The Missus becomes the Boss!

This is by far a record-breaker! My last post was exactly a month ago. I practically had a 30-day non-blogging life. In rehab programs, that’s enough to conclude sobriety. So is it apt to conclude that I am done with blogging? Well… not yet… I still got a lot of things I want to write but I just have no time!!! Thank God I couldn’t sleep tonight so here I am typing away in spite of a Carpal Tunnel Syndrome on my left wrist. It really hurts by the way.

The ironic thing about this whole non-blogging period of my life is that I almost never left cyberspace all throughout the past 30 days. I was on my laptop even longer than when I was still heavily blogging, and yet I didn’t have even a millisecond to drop even a single line on my blog. Forget about uploading photos. In short, I was just really really really BUSY! Sleep has never been such a luxury until now. Building a business is no walk in the park.

My husband and me in our company t-shirts @ the World Animal Day where we had a soft launch of MyPetChannel.TV

Setting up this enterprise was even made trickier by the fact that I am in business with my spouse and to top it all, I am the President of our company and he’s just the Sales & Marketing Director. There were a lot of times when the line between being my employee/business partner and being husband became so blurred. When my husband was still regularly employed in a private corporation, we usually spent our evenings ranting about work – my clients and his bosses. Now that we deal with the same clients and I am “technically” his boss, I realized that we have become the least ideal person to discuss with about work stresses. We have become each other’s stressors. Oh my…

What we went through for the past months as we set up shop could very well be scenes from a reality TV show. I told him we should have had another camera crew following us as we wrestled with robotic and dumb government agency clerks… as we fought over creative differences with each other and with our business partners… as we became the cliché parents who hardly see their kids anymore ‘coz of work. Kean even told me once, “Mom I thought you’re done with Shell,” referring to the last stressful client/project I dealt with before launching into my own business, “Why are you still stressed out?”

That really hit a nerve. That got me into thinking why I was building up my own business in the first place? Wasn’t it so that I can CONTROL my schedule? Wasn’t it so that I can BE WITH HIM MORE? Wasn’t it so that I won’t have ANYBODY PRESSURING ME ON DEADLINES? Ironically, while I was able to remove other people breathing down my neck, I found myself flogging myself to death in this enterprise. I have become my own enemy. Yikes!

I miss blogging. This is really the only time I can think about what’s going on in my life. So after 30 days of a blog-free life, I’m deliberately putting myself into relapse. Today begins my 30-day blogging program. So expect more updates from me especially about my new role as President of my own company. The website will be up in a couple of days. I will be telling you about what happened… what caused the delay… etc etc… I hope my readers are still there. :-) The Missus is back and she’s now The Boss!

It's my Blog's Birthday!!!

Guess what? This blog is celebrating its first birthday! Wow! I’ve been blogging (and shamelessly exposing myself to world, and maybe boring you in the process) for one year already! And with 159 posts out of 365 days, that means I’ve been blogging almost HALF of the time during the entire year. Which could also mean either one of two things: My writing gears were well-oiled for the past year or I just had TOO MUCH TIME in my hands! But Praise God! He has kept me financially afloat. I don’t know how but He made it happen.

Anyway, to celebrate my blog’s 1st birthday, I want to humbly give back something to my readers. My blog has been very therapeutic for me and so I wondered… what kept me sane before I found solace in the blogosphere? Then I realized that before I was into blogging, baking kept me busy. And so it hit me that I haven’t baked in a looong time! So I thought why not give away CUPCAKES?

So there you have it! To mark the first year of Memoirs of a New Missus, I am going to BAKE A DOUBLE DOZEN CUPCAKES! It can be for YOU or you may want to SURPRISE SOMEONE with my signature Jillicious Cupcakes! (more photos here)



Important Reminder:
Given the logistical limitation of this blog giveaway, anyone in the world can join but the cupcakes can only be delivered to residents of Metro Manila, Philippines. That means if you’re a contestant from abroad, you might want to join and surprise a friend or someone special who lives here in Manila.

Mechanics:
1. Simply write a blog about this contest, or share this link on any of your social networking sites like Facebook, Multiply, Friendster, and others.
2. Leave a comment on this blog entry to inform me about your post.
3. Be sure to leave the URL of your post so that I can check it out too.
4. Contest ends on July 21. The winner’s name will be drawn and posted on July 22 on this blog.
5. Winner can claim his/her dozen cupcakes anytime within 30 days upon announcement.
6. The cupcakes will be delivered to your doorstep, or to your chosen recipient’s address.

So there... I hope you catch some of the cupcake craze I’m setting off in this blog! Good luck! Thanks for joining and continuing to support the Missus!

The Honeymoon Is Over!!!

Don’t panic! It’s not what you think. I am still “happily” married to my husband, thank you very much. Though our married life is already simmering in a thick soup of domestic realities, we’re still far away from getting sour (by the grace of God!)

The honeymoon is over for the honeymoon wife – the blog, that is. But it’s not what you think again. I’m not filing a divorce from the blogosphere. In fact, I’ve taken it to the next level by buying my own domain! After one year from this blog’s birthday, I’ve decided to make this a serious site, and by that I mean to make it work as hard as I do. So after some grueling research and advice-seeking from my blogging sensei, I went ahead to give my blog its own .com.

My new blog URL is http://www.jillvillpalarca.com

Yes, no more “blogspot” within its name. Although it’s still mainly hosted by blogspot, it’s now completely mine. And although I still consider myself as a honeymoon wife, I just ditched the “honeymoonwife” name for sustainability reasons. When I started this blog, I didn’t expect that it could actually become a part of my life. After learning about its potential as a side-earner, I thought that changing its name would be the next best step. So I named it after who else but ME? :-)

As of the moment, the blog name is in transition – still being indexed by Google, etc… So the new domain should be fully functioning within 3 days. For now, if you type in my old http://honeymoonwife.blogspot.com the browser will still take you to my blog. But please do save my new domain name. Again, it will only be up in the next 3 days so if you try to access the new name now, you might get an error. Not to worry. It only means that the blog is still in transition.

Thank you to all my readers who continue to inspire me to blog. Thank you for letting me rant and rave about things silly and serious. I can’t tell you how much blogging has helped me cope with being a work-from-home-wife-and-mom. Your comments have always warmed my heart. It’s comforting to receive a cheer, a thumbs-up, and a nod even just in cyberspace. Again, thank you from the bottom of my heart. God bless you all…

Second Childhood and High School Crushes in our 30s!

The new Transformers movie is out and thanks to typhoon Feria’s threat, classes were suspended coincidentally on its opening day and as usual, it ironically turned out to be a clear morning after all so off to the malls the students flocked – Kean and us included. Thanks to a new Cubao secret (not too secret anymore now) – Ali Mall’s newly refurbished Cineplex – we were able to bury our bottoms very comfortably. While everyone else in the metro endured the long lines and the “standing room only” viewing, my family and I practically had the shiny new Ali Mall all to ourselves. I love it that we just live a street away from the classic Cubao landmark! Araneta Center is our backyard.



Speaking of Transformers 2 and in the light of Michael Jackson’s demise, the perfect song for my husband these days would have to be “Have You Seen my Childhood?” Like a “spoiled” kid in a candy store, his current indulgence is shopping for Transformers toys. And he really plays with them!!! The good news – he and Kean are totally bonding over it. The bad news – these toys cost at least P300 to P500 a pop! It may sound silly but this is really serious stuff for Joseph. Compared to my toy-filled childhood, he resents that his parents didn’t get him any of these robots back then. He recalls his mom saying, “It’s beyond your toy budget…” So the poor little boy had to live through watching those Uncle Bob’s Lucky Seven Club’s toy commercials without ever getting at least one of them. Awww… So now, I’m playing “mommy” to his reincarnated JJ (his nickname back then) and buying him these robots. Good thing that I’m also a fan and an ‘80s buff so I understand the need to feed the nostalgia.

So while my husband is going back to being 7 years old, I on the other hand had my own trip back to my 16 year old self by having a very ridiculous high school like crush on Zachary Quinto. Sigh… the name alone creates psychedelic hearts on my eyes. Let me just shriek! He’s soooo cuuuute!!! OMG my face is flushing just thinking about him.



Okay, before I go on any further, you might be wondering who the heck is Zachary Quinto? Well, for most people now he’s Spock from the new Star Trek movie but before that he’s been Sylar to me and to the legions of Heroes fans. I have never missed an episode of Heroes and even if the TV series has become too preposterous in its recent plot developments, there’s no stopping me from following Sylar – the super-powered serial killer who hunts the super-humans in order to steal their powers! He’s primarily a villain but I know there’s more to that psychotic persona… I know there’s a heart buried deep within that hate… I was thrilled when the series showed the character’s soft side as the plot’s paradox in the “Villains” season.

Anyway I could go and on about my own character analysis of Sylar – originally Gabriel Gray – but that would be too much of a geek talk. Yes, my husband and I are self-confessed Heroes freaks. We even plan to name our first daughter (IF EVER) Claire – after the show’s cheerleader character with the regenerative powers. Alright enough Heroes gab. Let me go back to Zachary.

I’ve always been attracted to him but the adulation was just limited within the show. I’ve had plenty of major celebrity crushes in my teenage years – you know that type of silly obsession that make you cut out their photos from magazines and stick them on your walls (don’t laugh!)— but I never thought I would actually have one again in my 30s! The last major celebrity crush I had that lasted all throughout my adolescent years was Keanu Reeves (don’t laugh again!) Hey if you saw him on “Pointbreak” you’d know what I’m talking about. And now ZQ makes me gush.

Like I said, before I was just in love with Sylar the character but now I AM IN LOVE WITH ZQ – the man who plays Sylar & Spock! This video did it all for me. Check out ZQ’s interview on Ellen last May.



Isn’t he totally adorable! Nothing kills me more than a guy who’s cool enough to strut some dance moves on national TV! Kilig to max! And so that got me hooked! I went online and plunged into Google ZQ Mode. I found his official website, grabbed his ooh-la-la GQ photos, put them interchangeably on my desktop (I’ve just recently named my laptop ZQ), became his fan on Facebook, and now having my own toy shopping spree by getting these Sylar and Spock action figures online!


I’ve been reading immensely about him and following his updates on FB. I even sent him a relatively long (giddy-sounding) birthday message last June 2. Actually his birth date stopped me in my tracks. The date was all too familiar and after jogging my memory about its significance, I stammered. He shares a birth date with some guy I used to “know”. Let’s just not expound on the meaning of “know” alright? I’m now a happily married woman. Enough said. But guess what, I also realized that ZQ and this so-called birthday twin actually have some semblances here and there. Hmmm… now this is the part where it kinda gets weird and worrisome. And I don’t know how else to end this blog so I’ll just trail off…

Hormonal Than Thou

Maybe you’ve already noticed that I’ve been gone from my blog for almost a month now! Come to think of it, I only have one entry for June and that was just to remind my readers that the missus is still online. I haven’t died (not yet). Being gone from the blogosphere this long is definitely a record for someone who lives with her laptop every day. The Tagalog slang words “windang” and “ngarag” would not even suffice to describe what happened to me the moment we entered the month of June. I just didn’t fly off the handle… I really snapped!

During the 1st week of this month (when classes began), I was in a manic rage. The smallest things irked me. It was as if an evil version of me took over my body and cried my eyes dry, screamed my throat hoarse, and just choked my heart and soul. My mind went totally blank one specific day and with my eyes blurred in tears, I hailed the cab, sent a text message to Joseph saying I want to be away from everything, and just took off! The sky was in its grayest gray and my spirit felt as ashen and burned out. The cab driver asked where to and I just said, “I don’t know manong… far away…”

At that time I didn’t know exactly what was going on. I was extremely sad, quasi-suicidal, and ultra-sensitive that I ridiculously cried at every HBO movie that was on… even “You’ve Got Mail!” Looking back, I can now qualify that the reasons for my breakdown were a lethal combination of so many things happening at the same time in that dreary gloomy depression-perfect weather.

There was the stress, frustration, anger, guilt, disillusionment about the church’s commemorative book project that I was heading… Financial pressures and expectations from our families… Our nervous pending 1st bank loan application as husband and wife… Kean coming back from Davao and starting Grade 1 on a very early 7AM class (which meant I had to get up at 5AM to prepare his breakfast & baon; wake him at 5:30; get him all ready for a measly hour that speeds by like a flash of light before his school bus picks him at 6:30!)… And then of course on top of waking up way too early is losing a lot of sleep over my work (as a freelancer, only one principle holds out: no project – no pay)… Worrying about my husband’s growing dissatisfaction with his career… The sad bed weather… Cabin fever… Lack of “actual” human contact… Desensitized by hollow cyber communication… and most of all my HORMONES!

The epic saga of my hormonal battle lives on. After taking some time off from the stressful and expensive fertility treatments late last year, my doctor put me on my hormone treatment again a couple of months ago to stabilize my hormone levels since I’ve been missing my periods again (not due to pregnancy, sorry to disappoint you). The treatment’s supposed to impede my weight gain too. This is all too technical, really. Explaining how hormones work in lay terms is too tedious because nothing is really cut and dried in defining these conditions. A lot of women don’t have troubles with their hormones at all while some just flip out – Example: Me.

I texted my doctor a days after what happened to me that horrible week. I knew I had to consult her because right after the height of my hissy fit, my long overdue period finally came. I knew right then and there that my train wreck episode last week wasn’t JUST about the immediate crises in my life and the dark clouds up above –my hellish hormones did some major damage.
She told me that based on my latest hormone tests I am vaguely somewhere in between having some premature ovarian insufficiency (or premature ovarian failure) and polycystic ovarian syndrome. In very loose simple terms, it means that my eggs ain’t growing and my pituitary gland and hypothalamus are not in synch which in textbook terms gives me symptoms of extreme PMS which could lead to early menopause!!! Huwwaaattt! This even makes me worse than my mega-moody mom!

Anyway, that’s the scientific explanation of my recurrent bi-polar tendencies. While I was in that cab, curling myself warm in an old cardigan (the first one I could pull out of my closet as I was rushing to flee from our apartment), staring irately out the windows as we drove past Gretchen, Angel, KC, with their sucked-in cheeks matched with either stoic looks or dolphin smiles, I thought everything around me just looked grating. I was so antsy that day that I couldn’t even resist e-mailing the management of this chi-chi restaurant at Boni High Street to nitpick at their grammatically-wrong electronic flyer which my inbox received that morning. It said, “… it’s our 2nd Year Anniversary!” to which I replied, “I am concerned that a high-end restaurant like you would be careless about your marketing copy. It’s supposed to be just ‘2nd Anniversary’ and not ‘2nd Year Anniversary’!” I know it was entirely not my business. In fact who cares about some ridiculously pretentious expensive restaurant who doesn’t even know basic grammar? Well on that day I cared. I cared because I wanted some sense of order and control in my very chaotic world. Sigh…

So there I was – crying inside a cab going to nowhere. And then suddenly God spoke to me. While we were crawling on EDSA, my cab driver was actually reading the Bible! Wow, that was a first! Have you ever seen a cab driver do that? It was rare indeed. My husband was calling me. His text messages were pleading for me to come home already. I caught a glimpse of the verses that the driver was reading. He was on Colossians, and my eyes landed on the words “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh to them.” I knew it was God telling me to go home to my husband, and it was an assurance that despite what I did that day, Joseph would understand and his love would just overflow for me because no matter what happens, no matter what I’ve become that day, he still loves me because he promised to do so right before God.

So I asked the driver to turn around, and the moment I got home, my husband greeted me in a warm bear hug and said nothing but, “I LOVE YOU!” We prayed together and I just felt truly blessed for having him as a husband. God really gave him to me ‘coz I couldn’t imagine any other guy capable of handling ME.

June is almost over. With fervent prayers, I survived. Now, my body clock has finally adjusted and in fact I even wake up a minute earlier than my set alarm. Kean and I don’t recreate WW3 during mornings anymore. The commemorative book is finally on its way to the printer. A new career prospect is presenting itself to my husband (please pray with us about it). The weather’s still crazy but my hormones aren’t anymore. The hormonal Jill is trying her best, by God’s grace, to be holier than that Jill who flipped out early this month. Pray. No more preys. Amen.

The Missus is Online Again!

Ladies & gentlemen... I'm Back to Blogging!!!

Wow! I just made an all-time record – I haven’t blogged at all for more than 20 days!!! Yes, dear readers I am still alive though living like a zombie on auto-pilot for the past weeks ever since Kean started school again. Sigh.

My little boy has just entered Grade One and his classes start at 7:15 AM. Considering how slooow Kean moves in the morning, I had to wake him up at 5 AM to have enough time for a good breakfast and for his daily grooming and health supplement rituals before his school bus picks him up at 6:30 AM sharp! So this all meant that I had to wake up at around 4:30-4:45AM to cook breakfast, and prepare his baon, etc…

Let me tell you this – I am the worst morning person in the world! My body and mind are just not built up for the crack of dawn. So for the past weeks, my body clock has been badly disturbed that as soon as Kean gets picked up by the school bus, I’d catch up on a few more zzzz’s and would end up sleeping the whole morning. I would only wake up when Kean finally gets home at around 1PM, so don’t count on me being productive any more.

Ever since this routine started, I just don’t have the mental energy to multi-task all my pending projects and do some blogging in between. My creative juices were parched. I was always grouchy. I always felt tired. And my lethargy only resulted to a sloppy household – the laundry pile was always brimming; our closets were a mess; the floor not mopped, the carpets not vacuum cleaned; food was always delivered or those simple dishes – all of these just added to my depression.

All this time, I was writing my pending projects and editing the fifty stories for the church’s commemorative book while on auto-pilot! Truly it was only God’s sufficient grace that kept me on and made me finish everything. On my next blog, I’m going to tell you about the WORST DAY of my life ever which happened during the first week of June.

Anyway, finally all my projects for June are done and the contents of the book are now in the hands of the layout editor, and as an added bonus, my father is in town for another short visit. Compared to the last time he was here, his arrival has never been most welcomed than now. He came right in time for Fathers’ Day yesterday. We've patched up immensely after our big fight last year. Celebrating this special day this year was indeed "special!"

He said he wants to help with taking care of Kean at least for a few months while I do my work. And besides, he’s really got nothing to do much in Davao now since our grandmother (his mom – the one he’s taking care of) is currently vacationing in Canada with my aunt’s family.

I already began getting back my creative rhythm a few days before. With Papa here now to help me and with all the stressful projects done at least for this month, I can have the last few days of June to catch up on my blogging. Oh my, I’ve got loads of stories and thoughts that I’ve been dying to share to you so stay tuned for all of that. The Missus is online again!

Celebrating Fathers' day yesterday @ our default Sunday restaurant -- Pho Hoa

Blogging... the Bliss and the Blahs

Last week I wrote about how blogging is making me fat. I “tried” to get into a home exercise routine and bent myself on more household chores than the usual just to keep my adrenaline pumping, but the lure of the laptop and the thoughts clamoring to be written down were a force to reckon with. I succumbed to my addiction… er passion… uhm hobby. I’m trying to make this sound less alarming than it already is.

So I figured that I can’t help it. I really love to be in front of the computer and type away these rants and raves in my head. But since it’s making me fat, I can’t justify it any other way than to earn from it. So lately I have been desperately trying to learn the ropes of Paid Blogging and man it ain’t easy. First of all, if you are a techie klutz (like me) this whole HTML can be very overwhelming. In fact, now it’s about XMLs and we’re not talking about shirt sizes here. If you want to be a Problogger, you have to have at least some of these words (heck they’re not even words, just abbreviations) in your vocabulary: RSS, SEO, PPP, SMO… and then you have to learn about page ranks, technorati, widgets, and so on and so forth. The BLARGON keeps on growing. You have to be smacked right in the middle of the blogosphere action to catch up.

Aside from my intention to optimize the generous time I spend online, I figured that blogging might actually help us make ends meet in the coming months. With the lean season for events production approaching this June to August, I’m about to push the panic button again. I have to find other income generating projects especially since we are planning to purchase a car (Why? That’s another blog soon). Whenever I read about my friend Frances blogging about buying a new pair of shoes or silverware or fancy furniture out of her blog earnings alone, I can’t help but feel green with envy. Now that’s the kind of financial freedom I’d like to have. There’s nothing more satisfying than to be paid for doing what you love.

I got into blogging basically for fun. I’m a writer by heart but I just don’t want to write scripts for boring corporate shows for equally boring clients, who nitpick at everything for nitpicking’s sake. I wanted some creative freedom. I wanted to write using my real voice. And since I didn’t get around to building my career in a magazine, the blogosphere was indeed a blessing. It provided a space for my long-time frustration – to be a columnist like Carrie Bradshaw. I did, by the way, have a very provocative Cosmo-Girl kind of blog five years ago (back when blogging was still primitive) which I had to delete because my conservative family in Davao threw a ginormous hissy fit over it. My mom, who ironically is a New Yorker, unfortunately didn’t see the witty wisdom that her Carrie-wannabe daughter wanted to share to the world. She almost disowned me. So I had to shut it down. I met my future husband (again), became a Christian and had closure with my Carrie alter-ego.

I got into blogging again last year after I lost my television job. Writing down my reflections on life, love and my lost career proved to be therapeutic. God was sweet enough to send me affirmations through nice comments sent by friends, anonymous fans and even famous people. Months passed and I noticed that I was already growing a humble-sized fan base. It turns out that some people found most of my stories heartwarming and on other times funny. So from blogging for myself I turned into having the sudden responsibility of writing for my loyal audience.

Now, I’m in love with blogging but I would like blogging to love me back too. I’ve been signing up on several Paid Blogging sites but I’m still far from having financial success. I browsed through several paid blogs and forgive me for saying this but most of them aren’t even written well. Pardon me but a lot of them are trash and it’s puzzling why and how in the world wide web did they ever get those high traffic volume. People actually like reading that stuff? The internet has surely lowered the bar for creative writing. A big exemption to that of course is my friend Frances’s blog. She’s always been a fantastic writer and the fact that she works as a magazine editor exposes her to a lot of commercial content that she can write about.

I’ve already sought some mentorship from probloggers I’ve met online and Jeff has been very genial and generous in giving me tips on paid blogging. He’s actually suggesting that I just start a new commercial blog altogether and this time write for a niche market. I have to buy my own domain because he said that most advertisers prefer self-hosted blogs. Then I have to tweak the codes in my layout, learn the language as I go along, market my blog in all sorts of social networks, and sign up to his recommended paid blogging sites. It sounds easier than done.

I mused about his advice practically the whole day, asking myself, what can I write about? What’s my niche market? What’s my expertise? And then I realized that I’m actually just a jack or should I say jill-of-all-trades-master-of-none. I think I just hit the dead end.

I still want to get my hands on paid blogging. I think I deserve to have a slice of that pie, do you agree? But for now I want to remain true to myself and to my readers so I want to keep this blog but also hope to earn from it at least. I think I’ve already done a lot of additions to it that needs to be cleaned up. I don’t know where to begin. So if there’s a Good Samaritan problogger out there who’s willing to teach me (and divulge all trade secrets) how to effectively monetize this site, please email me and make me a blogger-naire!

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Cooking... Blogging... and Meryll Streep

I’m really excited about this upcoming film starring my all-time favorite Hollywood actress Meryll Streep and newcomer funny gal Amy Adams. The movie’s title is “Julie & Julia” and is directed by Rom-Com Genius of the ‘90s Nora Ephron. Remember “Sleepless in Seattle” “You’ve Got Mail”… okay, you get the picture. I love it because it’s about three things that I absolutely adore: Cooking… Blogging… and Meryll Streep. Here’s the basic plot:

Frustrated temp secretary Julie Powell (Amy Adams) embarks on a year-long culinary quest to cook all 524 recipes in Julia Child's “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” She chronicles her trials and tribulations in a blog that catches on with the food crowd.

The film by the way is based on a real life story of Julie Powell herself who really blogged about her cooking attempts. The blog became such a hit that she eventually published it into a book entitled "Julie & Julia". Hmmm, now there's a great idea. Do you think "Memoirs of a New Missus" would fly off the shelves? (thought bubbles hover me now)

Anyway, Julia Child is played by Meryll of course, and in case you don’t know who Julia Child is… before there was a Martha, Giada, Rachael and the Barefoot Contessa, Julia Child was the TV Chef that all housewives in the ‘50s emulated.


(left) Meryll as Julia Child and the real Julia Child (right)

In the film, we would be seeing two eras in juxtapose as present day Julie struggles with gourmet cooking in a tiny New York apartment while Julia begins to build her culinary brand in the ’50s. Cooking then becomes the metaphor for their life and love issues. That’s just my literary analysis. (Me and my penchant for metaphors!)



I was kind of inspired with the story and made me think about putting up blog posts of my own kitchen adventures. I usually just post resto finds & recipes that I have tried and tweaked but I have never written about my experience in making them, and the whole drama that went behind it (if there were any). I actually have 2 new beautiful cookbooks (Martha Stewart's Cooking School and Classic Recipes book set by Hershey’s, Campbells and Eagle Brand) sent to me as presents by my secret “sweet” kitchen fairy. I call her my kitchen fairy because she has been so generous in sending me trivets, kitchenware and cookbooks every time she does some spring cleaning in her home. This famous lady loves to spread the love on homemaking. Thanks to her, I’ve been able to make cupcakes with my favorite gadget – a yellow Kitchenaid Mixer – which I named after her. I’ve told her that she should put up her own brand of home ware like Martha. She’s already got the name. Anyway, that’s enough about her. You might already guess who she is. Hehe. :-)


(left) My yellow Kitchenaid Mixer, a gift 2 yrs ago... (right) and cooking for hubby's bday

Anyway, I really can’t wait for this new film. I love Meryll Streep’s movies. Be it drama, comedy, and even theater… she’s done it all. I love her best in comedies. Here are my FAVE FIVE MERYLL STREEP COMEDY MOVIES: “Postcards from the Edge” (I love the mother-daughter issues of this story)… “She-Devil” (Her character seriously made me think about wanting to become a romance novelist when I was a kid)… “Death Becomes Her” (two words: Goldie Hawn)… “The Devil Wears Prada” (She was so deliciously evil!)… “Mamma Mia” (Again, this really reminded me of my mom and I during my own wedding. Mama drama galore! And her character Donna, is so like my mom. She’s funny like that. Haha!)



Of course, she ain’t Meryll Streep if not for the tear-jerking Oscar worthy roles. HERE ARE MY FAVE FIVE MERYLL STREEP DRAMATIC FILMS: “Kramer vs Kramer” (Again, she reminded me of mom when she left my dad and our family)… “The Bridges of Madison County” (I’ve really always wondered about falling in love in that age)… “Adaptation” (with director Spike Jonze and writer Charlie Kaufman, need I say more?)… “The Hours” (There was a time back in my melancholic years that I loved Virginia Woolf’s works)… “Angels in America” (An HBO mini-series that had her playing 4 roles. Wow talk about versatility)



But more than her craft, I am more delighted about the fact that she’s been married with 4 children for 30 years to the same man. Now, that’s a rarity in Hollywood. She’s really proof that fame and fortune don’t always destroy families.

Sorry for the Late Reply

How many times have you sent that message via SMS or E-Mail? I’m pretty sure that most of us have experienced responding late to a message either by a friend or a business contact. It could be because our hands were just really full that time or we were just really in a non-responsive state – you know those moments when you just feel lazy to text back? And sometimes, we respond late because we are not yet sure about what to reply. That’s the good thing about SMS and E-Mail – it’s not as direct as a phone call wherein you are most of the time put on the spot to answer questions you would have wanted to deal with much later.

Whether it was about being busy, lazy or uncertain – I think we’ve all been guilty of delaying our replies. But there’s someone I know who has never been late in answering back – Our Almighty God! This morning, our dear Father in Heaven showed me how foolproof his promptness is.

Last night, I was feeling a bit distressed. First, my husband wasn’t around for me to share my thoughts and emotions with, and second I was feeling a bit useless. To be honest, I’ve been feeling spiritually dry for the past weeks. I can’t really put a finger on it but I kind of felt discouraged. I dropped out of my Hermeneutics class because I could not keep up with the early morning schedule; my church small group has not been meeting regularly; I felt that my leadership traits and working style do not match with the people at the Young Adults Ministry; and most of all I felt so silly blogging everyday.

By now, people might be thinking that Jill obviously has tons and tons of FREE TIME on her! Truth be told, I have quite a number of script and concept presentation deadlines to beat. In fact, I almost never leave my chair the whole day (hence I play badminton now). Blogging serves as my BREAK.

I love to write. But with all honestly, I’m a bit insecure about my writing. I am friends with a handful of Palanca Awardees, English Lit professors, Magazine editors and writers, and I don’t think my writing could measure up to the sharpness of their semantics and grammar. They write full-length feature articles for a living. My professional craft on the other hand is short creative copy, hosts spiels and press releases. I haven’t written any feature article professionally yet. To be honest, I don’t even know if my writing skills qualify. But I’m also not really sure if do want to write for magazines and have editors breathe down my neck.

I love to blog because it makes me feel free – which results in me being more creative. Like I said it’s my BREAK from work. It’s writing as ME! There are no bosses to tell me to take out that line, change that joke, re-word this, add this thought, make this Tagalog, make this sound masa, make this sound more hip, shorten this, lengthen this… etc… etc… the builds just never end. And finally when all the editing’s done, I don’t recognize my work anymore and I would wonder why they even hired me to write the project in the first place. Hahaha.

That’s why I have learned in my 8 years in the business to be unattached to my product.
Work is just really Work. It’s not ALL fun. Blogging on the other hand excites me. It has become the substitute for my magazine career frustration, but it’s much better because with my blog I don’t get to be told what to write and how to write it. Blogging in itself is a free form of writing. No rules! Yehey! But of course I can’t really say that I am my own editor because I know that God edits and directs my soul.

However, like I said earlier lately I’ve been feeling silly blogging EVERYDAY! Last night I poured out all these frustrations to God. I asked Him if I’m just really wasting time and amusing no one but MYSELF in this endeavor. Has blogging become like my self-serving habit – a way for me to defy being governed?

God of course was QUICK to reply with a heartwarming encouragement. This morning when I opened my mail, I got two surprising messages from no less than Neta Jackson, the popular American writer I talked about in my Christian Chick Lit blog entry and the other one was none other than THE Harold J. Sala, renowned author of countless devotionals and books, Bible teacher and speaker, and who happens to be my FAVORITE Christian writer. His books ministered to me immensely when I was just starting out in my new Christian life. His book “Touching God: Guidelines for Personal Prayer” is my all-time favorite.



I was overwhelmed with the fact that my blog actually reached these noted people from the other side of the world. Ms. Jackson is a bestselling novelist based in Chicago, while Dr. Sala resides in California. Their messages were filled with encouragement for this "ministry". Just when I was about to feel that I’m just adding more clutter in cyberspace with my reflections, two of my most admired writers gave me my much-needed pat on the back. I felt like a fan who just received a simple handshake from her idol. I was ecstatic!

Once again, God has proven to me that he is NEVER late in his replies when we pray to Him. He ALWAYS answers right away. I remembered one scene from Bruce Almighty when Bruce now turned into God was actually answering e-mailed prayers and he could not cope with the gargantuan task. Of course, the REAL GOD can. If we could really e-mail or text him our prayer concerns, I’m pretty sure God is running on an UNLIMITED text load and his internet connection is the most powerful broadband.

God will certainly always REPLY RIGHT AWAY. It’s just that sometimes we ignore his messages in the Inbox of our hearts. When we see that His message begins with something like “I’m sorry child but…” I think we stop right then and there and pretend that we haven’t read his message at all. And then we forget all about it and begin to complain that we haven’t gotten any reply. He did. We just didn’t read it.

I have learned that not only God ALWAYS ANSWERS our prayers; He is also NEVER EVER LATE in His replies. He will never ever say “Sorry for the Late Reply…” His response may not always be a YES but he will be quick enough to tell your heart right away the following messages…

• “No I love you too much!”
• “Yes but you’ll have to wait!”
• “Yes, but not what you expected!”
• “Yes and here’s more!”
• “Yes, I thought you’d never ask.”

He answers promptly but are we listening? That’s the problem. I’ve been guilty of this too. Asking him something and waiting for His answer that I prefer to hear. He has replied to my call but I’ve been ignoring it.

I was blessed today for getting a QUICK REPLY from God. And what a reply! It was definitely a YES! And as if He was not done pleasing me today, when I was at St. Luke’s Hospital this morning to get some hormone tests done, He gave me another speedy reply to my SOS.

I was already waiting in line at the cashier when I remembered that the cost of the lab tests based on the last one that I had would be about 7 Thousand Pesos. I only had 5 in my wallet. Of course, I could always go to the ATM and make a quick cash withdrawal but just when I was about to get out of the line, my turn came up and I just decided to go on. I said bahala ka na Lord. I could always excuse myself from the cashier and tell her that I didn’t expect that cost so I would have to get some money first. True enough, when I took a peek at her computer screen, the tests cost a little over 7 Thousand Pesos. Just when I was about to tell the lady that I don’t have enough cash on me, she suddenly said, “P5,000.00 ma’am” Huh? Apparently, I got a discount and I don’t know why. I was too dumbfounded to ask and just elated with God’s instant miracle. Haaay! Grabe!

Yes is not the ONLY VALID REPLY. No, Maybe, Wait… they’re also responses and God is always quick to give them. I’ve had my share of Nos, Maybes and Waits. But today, let me bask in the BIG YES that God has given me.

“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples” – JOHN 15:7-8

Why my Blogs are Looong!

First of all, I would have really preferred them more concise, but somehow I couldn’t make them short and sweet. I am writing about it now because after posting my recent blog (the one preceding this) I realized that it was just darn too long. Isa siyang nobela, hehe! Well actually, most of, okay I’ll admit, ALL of my entries are LOOONG. According to this site called PROBLOGGER, I’m already shamelessly disregarding Tips # 3 & 4 – Write less & 250 words are enough. Eeep! My last blog counted up to 2,500 words. Hahaha!

Well never mind PROBLOGGER. The truth is I’m not a professional blogger. I’m not selling anything online. I’m not reviewing the latest gizmo out there or the latest Hollywood flick. I’m not doing this to gain some income though I do hope that those AdSense boxes on my site would generate even a FEW dollars maybe after a year or so? But that’s not even important at all. I just wanted to make my blog look “web-savvy” hence you see those Google ad boxes there that I’m pretty sure nobody clicks on anyway.

While blogs originally started out as techies’ personal takes on topics like web management, new gadgets, software, and everything in that realm, it has definitely evolved and now every topic in the world seems to have a blog about it, and phenomenally people read the blogs more than the press releases. That’s because people want to know the real deal, and they need to hear it without biases from actual users.

But most blogs I have in my network are personal journals. That’s where I fall under. And while a lot of people would rather blog about silly and/or random things, I just prefer to write about recent events in my life IN A COMPREHENSIVE WAY, and in the light of Christ’s Word. And that’s how my blogs turn out to be lengthy. Sometimes, or make that most of the time, I just get caught up with the overflow of my heart and I just can’t stop writing at all. It’s like writing in a trance.

I don’t really mind if people don’t read my blogs because they’re way too long. I’m not really forcing my thoughts on anybody’s throats here. But I do pray that some readers will be moved whenever I'm sharing about my personal walk with God. Holy Spirit na bahala nun! =) Basically, I am just being me. Writing away whatever goes on in my head and in my heart. And based on my extremely looong blogs, you can now conclude that my line of thinking stretches out miles and miles away.

Hey, ironically this blog is short. However it still counted 400+ words. Oh whatever!