Pending Passions

  When I was, oh I don't know, 9 or 10, I went to ballet classes. I don't remember if it was during summer or actually within the school year, but I kept going until we "discovered" my scoliosis. But this post is not about my scolio. (I do have another post ready to talk about it, but I need to edit it first because I wrote it angry haha.) In one of our ballet recitals, I was awarded as the ballet student with the "Most Potential." I still have the sash in my old bedroom drawer, and I'm sure I can still find the picture of little me grinning with so much pride wearing that sash. For some reason, that sash has defined a significant portion of my life. Fast forward to nowadays, I still sometimes hear people tell me "You have so much potential!" excitedly pointing out all the things I could do. And it triggers me. It's not that I don't like being told that; I actually super appreciate it because I at least know what steps to take next. It&

A few nights ago, I dreamt that we were eating at home. My coffee was waiting for me on the table when I had to go somewhere else to do something. I distinctly remember thinking, "I'll come back for my coffee." But when I did---which is unusual because, as we know, we can't control dreams---my coffee was missing. Not on the table anymore. And I searched, and I searched, but it's gone. I woke up. I considered it a bad dream. Where would my coffee go? Why would anyone, if anyone did, take my coffee? Why? I felt stressed and frustrated. Until I remembered. In Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness , they said that your dreams are actually the lives of your parallel universe self. And, well, I felt better but also a little guilty. Because somewhere in an alternate, parallel universe, my other self lost her coffee.  And I can't stop laughing at her. 😂 The end.  PS I hope she finds her coffee.

 Almost a year ago, I woke up with the heavy feeling of what most of us were going through at that time. There was the burden of having to go about the day with the unusually highlighted reality of not knowing what the future holds. Of course, I am talking about the Coronavirus (Covid-19) and how, even as I write this today, we still don't know how this ends. That morning in May, I had been particularly concerned about the details of being asymptomatic. No, I didn't get the disease, but it hasn't stopped me from thinking what if I'm just asymptomatic. I had been thinking about what symptoms an asymptomatic would have to actually know they had the disease. How do you know if you're already contagious? Is it only through testing? Because for other diseases, at least you know you won't be passing on the disease after a certain time or a certain stage of the disease. When do you know you don't have it anymore? How do you know if you were part of the trail if, fo

And she's back! In the kitchen! Which is a rather strange place to be. But fret not, nothing has happened so far that is cause for concern. Today on my comeback post, I present to you my first attempt at Corned Beef Sopas. Why am I posting about this and what prompted me to tell you what I did for this recipe instead of the creamy scrambled egg with marble potatoes I did last week? I have no idea. But it's safe to say that this is one of the more successful experiments I've done in the past couple of months. So here we go. For the original recipe, the one I attempted to follow, please check the Yummy Corned Beef Sopas from the Nestle site. It's really pretty simple. But I had to make it complicated because reasons. Okay, so what I did and what I learned and things that went through my head while cooking this. Always check your available ingredients. I learned that elbow macaroni is different from salad macaroni. As you can see in the picture,

And we're back in the kitchen (and on this blog) after a more or less three-year hiatus on cooking/wreaking havoc/playing with food (which we should never do, no). Tonight's victim is a well-loved dish that people still find hard to identify: the afritada. Tadah. As anyone would easily notice, it does not look much like an afritada. But it is. You know why? Because the ready-mix sauce I poured on it said so. So here we go with what went wrong. First and foremost, I bought adobo cuts. It's not technically wrong, but it does deviate from the normal afritada. Second, I did not buy Baguio beans or green peas. Honestly, it was just because my basket was too heavy already to go get more greens. (Excuses.) Third, the instructions said "potatoes, in chunks." In my mind I was thinking of large cubes. In reality, I had diced those taters. And the carrots suffered the same fate. Fourth, stir-fry. I Googled afritada. I Googled the sauce. I Googled the ingred

"Good morning," she says. They greet her well enough. They start talking. They start sharing. They start gossiping. "Good morning," she says. "How are you?" they ask. "I am okay," she says. They talk. They share lives. They share new information. They leave and continue with their day. "Good morning," she says. They do it all over again. Day after day, they greet and talk and everything's fine until it's not. And then they wonder. "I am okay," she says. She talks about her day, about the movie she just finished watching, about the new song she was listening to. She talks about the person in the next cube. She asks about her workmate's family. She asks about her friend's friend. She asks about the weather. They talk. It's all normal. They're all okay. Until they're not. "Good morning," they say. But she doesn't answer. "I am okay." She smiles. Her smile,