Having been at home all day, I had all the time to scrap a brand new layout – but I didn’t. I’ve completely forgotten about Scrapbook Saturday – and I find that ironic really. In previous weeks, mainly the ones where I couldn’t find time to squeeze in a layout or two, SS would be foremost in my mind when Friday night rolls in. Now – it just completely escaped me.
Perhaps it was the fact that I’ve been sneezing all day. Or that my nose is completely red from all the pinching and rubbing and wiping it has endured in the past 15 hours or so. Maybe even the annoying feeling I’ve got just above my throat. Whatever it is that’s caused this slight memory gap – I hate it!
So I am cheating with my 13th SS post. I’d love to direct you to my 200th post for the download link to the QuickPage freebie that I’ve posted to celebrate my blog’s milestone. 😉 I hope you find use for it!
October is already drawing to a close. Years ago, I regarded October as a busy month because it is dubbed as the National Children’s Month. Government and Non-Government agencies alike usually have programs all throughout the month, and the organizations that I’ve been a part of would surely participate in some form.
Now that I am no longer involved in children’s organizations, I still find myself looking around for signs that this month’s theme is actually being publicized. Call it bad timing, but worldwide, October is Pink Month for Breast Cancer Awareness – and you can see that everywhere (including in this blog).
The other day though, I did see a banner about this year’s theme right in front of the offices of the ABS-CBN Foundation. Other than that, no sign. I don’t read the papers much, but of what I’ve read, there was no mention of children’s month. I usually get to see the weekend news; but then again, no news on Children’s Month.
Then just now, after searching for signs on the Internet, I found that there was a festival right around the corner. The Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA) spearheaded a Children’s Theater Festival this weekend (October 24 to 26). Their Theater Center is about three to four blocks from here, and I could have brought my nephews and nieces there had I known of the Festival beforehand. Alas, that’s how out of the loop I am. Buti pa when PETA had their shows and festivities in far away Raja Sulayman Theater of the Fort Santiago, I was able to go. Now that they’re here, and they’ve been here for YEARS, I haven’t been to see a single production.
What I’m trying to say is, it is so frustrating that no matter how long the child-welfare circle has been celebrating Children’s Month, we still haven’t been really able to break into the mainstream.
Who knows about October being the National Children’s Month in the Philippines? I hope that we have had more success in raising awareness of actual child rights/child protection issues.
It starts off my weekend, the last workday of the week. I get to relax after uploading all of my required monitors for the week. I can spend time to speak to my agents – and really talk to them instead of being in a rush.
Of course I’d rather spend Saturday sleeping in or going out to enjoy the day with friends or Alfred or with some of the kids. But it being the last day of work is just fine by me too 🙂
Oh and it’s also Scrapbook Saturday! I almost forgot about that, I haven’t scrapped a new page this week! Hmm.. So it’s going to be a belated SS post for me again this week.
Tomorrow, I’ll be seeing one of my best friends. We haven’t seen each other in maybe three years. She’s got a little boy now who turned one this year, and I still haven’t met him!(links will open to the pages I scrapped of him) So that’s something to look forward to.
Ohh and I’ve been spending time up and around the Net as usual and I came across software for Text to Speech Voices. I remember trying software like that back in college. Our professor for Science, Technology and Society (STS) told us about it and since we had SO much to read for that course, I thought I’d give it a try. The one I tried was too robotic for my tastes. Didn’t help in the comprehension department at all. So I stopped and went to conventional reading. But the ones on that site I linked seem to have a variety of natural voices download that are more close to being human.
With e-books now gaining more popularity, specially with new reader products coming out, it doesn’t seem strange that more people are also looking to Download Text to Speech Software. It will, after all, allow one to “read” conveniently.
I also found this template (or did it find me?) and am now thinking of using it. I’ll have to back everything up first, of course, so I guess I’ll switch templates after upgrading to the latest WP version too. Goodluck to myself on that. Is it really necessary to upgrade, by the way? I really prefer my blog to have a black/dark background for some reason. And then a couple of months ago, I read about Blackle and figured, that’s another reason right there.
Blackle is basically Google, but in black. Using it as your homepage and main search engine (it is powered by Google anyway) can save a lot of energy in the long run. There you go – an a eco-friendly way to search I guess. 🙂 So if my site has a black background too, then I help save energy don’t I? 😉
It’s 4 o’clock on a Monday morning and I am wide awake. I feel like I had slept off Sunday although I didn’t really. It’s just a relief that now, I am up, showered, and headache-free. But my my, I am hungry!
To get my mind off food (although I should probably heed my body this time, I wouldn’t want to have another tummy episode later), let me just show you my current desktop:
Photos from AJ's 1st birthday - 6-18-2005
Credits: Desktop Calendar template freebie by Mushy. Background papers and elemenst form the PopN’Art kit by the Scrapbook Graphic Girls – freebie from Scrap N’Art
That’s my nephew AJ on his 1st birthday, three years ago. Isn’t he just cute?
Oh and I was going through my Multiply Inbox and found this. I first heard of lomo from another blogger and I immediately asked a photographer hobbyist friend about it. I was under the impression at the time that one needed special filmand printing services for lomo; apparently I was wrong. The cameras are fairly inexpensive, if I still want one by the end of this week I’d probably order one 🙂
I actually visit the seller to checkout their Local Obagi set. I don’t have a lot of pimples but my skin is prone to black/whiteheads and I have those white pockets of oil all over sometimes. I didn’t see a price tag but I’ve sent them an inquiry already. It all boils down to the cost. It’s not a necessity for me at this point, but if it will be more cost effective that having facials then I’d take it.
I realized that the story of our Bohol adventure isn’t complete yet, now is probably a good time as any to get back to it. I’m not sure if a single post would be able to finish it off, but I know I’d like to take time in writing them. Sunday morning on TV, Kim Atienza’s Matang Lawin, I saw him cruise through Loboc River at night. I knew it was going to be awesome at night – he saw hundreds of fireflies! It was such a beautiful sight.
It’s still way too early to take Zune out for a walk, and he’s sleeping. Yet I can already hear little Sharpei yelping two doors down. I still haven’t taken a photo of them together, but I’ve already got a very appropriate journalling for Zune’s behavior when I do get to scrap a layout of them. Haha 🙂
My friend and colleague, Ingrid, signed up for a Globe post-paid line because they had a promo at our office over the weekend. It was a great deal actually because the phone that came with the Plan 500 already has a 3-megapixel camera among it’s other brilliant features. Our first Kodak digicam was 3.2MP, so no one can really say that that small phone’s photos aren’t of good quality. If I had one, I’d probably buy a micro sd card for it for extra storage. It’s a Samsung phone and it’s really cute, small, and lightweight. I thought my phone was small, but that one was even smaller!
Anyway, enough of this chatter. Lemme grab a bite before I hunker down on my next Bohol post. Until then! 🙂
I used papers and elements from Vicki’s new kit, Blue Jeans. Check it out on her blog, here. The alpha I used for the title is a favorite, also by Vicki, but this time from her Cherry Cheesecake Kit.
The journalling at the top is something I made using freebie Glitter styles by Flergs. Wow me. Haha 🙂
My PSP crashed just when I was adding the title (beads) and journalling to this page. The catch is, I hadn’t saved my work! So I started again from scratch but because I knew what I used and how I used them, the second time around was faster to make 🙂
By the way, I resized all of the stuff I used here because this page will go into my mini-album too.
