Thanksgiving: The Upside and the Downside

First of all, now that self knows that she is capable of herself roasting a whole turkey, she can face the world with much more confidence. Which may even end up translating (hopefully) into her being more aggressive when pitching her Read the rest of this entry »

Telephone Conversations, Week Before Week Before Thanksgiving (2009)

There are two self is thinking of at the moment:

One happened late last night, a little after midnight, California. Self decided to call Dearest Mum, after three Read the rest of this entry »

A Survey

Since self is now pretty sure of going home in December, and since there’s only so much a body can accomplish in three weeks (!!!), other than get horribly jet-lagged and fat,  self thought she’d better begin soliciting suggestions for:

  • The three best books by contemporary Filipino writers that she must buy to bring back with her to the States  (No coffee table books, please!  Self likes poetry, she likes prose, she likes graphic novels, she loooves  –  at the present moment, anyway  –   history and memoir and non-fiction)
  • The three best bookstores that she must be sure to visit in the three weeks that she is in Manila
  • The three movies she absolutely must see before going back home

Never mind restaurants or food! She’s sure she doesn’t need to eat one more thing, not one!

*    *     *

Call to Dearest Mum:  Why didn’t you send copies of The Lost Language with cousin who was just in Manila?  Self has a reading on Nov. 7, and it would have been so great to have the copies ready.  Dearest Mum replied, she is ashamed.  She doesn’t want anyone to read the book.  The stories are so violent.  Even her brothers couldn’t read it, they had to stop after the first 5 pages, never mind that self dedicated the book to Ying.  So,

HA HA HA HA HA HA !!!!

(Now, self thinks:  how in the heck is she going to get through three weeks of December in Manila?  Hubby, though, maintains it will be very “good” for self to go.  Self wants to ask him:  And what do you know about it?  Did you ever have a family such as mine???)

Now self is wondering: which is worse, to have the maternal seal of approval, or not to have the maternal seal of approval?

Stay tuned, dear blog readers, stay tuned.

Is It Worth It?

Self means, to fly home, simply on hope.

Self has just returned from watching a sad-eyed Audrey Tautou (waif-like, but somehow hard, too, especially around the mouth) in “Coco Before Chanel.”  The movie was wonderful, and the original score was composed by Alexandre Desplat, the same composer who did the music for “The Painted Veil” (one of self’s all-time movie faves). Had a wonderful serving of peanut butter cioccolato before the movie (At the Aquarius on Emerson in downtown Palo Alto  –  but of course dear blog readers might have guessed, just from the mention of the gelato!).  And now that she is home, she seems to have been sand-bagged by the most awful doubt about her upcoming trip to Manila.

The weird thing is, self keeps asking herself:  What is she doing spending the holidays there, when son and hubby are here?  Does that make any sense?  She will be with other people’s children, in other people’s houses.  What a lonely feeling that will be, especially during Christmas!

When self went home with son, in 2006? She almost didn’t go. Because her whole family came here, to the Bay Area, earlier in the year. And it drove self crazy. They brought a maid, but the maid didn’t know how to cook.  So self ended up cooking for everyone, including the maid.  And she was still teaching four classes.  There were a few times when she still had to cook after getting home from a night class, close to 10 p.m.

When self confided her doubts about the 2006 trip to Ying, her wonderful sister-in-law brushed all self’s doubts aside and said simply: You’d better come.  And self did indeed end up enjoying that trip.  She and son went to Boracay.  They went to Bacolod.  They even went to Puerto Prinsesa!  And saw the St. Paul Underground River!  And made friends with a very nice young couple named Kat and Dexter who have since moved to Read the rest of this entry »

Oh, the Excitement!

Dear Bro called from LA around 10:30 this morning. Self said, no problem, she could pick him up. Did he want to come with her to Filipino authors reading in the City, in the Bayanihan Community Center, at 2 p.m.? Dear Bro said yes, with alacrity.

Then, the following things happened:

Somewhere around Millbrae, on the 101, self’s engine overheated. Car slowed to 20 miles an hour. She barely had time to nudge it onto an exit. Luckily, a few feet from the exit was a Doubletree Hotel. Self glided into the parking lot.  So gracefully that she actually landed in a space directly across from the hotel’s main entrance, and exactly between the two white lines of the parking stall, which is a very rare occurrence.

Then, she called Dear Bro. Ah, could he possibly get a cab and meet her at the Doubletree? He said he could, and he did.

Next, self asked Dear Bro’s taxi if he could take the two of us to the nearest car rental place (as self was determined, simply determined, to take him to the reading with Read the rest of this entry »

Regrets, Dear Bro

We never did get to take you to Lobster Shack.

And, the other night, when you kept saying you wanted to see “Inglourious Basterds,” self made you watch “The Painted Veil” with her instead.

There are three big, fat juicy rib-eye steaks in the refrigerator, for self expected you home last night.

There are breakfast pastries from Whole Foods on the kitchen counter.  Self bought those for you as well.

Self never did get to give you her presents for your daughter:  the copy of Irene Nemirovsky’s Suite Francais, the books by Alexander McCall Smith and Sarah Vowell.

Most important of all, self never got to give you the x-rays from her dentist here, to give to the dentist in Manila who self is going to see, when she goes to Manila this December.

For some reason, self got all confused and thought you were coming back from LA last night.  She didn’t know you were planning to stay there until Saturday, when you return to San Francisco for a brief stop-over before going home to Manila.  After checking son’s room (where you slept, this past week), she saw it was so clean.  All the toys you brought for your kids were gone, and if self hadn’t been so distracted (by being finalist for Donald Barthelme Prize and then not being a finalist) she would have noticed and thought it was strange that you brought everything down with you to LA.

Self even left the key out –  but, sometime during Craig Ferguson’s monologue, she realized you wouldn’t be coming and took the key back.

Self slept four hours.  Which she supposes is not that bad, considering how many nights she’s had less sleep than that, lately.  Just before she went to bed, she decided not to finish reading Elizabeth Gilbert’s much-touted Eat, Pray, Love (because all the talk about God and self-fulfillment and following your bliss was making her queasy) and go on to a Ruth Rendell mystery.

Stay tuned, dear blog readers, stay tuned.

Today, Monday, Columbus Day 2009

There is no mail delivery today.  Self just realized this when, after she got home from lunch and a walk around downtown Redwood City with Dear Bro, she stuck her hand in the mailbox and was surprised to find it empty.  Then she realized it was Columbus Day, a holiday.  Ergo, the library will be closed as well.  Self has to wait until tomorrow to return James Surowiecki’s The Wisdom of Crowds (which she read until 3 a.m. this morning) and borrow Kazuo Ishiguro’s Booker-nominated novel of a couple of years back, Never Let Me Go.

Self did have to work at the Writing Center, however; she is starting to see a core group, students who present week after week, who self has formed a tutoring relationship with, and also a student she taught in African American Lit, last semester.  And that student was a very good writer!

But, in general, self found herself rather “low bat.”  (Could it be the overcast weather?  Could it be all the nights staying up reading?)

Self arrived home to find the house empty.  But she wasn’t undisturbed for more than five minutes, for then the phone rang and it was Dear Bro telling her that he was on the way home: would she like to have lunch somewhere?  Self said sure, and suggested he might like to see Whole Foods, “because they have this great buffet, and everything is weighed by the pound, and we can take the food home to eat it here.”  But she sensed some reluctance on the part of Dear Bro, so she asked, “Or did you want to eat at a real restaurant?”

It turned out Dear Bro would rather eat at a restaurant.  And he surprised self by saying he wanted Indian food.  And self knew just the place to go:  Read the rest of this entry »

Friday Night, Redwood City, October 2009

First we took Dear Bro for a walk.

Then we encountered a concert in Courthouse Square, and it just so happened to be a “Michael Jackson Tribute.”

Then we looked across the street to the Fox Theatre, and we discovered that on this very night, a Filipino group named Parokya ni Edgar (“very popular in Manila,” Dear Bro said) was also playing, which fact absolutely blew not only self’s mind, but Dear Bro’s and hubby’s as well.

Dear Bro standing in front of a poster for "Parokya ni Edgar" outside the Fox Theatre in Redwood City

Dear Bro standing in front of a poster for "Parokya ni Edgar" outside the Fox Theatre in Redwood City

Then we walked to the Century 20, and self very proudly showed Dear Bro the lobby where she spends so much of her time, and declared that if he had a chance, he should catch “Inglourious Basterds.”

Then we walked a little further on, to World Market, where hubby discovered a bottle of wine with the extremely interesting name of “Cupcake,” and it so happened to be from a winery on the Central Coast (Self tried to take a picture, but it was even worse than the one above, so dear blog readers will just have to take self’s word for it that there is in the world a merlot named “Cupcake”).

Then we had dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, New Kapadokia.  And followed that up with beers at a very noisy City Pub on Broadway.  (As we were walking back to our car, a very drunk patron in the bar next door, Mesquite, was demanding that the live band play “Mustang Sally.”  Why oh why did he start up just when self came to within one foot of him?  Because he nearly shattered self’s eardrum)  Then we went home and saw two snails on our front step, but hubby forbade self from crushing them, saying they made the worst awful mess.

The End.

All Is in Readiness

For arrival of Dear Bro tomorrow.  Self is not sure if he is with self’s cousin (who works for Dear Bro).  In which case, she’ll have to make up an extra bed (which means she’ll have to drag a mattress out from the garage; let’s just put that off ’till the morrow!)

Self knows Dear Bro is a stickler for cleanliness.  Here’s a story:  when self was a young working girl in the Big Apple (Does anyone still refer to NYC this way, self wonders?  Or is that horribly dated, a throw-back to the long-ago 80s?), Dear Bro came over to visit.  She was at that time sub-letting a loft on 8th St. and First Ave. (the East Village).

One day, she returned home from a very tiring day in her crap job as Administrative Assistant to an Ernst & Whinney manager (This was in the long-ago days before it became Ernst & Young).  The only saving grace of this job being this:  it was on the very top floor of the Citicorp Building on 53rd and Lex, and every time the manager opened the door to his office, self glimpsed the Chrysler Building.  But the manager never left his door open for long, so the Chrysler Building would present for just a moment or two, and then vanish.  Present, and then vanish.  Like a slide show.  It made self quite dizzy, at times.

Anyhoo, as self was saying, one evening she came home from crap job, and she couldn’t believe her eyes.  The whole apartment practically Read the rest of this entry »

Manila International Book Fair, Sept. 16- 20, Mall of Asia

Self should be there.

Yes, she should be.

Because her new book definitely will be. At the Anvil table. And Dearest Mum will have 10 copies of her book, and she will have so much fun handing them out to all her chums!

Which reminds self: several years ago, self begged Dearest Mum to send her a copy of Story Philippines, which had just published her story, “Don Alfredo & Jose Rizal.” Dearest Mum sent her the requested copy through the daughter of a friend. Self and the daughter made plans to meet at a coffee shop in Burlingame (Of course! That’s where all Dearest Mum’s friends congregate!). Self presented in shorts, T-shirt and sandals (it was summer), and the daughter of Dearest Mum’s friend was wearing a silk blouse, pants, and moreover had bothered to apply full make-up.

After some desultory conversation, daughter inquired of self, “What is this you have written? Are you a chef?”

“No,” self said. “I am not a chef. I’m a Read the rest of this entry »

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