Alright, so I'm here at work again, doing my posting on my thanksgiving aftermath super special days off! Actually thanksgiving went pretty smoothly, it was over at my cousin's place which it always is mostly cause his birthday is so close they celebrate it on the same day (Yeah i think he gets gipped).

Oddly enough I oddly enough got into a debate with one of my uncles which then included a few of my aunts as well. It was strange, cause that never happened before. It was playful and all, nothing like heated or something but definitely strange. As far as I can figure, it was at first about the whole 2012 thing, and then how I call bullshit on that though I did enjoy the movie mostly cause of john cusack. And then it lead to talking about glenn beck and how I thought he was a crybaby, and then my uncle was like, "it's cause of you left extremist that the country is going downhill" Keep in mind this is all playful still. It took a bit since I had to analyze and sum up the situation but he kept interrupting me before I said, "so, how did this debate get from 2012, to glen beck and when did I ever say I was an extreme leftist? Cause yannno, I hate plenty of democrats as well" And actually he paused for a moment cause he couldn't remember I said I was an extreme liberal.

It ended though with a small talk about healthcare. Now I was kinda ill prepared for that one mostly cause majority of my uncles and aunts are nurses. Though it's funny when I asked him the random facts that I know, like which country is concluded to have the best healthcare system and he said the U.S. and I told him no, it's france. and also I asked the U.S. is the only modern westernized country that doesn't have a government run healthcare system. and he was like, oh I didn't know that. My cousins though helped me out every now and then cause I think he was addressing all of us. Though suffice to say, it was a losing battle.

overall! still good!

Alright, after i dunnno how long, but i figured i'll post something now~ I've been in this sort of active mood lately in that I actually want to push myself forward more despite the whole years upon years of inactivity or...bipolar activity. SO GO ACTIVE KOJAK!

So I'm going to animeUSA with my cousins this weekend w00t! and actulaly i'll be cosplaying at the young walter dornez from hellsing.
http://media.photobucket.com/image/walter%252Bc%252Bdornez%252Byoung/jeapekou/12.png

will provide pics later~

S'funny actually, these "mood swings" come and go a lot more often than when I didn't think about them or at the very least didn't write about them. But regardless, having some note of them is better reflective material. And that's usually what I'm all about as much as a pain it is, I think it's a beneficial habit I sort of wandered into.

Now, I've been working on two big projects at my job. And I'm actually pretty happy to do them, since it's given something for me to do, to really get obsessive over it like I did back when I was at school.  I was actually given help a bit though since I haven't been with the company long and they didn't know my work ethics so they thought it'd be too much for me to handle. Regardless I was on top of it easily enough thanks to the help and cooperation of everyone else. Though, I noticed today as I was putting on the finishing touches of this that my coworker, the one who was hired along to oversee it mentioned to me how I was in a different mood now. I seemed a bit more, I suppose meaner since I said a bit more taunting things. I didn't see it really, though I figured I usually do the whole overly happy guy thing when I'm in new places. Though most people do say I'm a very kind and nice person who apparently always has a smile on (very creepy).

I said to myself an hour or so ago, "yeah, you just seem to have an uncanny ability to push people away without noticing it". I tend to say random things like that since it's usually a way to stimulate ideas and thoughts. This time around, it really did make me think of how I deal with people. Sure, I try and be as nice as I can in the beginning. But as soon as I get comfy around people, I start to let things slip, sort of like revealing more of my cynical side. And really, I don't enjoy doing that. I'm one of those weirdos that doesn't think before saying stuffs when I get to that sort of mentality. After saying that, I soon followed afterward, "you really do deserve to be alone sometimes..." Hah, I really must be crazy, despite how agreeable that statement seemed to me, despite how stupid it sounded as well. I mentioned before I think in my first entry how I don't let people get to know me. And perhaps really this is the major reason why.

SO first post of the new years! Last week didn't have anything important happen so figured, meh, might as well skip it. At the moment it's 18 freaking degrees here in NYC. And from what I heard, it plans to get even colder by Friday. WTF?!!?!? Definitely not good temperature for a person like me who's already sensitive to the cold as is.


So the last week or so there's been lots of new beginnings that I've heard from other people. There's minor things happening with my cousins, who begin their spring semester at college, good luck to them. There's also a few major things happening to friends and family.  My older sister apparently headed off to California for a week for job searching; my friend finally moving out of his parents place into a house he renovated himself; another friend who started his new job at teaching science to high school students. A huge good luck to them then.

With the new year arrived, i think it's great to be able to start something new and fresh. It's symbolic in a way like a new chapter in a book. While I haven't started anything new or drastic as my friends and family, it made me wonder what exactly will there be in this new year for me, if anything on the line of new beginnings. I've chatted before about how I don't necessarily see myself staying at my job for the rest of my life since a graphic designer needs to experience all sorts of things to further push his or her creativity. There's also the whole, parents moving back to the philippines, so I'd sooner or later move out and live on my own. It's all very exciting and nerve wrecking at the same time. Despite what I've told myself and others how you're suppose to really put yourself out there, there's a part of me, the humble part that resists all the change. A part of me just wants to stand still really, and I think that that case is true for a lot of people.

Regardless, if anything that I've learned, it's to always make the best of any situation that's been given to me. What a optimistically cheery side of me to share here.

And it's the faithful wednesday here once again. And turns out it's New Years Eve and it's snowing here in NYC, how bout that?

Usually on New years, I tend to remember past things that I've done that year, as well as branching out the years passed. Now I don't mean that I look back and do the whole, "I wish I shoudla done this...or done that," I usually don't dwell too much on the choices that I've made. I mostly  just remember them in a sense of "what have I learned," sort of deal. I'm sure a lot of other people do this, and I think it's a healthy exercise or at least it is for me since it keeps me in balance.

I remember when it was the beginning of December and I started my first entry. I thought about, during the time I started writing because I was sort of moody and wanted to just post something public. A while back, I actually kept a document of random thoughts that I had on my desktop. It wasn't really a journal as it was just a collection of theories, emotions, and deductions on life or whatever. I also found my written journal as I was cleaning up my room a few days ago. It was a journal I kept the last time I was in the Philippines and also I wrote in it the time I was in Barcelona, Spain. I guess you can call it my travel journal since I haven't written in it at all when I'm home. I tend to think a lot in most scenarios, but lacked the drive or attention sometimes to just write about it. And to make it less than ideal, had I written about it, I end up briefly just writing about those events and concentrate more on what thoughts were going on in my head.

I suppose, that's why I continue to write in this LJ. My original intentions were to just write in other people's journals as I explained I believe in my first entry. But I think this can be my sort of for now, since I do check my LJ each morning to see others. And I figured if I'm logging in anyways, might as well write about something, even it doesn't make sense and it's just babble. It certainly could be a nice nostalgic trip for the next year.

Happy New Years Everyone!
 

So, I'm at work atm, partitioning my time since there's not much to do before the holidays and I don't wanna be caught just sitting around. A few days ago, I was visiting my friend at his apartment.  Later on my friend mentioned to me how he got his teaching certificate and how he was a little afraid and nervous to teach a bunch of teenagers in high school. He mentioned to me, wouldn't you be afraid? And I was like, I suppose so, but I kind have gotten use to explaining things to people which I end up doing when I chat with a few friends online. He sort of took that as a joke seeing as he usually ends up explaining things to me, which is more or less accurate. It's then it kind of dawned on me that I really don't know much on most subjects. Now I'm not saying I should be an expert on something, but really I don't know much on things that sort of interest me. I compared it to like when you select a beginning character to a game and they give you several  to choose from. Usually you'd have one that goes high in one stat and low in another, but usually there's always that one character who's just all around average in everything. I usually hate this type of character, cause it's just so boring and dull, no strengths, no weaknesses, nothing interesting about 'em. And it's just my luck that I'd view myself like that.

I began to break down my own interests that I have. Ranging from my career as a graphic designer to looking up and drawing anthros, and I sort of admitted that despite I say these are things I'm interested in, I thought about, well I'm only sort of semi interested in them. And during the times where I some how was passionate in doing whatever it was, designing or illustrating or whatever, I think only was in that moment not so much because I liked doing it, but just because I had others on my mind. It was a feeling more of I wanted to help them out rather than me doing it just because I wanted to do. I think about things too much and they tend to fester unsightly into ugly thoughts in my head.

Now... I was pretty moody when I had this sort of feeling. And technically I started writing this tuesday morning. It's strange on how I can sort of feel down and then back up in a day with no factor involved other than time going by. Anyways it's xmas eve, time to feed on all the xmas cheer and stuff going about.

Well then it's Wednesday, and in all honesty, I'm pretty tired. This  passed week and a half, I've been averaging about 10 hour work days. Now two of my friends have mentioned to me, dude, ultimately working really hard, as in putting in the long hours won't really help ya get too far. Like I'm sure whoever your supervisor or boss is appreciates you for doing so but will it get you more benefits? Probably not. The way I think we'd all see it is that you're an employee that they can ride for a while.

Now not to be all down and apathetic about the subject of working, but as I explained to my friends who mentioned this to me, I'm not working these 10+ hours a day to impress my boss. In actuality I put in these hours mostly because I anticipated the work load I received and I know if I didn't put in those hours of work beforehand, I'd probably still be at the office right now desperately trying to rush in everything. And really at the moment, despite those hours, I haven't really be tired through them all, actually they went by pretty quickly IMO. It reminded back in college how my friends and I would put in these types of hours in our school mac lab to get our work done, but also having a good time. It made me remember that among the 4 of us, each one had their strength in something. One always came up with the most random and successful idea on a project, one had the best engineering and craftsmanship, one was just literally a perfectionist to anything he made, but as for me, other then my minor skill in illustration, there was one trait I had that nearly put me on the same level as these guys. That trait being, my stamina. I was best capable of staying awake than all of em. I use to make a joke that I actually just stole their energy, cause when they got tired, I got more awake. What's kind of creepy though is that I can be that focus on what I'm doing, I think I forget to blink sometimes, even forget that hungry and mostly just drink water. The blinking part, well, I figured because when I actually did blink it stung a bit and the fact that my friends were all freaked out when my eyes were all bloodshot i guess, though what was really creepy was when a straight red line went across my pupils.

Anyways...staying off topic now, with an hour commute now to deal with every day on the train, I figured, other than sleeping, I can at least get some reading done. So I picked up the book, Dream City, by Brendan Short at my local barns and noble. S'about 355 pages, and I only read on the train ride back. (I sleep during the morning commute). Finished it a few days ago, all in all a good book with a progression of the main character from childhood to preteen, to teen, adult and then senior. But honestly, I assumed the book would last me a month or so. I ended up picking up another book called The Learners, by  well known graphic designer, Chip Kidd. This one was about 253 pages. And hah...well I finished it about 4 days. I usually never read really, but I think I know why. Mostly cause I've got far too many distractions around me to ever set myself up in the position to do so. It's a real shame really, the feeling you get after finishing a book while your mind still wrapped around the characters the author has painted for you is truely a unique experience. But thankfully now, I supppose with the force spare time I have, I'll have ample opportunity to get to know that feeling.

Mmm, Wednesdays seem like a good day if any to post something here. It's right smack in the middle of the week, where the the previous weekend is still fading and the new one's on the horizon.

So recently I heard Manny Pacquaio won the world boxing title against Oscar Del La Hoya. Only reason I know this is because my parents took me along to go to my cousin's house to watch the fight. And while I know my parents would sometimes watch boxing and such, I pretty much think they were all hyped about this one because, dun dun dun, Manny Pacquaio's filipino. Anyways, I mostly went just to hang out with my cousins, or at least three of them during this time. Two of em are in High School, the other is like in elementary. The rest are either in college or living out of state now. Now while we chatted there, as one of them played tennis on the PS3 and one trying to cheat at it, I got to a site where it basically told stereotypes that one particular person hates about filipinos. I rattled them off to my cousins as they agreed and disagreed with a few of em.  Personally there's three top things I hate being filipino or related to the filipino culture, none of these in any particular order.

1) When other filipinos automatically speak to me in tagalog or any other filipino dialect and automatically assume I know what they say.
Ok, seriously, I hate languages in general. Which is surprising since I did have a English minor, but yeah I still hate em. They say the best time to pick up on a language is as a growing kid since your mind is a bit more flexible that way. But nope! Not me! As my parents say to me, you just never really seemed interested and we never pushed it on you. So while I can understand a few words here and there sure, actually full sentences or anyways, goes right over my head. One day I suppose I'll learn tagalog. Highly doubtful if it's any time soon

2) Becoming uninterested in world events unless it has another filipino in it.
This one I can say is something my parents have shown me several times by now. Take for example the Manny Pacquaio thing. Kay...alright so I'm not trying to downplay his achievements or so but I never was too interested in fighting. (Despite I did end up teaching shaolin kung fu at my college for year). I hear it from my aunts and uncles, and parents as well when some news should happen and they'd seemingly include such and such story with, "he's filipino, she's filipino, is s/he filipino? I think s/he filipino." Seriously...c'mon does that really matter? And it's only more bleh that they listen to the news on TFC (that's the filipino network). I'd try and switch it over to like CNN or so, but no, they'd prefer world news by the filipinos instead. >>

3) Not acting to display enough pride in my heritage by acting ghetto and sometimes materialistic.
I pretty much grew up knowing no other filipinos aside from my family and cousins until i reached high school. Seriously, yeah, I guess you can say I'm pretty white washed. But I never felt the need really to display my so called "asian pride" shoving it in front of people's faces or such. And sorry if i didn't grow up in the Philippines and acknowledging that by acting all ghetto to show I use to live in a 3rd world country. I only know of one life I've lived and that life grew up in NJ in the suburbs (jersey city till i was 5).

You might think I hate being the ethnicity that I am, but really I don't. I like who I am and where I can trace my roots. While I'm not completely happy with it, I'm not outraged by it either. I'm a pretty balanced type of guy.

Hah, I never thought i'd ever start writing one of these. I mean seriously, I mostly just created this account to read through other peoples journals and possibly comment on them. I made it a general rule I'd never try and create some online journal thingy or whatever. But actually since I ended up creating a facebook account, bleh, I figured there's no harm in this. And in all likelyhood I probably won't really update it if anyone happens to be reading this.

Lately I suppose I've been conflicted in balancing my emotions. Which is probably the reason why I'm posting this actually. I made it a general rule to myself I wouldn't ever let my emotions get the better of me. I made some pretty shitty mistakes when I was growing up cause I thought I was being rational about things, but only realized later how obnoxiously selfish I was being. I never wanted to be like that. I try my best to always step away from things and look at it was a bit more eased perspective. I usually don't let people get to close. I'm not unfriendly or anything, I just prefer talking more about the other person and finding out more about them then explaining who I am.

So then, how bout some general information? Well I'm 23 years old filipino, born and raised in the states, specifically New Jersey. I graduated in May 2008 with a major in Graphic design and minor in English. I have a job in NYC as a junior graphic designer for a inhouse company. In my free time, I usually illustrate a bit (I have an FA account here, hang out with a few friends sometimes going out to where ever is planned. I use to play World of Warcraft and I'm still debating whether or not to return to it since wrath of the lich king came out recently. Though honestly I was pondering whether or not to get a console system since I've been out of that loop for a good chunk of time. (last one I bought was a gamecube).

I wouldn't really say I'm a furry...so to speak. I don't really fantasize about anthros or so, nor am I too big on fur suiting. If you can believe it, I'm actually just interested in the art of it all. Not so much the porn aspect of it, but just how creative things can get. It's definitely an illustrated driven genre, along with the whole attire and writings. I guess I like the whole aspect of how people view themselves and choose to project it to everyone else. Plus it sort of relives better days of being an innocent kid and being amazed by cartoon animals.

mm...that's enough I think for now.