Beginning Of The End


I did say in my last post before this one that I planned to present the new version of this website (and as far as I could remember, I told that it was supposed to be last week). Well, I am not going to say again that I would be postponing the opening.

Nah. What I am going to say today is a farewell greeting.

That's right, I am going to end this website.

I am not kidding this time. And my name is not "kidding".



Why all of a sudden change of decision?

To put it this way: I suddenly found myself too busy at work. I also found myself too busy to think about what to put within my website. I found myself too tired to talk of the things that interest me. Or bother me. Or both interest and bother me.

I found out that I need to go back and review the things I have blogged for about the past two years of blogging. The more I read the entries, the more I yearned to know more about myself - of where I am going, what my future should be and what life story I should weave for myself.

In short, I need to re-assess my life (again). I need a much needed break in order to do that.



I already made my decision. A Rubicon. But this does not mean I am going to forget everything I learned so far from blogging with new friends and acquaintances in the Internet community.

I learned much about myself as I learned things about life from the blogs of other people.



To all of those friends I made through blogging, don't worry, I still have the links to your homepages. I would try as much as possible visit your webpages and make my presence felt.

Peace. (I'll leave this entry for the rest of this month.)

Updates And Fire Drilling


It's been almost a month ago since my last post. I forgot to update some things here, but I never forgotten to return back.



So what happened since then? Well, I have a new desk outside of our "dungeon room". I (with my other development team members) am placed in an Internet type formation of cubicles with my back to a narrow walkway leading to the pantry. Thus, my personal privacy is gone. Actually, this would be only for a temporary basis. I heard from my boss that we could be getting new cubicle positions at the other side of this office floor as soon as construction is finished.

I hope we would not be getting the South Cemetery view.

The "dungeon room" is planned to be demolished and reconstructed as a walkway. We could already hear poundings at the other side of the wall, so before the end of last month we were ordered to move out and transfer to our new cubicles.

Yup, I missed my old position at the corner of the window panels. Gone are the late afternoons watching the orange sun slowly setting over at the Manila Bay.

Anyway, since last week, I wasn't missing much panoramic views of the setting sun as typhoon "Chedeng" wrecked havoc over Luzon, ruining every bit of chance of getting a nice view outside, high atop this building. It was all gray clouds and heavy patter.



We have just concluded the fire drill of this building, PBCOM Tower. To the surprise of my officemates, we were directed to use the fire exit and descend the dizzying flight of stairs from our floor (43rd) down to the ground.

I was not surprised. My officemates expressed worry. I was not worried. During my stay with my former employer, I was used to going down from our office located at the 25th floor downwards while accompanying two other officemates, one of whom utilizes the stairs daily as his form of exercise since he could not regularly visit the gym. Mind you, he does not only go down regularly after work, but also climbs up every morning. My first try then was almost unbearable for me, as I have to stop now and then to pacify my shaking legs.

Working now for my current employer, I remember the times I did daily climbs up and down in our former office location (a very old building with 8 floors maximum). I would go up the stairs from ground towards our floor at the 7th, go back again to the bottom and repeated the climb to the 7th. It looks simpler than going down 25 floors, but the routine was enough to send me huffing and puffing. Nonetheless, I got the hang of it and made it my daily exercise.

We go back to the fire drill story. As we approached the fire exit door, some of us were surprised to find people from the other floors (44th or 42nd?) huddled at the corner outside the door. Some of them had entered our floor using the fire exit. As one of my officemate said, it looked like they were trying to avoid the drill thus hiding from their companions. Oh, I see.

One of my officemates decided to act crazy by screaming like some terrified woman. He continued doing this while we descended the flight of stairs. He only became silent after we met a couple of women slowly climbing down. I have observed that we were quite a bunch of noisy people. We continued to joke around; others ridiculed fellow officemates by calling funny names. Because of these, descending the stairs became a little bit bearable for all us.

After a series of winding alleys and stairs, we have finally reached the bottom floor and into the outside world. Like a triumphant survivor of a holocaust, I stretched out my arms in a winning gesture.

Outside the building, near the pedestrian food stalls called "Jollijeeps", hundreds of office workers huddled with their companions, many obviously standing shakily and with wobbly knees. I chattered with my officemates, oblivious of the fact that I too felt weary and wobbly down my legs. It has been a long while since I visited the "stairs".



I planned to present the opening of the new version of this website next week. Preferably on, before or after Philippine Independence Day. Watch out for it.