Twenty-secondth day of quarantine and I somehow managed to keep it all together. I have been a telecommuter since I stopped going onsite for site builds and maintenance, maybe 5 or 6 years ago. And ever since I have been working from home steadily. Even with all the chaos and disruption caused by Covid-19, somehow work goes on and in great abundance, piling projects and daily scrum calls hinders pandemic feels. My thoughts cascade from lucky to have work to why do I have to work during a pandemic. Why can’t I just relax and spend the day watching viral clips in Tiktok (my heart goes oops…)
Covid 27
Having experienced the Pinatubo eruption first hand, literally beaten and buried and eventually rose from the ashes to start a new life, has led me to believe that nothing worse could possible happen in my lifetime. And life has imparted yet another lesson on thinking with absolute finality. There will be worse to come.
Montero Sudden Unintended Erection
Sudden Unintended Animation
With the all the bad publicity the Montero Sport is having, the fate of the 2016 model doesn’t look promising. The alleged SUA caused a wound so deep, that even tricycle drivers near my house veer away when a Montero Sport parks or crosses its path. The stigma is real. You can thank the video clips circulating around social media and the biased reporting of TV Patrol for the new model’s premature death. I may not have the full technical prowess to convince people to change their minds, but my family owes this SUV a big thanks for the years of Biogesic-free service. More than enough to compel me to write about my experience with the Montero Sport in defense against SUA claims.
Backgrounder.
My mom bought a Montero Sport way back in 2009, If my memory serves me right, it was the same year the Montero Sport was officially launched in our shores. With the Fortuner already the leader in the IMV segment that time, the Montero Sport posed itself as a worthy challenger. On paper specs, it toppled the Fortuner and on the actual drive, it did not disappoint either. I was rooting for the Fortuner and made every effort to turn the tides against the purchase of a Montero Sport. I find the Fortuner macho/manly with its bold stance, while the Montero’s aerodynamic design a bit too conservative and refined. I failed miserably of course, simply because whoever holds the power of the purse has the final say, a reoccurring lesson that I never learn.
A few days after making a reservation, my mom and I went to CarWorld Pampanga. We came early morning and by mid-afternoon the grin on our faces and the universal feeling of excitement of new car owners was upon us. I remember when we left the dealer it only came with 10 liters of diesel and the low fuel warning light’s amber glare was stone cold. Before we can conquer the roads, we had to stop at the adjacent Shell station a few meters away. It was pretty disappointing.
It came with free tint and EWD (early warning device). I remember getting a freebie in the form of an umbrella. As soon as we got home we took pictures with our Monty. From that day, we never had any major issues with the Montero Sport, not even a sighting of the alleged SUA ghost.
Return of the comeback.
Mom’s Montero Sport was so dependable that my Father opted to buy the beefed up version which came in the form of the Montero Sport GLS-V back in January 2012. The comfortable suspension was the main driving point that led him to the decision. The additional ponies (horse power) made it a dream to drive on NLEX and the abundance of power and torque tempts you to toy with the speed limit. It was the fastest thing I drove on four wheels. I bought a second hand Fortuner V 2006 model a few months before his purchase, the stock Fortuner had a harsh ride. I was able to observe the pros and cons of both the Montero Sport and Fortuner as a consumer and a daily driver. Without any reservation, from 2009 until January 2015 after we sold our last Montero Sport, we never experienced any Sudden Unintended Acceleration.
I alone racked up 35 thousand kilometers driving my father’s Montero (he later sold it to me a little over a year after he bought it). We also drove it weekly from QC to Pampanga and fuel cost was no more than a mind blowing Php500 back and forth. Just to set the record straight, we sold them way before the SUA claims came out. It was a business move as they were purchased way above their current market value. My mom’s 2009 Montero Sport was bartered to 1M worth of dried corn she used as main ingredient for livestock feeds in her farm, the valuation was 700K at that time for her Montero Sport.
My two centavos.
The Montero Sport shares the same engine and specs with the Strada, why the alleged SUA happens only to the Montero Sport escapes me. Surely this would have affected the venerable Strada as well if there was a grain of truth in it. The alleged SUA happens only to Monty’s with automatic transmission, which is all too fishy in the first place. The Montero Sport is manufactured in Thailand and is sold to different countries with the same specs as the ones sold in our shores, how odd that all the cases and claimants all came from our beloved country? Is it possible that only the defective units were shipped here in PH? Probably a Trojan planted by Mitsubishi engineers so they can take over our country? Do our road conditions turn them into wildlings?
The timing of the SUA issue coincides with the release of the New Model. Just today I saw a 2016 Montero Sport on the road and my suspicion was up to my nose. A smear campaign meant to discredit and bring down sales. As a member of a Facebook group with thousands of Montero users, not a single soul has stood up to claim they have experienced the SUA first hand. It was always “kaibagan ng kaibigan ko.”
These are facts, people, it is up to you if you want to join the bandwagon. Thank you for reading!
5 Years
Tomorrow will mark my fifth year of working for the same company. I consider this a milestone considering the longest time I stayed with a company was a year and two months. Job hopping, job hopper record of 10 companies in 5 years. The frequency still amazes me to date. If too much job hopping was a crime, I would probably get a life sentence. Death penalty, if you include harassment cases.
Graciously thankful for the past five years, for not everyone is blessed to work on the stuff they love to do, working with diverse groups of people (some are really close friends) – relentlessly challenging and pushing what was once a lonely planet to a thriving solar system. This is only metaphor I can think of as of the moment, too much sun I suppose.
Spitefully mindful of past five years during the times my work has taken over my life, for everyone knows what it’s like to forgo personal plans over work. I wonder a few years from now will it matter? How I started wearing glasses because of too much screen time? How I skipped countless family gatherings just to keep a clean record?
With my big eager eyes, I look forward to the coming years, years filled with continued growth in skills and financial stability, and probably the most important one, more time with my family.
Cheers to the good life.
P.S.
Some notable stuff I learned the past week includes:
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- Replacing wheel bearings and bleeding hydraulic brake systems
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- ATM – means “at the moment”
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- You’ll be safe here chords
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- People living in Loyola Grand Villas are insanely rich
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- My mom watches OTWOL and she enjoys it
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- You can get rid of ants using a home made solution of boric acid, water and sugar.
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- Yaya dub’s sister is hotter, I accidentally found her in Instagram while searching for Coleen Garcia
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- Mr Robot tv series is one for the books
Out of Nothing
If you have been a follower of the anime series “Full Metal Alchemist,” you have probably memorized Edward’s monologue which he delivers during the start of every episode. It goes something like the paragraph below which I got from the third link of my Google search.
“Mankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy’s first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world’s one, and only truth.”
I was a sucker for the series not only for its unique plot, but also for its killer lines about the metaphysical aspect of life. I have never wished to have a brother so bad until I felt the connection between Edward and Alphonse, willing to sacrifice their life and to cross parallel dimensions for each other.
One fateful Sunday morning trashed everything good I knew about FMA. I was doing my usual habit of hopping radio stations while waiting for the green light, when I heard the line “Out of nothing at all, makin’ na na na and so on…” I had gone past 3 stations when I realized that I need to get back to the channel and listen more to the song. My mind was battered with what I heard, feeling close to having an intra-cerebral hemorrhage. I came to class still agitated, I was thinking about the song I heard, and if I heard it right in the first place.
As I hurried inside the room, my mind was set on googling the song that I even skipped greeting the students a good morning. After a quick search in Google, I found out the song was entitled MAKING LOVE OUT OF NOTHING AT ALL, by Air Supply. I hastily clicked on the link to YouTube and listened to the song.
“Out of nothing at all, na na na”
This song is the antithesis of Full Metal Alchemist.
Pale Pilsen
I have been a staunch supporter of PNoy since the start of his campaign. Slicing precious time out of my busy schedule to register and eventually vote for him and his party come Election Day. I had high hopes for our country if he were to become the next president. Noong mga panahong iyon, simple lang naman ang rekisito ko sa isang presidente, basta hindi lang magnakaw sa kaban ng bayan solb na ako. Ang logic ko, masisipag naman tayong mga Pilipino, kayang kaya nating i-angat ang bayan basta lang hindi ala-gloria magnakaw yung president natin. Hindi pala ganon kadali iyon. Sa ingles, “it’s not that simple.”
I thought he was that leader that would liberate this wretched country mired in poverty, the glimmer of light that would guide us through this endless darkness.
I always wished the best for our president and our country, hoping for a reversal of fortune or some sort of cool change, but the past three years had proved me wrong. I am tired of waiting for something to happen, something real, concrete and palpable. Kaso wala eh, aanhin mo ang mga statistics at ang mga financial indicators na nagsasabi na ang laki ng ini-angat ng ekonomiya natin kung hindo mo naman ramdam ang pag-asenso ng bayan. Mapa lower class or middle class wala eh. Hindi ka nga nagnanakaw sa kaban ng bayan at tuwid ang daan mo, kaso lahat ng programa mo pang mayaman at hindi maka masa. Wala rin brad eh, hindi lang pala enough na hindi magnanakaw yung presidente. Wala ang salitang “masa” sa bokabularyo ni PNoy at mas lalong wala ang salitang “pagkakapantay-pantay.” Sorry lasing lang, kailangan ko na kasing isoli yung mga natirang bote at case ng beer sa tindahan. Hindi kasi inubos ng mga bisita ko nung birthday ko.
Letter to Among
Dear Among:
Atcheng Bising recently delivered a hagiography – yours – and we can all forgive her decision to go for the big words. And her failure to grasp the power of understated words. Her grounding is neither in the letters nor in the humanities, but in the natural sciences.
Collectively, though, we agree, fully and wholeheartedly, with her general drift. You rock, man. Welcome to the parish.
What are the things refreshing and amazing about our new priest? As one of the Brownings said, let me count the ways.
Number one. The breadth of your literacy.
My God, who still reads Guy de Maupassant? Functional illiterates like myself cannot even pronounce his name, even when we want to invoke one of literature’s greatest short story writers. Victor Hugo? Les Miserables is, to many, a nice print on a tee, over-commercialized like Che with his beret. We don’t realize that it took Hugo 17 painful years to get Les Miserables finally published.
Truth to tell, we are more interested in knowing about the blood-drenched rise of the Jacobins than Hugo’s and Maupassant’s elegant writing.
Number two. You are the perfect mutatis mutandis. Not the old meaning, mind you, but the modern usage. This means one who can immerse deep into popular culture and technology trends and come out as an awesome aggregator. Your homilies, like the Aeta with the eclectic taste in movies and the deft reference to “people hearing without listening “of Simon and Garfunkel were both apt and to the point. The gadgets, definitely, are dumbing us down.
Number three. You steer clear of politics.
I am a great admirer of Gustavo Gutierrez. I read and reread the Sermon on the Mount. Homilies, however, should be about the bedrock teaching of caring for the neighbor in a straightforward kind of way, with no political and angry undertones. Which, you do. Which you do on Sundays through stories about humanity and caring that truly resonate.
Again, you rock man. We love the homilies.
Pasalamat ke pu keng panyatang yu.
A parishioner
Dear Tang
You’ve been out of the country for just two days and our fridge looks like new again. Empty like a deadbeat’s promise, barren as our yard in Pampanga (our damn goats eat everything), well except for a few bottles of water and a bottle of catsup. Which probably wouldn’t fall in neither go, grow or glow foods. Not that it matters, but the thought would be comforting, ingesting something categorical in this world where people feel the need to belong to something. Although we have the same conversation every single night, I still anticipate when you arrive from work. The wringing sound your truck’s CRDI engine echoes as you hastily park in the garage. It sends a signal to my brain like how a pet recognizes when its master is waving a treat, Pavlov would be so proud of you. And if you can learn to close the door gently I would be prouder, contrary to your favorite line in Dylan Thomas’ poem “Do Not Go Gentle Into that Good Night,” it makes sense to go gently in the dead of the night when people are asleep. I’m kidding, of course.
And it’s only been two days and I know you miss how I make “mano” with my right hand while my left hand simultaneously juts out to grab the “pasalubong” dangling in your hand. Barely entering our abode, without missing a beat, you’d describe in detail what you have in store for me like how a preacher would describe life inside the gates of heaven. I guess it comes instinctively with your job as a journalist to auto-generate press releases. Whether it came from an expensive place that I have never even laid eyes on or how the chef used nothing but olive oil and the list goes on. And even if it is the same old story, it always feels like the first time I hearing it. Then you ask how my day went and I ask the same, and if our conversation exceeds 2 minutes it would be about cars or about the wonders of the Internet/Google or something about my juvenile ways which I quickly dismiss. I hate to admit it but at age 28, you still make me feel like I am in still in high school when I was living with Ma in the province. But instead of her taking care of me, you took on the epic challenge and I have nothing gratitude. I still have a lot of things to write but I’m already tired and I still have work tomorrow.
And wait… I miss you Tang! Don’t leave your heart in L.A.
Mynd
When you have to go, you really have to go.
It takes one rainy Sunday afternoon to tap into the depths of my mind. The water’s rhythmic cadence on the roof whispers like a good old friend that makes us feel how lucky we exist in this lifetime. And the flood it leaves after its splash reminds us of the sick cycle that after life comes death. I am assuming, of course, for normal people like me that happiness is balance and getting what you paid for. As simple as getting a tattoo, out of ink, pain and blood comes ‘skinful’ art. Or when starting to play the guitar, you can’t expect to fret out stunning riffs without callusing your fingertips. You can have your cake and eat it but expect a rise in your sugar level.
Outside looking in, inside looking out.
I decided to take my neutral side, leaving my extremes behind. Hoping to see what I came to find, I slowly took a peek inside my mind and in there only you I found.
Dear
Every time you go away, you take a piece of me with you.
Bravo!!!
Driving a car frees my mind, while riding a bike frees my soul.
I got my first motorcycle today, a pre-loved bike that I got from my co-worker for a very reasonable price. Ever since I can afford to buy one, my folks would always crush every attempt and opportunity for me to own one. I guess they have seen too many bike horror stories. Now that I have successfully sneaked one into the house, I’m not planning on a quick trip to the morgue anytime soon. I’ll be taking my sweet time learning the ropes of riding, and discipline on two wheels.
Travelling from point A to point B with my bike never felt better compared to a cage in four wheels. Sex is overrated. Riding sends a different thrill between the legs.
Honda Bravo Specs:
Engine Type: 4 Stroke, OHC, air-cooled
Bore X Stroke: 50 x 49.5 (mm)
Displacement: 97.1 (cc)
Compression Ratio: 9.0:1
Max Output: 5.36 kw/8000 rpm (or 7.3 PS/8000 rpm)
Max Torque: 7.34 N-m/5500 rpm (or 0.75 kg-m/5500 rpm)
Engine Oil Capacity: 0.9 liters
Starter: Electric
Transmission: 4 speed rotary type
Dimensions: 1.908 x 6999 x 999 mm
Dry Weight: 89 (kgs)
Fuel Tank Capacity: 3.7 liters
Seat Height: 764 mm
Wheel Base: 1.234 mm
Min Ground Clearance: 127 mm
Front Suspension: Telescopic fork
Rear Suspension: Twin
Front Break System: Drum
Rear Break System: Drum
Save Me
Where have all the righteous men gone? Meanest places? When the right thing happens to be the hardest, can you blame us for being wicked. On the first sight of blood, if I turn around and flee? Can you blame me for being a coward, choosing self preservation over principle? There will be another day, as certain as the games we play. The next time, I’ll wield my sword in triumphant glory.
Saving game… Please wait.
Do not remove memory card.
Tapilok
I sprained my right foot muscle over a basketball game this evening. I shouldn’t have played with the construction workers. I only have one week before our company sports fest starts. Based from my previous battles with sprains, it looks like I’ll be warming the bench with my skinny ass again. Just when I secured a spot at the starting line up, the goddess Nike screws me. I have never been part of any starting line up, even on the small time barrio leagues. God, I’m hopeless.
Looking on the bright side, my injury inspired me to brew an ultra corny joke that goes like:
“Ano ang tawag sa pinakamasakit na chocolate?”
Edi…
“Tofiluk!”
Final Friday
And if there was something out of the usual to share, it would be absence of Manic Mondays for the last six months of my existence. They were replaced by Troubling Tuesdays due to our company’s adherence to MST Zone, which on my opinion is the best time zone to follow when working in our beloved country. 6PM MST is 9AM local time; do I need to say more? So much for planning to make this an I’m-bitter-with-the-world post, I just used the word beloved. Starting this May, I am forced to bid farewell to my existing work schedule meaning goodbye Friday to Sunday day off. Hello Monday to Wednesday day off, I hope you’ll be kind to me. I have a weak heart. A heart so weak that I replaced my truck’s leaf spring bushings and front shock absorbers in honor of my final Friday day off.
Epic Beard
People’s reaction after I grew a beard and a moustache:
“Natakot ako pag kakita ko nung pic mo!”
“Bad boy look”
“Manong Joma”
“Action star look”
“Kamuha mo si Victor Neri na may sakit”
“Bagay!”
“‘Wag kang magsasalita ng kengkoy, ha?”
“Kuya!”
“Hoy hoy hoy Mr Suave!”
Average Jom 