Whining Chronicles II (Or Losing time to a productive activity having no product produced at all part II)

While I may not be the only one who's supporting our large family (numbering close to 10 persons), it pains my neophyte pocket especially for someone like me whose miser-to-a-fault character always sublimes wherever and whenever money's involved. There are currently four of us working our asses off for the household: my mother who of course had been an employee all these years; my father who's currently overseas and our spark of hope of being able to pile up some money to get that dream house rolling after almost 20 years of being on hiatus; my brother, who's currently a call center agent and has a nick of spending his hard earned money with ease just like swallowing a piece of mini "Kutsinta" followed by a hot cup of cocoa; and of course me, who's currently stuck and getting all moldy and dusty being a helpdesk analyst under the regime of call center companies and their Filipino cohorts.

It may be a wonder to everyone of you out there on how four people working for 8-10 people and still here I am whining in this column. Come to think of it, I am wondering actually on why is it hurting my pockets a lot. Here I am, elated at the fact that tomorrow is pay day but at the same time, I'm depressed since more than half of that goes to bulging bills and mountains of groceries. There's this other half of the pay you say? We will, of course, take into consideration your transporation allotment, your sudden caprices for some quick snack at the office and that book that you have been waiting for three months time and finally (FINALLY!) it arrived and is ready for pickup.

Before anything else, I would like to say first that my salary is not that big. Considering I am a hepdesk analyst, it doesn't really come in packages--helpdesk analyst and near 30K wages. I am just one of those poor blokes who would have wanted a better stand in the company but since the company would rather outsource a hiring agency than hire us directly (which would more or less, yield the same budget tally for them) I am currently whining now.

So why go through all of that outsourcing and stuff? I don't know. All I know is that they'd see me prancing out of their doors after a few more escapades and brawls with an American ass-kissing house fly who pretends to be my boss. It's so not worth the pay.

Pay is not good. Boss is being an asshole. Not my ideal niche. What's the plan?

Of course! Another job hunting!


There are several benefits on landing on the job that I wanted to pursue. One would be: I would at least be able to practice my profession of choice, though to a minimal extent (but hey it's a start). Next: I would be able to rake in money for that very elusive house that's been sleeping at the back of the minds of our parents (and now it sits on top of my head with flashing neon green, orange and pink lights; and they're running mind you). Thirdly: I would be able to at least save money (after taking out the neon lights first) finally for my schooling again.

What job is that?


Teaching English.


There's this new trend that, I believe is an off shoot of the call center indsutry--teaching English to Koreans, Japanese and Chinese. If you have a very good American accent, stemmed from being a call center agent, you'll definitely get the job.

So I applied, but only as a part timer. This could at least add to my current wage and the pay is good I believe just for working 4 hours a day. Add that to my current working hours and that's a total of 13 hours. Half a day out of the house but earning almost double my current salary is not a bad deal. In fact, it's really one good deal.

First company to apply to: EduConnect (or something like that)

result: "We're not hiring as of the moment."
reaction: Then why the hell post it in Jobstreet bitch?!


Second company to apply to: English Channel (this time I'm sure of the name.)

result: Still pending after almost two months of following up. They would say that I was up for an oral interview by next week but three weeks has passed since that day and I am still waiting for that schedule. This is the first time that I have experienced the maximum effect of the "Filipino Time" at its best.

reaction: clueless


Third Company to apply to: Duzon (or something that goes like that)

result: Aching muscles; knowledge of the long forgotten stations of the almost non-existent Philippine National Railway; cumulative dark bags under the eyes which are thankfully subsiding gradually at present; first hand information about how to go around the Filinvest area via Festival Mall; removal of some dentures due to too much teeth grinding caused by stupid fellow applicants who boasts on their stupid American-accented talks when they could have talked with each other using their native tongue but decided to go against it for reasons I am not able to discern until now; discovery of the dread that a four-city distance work might present and; a contract signing.

reaction: *raises white flag*

Why raise a white flag when the opportunity is presenting itself?

Why not?


First things first. I need another job but I need to be alive in order to do that job. Three hours of travel time from my place to that part time job entails me to give up more than three hours of sleep everyday!

So? You say I can sleep on the way there? How can you if you need to change from one public transportation to the other after almost every 30 minutes? Then you have to walk for about 20 minutes or so to get to the other place where you'll get the bus to your destination. Who can sleep with all that? If I may add, the longest travel time of all those public vehicles would require you to stand up from when you boarded it until you alight it.



*sigh*

So now I'm back to square one. Back to square one and has no money in the bank.

Eh? Yeah no money! Salary day? 2 days ago? What salary? All I know is that when I came to my senses, there's a two week supply of groceries for everyone in the fridge and the threatening bills were gone from underneath that plastic apple magnet stuck in front of the fridge.

I wonder...how did that happen?

Whining Chronicles I (Cascade multiple amplifiers and let's see what you'll get!)

I never believed once in my life how thick headed I was until some few weeks ago when both my mother and I were talking about my little sister being hard to discipline and doing anything that would just please her in her own accord regardless of demarcations be it at school or at home. Then I looked back to the stories that they told us about my father being the rebellious type when he was a kid and I knew that genes were at work for all of us siblings--from father to my older brother, to me and finally to my sister whose sense of rationalism needs some fast sorting out.

During work, there were numerous times when my boss would always notice how I handled some issues (especially how I've handled priority issues). I have to admit that some of the issues have been mishandled to some extent but I was able to resolve everything. It's not that it was reported to me and I just left, went down to grab something in the convenience store, took it up to the pantry and ate to my heart's content. He knows that I had never left any priority issues lest I was not aware that it was supposed to be one or I called it to be of no particular high severity. This made me think, on why my boss would always nag and nag regarding things that go wrong at work and would almost always point the blame on me (even though I didn't do it). Then I remembered how our conversation about my sister went. My mother asked my sister on why, despite the fact that she was being scolded by our grandmother about not doing her assignments and not studying at school, is she still not studying. Simply she answered (according to my mother), "I just didn't want to do it."
There was definitely a hint of determined insubordination there. She was being scolded and she didn't like it. So what did she do to show defiance? Annoy my grandmother by following that circle of not studying and scolding.

Now whenever there was something that went wrong at work (viewing it subjectively from my boss's point of view), he would almost always notice me if he can't trace the trail of emails to the point of origin.
"Ano nangyari dito sa issue na to?" would be his tag line whenever he's asking me. If it's not my issue, I'd say it's not mine. But he'd still have a backup, mouth-shutting back up words carrying a tinge of finality in the conversation, "E nasa shift mo pa to nung naka-Open pa a? Ba't di ka nag-follow up?" One time I retorted to that and I learned that it was one of the Ten Commandments of the office: Never retort to your boss. "Dapat nag-follow up ka pa din, kaya nga tayo team. Hindi pwedeng iiwanan mo yung issue..." And what follows is a series of litanies that would make anyone praying the rosary catch their breath in exhaustion considering they are only kneeling.

"Ok fine! Whatever you want!"

But that's not what I did.

Perhaps this is how my sister felt at that time. Why would I give you the satisfaction that you want when you're not even listening to what I'm saying and would just point at me and bombard me with your one sided pieces of crap? You'd never get that from me. If I can't get even with you, I'll destroy you bit by bit.

So what did I do?

During weekends, I would go to sleep as soon as I get to work. Whenever there was a waiting call, I'd just let it ring there and would just go to sleep. When someone wants to file a trouble ticket (a document of a reported problem), I'd say that the ticketing system is down and we can't give out any tickets as of the moment. When someone reports something regarding a major issue, I would delay it for some hours. Yes just delay. A major issue is something which will make our clients almost millions of dollars if prolonged to some extent and if it would be traced back to me, I'd definitely lose my job. When he's there during weekdays, I would not include him in the emails for issues. Let him grope from where the issue started. Let him suffer for all I care. If he can grovel on the floor and crawl under my feet to apologize, I'd definitely laugh that signature sinister laugh that villains have at their disposal, adding a clean-my-shoes-with-your-tongue finisher.

But alas, amidst the efforts to have my silent rebellion be noticed, he never wavered in giving me my daily dose of pawnage. It seems like, after I lunge at him to attack, he just parries and does multiple ripostes for each of my unnoticed advances. Either that or he's just oblivious of what I am doing. Or what I'm doing doesn't attract too much attention. For so many reasons, I don't want to do considerable damage to the company (which I can freely do in so many ways that a normal employee can never imagine). Making it lose revenue is as simple as pressing the delete button, while masking my presence by using another poor bloke as an escape goat. If I want to start an all out war between me and the company, I could just do that. But as far as I can see, all of the little things that I am doing now will snowball eventually and when it hits a dead end, it would have destroyed everything in it's path due to its massive size and inertial force.

Perhaps the only difference between me and my sister is that I have gained some knowledge over the years and is thinking about my own welfare--about the future. My sister, for the moment is not able to decipher the meaning of studying properly for her future that she considers it meaningless and a waste of her time. I'm just one notch above her.

On another sense, perhaps she's one notch above me for not conniving a plot on how to destroy her self-crafted enemies.

Well, who knows. I even thought something like that when I was a kid.

Everybody's grabbing a piece of the topsoil, so hurry up while stock still last (at least on the same field)......

Stagnation of the thoughts and the wish to unclog some pipes within my mind allowed my tight budgeted schedule to purchase some time off and sit down to write something on this column. Not that it really is affordable but like in a three day sale where people are in a state of panicked-buying, it has been agreed by the council and league of consultants within my mind that it is now the time to invest and buy some limited stocks of time to be used for funding this humble page of nonsense and self-centeredness--while there are still stocks available.

It has been a while since I last wrote on this page (took about 4 months or so since the last one) and as usual, the cobwebs of the mind are still hanging and sticking to the walls of the membranes which maybe sapping every idea that may have developed (or at least still developing) through the four months interval. I figured that reading some books may keep the cobwebs from gathering--and I was right, though not entirely. It may not be in an alarming rate, but the webs and cobs would still accumulate. And four months isn't a short period of time especially for someone who doesn't have any proper education on English Writing. So here I am now, giving a very long introduction to let the flow of words circulate my system first, very much like a stretching routine for joggers and athletes. Blood needs to flow and so does words.

And in four months time that I wasn't able to grace the pages of this HTML and javascript concoction, what have I been doing?

Focusing on my job?

Nah! Focusing yes, but not on the current job, but on a career path.


How it came to that was thankfully to the lame ass job that I got in right now. If it hasn't been for the countless tickets that I created; if it wasn't for the endless cycle of resetting passwords for the very dumb users of the company's domain; if it wasn't for the side by side priority issues that I have handled (which was lovingly "praised" by none other than my egotistical, pompous, self-gratifying boss *sarcasm intended if it wasn't obvious enough*); if it wasn't for my dominatrix of a boss (mind you he's a guy), I would never have clicked on that small blue "E" icon on the desktop and typed the word "teaching jobs" on the net to reveal a whole new hope for people like me who has swayed away from the straight path and ended up in circles.

Let me relate something:

There was a boy, lost on a dry and dusty road. At first he wasn't at all that lost since the road was just a straight path from where he can see it. For some time, he trod on the road and on some occasion, would shelter on some nearby trees when the need rises. After a while, he stumbled upon a fork on the road. One was going left, the other one going right. He saw at the right path, numerous people prancing around and happily whistling as they walk along. He examined the left side and he saw a dark road though no hint of fear embraced him. Enticed by the gaiety of the right path, he trudged towards that way and engaged along with the prancing. As he pranced, he glanced to his left and right and saw that most people were moving along and were now wearing a different kind of face. He looked up and about and saw some object on the road. He saw a face smiling brilliantly with red cheeks and white teeth. It has been discarded. Fearing it might happen to him also, he urged himself to go back, but he was clueless on how to get back being busy with the prancing and whistling while walking along the road. So, instead of going back, he moved forward. As he continue on, evidence of any happiness was nowhere to be seen on the latter part of the road. Near a clearing, beside the road he tripped on large rocks, bruising his knees and feet. As he bent down to examine his knee, he wasn't aware that another prancing man was passing along and bumped onto him, sending him rolling down the clearing and straight to a small lake. The prancing man carried on and paid no attention to the boy as he whistled gaily, swaying his arms in full length. Meanwhile the boy clambered to his feet and went on the bank to try to dry himself. He remembered his injury and immediately went to the water to wash it. As he bent down, he saw a reflection of a tired man in front of him. He reached out to him on the water and it seemed to him that the tired man was reaching out to him also.
He gasped! He hurried out of the water and went on to the road again. He shuddered every now and then but would immediately put up a stern face and increase the pace of his strides. He moved forward taking a right turn at every fork that he see. After a long while, he reached the familiar fork where he had made his big decision. Right in the middle of the fork, there was this dilapidated sign that was barely readable because of the dust. He tried reading what was written on the sign but it seems that hope was gone for the wooden sign. He dropped his body on the ground and let his back rest on the pole of the sign and heaved out a very long sigh. All of a sudden, he felt a coldness on his face. He felt it with his palm. His eye widened and looked immediately at his soiled hands. No doubt--a trace of dark brownish color confirmed what he thought. He raised his palms in the air and soon after, droplets of rain poured down and washed the soil that clung to his wearied body. The boy stood up and drank the rain with his whole essence and pranced around the wooden sign. After the rain, the sun's rays caressed the boy's nape and bathed him with a light that seems to signify his rebirth. He turned about to get ready to tread the left path when he saw the wooden sign. The dust being washed, revealed the words beneath it.

Right for prancers
Left for non-prancers

The boy smiled at the sign and with a last effort as if to thank the wooden board, he polished it with his sleeves before setting off. On the road, he saw a clear puddle made by the rain. He looked into it and saw the man that he saw on the lake but now, the weariness has been erased. He stared at the man for a while, reaching out to him as the man reached back. Their fingertips touched sending ripples--but not on the puddle.



There are many of us who would be in the same situation right now. Especially for those who are quite undecided for themselves, they let society do the decisions for them. There has always been an unspoken truth: If everybody's doing it, then it must be the right thing. While it is an exaggeration to say "everybody", you can surmise that once most of the people are doing it, it might be the right thing for each and everyone. If someone prances along while wearing a tank top and laced panties on the street while screeching Wannabe by Spice Girls and then everybody soon imitates that jerk, it doesn't mean that you'll have to be in it also. It's not my position to dictate to you if you want to do that but in a subjective way of speaking (that is, my opinion matters here), you wouldn't catch me doing that, covert or overt. I'd say, take the left path. If there are any other paths there that might lead to your proper destination, then by all means, take those. Do not choose a road has been leveled enough by the feet of millions of people that the erosion is making it's way to the subsoil. Remember, the topsoil is where the nutrients for plants are most found. If you're planning to plant a tree of success, subsoil, as it is mostly sand, can't hold your plant much more your tree. It'd be stunted due to lack of nutrients and be easily torn away from it's root.

This is not a circus but we have a wolf who wears an underwear, breathes fire, and plays the Russian Poker

I always get mixed emotions whenever I observe a person trying to impress others by implying their greatness and engraving them on a stone, seal it with a magical ward and parade it on the street while waving to catch some attention (okay i went overboard there but you get what I mean). The heterogeneous feeling makes it more difficult on how to deal with people like these especially if the confidence that they have supersedes those of the gods of the old times, while unconsciously, or rather oblivious of the fact, that they are making a fool out of themselves. While I don't usually encounter those people head on, it doesn't mean that they are tolerable. Never wander inside my mind while these people are in the premises, else, you'd die of the curses brought to reality by my strong imagination in my imaginary world.

There was a line that was mentioned in a game familiar to most of us gamers but easily forgotten. I don't blame those who chose to set that memory aside since it was dubbed as one of the worst Final Fantasy ever (by most of the fans, though it can be brought into argument, but I won't be participating in any of those...please!). The game--none other than Final Fantasy IX.
Sure it has got it's ups and downs. But it's not the game that we are focusing at here for the moment. It is a line that Zidane mentioned in one of his flashback with Amarant (non-FF fans, forgive me, but you'll soon get it in a while). Zidane said to a, then, arrogant and hot-blooded Amarant, "A sly eagle hides it's claws."

The quote explains itself but allow me to elaborate more.

There was this wolf who happened to drink a potion left by an elder dragon. This potion, without him knowing, gave him the ability to breath fire like dragons do. After wandering about, he saw a pack of wolves, who shunned all other wolves trying to get in the pack or even those who are just trying to pass by. The lone wolf, realizing it too late, was drawn into a fight with the leader of the pack after trying to pass by. The leader howled, signaling the start of the duel. The lone wolf, seeing his disadvantage, cowered in fear. The whole pack laughed and sneered at his pathetic state. In an effort to redeem some of his pride, the lone wolf tried a howl, but instead a squeak came out. This made the whole pack laugh more and the leader who was waiting for his opponent, was rolling on the ground, jesting and mocking on the lone wolf, making the whole pack laugh harder. Belittled by this, the lone wolf gathered all his courage, took a deep breath and howled towards the sky. The dark night glowed beautifully as a pillar of fire ate the darkness away and illuminated the moon with crimson brilliance. The wolf pack seeing this stopped laughing as fear grew inside them. The leader stood up, with tail behind his legs, trying to step back and run away from the fight. But it was too late. Before he even moved, a hot stream of fire engulfed him and soon, he was consumed by the fire. The lone wolf triumphantly howled once more. The pack mimicked this howl as a sign of recognition of their new leader. Thus, the lone wolf became the new pack leader. Sometime later, the lone wolf, along with the pack, met a young lone wolf passing by. As a rule, this lone wolf should be challenged by the leader. So, as the new leader, the lone wolf stepped up and howled once more to the moon. Again, a pillar of bright fire filled the night. The young lone wolf stepped back and ran towards the stretch of the prairie. The new leader ran after the young lone wolf breathing fire. But the young lone wolf dodged skillfully at every attack. Soon, they were inside the forest. The leader furiously chased the lone wolf through the thickets and trees and bushes and shrubs but the darkness of the forest made it more difficult to see. At last he came into a small cliff with a clearing just below in which, on the other side, on another small cliff, stood the lone wolf, waiting for him. The lone wolf growled and at the leader, beckoning him to fight against him. The leader gave one more mighty howl and started towards the lone wolf. As he leaped downwards, instead of touching solid ground, he splashed liquid all over the place. The leader struggled to get out of the murky waters and swam towards soil. He had barely got out of the waters when a bite came on his shoulder. He looked at the attacker, and no doubt it was the lone wolf. He growled then opened his mouth to breath fire, but no fire came out. He tried again and again yet nothing happened. The lone wolf attacked him mercilessly, and by the time he stopped, blood dyed the soil. As life faded away from the leader, he saw a figure of the old leader whom he defeated. He tried to breath one last stream of fire towards the old leader yet none still came. The old leader just smirked at him as it evanesced with the next howling of the wolf.

We've seen so many things like this in the past, either fictional or in real life. Just like in a game of Russian Poker--never reveal that two of diamonds unless you have pairs, trios or full houses. Yes you can win by singles if you play it right, but knowing what your trump card is by an opponent will get you into trouble rather than giving the opponent a reason to fear you. And nobody fear the two of diamonds alone.



I remember this old pun text message:

What's the similarity of an underwear and knowledge?
You hide it until you're going to use it.


Perhaps people who flaunt their knowledge up and about like a prancing idiot wears their underwear outside their pants.
Sounds about right.

You know how they try to wrestle those beetles with gum?....hey, why are you sticking that taser there?

It has been a while since I have posted here but I was trying to collect all of my thoughts, ball it into one great idea and then slam it in on this page like a rolling down a bowling ball knocking all the pins down. Soon you'll see that that great ball of ideas is nothing but the loud representation of the author with a column named Zero Level Omniscience.


I remembered when I was in grade school, there was always a man in outside the campus who would bring every whatchamacallit things and sell them to kids for an unreasonable price. Gullibility seems to be inherent to kids without the aid of their parents. While the latter would appear immune to sales talk and coercion that only works on kids, gullibility visits them every now and then when they hear squalls and cries from the main arbiter that ties them and the whatchamacallit vendor.

In more ways that one, I have seen the angel of salesmanship whenever I frequent the gates of our campus back in the years of shorts-for-uniforms, only to find out later after staying in school for a few more years, that angels coming down from heaven, that are neither Gabriel, Michael and Raphael must be fallen angels--and I have fallen into their trap. *sigh*

Moving on, or in this case going back to those years, upon getting a message from the (then) angel of salesmanship, I have decided to buy this device that stings your finger with a sudden jolt of electricity when you press the button. It was worth Php 2.00 but hey, I was a student back then and it wasn't those times where "baon" would translate to money.
Anyway, hard earned money (meaning money that was raised from constantly looking down while walking) allowed me to satisfy myself with this piece of junk. But hey, a kid's got to love what he bought with his sweat and blood(?)!

You know, the funny thing with this toy is that at first when you know what it does, you feel like not experiencing it first hand, but once you test it, you feel like you don't want to end it. You just want to keep on pressing that button, feeling that sensation that brings euphoria, psychological in manner (whatever the vehicle is). Kind of like when you play with beetles. At first, you gross out when it's spiky legs comes in contact with you but when you get the hang of it, you don't want to let go of it till it dies. But then it still dies, and that stupid button-driven-small-taser-device gets dull and the jolt becomes no more than a prick. At any rate, the discomfort brought by these two ends--but in two different ways.

There are many ways for a beetle to die.

• Don't feed it
• Give it to the birds
• Pretend it's a Walking Stick (the insect)
• Mother makes a stew out of it
• The Natural Death

I could go on with the list forever, but it only separates the ways into two categories: natural and induced.
For an induced death, refer to the first four on the list. These are sure ways of removing that awkward feeling that you get from those horrible spiky legs.
Natural death comes to beetles when the owner decided to endure the awkward feeling. But eventually he becomes liberated from that.

Now, the mini-taser is an object that could be destroyed in a few ways:

• Place it on the train tracks
• Feed it the dog
• Pound it with a hammer
• Press and press the button till friction bears fruition and μ becomes negligible
• Press and press till the body becomes accustomed to the damn jolt

There are lots of awkward situations that we encounter. Majority of these awkward encounters entails us to distantly escape or hastily end it. It maybe in the form of a slow and grueling escape or have your Mom do it for you in the kitchen. Nevertheless, you would still try to kill the beetle.

A minority shares the same fate as the mini-taser in the sense that we try to cope up with the awkward jolt and press the button continuously till μ becomes so small that we don't even feel anything anymore. We know, in our minds that the awkward feeling is there but, as we keep on pressing the button, we acknowledge the fact that we can't get away from that feeling and as we perpetually press on the damned button, oblivious of blisters and callouses, we are fully geared to face it--helmets on.



So let me go on ahead and roll the ball down the alley. It'd probably be too small to even down one pin.

*Aaaargh!* Gutter!!