Time for another update! Looks like I'm going with one blog post per month at this rate, but I'll try and keep things fresh anyway. Bear with me!

With the departure of March on the horizon we all found ourselves saying our farewell's to one of our AU bosses. He'd been our manager ever since, and had probably trained over 80% of the staff during Briston's first few months. It's going to be real weird without him, yet sadly life goes on. On the other hand, I'm quite happy one of our own will be taking the mantle as the account manager in his stead! Yay, Crystal! 

Earlier this month Jed and I went to celebrate an old tradition - in Japan!

Loljk it's not really Japan - I'd have a separate (and longer) blog post for that if it were! It's as close as we could get though. Fingers crossed we'll cross Japan off our list come 2017!

I come here almost every year to celebrate with my friends from AdU, and it's literally like stepping into a whole 'nother dimension. I love everything about this place, and I can't wait to come back next year! I'm also quite happy that Jed enjoyed himself during the festivities. Lol what's not to love, really?? Happy I got to see his inner weab come out and squee, haha!

With another month coming in quick, I'm looking forward to more adventures and stories to tell. Where to next?

Heya! While I'm catching my breath this month, here's a blog post~! 😜

Where I come from you'll often hear February being referred to as the Love month, or Singles' Awareness month - whichever side of the spectrum you hail from. I don't know what the deal is with this weird focus on your relationship status; maybe it's because Filipinos are just naturally loving people. Take it as you will. 

Anyway.

This month Jed and I were still feeling the high from our last out of town trip so we've decided to gun for a short Baguio trip on Valentines' day. Nothing lavish, just a short trip up north so we can have a taste of the cold air, which we heard was dropping at an all-time low this year.

(Funny how I kept saying "short trip" when it's a 6-hour long bus ride at best.)

Our bags were packed by 3AM, nevermind that we had to lug our stuff to the office because we still had to work that day. Right after our shift we headed over to the bus stations in Cubao to catch a late Baguio-bound bus. We got to the terminals at around 10:30PM. I didn't go with my usual style of traveling where the tickets were pre-booked and our route and itinerary were ironed out - this time I decided to let my hair down and relax for once. Surprisingly I didn't mind being a chance passenger this time, and come 11PM  a bus (luckily) came by with seats with our names on it! I'm not sure we got enough sleep because of all the hype, lol.

The thing about excitement though, it tends to make you forget certain things. Like your phone charger cables. :)) We managed to take a few shots before our phones promptly died. 

It was a great feeling, waking up at the crack of dawn to find that you had just reached your destination. Jed and I were wearing thick jackets yet the biting cold still stung at our skin and fogged our breaths. We enjoyed a few moments of euphoric laughter playing with the clouds of air we exhaled before deciding that we needed to take shelter before we freeze to death. (Well, not really, but it it was still quite cold!) The temperature read 10°C, but it somehow felt even colder than that.

Since we only had about 24 hours till we catch the next bus home, we ended up walking around the city after we dropped our stuff off at the hotel. We only returned to the hotel a few hours later to take a nap, then went around the night market to buy our souvenirs and get some dinner, and watched other tourists walk around dragging their loot from the various ukay-ukays that can be found all over the city. In the morning we had breakfast at the hotel courtesy of their buffet, before checking out at noon. 

We stopped over at SM Baguio (because you must) for a short lunch date before heading to the bus terminal where we caught another bus for Manila by chance. For all the roughing-up that we've done, the entire trip was surprisingly light and relaxing.

So I guess the lesson there is, either you remember to pack your charger cables or be prepared to come back if you want to take more pictures. Haha! I wouldn't mind coming back though. 

This year I also went ahead and made some surprise homemade Nama chocolate for Jed using a recipe I found in YouTube (lifesaver, really). I know it's customary in some countries for girls to give guys some homemade chocolates while confessing their feelings, so I thought it would make a sweet gift for him even though he already knows how I feel about him. :)) Unfortunately no pics of that because he ate everything right away, lol. Next time I make some I'll make sure to take a quick snap before I hand it over to him!

But really, I'm conflicted in choosing which was the highlight for February because OH MY GOD WE WATCHED DEADPOOL. UGH. It's only February but I can safely say this is the. Best. Movie. Of. The. YEAR. Hands down!!! Ryan Reynolds was born for this character, haha!

Really, it's just sweetness overload this month interspersed with random doctor visits here and there. Hopefully after further testing we'll hear something more concrete about what it is that's wrong with me, aside from the obvious love bug. :P

Happy New Year! Looks like life caught up with me like it always does and now I only have time to make a (long-ish) recap of what happened the past month. Like they say, time flies when you're having fun. 

I always spend the New Year the same way - slumped with work and too busy ignoring the fireworks, lol. There's not more to it, really; I just happen to work 'round this time every year and I never bothered to take a leave. Not that I mind, actually, especially since Jed and I have got each other for company in the office anyway. Work perks, I guess?

This past month had been a blur for another reason though. I hadn't been feeling well since last December, though I took it as a sort of Christmas bug and didn't pay it much mind until recently. The moment I was forced to take a sick leave I just had to have it checked. I'm still waiting for the results but hopefully it's nothing serious. 

(I'm actually crossing my fingers and praying hard here; I hate going out for check ups.)

This month's highlight though is coming to Pam's gig at Catch 272. She was sweet enough to invite us to watch her play after her hiatus and OFC we weren't going to miss it for the world!

On our way to Pam's gig~

Honestly, she plays such hauntingly good music. She's got this distinct sound that mesmerizes you - so much that you'll forget to whip your phone out to take videos and photos. :)) Also I went ham on the drinks because I love cocktails and they're dirt cheap.

Sicknesses and workloads notwithstanding, I did have a good January. Let's maintain this momentum, shall we? :>

I guess I haven't updated this blog much to establish the fact that I'm not very fond of December. Mostly because it's THE holiday season for the PH, which means droves and hordes of people will be coming and going in the weeks to come. When it comes to my dislike for people and crowds, I believe that much I was able to translate here, at least. 

Despite my tendency to shy away from The Outside during the festivities, I'm very much willing to forget all that if it means I'll be spending time with some of my favorite people - like my dad. 

Look who decided to come home for the holidays! We don't usually get to spend time with him since he lives and works so far away, and often when he does get a holiday it's during the summer. Seeing him during the Christmas season is suddenly tons better for some reason! Lol all the sales happening in malls huehue time to ask my dad for gifts, mwahaha!

We had this for our family dinner at Seafood Island where my dad got to meet my boyfriend for the first time. So far so good!

Also while I did say I'm not fond of Christmas that doesn't mean I'm a complete Scrooge. I do have people I hold dearly and I like to pamper them with gifts from time to time. Jed and I decided to go and look for some good gifts we can hand out to our family members one weekend and although I failed in documenting our haul, I was able to take a picture of this: 

I've been obsessing over Crimson Peak since it came out and I could not resist staring at this Thomas Sharpe Funko Pop figure when we passed by a toys and figures shop. ♥ I didn't want to purchase it then because I wanted to buy my gifts for my siblings first and planned on coming back for him later, but sweet boyfie decided to grab him for me as a Christmas present. Eeeeeee~! He now sits on his place of honor atop my computer desk so I can stare at him every time I need some perking up, haha!

On the subject of surprises, looks like he's pretty keen on letting me know just how much he likes to go big on the gestures:

As if he doesn't already do enough to keep my heart beating faster and faster. It was a regular work day and I was just reading manga working when he plopped this on my desk after coming back from his break. What a keeper! ♥ 

Merry Christmas, and have yourselves a Happy New Year!

I think one of the best things about my relationship with Jed is that we both love to cook - and that we can get incredibly creative with our cooking! It's an amazing feeling when you collaborate and end up with a really good dish that you can share after all that hard work. How's that for a couple activity?

Recently I've been watching a lot of cooking videos on YouTube again, and I decided to revisit some old favorite recipes of mine from Cooking with Dog. I've been following their channel since 2008 and I'm proud to say I've tried out quite a few of their recipes already - with astounding results! Japanese cuisine will always have a special place in my heart.

So - back to cooking: since Halloween had just ended I thought it would be apt to make something out of pumpkins because, y'know, why not. And also we had A LOT of pumpkins at home for some reason, waiting to be cooked. 

I've made some pottage before using Cooking with Dog's recipe and it turned out great! Making some the 2nd time around - and with Jed - would ergo be twice as awesome.

And I was right! Check it out: 

We've decided to add some bacon because anything's a good excuse to have some bacon, lol. Do check out the original recipe if you'd like to try it out for yourself.

Later into the month we also tried out Hokkaido Ramen Santouka, just because we couldn't get enough Japanese food in our system. :))

Good food, good fun, with the best company one could wish for. If I could ask for more, I'd ask only for seconds!