Now, i dunno how it would fare to my nanay.

Black and Yellow: expectation vs reality

I'm taking up crochet lately. Not really because I like it but it's the best way I can connect to my nanay, to while my time watching over her. I don't know if my nanay loves crochet but it's one of the childhood memories I have of her. She made me crocheted tops before if she's not crocheting some coasters or curtains.

Anyhow, I realized that to make beautiful crochet pieces, it can be either through beautiful stitches / patterns (albeit complicated, most of the time) or through color combinations of yarns. If you don't have any of these 2, don't despair because crocheted dishcloths do not need any of these 2 skills.

So in my case, beautiful complicated patterns always lost me so I tried going to color combination. I usually just randomly pick lively colors because they make my unusually quiet days alive. So one day, I feel like getting a color combination for my crochet piece to the tune of:

 
So I was crocheting away feeling like I'm on a roll in a black-and-yellow sports car, cruising with Whiz Kalifa's music in my head...

Then, my kids first impression when they saw my finished product black-and-yellow crocheted scrubbie was that it's a HONEY BEE! 

The color combination was supposed to feel this bad-ass:

But they only see Jollibee. @.@ 

The Martian (not a movie review)

(My Diaryhea Challenge got constipated. Well, at least I'm being consistent of being inconsistent.)

I watched The Martian because of Matt Damon, who's supposed to be my soulmate but somehow he got stucked in Mars. So instead, God sent me something close to "Matt" -- a "Mark."

I'm just not really into NASA, astronaut kind of nerdy stuff so I don't know what's the brilliant theory or idea they're trying to prove in that movie. Well, I learned that a farmer has a big potential of becoming an astronaut.

On a serious note, I don't know if USA/NASA saving one person out in Mars is heroic or ridiculous. And somehow it hit me on a personal note. Seeing how the whole USA rally to save that one person left in Mars, while I'm not doing any thing to save my mother.

It made me think that a lot of money to get 1 human at Mars? It can be ridiculous. Well maybe they can put it on saving cancer or sick patients or cancer meds research and save more. But then if cancer will be curable, another kind of level of disease will come up to haunt us.

Putting your colleagues at risk to get you at Mars? I thought Matt was a bit selfish. I want to say that Matt was being gay, but I don't want to use the word "gay" because I don't think being "gay" (sexual orientation) is coward. I was thinking Matt Damon should have insist that the script should be him going home on a more practical way. But hey, it's a movie.

It's just that I could not see the logic of putting a lot people at risk to save 1 human when the same group of people can also easily sent off people to war, and kill families with a bomb. Hello, America, you're being hypocrite.

The Weather

I'm going to sorely miss my nanay.

I've been trying to stay stoic about the thought of my mother moving on to her new life but A big pang of "missing" hit me today. 

Though, majority of our lives we're apart since being moving to city when i got into high school; but i realized that it will never be the same without her.

Of doodles, and notes

Among the 3, Mati is the most "sharer," and still has no concept of "privacy" so i am free to check his notebooks and stuff.

He has these doodle notebooks, which he said is for when he's bored. Based on how he fast he can fill up a notebook, he must be bored. 

But i noticed there are some doodles that are not his; there must be a lot of bored students. @.@

There are doodles/drawings that come with a text / story on the side.

He said that the texts are from his classmate Jarrel.

Jarrel even give him a note.

17th Birthday

It's nanay's 71st birthday. And thanks to all the relatives and friends who came, and also to Father Palang for officiating the mass.

The stroller party :)

More like a children party

Nanay's co-teachers back in badian :)

My nanay's / we are not into big celebrations. I don't remember we had any birthday parties back home in Badian. So this one felt weird, but definitely very thankful for everyone's presence.

Comfort food

Dinuguan and piniritong danggit are mine.

The bad-assest Dinuguan for me is by my aunt. The main reason why I would attend their death anniversary celebrations because it's one of the few occasions I get to taste it. @.@ But she no longer cooks this, maybe because she's now leaning to be health buff?

Though they serve dinuguan at their carenderia, but it was not as bloody comforting food as the one served at the memorial park during the death anniversaries. 

While staring at the dinuguan, eating dinner alone, I became nostalgic. I remember my childhood Sundays at Badian. My nanay would bring tupperware to the Sunday mass, which she would use to contain the dinuguan we'd buy at the "merkado" on the way home. 

And Back in my childhood days, piniritong danggit was like the hotdog of today. And there's no sweet-yummy danggit than the danggit from home in Badian (must be the cleaner sea there). 

My neighbor playmate "mao-mao", we used to divide the danggit into halves.  He loves the "head" part, while i love the "tail" part. In the afternoons, after a sweaty playing, we'd then sit on the table and munch on the leftover piniritong danggit, either in our house or theirs.

Mao-mao was also the playmate, who we dared each other who can eat the dirtiest "ikasen." Our trick could range from dipping the ikasen to the sand, soil, soil mixed with water.  Thank goodness, i could not remember shit. Eeewww!

Then his mother, who is a pediatrician, would then prescribed my mother the deworming meds when I'd complain itchy ass. @.@

Then I should stop reminiscing or else it would be a crying fest for me. Definitely, i have an amazing childhood memories. I have to thank my nanay for that.

"Do It Anyway" Prayer

Witnessing my mother chill for endless hours from her high fevers due to infections for successive days, there's an app for that. Kidding. But I did download prayer apps, and recite all the prayers listed in there while sitting beside my mother who was stiff from chilling at the hospital last week. I then became prayerful. (I was not schooled in a Catholic school all throughout my life so there's my defensive mode.)

Anyhow, relatives gave me a lot of prayer booklets and novenas which I go through on a daily basis. Some of the prayers became my favorite. This one, I haven't really read this to my nanay but it's a nice motivational read.

Mother Teresa can be the Saint for Entrepreneurs / Creators.

 People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered.  Forgive them anyway.

            If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.  Be kind anyway.

            If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies.  Succeed anyway.

           If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you.  Be honest and sincere anyway.

            What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight.  Create anyway.

            If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous.  Be happy anyway.

            The good you do today, will often be forgotten.  Do good anyway.

         Give the best you have, and it will never be enough.  Give your best anyway.

         In the final analysis, it is between you and God.  It was never between you and them anyway.

-this version is credited to Mother Teresa

source: http://prayerfoundation.org/mother_teresa_do_it_anyway.htm

Diaryhea Challenge

I had a quick chat with a friend about how he handled the re-birth process (a better term for end-of-life, dying, passing or however you call it) of her mother while still being active in his regular activities. Listening to how he handled his job, being the sole-caregiver, financier, family man at the same time, and occasionaly crying at the bathroom to relieve his self from the stress, I realized I'm such a DIVA.

Mark was probably right to say that I'm acting so entitled when I pulled him the I'm-so-damsel-in-distress drama so don't you dare complain why everything's a mess, why the kids are all getting sick.

Anyhow, I think I put so much drama on my little world. I need to move my mind out of it from time to time, add a few little activities to my routine -- which is mostly either getting worried, depressed which are all not helping.

So viola! My world-changing idea is to post daily here, and it should be from the computer (not from the celphone). Like duh. At least it's not going to be a video blog. =)

My most favorite fruit - marang.

Dessert Factory: yet another pad thai in Cebu

Before this, I don't know when was the last time I ate at Dessert Factory. Somehow, along the way, i was just no longer a big fan of sweets. That statement is probably a lie. But i guess with the many pastry shops popping up in Cebu, Dessert Factory went off my radar.

And when I tasted their food, I guess i knew why I had not visited it for a long time. Sadly, i just no longer find their food good.

It's sad because it's a Cebu resto. I used to see DF as at match of Bigby's but they somehow just was not able to keep up (based on my very highly sophisticated taste @.@ not that i'm a fan of Bigby's but somehow B's able to keep up with times).

Anyhow, their pad Thai made me want to cry. And the rest of the cakes, well my aunts were owkei with them. The green matcha tea was just too sweet and powdery.

Sorry for my not-so-good review. I should have just not post this but I need to keep up with my being foodie blogger. :)

Next week... Next week...

Time perception is one of those things that got strongly knocking on me upon knowing the health situation of my mother.

Learning about my mother's limited time, i get to think that my time is also limited. I probably have only 20 more good years, hopefully, to come.

The 20years is not really much when considering that it takes 10thousand hours (roughly equivalent to 10 years) to master a craft. Then i only have my another 10years to make use of being a master of a craft -- maybe make a business out of it. So i might subtract a few years of figuring out what to make of the craft that i mastered. Then maybe I only have 8 or 5 years to make the most of my mastered craft.

But for now, I ran out of next week of excuses.

After our 1st discharged from the hospital when my mother was diagnosed and she had a surgery, i went with Mark to Boracay for GOAB and thought to myself that when we got back NEXT WEEK, we'll be back to our usual routine though a bit sick this time.

Next week came, and we were home from GOAB, looking at my mother having to be "bed panned," it hit me that it's never going to be the same again.

I was cool about it but it took time for me to get into the new routine so i often told myself to take time off to let things sink in. And, NEXT WEEK, i'll start going back to my routine -- working again on the projects I committed to. Hopefully getting myself busy with a few projects here and there can take my mind off from my nanay's.

NEXT WEEK came, and I start informing the people I committed to that I had to quit as I just could not find my mojo back.

The NEXT WEEKs had been about trying to find normalcy, then the boat got shaken a bit from time to time. So Then the next weeks became time to find a new normal again. Though, normal is probably not really our type of lifestyle -- somehow I'm thankful for this mindset as it helps me get a quick grip of sticky situations.

The NEXT WEEKS are like being in a constant adrenaline rush, always on the heightened state of alert of the sudden changes in my nanay's health situation. The next weeks are like sometimes on the brink of breaking down but hey I can't complain i'm not the one with cancer.

Then next weeks, maybe after all this beautiful storm, i can come up with a craft worthwhile mastering for the remaining years of my life...

But for now, let me get back to it next week.