More happy thoughts

being a underutilized copywriter clerk has its benefits. i've been filling in the vacuum in my heart (haha drama) work hours with a whole lot of youtube. more specifically, rekindling my adolescent preoccupation with rumiko takahashi -- which, incidentally, was first kindled by an equally adolescent preoccupation with the guy who introduced me to rumiko takahashi.

and so i've finished a couple of episodes of mermaid forest, all five parts of the mermaid scar oav, and random episodes of my all-time favorite, ranma 1/2. it's been fun reliving the creepiness of mermaids and lost souls, giggling over the wit of ranma and company. i almost forgot how cute and gravelly ranma's (english-dubbed) voice was (kaka-in love!), or how perfect mr. saotome's comic timing was (but only when in panda form).

i used to be obsessed with ranma in high school, drawing the characters all the time, even buying the graphic novel in english for php600 (which was a hefty amount of money to a high schooler in the early 90s!). come to think of it, that wasn't the only thing i did for ranma. i even made pa-cute to this cousin of a classmate of mine who liked me (and who i totally did not like) just so i could borrow his vhs tapes (vhs tapes?!?!?!) of ranma episodes.

after four years of me pimping myself to him for anime, he ended up asking me to his grad ball through his cousin. i went, but the moment he escorted me out of my house, i knew that i was in for the most boring evening of my young life. so i ditched him an hour after we got to the ballroom by pretending to have a really bad headache and asking him to take me home.

yes, i was an evil little girl.

or maybe this ranma provider and the poor ditchee are two different guys and i'm mixing them up. at any rate, i don't have to do evil things like that now that there's youtube! youtube will keep me from sinning!

one episode down, 38 volumes to go! that's a lot of happy thoughts. thank god.

(my favorite ranma character is shampoo, by the way. now that i've read her wikipedia writeup, though, i'm kind of worried as to what that says about me.)

Think happy thoughts!

to combat the effects of the work hazard/s i have just written about, i shall now attempt to distract myself with random happy thoughts.

happy thought #1: marlon has successfully booked us a room in paris! the source of my elation comes just as much from the fact that marlon surfed the web and did the booking also by himself (with some help from my sister's 2004 edition of let's go europe), as it is from the rave reviews of our choice, the hotel montpensier. for a hotel that's practically next door to the louvre, the rates are well within our budget and the rooms aren't too shabby (love the big windows and high ceilings!).

happy thought #2: acs is getting into competition mode! last night's rehearsal had perfect attendance, a herculean feat for a choir composed entirely of working professionals. we dropped scores for the competition pieces (although it took quite a few barbs and nasty glances for the male sections to drop them for real), and began my favorite part of the process -- shaping the music. augh, a month and a half to go until we leave!

happy thought #3: watched the devil wears prada with leo, mimi and eunice on saturday. loved meryl streep, the outfits, the humor -- everything! what i'm totally not loving, though, is how manila's alta de sociedad have been tossing out "lifestyle column" after "lifestyle column" filled with copious delusions that they are the manila version of the new york fashion world so glamorously depicted in the devil wears prada. puh-leeze. can any local fashion/lifestyle columnist/editor really say/believe they "make or break" any careers other than their own?

uh-oh, happy thought leading back to angst.

that's all.

Told you so

i knew i'd say it sooner or later. now i find the time has finally come for me to say it: be careful what you wish for -- it might come true.

turns out i never really "got" that project that i really wanted. somebody, somewhere is still keeping it tightly wrapped in the enormous tentacles of his/her/their leviathan ego. while i sit in my little cubicle meekly waiting for instructions to encode and print out like a good little drone, and generally try to fight off creative atrophy, a sinking morale and work-related depression.

i could probably sum up the whole thing in two words, but i'm having a hard time deciding what the killer combo will be when there are so many contenders. control freak? giant ego? trust issues? glory hog?

i know i should be thankful for a lot of things -- a great cast, fabulous concept, early material, a strong creative direction (understatement of the year). hell, some people would even be thankful for not having to do any brain work at all at this point in the campaign. but that's just not me.

then again, i have a pretty tough job ahead of me -- reminding myself that i'm a copywriter and not a clerk. that, i will need to do full time on this project. at least until the humdrum daily requirements start coming in, which of course will be left to me 'cause they're just too damn low-profile, or since the creative directions have already been set and my miniscule brain can probably be trusted to obediently follow in the brilliant wake of the powers that be.

yes, angst. and this flu ain't helping either.

i'm probably overreacting. this is just one of the hazards of my job (which is still a lovely job), and what's happening to me now has already happened to most everyone on the floor. as pia likes to say, God is fair.