Mr. Cab driver

I’ve been riding the cab to work for the past 3 weeks now since I sprained my ankle and at the same time, the tabs on my car expired just right when I got back from my trip. How timely right?

On my first days of taking the cab, I came to realize that I save half of the money I pay for parking ($11) and probably gas in a day. I know! I know! A lot of my friends and co-workers have said that why not take the bus? I’ll save $10 of what I’m spending. This week, I decided to give my ankles some exercise so I started walking home from work. Slowly but surely I am starting to pick up the pace and getting into my usual walking time without being injured. It’s painful at times but it’s nothing like a pain meds can’t fix. Haha! But the walk is the reason why I’ve been saving half of my gas money and parking fee everyday on a work day.

Mr. Cab driver

I’ve had the same cab driver the past 3 days. A really nice older African-American man named James who obviously is willing to take a passenger (as he said today) $5 cab drive.

On the first day when he picked me up, he parked on the side of the building instead of the front door. He started driving the other way instead of my usual straight to downtown which is obviously quicker. He corrected me and said, it would just make sense to take the road he chose coz he was facing that way. In the back of my head I was like, “hello? A simple U-turn can fix it”. And of course all I was thinking was he was just trying to get as much meter time since it’s a short ride. It was just a couple of cents difference when I got to work so I was like “whatever”! But honestly, I was annoyed.

I didn’t remember him the next day compared to how he remembers me. As soon as I said my destination he immediately said “Now we can go straight downtown”. I looked at him and remembered my cab ride the previous day. Great! Same rip off cab driver. He was trying to explain how he didn’t want to park in front of my apartment coz there’s buses coming from traffic and he didn’t want to get honked on. He is actually nice and talked stories but it was too early for me to comprehend (LOL!). Upon my arrival to work I asked if he is normally in my area on that time of the day (as early as 6:15am) and he replied “yes”, I replied “well I hope I’ll see you again coz it’s hard to get a cab sometimes early in the morning.

Today, I think he was right outside my apartment even before I called. It took me awhile to go downstairs and I wasn’t getting any calls from the automated thing that calls you when your cab has arrived. He knew my schedule and told me that he was waiting for the dispatch on my area around 6:20am. I said “Sweet! I didn’t have to worry that nobody will show up on time and I’ll be late for work”. He was more talkative and chatty today asking me question if I always take a cab and if I was from the Philippines when it made me think, is it actually a good thing that he knows what time I leave for work and stuff like that. But its sweet having almost like a personal cab driver. Haha! Before opening the cab door he immediately said “ill see you tomorrow”. Kinda scary I know. But the old man is really nice and takes me to work safely.

not using xoxo,

ChaCha

Houston Galleria Water Wall

My friend Heart showed me pictures when he went to the Water Wall the previous day and I had to see it. It was perfect timing that my friends wanted to go to the mall and chose Galleria Mall. I have to admit, eventhough there was so much sale going in fo the Memorial day weekend, my brain wasn't into it.

As I've mentioned in my previous blog, I sprained my ankle during the tournament and was just in so much pain. The mall was huge, probably as big as the malls in the Philippines.

Anyways, thanks to google maps coz I found the water wall and it was jut around the block. The sound of the water just relaxes me and I loved it!

3GS Vacation

Well my iPhone 3GS decided to take a vacation again this morning. Just like every morning, I check on my tweets, Facebook n whatnot like am morning paper which worked fine. After taking a shower, I grabbed my phone from my desk to play my Pandora and it just peaced out.

As soon as I get to work, I messages my friend Marc on Gchat and FBchat so he can bring the 3GS our friend Sidepo gave me. Good thing we work a block away from each other and he get to drop it off.

I hate this thing coz it's super slow but I have no other choice. Hope my 3GS decides to make a come back soon.

OUCH! My Cankle!!!

This is probably a super late entry coz it happened a week and a half ago but I was down in Houston,TX for NAGVA Championships  where I was super excited to play with my team Seattle Alpha Kenny Body (search “Alpha Kenny Body” on YouTube for team name history). I got in Thursday night and rushed to registration night and was glad to see everybody.

The tournament was 3 days long. Friday was split in to two, morning and afternoon. Luckily,  A and B division was scheduled to play the afternoon pool play so we had time to party on Thursday night. A lil bit of a great start in Houston but DAMN it was hot and muggy. Jumbo Margaritas anyone?

We had a rough start in the tournament Friday afternoon. The team was trying to get the right rhythm and connection. We are mostly friends outside the court but never really had a chance to play on the same team except for some. Nate and I decided to put the team together after playing in Portland Last Chance together with Camacho and Dennis. We added Nakamura as libero who recently got uprated from BB to A (well duh! He’s been dodging it for years) and had to pick up middles Marlow (recently uprated to) and my son Nemo. By the end of the day, I thought we figured things out and on the right path.

The Cankle (cow ankle) that was bound to happen ...

On our first match Friday afternoon, I was hustling for a ball to set when all of a sudden I took a wrong step and semi-rolled my right ankle. We had to use a time out just to get me stabilized and see if I can pull through. That set was almost done so I just went ahead and played. On the 2^nd set of the same match, I was blocking Eric and landed on his right foot with my left. It was scary but thankfully I landed right on his foot  and didn’t roll it. But that shi* still hurts.

OMG! I was like WTF? This is just the first match of a 3 day weekend and I’m getting injured already?

We had an early Saturday and we were ready to play. The day was looking better after finishing Friday 3-5 standing. Team chemistry was much better and we were all playing a lot better than the previous afternoon.

FISH ON THE FLOOR!!!

We were playing our last match for play and it was a fight for a better seeding versus the San Francisco team. It was about game point on the 1^st set of the match when I was blocking Billy. All I saw was a tight shoot inside set and I jumped up and down for a block.  Sure enough, I see the outside hitter rushing to the ball and next thing you know I was on the floor. I landed on his foot and I’m pretty sure he was under the net. All I remember was saying OUCH! twice and put all my body weight to the left so I can fall on the ground and prevent my ankles to roll all the way. I didn’t move for  a second and all of a sudden I felt the pain and had to turn to my stomach crying. A lot of people were around me as far as I remember, I immediately looked for Nate and looked up to him saying “take over

Nate has his own injury himself. He was supposed to play outside for our team but hurt his knee a month and a half before Championships so he was just playing back row. But I admire how he stepped up and loved seeing his confidence back inside the court, jumping and attempting to block. I was down on the floor elevating my ankles after the in-house RN taped my ankles when all of a sudden, Billy from the other team came up to me and said sorry. I had no clue who I stepped on but that made it all clear. I was helpless but was cheering on the team. Unfortunately, we lost both matches ending our day with 5-3 standing I believe. Still good though, compared to the previous day.

Tournament play

I decided to sit out our first match on tournament play that started the same night I got injured on Saturday. The pain was a lot worst at this time and I didn’t want to risk it. It sucked just sitting there most especially when you know the team needed you. Funny how we were talking about picking up another setter/hitter just in case we needed it and it looked like we did need it.

The team was looking good though. We played the Greek Gods who we played in tournament we split with in pool play. I had mixed emotions watching them smash the team coz they were doing so good without them. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy but at the same time insulted. Haha! Tiffany who flew in from Nebraska was there to support me and kept reminding me that they were doing it for me. Haha! First match done! We won in 2 sets. Felt great!

Then we ended up playing Vancouver Liquid Explosion who I played with the last season in tournaments. Sister cities who always end up playing against each other. We got blasted!  It looked like the team went back to square 0 and totally lost chemistry. It was heart breaking coz it was the same team who smashed us down to 3^rd place in Portland Last Chance.

Early Sunday we had to play our 2^nd tourney play. It was a double elimination so it was really crucial for us to win. Guess who we had to play? The same San Francisco team where I got hurt L… I had to decide that morning I woke up whether I should play or not but made a decision to sit out the rest of the tournament. I didn’t wanna take away the dynamics that they built right after I got hurt. It takes a lot of work to restructure a team after a change like that and its almost rebuilding the whole team once again.

We surprisingly won the first set without knowing and lost track of the score. We were hyped up! The game went to 3 sets but we didn’t get the results that we wanted. Our tournament weekend ended up earlier than we expected.

Im glad that everyone had fun in our team had fun in the tournament though. All in all, we knew coming in that we were there to compete but at the same time have fun. Im definitely looking forward on playing with the people in our team in the near future.

Rest of the weekend

With early elimination comes early hanging out time. I was wobbling around the gym with my ankle taped up but I was definitely having fun. Beer garden opened and people started partying. Drinking games, talking stories and catching up with friends - that’s why I love going to tournaments.

Till the next season! And let the healing begin!

not using xoxo
ChaCha

 

Crazy Little Thing Called Love

Call it a chick flick but the movie tackles about a typical highschool life of a young girl and a young boy who are in somewhat separate worlds.
It's cliche but yet it's real. A girl who felt out of her element but had her own world and fun in highschool who didn't have the pretty girl looks but tried to change just to get a boys heart. Little did she know that the boy is manly in love with her even when she was a nobody.

Bromance - we all know about there is a bro code but when the bestfriend became interested to the girl and asked never to fall in love with heathen that's painful. Sometimes it's hard not to break the bro code but if he is really your "brother" then it should be understandable.
I definitely recommend watching this movie. Your gonna have to have patience with the subtitle and foreign language but it's different and it makes it more interesting and you get into it.

9 out of 10 but make it 10 out of 10 coz of Mario (main lead)