Reason #8 of Why I Love Doing The Rock

Working on The Rock magazine with Raymond and Tricia has all these little happy perks. One of them being pretty and yummy food at events. I went with Rico to cover the Chairman’s Cup dinner, and I was just glad to be with a boy I could pig out with–with class. Clearly I’m not a foodie, but this blog is just desperate for a post. So ta-da! Post-processed gourmet dishes that I ate months ago, for free, merci to Chef Laudico and the Rockwell Club team.

This post is so old I dont remember what this dish is.

 

Enderun kids clocking in OJT hours. Props to these kitchen wonders!

Strawberry Mousse Forever. So. Fucking. Good.

Jacques of Hearts

Looking at Arlene Sy‘s work made me block off my schedule some quiet, watercolor time for this week before things get too tight. Busy-ness is in the horizon, and although I’m very very very excited, I want to make sure I do the things I wanted to do as a sorta-bum before I end that phase. The last time I sat on my bedroom floor and started painting, I came up with these heart bookmarks, which eventually ended up in notebook designs for KartON.

Collection de Coeurs

And this entry is more of an announcement to myself that being busy is merely a convenient excuse for not painting. This is something I keep telling myself (and other people who insist they don’t have time to go through the books they stacked up to read, start the sideline they want to explore, cook the new recipe they want to eat, etcetera etcetera): if you have time to Facebook, you have time to pursue your (side) passion. It doesn’t always have to be one-time-big-time, just put a little time and effort to keep it going. Better small steps than none at all  So here’s to more little watercolor bookmarks to come!

Geladdicto

So a new addiction has taken hold of me (and my wallet), and it goes by the name Caffe Ti Amo. The cozy coffee+gelato joint opened just last week, very close to KartON in Greenbelt 5, in front of Mango. Imagine my excitement at having a gelato shop near “home”! Now I don’t have to walk all the way to the other end of Greenbelt to Gelatissimo for a gelato fix! Or to Coffee Bean in GB3 to settle down and work with fast, free-flowing wifi! I have found a new nest and a chance of being Mayor somewhere (not that I’m Foursquare-competitive or anything).

Nothing says Benvenuti better than an array of frozen Italian goodness

The start of an alternate, watercolored life

I keep thinking (out loud) how much I want to learn watercolor painting. Keep looking, right-clicking at the creations of Stina Persson, Marguerite Sauvage, Fifi Lapin, Miss Capricho and now Valerie Chua. I keep imagining the pictures I will paint, the colors I will use, the techniques I will try, blah blah blah. I never studied art or even the basics of watercolor painting, so one can imagine my fear of coming up with total crap. Of course, I blame this on my Management course (because I chose it for JTA and “practical reasons,” because I knew I wouldn’t stand a chance in the talent test for UP Fine Arts), which, of course, is plain stupid because being a Management graduate doesn’t mean I can’t paint. Right?

So today, while walking around the grocery not helping mom, I concluded that all this time, I’ve just been too scared/lazy to try, and that I will prove myself wrong today. It’s part of my Nike life–the one where I just do it. Because (1) All our Logical Reasons are in fact just  Lame Excuses for not doing what we want to do and (2) If I have time to Facebook, I have time to learn watercolor painting and (3) Pag ayaw may dahilan, pag gusto ay laging mayroong paraan.

I walked into National Bookstore and picked out the cheapest stuff (because I didn’t want the price to pressure me into coming up with brilliance this early on). Also, if I do end up being a disgrace to the watercolor world, I didn’t want the endeavor to cost a heartbreak PLUS a bank-break. When I showed dad my loot though, he scoffed at my Lil’ Kids and Best Buy watercolor, saying they would only leave the wannabe artist in me frustrated, and my painting future un-pursued. He picked these out for me:

Look mom, watercolor shopping!

He chose Prang watercolor, the same brand he used back in college, a couple of pencils whose purposes he will show me tomorrow, cheap brushes and paper to play with.

Now that I was beyond my initial P150 budget anyway, I threw in a sale item I spotted from the counter:

Watercolor Shopping Trip Bonus: P22 Classic

An Oscar Wilde quote descriptive of my initial attempts below:

“Art, like Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous voices.”

First watercolor works: work on it.

Wish me luck that I don’t fuck up and give up!

Three reasons to vote for the Filipinas in the Clean & Clear competition.

1. If your Facebook newsfeed hasn’t informed you yet, Filipina representatives to the Clean & Clear Best Buddies competition are only second in Southeast Asia right now. They’ve got 11,000+ votes, and team Malaysia is leading with 13,000+ votes–the rest of the girls don’t stand a chance (64 votes, 520 votes, sad sad votes). SECOND??? How could we let this happen? I thought we could count on Filipinos to throw off judges’ numbers by voting by the millions?

Now we’ve heard enough talk about building the Philippines’ image to the world again, I say this is one way to do it! Let’s show the teenage girls of Southeast Asia that Filipinas are the role models to be! Vote here to support Filipina power aaaaand…

2. Get a chance to win one of these sexy babies! Keep voting until September 16 and you might get a FREE ZARA ACCESORY! Clicking vote is so much easier (and cheaper) than fighting with Zarawhores during the sale.

Tissue ideas: yours are for wiping crap

Some things are best learned the hard way. But really now, most things can be learned just fine the painless way, or in my case, through TV. I learned what tissue paper ideas are in the most painful way possible, when I could have gotten the lesson from the very first scene of Mad Men’s very first episode.

Don Draper’s Tissue Ideas: Better Than Mine

I happened to be hanging out with Charz in the 12th floor veranda when legendary awesome gay genius Chief Creative Officer, after his yosi break, spotted us and pulled us into an impromptu brainstorming for a pitch of apparently epic proportions. In the meeting were veterans, top art and creative directors–I think we were thrown in for variety’s sake. He gave us the brief and told us to come back in 30 minutes with tons of tissue ideas. Sounded simple enough.

So I spent the next 30 minutes jotting down ideas on my pretty gradient-colored pad (from Dijon, nonetheless) and ended up with 2-3 cool (or so I thought) taglines. CCO passes by shouting for us to regroup in his room. Everyone settles down, I’m seated on the couch right across the big boss.

CCO: (looking down at me) Okay, go.
Kim: Oh okay! So my idea is (brandishing pretty pad) blah blah blah blah…
CCO: Stop stop stop. Darling, do you know what tissue ideas are?
Kim: Mmmmnot yet.
CCO: Akin na yan (gets my pretty pad, looks at my scribbles and re-writes each tagline on separate, 1/4 letter-size scratch pieces paper). That is a tissue idea. Next.

Needless to say I was mortified, but I guess everyone else was too preoccupied with their own “tissue papers” to care about other people’s ideas. Or bloopers. One by one the non-newbies laid down tissue papers with tag lines or key visuals, each person having five to seven ideas each. I only had one. And in the wrong format. Ah well. At least I got a taste of high-pressure brainstorming early on.

Learned my lesson, life moves on! At least I didn’t almost cost the company thousands (ahem ahem accounts girl). Now I’m wondering how many mistakes I’ll have to make before I get my first advertising award.

Blueberry Pancake Day

Beautiful breakfasts are the best way to start the day, and Pancake House always delivers. So damn good I’m naming my day after it.

Blueberry Pcakes: Best with Bacon!

The purpley syrup added to the prettiness (and sumptuousness) of the whole meal, but it really was the bacon that put it on the top of my breakfast list.
Grabe sarap. Thanks for the tip, sincere waiter!