Crud! --- Ruminations

My brain is not in the best shape right now so I'm unloading and blabbing on a bit.

Just a few things to share.

• My weight has ballooned to 107 kgs., which makes me just as heavy as San Antonio Spurs forward Robert Horry, only he is about a foot-and-a-half taller than I am. Yikes! That was my arrival weight last year, too, but I think this one is more legit since I was weighed down by adjustment last time. Scary.
• I am now a lone wolf in the apartment (at least for a week) - my officemate went on a training trip while his wife and two kids are still in the Philippines. Being in an empty space like this one is more depressing than I thought - I actually sat through "A Countess from Hong Kong" with Marlon Brando/Sophia Loren (Sophia put the "S" in sizzle in this movie), "The Apartment" with Jack Lemmon/Shirley MacLaine (in my opinion, the best Billy Wilder movie, though "Some Like It Hot" is a real good one), and "Little Man Tate" with Jodie Foster starring and directing ALL in one sitting. We have a great movie channel by the way, but sometimes the commercials can be a drag.
• We went to meet with the Dammam Toastmasters Club since the Company Head Cheeses said to us we must do it. To illustrate the phrase "dragged while kicking and screaming" would be an understatement. For those in the know, we had a Table Topics session and incidentally, I won that one over my boss, who was also dragged into the fray. As if I needed another goad... Crud! Still, I came out of that session hall learning something useful.
• I started my walking regimen on Thursday and boy oh boy, was that a real bad move. I got up at 5:30 am, joined my buddies at 6 and came back to eat breakfast at 8. It was a torrid pace, for me, at least, cutting my walking time for the same distance by about 30%. Result: when I showed up in the office to do additional work, I actually fell asleep. My ankles still hurt. That, however, does not make me Shaquille O'Neal.
• Our mandate to do really good things becomes even tougher with our Chief Banana getting bumped to position as Director, Administration and Human Resources. I predicted that six months ago and even without my crystal ball there will be tough times ahead.

It was just one year ago people voted for President...now people want another change. Bombs go off in Iraq, but somehow the sense of outrage is deadening. That, I think, is a greater tragedy...

I never did get to share what happened with me the day Pope John Paul II passed away. I was playing an endless rote game on my PC back home in the Philippines when I logged on and read that the Pope had died 30 minutes past.

It was like the crumbling of another pillar of our lives, like the world had lost another reason for being relevant. I wrote so many years back that the late Holiness was, in many senses, head and shoulders above the normal human throng, and I am glad that HE SAW ME that day when the PopeMobile meandered its way through Intramuros.

I write this because I have always calendared my good buddy Robert's birthday alongside that of His Holiness (since they were both born on May 18). I reminded my friends not to forget Robert on his birthday. He always has surprises or treats for everyone.

So now, it's crud since it's freaking HOT in the Philippines. Crud that I sit behind this desk and soon will be booted out in the name of progress (hope the new cubicle is better). Crud because of work. Crud because I'm not up to doing work.

And most of all, crud because I'm missing the NBA Playoffs on TV. Go Pacers!