The problem with working in a corporate world is that it seems like everything comes with a price. A very hefty price tag for that matter. If you want to hire the best, you need to make a generous offer that only someone crazy would turn down. Double or triple the salary that their currently getting or offer them tax shield. I'm very sure that'll be very difficult to resist. If you want your best employees to stay, you need to keep on upgrading their salary structure, benefits and probably offer them retirement benefits.

Big boss spoke to me the other day. I don't know how he found out that I am thinking of leaving the company. He asked me to give him figures on how much salary I want and a justification for such salary. Maybe this is a question that any employee would want to hear from their employers. However, I really think it's a very difficult question to answer because our natural instinct would be to ask for the maximum amount that the company can give us because in our minds we know we deserve something better. In my boss' eyes, do I really deserve this much amount? Can I convince him to give this much salary to me? Maybe i'll just try asking him and let you know if I convince him or not. Goodluck to me!

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This is a long delayed post. It has been in my posting inbox as draft for almost a week now. Roldz' resignation has definitely affected me more than I expected. It's sad to know that I don't have any immediate superior whom I could trust. I mean, since my boss didn't have any replacement, I am currently reporting directly to the big boss which sucks big time! Big boss told me that it's my time to step-up and shine to lead the whole java team. I am sort of getting a promotion. Just "sort-of" because I have been doing this same task for more than a year now, the only difference is that I report directly to big boss. I wonder how Roldz was able to manage the pressure and disappointments reporting to big boss?! Hayyy...

1. Java certification - My voucher expired last Feb. That's 5thousand pesoses down the drain. Wasn't able to take the exam due to that f*cking local project. Oh well, will just take it some other time hopefully before the year ends.

2. One flight out of the country via KLM to keep my platinum status - No news if there will be any big nokia projects that will require me to travel. There are several small-time projects with them currently but as far as I know, no big ones until end of 2nd quarter of this year.

3. Spain 101 - I need to absorb more spanish culture by visiting Espana. No progress at all. Seems like this is not a travel year for me.

4. LPF Piggy Bank - I need to save money. For starters, I bought a green piggy bank and HH named it, "Lisa's Paris Funds". Hehe. I was hoping to visit Paris one more time because the last time was too short and I didnt even make it inside Louvre nor Notre Dame nor Sacre Coeur, aka. "culture Labas". Hehe. The next time I will see Paris, I swear not to eat Chinese food there. Haha. Yep, I ate Chinese food for 2 days in Paris! San ka pa?! Next time ko na lang kwento mga bloopers ko dun sa Amazing Race Rome & Paris last year.

5. Clean my stuff - CHECK! Almost done. Will do more cleaning-up of the rest of my kalat during the weekend.

6. Health concerns - Odd cyst on the left eye disappeared. Thank god! Polycystic left ovary... as of November last year, it was gone. Haven't seen my OB during the last 5months so this month is a good time to see her. Had prophylaxis and tooth filling last month. So far still good.

7. Aesthetics - Haircut... CHECK! Hide the signs of aging... CHECK! Hair damage control... CHECK! Diet... err... NADA.

8. Quick V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N - Went to Tagaytay twice during the last quarter.

9. L1.... maybe we should not talk about it here. Boss gave me news... more bad news.

I had a sensible chat with the late architect's cousin. As usual, it was one of those reminiscing conversations. The architect's cousin and I share this semi-awkward relationship because 1. i am her cousin's ex-gf whom she is very close to, 2. she is my cousin's ex whom I am very close to, 3. she was a common friend of HH and I (probably also the reason why HH is my bf now) 4. my bf used to have a crush on her (hehe. binuking ko!). How cool is that?! Yeah it is an overly small world for both of us so I guess instead of hating each other for not ending up with each other's cousins, we could at least be good friends instead.

It's boss' last day next week. Many things are still running inside my head. It's been more than a quarter since big boss promised that he is following-up my visa application. No good news til now. I admit my patience is only 3feet long. What I hate about waiting is that I had to stall everything in my life just because I don't know when I am going to leave. I can't even plan a vacation 3months from now just because I worry that the embassy might require me to be in Manila then. It's really annoying to have to wait with no assurance on what your future could be. I guess my boss already has a hint that I am becoming impatient waiting. I'm actually giving him until June this year to send me to US, if not, I am quitting his company. Well he doesn't actually know the deadline because I don't want him to be reactive. I want him to send me to the US on his own freewill and not because I threatened him that I'll resign.

I think I better start looking for another job...

Just when I thought I was almost done with my cleaning-up task, mom just broke to me that I am not even halfway done. What?!? Well, I shouldn't be surprised because I have 10years worth of kalat and I expect myself to do the clean-up in just 3days?! Hehe.

Here are some of the things that I found during the past 3days...

1. More ugly pictures eg. jeproks-looking, siopao-looking, wilma-is-that-you (wilma in flordeluna..hehe)
2. Cigarettes given to me by Doc (yes, the ex!) when we were still going out. Of course it's stale because it's almost 9years old. Yuck! Amazingly, I kept it.
3. Used facial tissue that doc used to wipe his sweat. Whahaha! Also almost 9years old. Psychotic talaga ako dati!
4. Lots of handwritten diaries since 1995 and I swear never to write a diary on paper ever again. It's so difficult to dispose that I had to tear each page by hand!
5. Tons of vcd's and dvd's.
6. Highschool ID's. It's funny to look at how my face evolved from the Nene me to the mature looking me.
7. Old FHM issues. HH and I used to collect these magazines.
8. Wine cork from my one week all expense paid Cebu trip that we spent in Plantation bay with my bes and friends. There were 7 of us who were all underage then and we travelled by ourselves. 3 girls, 1 boy, 3 badings. This was in May'98. Definitely one of the best trips I've had.

As opposed to my belief that I have difficulties in letting go, it wasn't difficult to dispose much of these things after all.

We went to Pampanga awhile ago with HH (aka. the driver), my parents and our bunso to pick up my other siblings who were at her boyfriend's house because of the fiesta. This isn't the first time that the future in-laws will meet. My sister's boyfriend, Bryan, lives in Pampanga and visits my sister here in Manila almost every week. Ang tiyaga ano?! Anyway, it's nice to know that our family now knows my sister's boyfriend's family. At least we now know where to hunt down this guy if he does something bad to my sister. Hehe.

Reminiscing...

After my quickie relationship with Mike(ex#1... the M.D.), it took more than a year to feel ok(take note, I didn't say I was already over) about him. My relationship with Mike was a living proof that good friends cannot be lovers. Mike and I were too comfortable with each other as friends and when we tried going a step higher in the relationship ladder, it didnt work. What went wrong? Probably it was the wrong timing and conspiracy of the world around us. That time, there was just too much problems that being in a relationship became unbearable for both of us. Probably, my only regret was I should have not returned the ring he gave me. Hahaha. Stupid me! Pwede na sana isanla yung ring para pang-tuition ko. =)

I just realized that I was such an a**hole before. Ok... I got involved with this Aussie guy (Pinoy but living in down under) but when the architect courted me, I dumped Mr. Aussie to be with the architect. Knowing me, a person who does not believe in courtship, it seemed that it was so easy for me to give up my 2months involvement with Mr. Aussie for the 1week barely knowing Mr. Swept-Me-Off-My-Feet architect. What an ass! Fine... I've done things that I could not be proud of.

No wonder I am getting bad karma most of the time in the love department. God must be punishing me for my kalokohans before. I'm so doomed...

1. I am capable of stalking my crush and memorize how many pairs of shoes he owns. Psycho!
2. I can be so OC at times that I could plan what attire to wear (take note: head to foot!) one month in advance.
3. I doodle my name, my exes names, and crushes names in almost all of my notebooks.
4. I exchange personal notes/messages with my friends during classhours whenever I get bored.
5. I have a very nice penmanship until college. I don't know why my penmanship is so bad now but probably the computer has something to do with it.
6. I hoard UP bluebooks. I was surprised to find out that I still own 30 pieces of unused bluebooks hidden in my stuff.
7. I had a ka-M.U. inside the classroom. Of course he's a classmate! No, he did not find out and I intend to keep it that way.
8. I was an average student in college as opposed to my excellent academic standing back in highschool. There's just too much smarter people than me inside UP.
9. I still have ugly pictures that I swore would kill if it gets out of our house and gets seen by other people. I wanted to burn them but mom didn't want to dispose any of them because she said, those photos will never happen again. I sure hope my ugly days were over!
10. Emotional cleaning up takes a longer time to accomplish.

The best and the worst thing about cleaning up is the fact that you have to go through the things that you either kept because of good memories and/or the things that you have hidden as hidden as possible so you don't have to see them again. This holyweek, my main agenda was to do a clean-up of my stuff. I have gotten rid of 50% of my clothes, office kalat at home and most of my personal kalat. While going through my stuff, it was like going through the last 10 years of my life. It was like reliving my triumphs, good times with old friends, toxic college life, escapades with my bes, my telenovela lovelife 10years back.

Warning: next few paragraphs are uberly cheesy!

While cleaning up, I found the mails that the architect sent me. The first time I met the architect, back in 1999, we were still kids. We would send each other mails and packages almost every other day. That is besides emailing each other ha. We couldn't get much of each other that we couldn't content ourselves with the emails and phonecalls and had to send handwritten(!!!) love letters. Cheezy, I know! Back then we only worry about passing our subjects in college, how to save enough money so we can continue sending each other stuff and make long distance calls or buy cellphone load.

I can't believe that I kept almost all of the things that the architect sent me. The bad thing about disposing loveletters is that you can't just throw them in the trashcan as is or just crumpling them a bit. I was too scared that somebody from my family will find out about my kalokohans back then so I had to tear up all the architects mails one by one into the smallest possible piece that will surely challenge the csi wannabes to put them together and read them. Yes, I tore them all until my fingers were numb and full of papercuts. No, I did not attempt to read them again except for just a few.

Almost 8years ago, I met this wonderful man who made me feel so special but broke my heart so many times. Today, maybe this is the finale of my letting him go. I just want to remember him as that person who was special to me and will always occupy a special place in my heart. No more regrets... just happy thoughts.