President Marcos And Sabah

Disclaimer: I write historical fiction. I am not a historian. What you read here are products of years of playing around with historical fact to create stories.

We all know that some time in the late 60s, Marcos planned to invade Sabah by training commandos who would slip into Sabah, sow chaos, and ultimately lobby politically to break the claimed territory out of Malaysia and into Philippine custody.  And we all know that during the training, the commandos mutinied and were culled in what would be known as the Jabidah Massacre, with only one survivor escaping the prison island of corregidor and living to tell the tale. The account was then made public by the then-opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr. in the Philippine Senate, which then concentrated the dissenting clans of Mindanao into full-on rebellion that lasted for almost 40 years with the succession of the MNLF, MILF, and the more recent BIFF. We also know that Malaysia, in seeking to prevent another attempt by the Philippines to plan out another retake of Sabah, secretly helped the MNLF with their struggle by providing Libyan arms and funding in the Philippine backdoor. And finally, we know that first quarter of 2013, the Sultan's Royal Army, with the backing of MNLF, finally went to Sabah.

Those are the things that we do know.

But there are still some things that never really got clarified.

Most of what the public knows of Operation Merdeka came from Benigno Aquino Jr. who, the Bangkok Post cautioned at the time as, at the baseline, a politician with great rhetorical skill, and may have formatted the information in such a way that it would stir up greater emotions among the populace and the spotty Senate hearing that led to nothing but dead ends.

Wedding Expos 101

Every once in a blue moon, a strange phenomenon happens in convention centers, activity centers, and event tents all over the country. People from different walks of life gather together and discuss topics and prepare for activities such as feeding the masses, clothing the naked, and sheltering strangers. No, I'm not talking about charity events. They're called Wedding Expos, which is what happens when clumps of clueless couples-to-be have a head on collision with people out to milk as much money from them as possible. If you're going to get married and you're into mainstream marriages, chances are at some point in your preparation, you will have to go to these strange occasions that seem to have its own traditions. If you've never been into one, or went to one and had such a traumatizing experience that your mind completely wiped out all the horrible memories out, let this article serve as your guide towards a healthy and hopefully, violence-free experience.

Just like most conventions, with the exception of the annual nationwide jueteng get-together, Wedding expos require you to register upon arrival. Pertinent information such as marriage date, religious affiliation, annual salary, and DNA swabs (sometimes) are collected, quite possibly for the benefit of getting a genetic footprint for gullibility. Grooms and brides-to-be are required to declare that they are soon to be married and are given special "badges" so that they are easily recognizable, herded, and sent to concentration camps treated with extra care by the exhibitors. These badges are required to be worn throughout the affair, even though wearing one will cause you to get constantly mauled by booth reps desperately trying to hit quota. NFL-style pile-ups are not unheard of. In some expos, and I kid you not, there are bouncers roving around for the sole purpose of ensuring you are wearing your star of David /s> badge, by force if necessary.  

Resolutions 2013

First, a result of my last year's resolutions:

Things to do for next year:
- Publish "the" book
- Give car a serious maintenance run  , Brakes, wheels, suspension
- Give standup comedy another go
- Read at least one Elliot Wave theory book
- Cook the perfect steak

My steak's vastly improved. With the introduction of tenderizing, the right amount of oyster sauce and pepper, and the better timing of cooking, I'm now less susceptible to serve half-raw, half-burnt steaks with a taste that treads between roadkill carcass and burnt rubber. When you're coming from that direction, any improvement is a vast improvement.

The car's gotten an oil change, new brakes, wheels. The suspension turned out to be still good. I also replaced the lights, wiper fluid, and cleaned up the windshield from old stickers.

Standup comedy didn't materialize. I'd like to say I've been busy but the truth is, I've been out of the game for so long it kind of scares me to go back. Watching my old vids kind of tell me that my jokes suck. But hey, there's still this year.

Read an Elliot Wave Theory Book. Two, even. Realized that in the wrong hands,it's more prone to give you bullshit predictions than other techniques. I picked off what I could, however, which I am now using for my week to week trading.

Publishing the book's been tricky. I've been editing the book for the better part of last year. I'm working with an old friend to do the artwork for me and it looks like the publishing's going to take more than just early this year. Good things don't need to be hurried anyway.


Others (aka shit that may or may not happen, kinda like sex on the first date):
- Android programming
- 10 lap regular swim
- At least one marathon

No android programming. I swapped it with other technologies I could use better at work, which I still suck at as well. But hey, sucking at something means you're actually trying, right? RIGHT?

No swimming either. My regular hangout's a bit too crowded these days. Maybe I'll try again. Maybe.

Marathon? I run 5k every now and then. My android app called ZOmbies Run make it more festive, but lately I haven't done so again. I'll give it another go this month.

This year:
1. Write screenplay for at least two short films
2. Publish at least 10 articles for the InTouch magazine while doing edits.
3. IELTS
4. Check prospects for another job.
4. Continue the stuff above that I did not completely abandon (book, running, swimming, standup)

Here's to another year of dicking around and pretending that partial progress is actual progress.

Yay!

p.s. Oh yeah, updating this blog once in a while sounds good too.

When Did Video Games Hit Mainstream?

Earlier today I came across a short article asking the absolute moment that videogames hit mainstream. The answer's probably not the same for everyplace, and the answer's probably not even the same for every person but as somebody who started gaming in the Philippines as early as 1986, I can at least shed some light (from my direction) on the subject.

The first probable time you can say gaming hit the mainstream is with the release, and the subsequent popularity of the Nintendo Family computer (Famicom), peaking sometime in the early to mid 90s. Before this, gaming was restricted to godawful personal computers that required multiple floppies and amazingly confusing jargon to install. For those who bitch about having to copy paste cracks, update software and the like, try having to update your bios and experiment with IRQ/DMA/IO just to get your game to work on DOS with sounds.

No, with the Family computer, anybody with a TV, a system unit, and a game cartridge could operate it. Hell, even my mom played it. Rental gaming centers popped up for the first time too, which was the reason my parents were called by our principal when i was in first grade for cutting classes. For the first time, video games were accessible to those who have the money but don't have the techie knowledge.

The one thing that the NES fever lacked is the idea that it could be for everybody. It was a toy, pure and simple. Adults would have none of it and those few that do, are afraid of talking about it in public, as though it were some sort of weird bedside fetish.

This changed sometime in 1995, when the playstation was released. The PS1 was radically expensive initially, but it was introduced not as a kid's toy, but as an entertainment appliance. Michael Jackson endorsed it. Michael Jordan endorsed it. Superstars endorsed it and not the prepubescent models of Nintendo. The games that came out were not only sophisticated. They were mature. They had blood. Violence was more graphic. The only thing that held back its popularity was its price. At 30,000 pesos a unit, it was not for everybody.

And then something else happened. Sometime when the PS1 units finally started depreciating, piracy came in. Don't get me wrong. Piracy has existed far longer than I have as a gamer, but with the age of CDs, piracy no longer meant having to shell 200 pesos for a 300 peso discount on a cartridge. It meant, in the year 1998, you can buy an entire game for the price of 30 pesos in the middle of a video store (Astrovision, from my experience) inside a mall. At 12k a system unit and 30 pesos a game, adoption exploded. Rental shops were everywhere. Every other classmate had a system unit. Games were swapped with abandon, both old and young.

Videogames was now accessible, and for all ages. At this point I can say that VGs have already hit the mainstream, but there's one more step.

Sometime in the year 2000, in parallel with the playstation's popularity, the PC once again became a popular gaming device of sorts. Game cafes started growing around the country for one big reason: Counterstrike, a first person shooting game. Whereas as recent as 1998 people had to go to Greenhills just to be able to play a decent 30 player game, by 2000, every other mall or college hangout had a cafe that could host a game twice the number of players.  Counterstrike, at its very heart, is really the first popular multiplayer game that doesn't just have players alternating in two controllers in front of the TV. It didn't need taking turns. Counterstrike was a game that involved people and in turn, socialized gaming itself.

It did not need investment in buying a console either. Anybody of any age with 40 pesos (it was still expensive at the time) could buy an hour, sit down, learn the game, and play with friends. It became an acceptable alternative to other social activities. Even girls finally got involved (a very rare sight prior to year 2000, to be honest). Tournaments were setup, cliques formed within and outside the game cafes, and people were no longer as afraid of telling other people what they like to do. People recognized videogames, albeit still with some apprehension, but accepted that yes, some people, adults even, consider it as an entertainment. A sport.

That year, I walked into a game cafe one of five in the same mall with my friends, saw college girls playing with guys who looked anything but geeks and spent two hours in Counterstrike playing against them.

It was at that moment that I realized, videogames have finally hit mainstream.

MacPox

Before the Europeans arrived in continental America, there was already a bustling civilization of Aztecs, Incas, and Indians there. What happened though is that when the Europeans arrived, they carried with them smallpox, a disease that is commonplace in Europe but unheard of in America. The Europeans were affected by it, but multigenerational exposure to it has minimized the fatality percentage on their population. The Americans, the real Americans, did not have such an advantage. It was new, their bodies quite literally didn't know what hit them. The population nearly got wiped out in what could be a worse percentage toll than the bubonic plague.

Why am I mentioning this? It's almost like the same thing with Windows and Mac users. Once upon a time Mac users were a niched minority and very few took interest in targeting them with viruses and malware. Fast forward to this year, there are now much much more Mac users than ever before and more and more virus writers and malware producers are targeting the Mac. Some of the types written for Mac are actually just ported versions of PC viruses and malware. While the PC counterparts still exist, people are very much wary of them now, and with the abundance of AV software and just a general distrust for pretty much most vectors of viruses, the damage is much more limited.

On the Mac however, it's quite the opposite. With the years of reinforcement of the idea that the Mac cannot get any virus, most of the userbase is the perfect new target for old viruses. Nobody's defending, nobody's wary and we just might be looking at the smallpox phenomenon all over again.

Too early to tell? Who knows?

How to Level Up in Ingress

So I've been playing this game called Ingress for a couple of days now. It's an augmented reality game by google that lets two factions fight over fictional portals that appear in local landmarks (Intramuros, Rizal park, etc) using energy called XM gathered from places where there are lots of people. It's currently in closed beta but soon it will be open for everybody.  Here are a few things that I've learned:

1. Portal requests take a while, 2-3 weeks, and even then, Google can reject submissions just because.

2. There are portals around already. The quickest way to find them is to use the dashboard at http://www.nianticproject.com

3. The stronger the portal, the harder it is for lower level characters to occupy it. Leveling is key.

4. You level by doing actions, constituting action points.  Here are the levels available so far and what they mean as far as stats are concerned:

Level	AP required	Max XM	Burster Damage	Burster Range	Resonator HP	Best Build Portal	Portal Range
1	0	3000	150	50	1000	1	160 m
2	10,000	4000	300	75	1500	1.5	810 m
3	30,000	5000	500	100	2000	2.5	6 km
4	70,000	6000	900	125	2500	3.5	24 km
5	150,000	7000	1200	150	3000	4.0	40 km
6	300,000	8000	1500	200	4000	4.75	81 km
7	600,000	9000	1800	300	5000	5.125	110 km
8	1,200,000	10000	2700	400	6000	5.625	160 km

And here are the ingress actions and their respective action points:

RESONATORS:
	Placing a resonator	125 AP
	Destroying a resonator	75 AP
	Placing the first resonator on a portal	500 AP
	Placing the eighth resonator on a portal	250 AP
LINKS:
	Creating a link	313 AP
	Destroying a link	187 AP
FIELDS:
	Creating a control field	1250 AP
	Destroying a control field	750 AP
OTHER:
	Applying a portal shield	150 AP
COMBINATIONS:
	Placing the final link on a field	1563 AP
	Destroying a [full] portal	600 AP
	Destroying a portal + (1) link	787 AP
	Destroying a portal + (2) links + control field	1724 AP
	Destroying a portal + links + cf + capture + mods

 When you're new, linking and recharging resonators is the best way to level. If you're lucky enough to find undiscovered portals, go for it. Items can be found by hacking occupied portals.

That said, good luck and happy gaming!

Realizations

If I were to go back to all those stuff I worried about in my youth, I'd be laughing instead of worrying.
Because I know that there are far more important things that actually matter in the long run.

If I were to go back to all those opportunities I found as unnecessary, I'd take them.
Because I realize that some things only happen but once and can't be relived over again.

If I were to go back to all those moments that I thought were unspecial, with people I always see, I'd treasure them more
Because I realize that those moments happen but once, afterwhich they can only be remembered

If I were to go back to all those fights that I thought I had nothing to lose, I'd patch them up as fast as Ican
Because I realize that the wounds get harder to heal as time goes on. 

If I were to go back to all those times I loved, I'd love even more
Because there's no such thing as enough when it comes to being passionate and sincere.

But I can no longer go back. Not you. Not anybody.

That's why it's important to look forward with the intention of looking back.

From this moment on I will live like I'm already from the future, gone back, and given the second chance to do things over.

That someday I will look behind and think about all those things that I've done, and  I can smile.

Because I've realized.
 

Where's mah money?

So last week I tried for the first time to issue a cheque to myself. Long story why. Anyway it turned out that my account had been marked as dormant. Apparently banks like to keep your money but not so much. If they find out the account is no longer being transacted on they start pinching money from it bit by bit like fish on a lake nibbling on a dumped corpse.

Yes I'm working on my analogies.

Anyway if you got a dormant account you can't deposit, you can't withdraw, and you can't issue cheques from it. You can't undormant a dormant account. It's still your money but you can only look at it. At least until you go to the main branch and tell the manager there that no, the mob did not rub you off for bad payments and yes,  you are alive enough to withdraw.

So that's what I did.

Lo and behold  the place where my branch stood was now a vacant lot. Many WTFs were had this morning.

So I went to another branch just to check what happened. It did not help that the branch name is BPI Sherwood.

Yes. The king of thieves forest.

Anyway turns out that I wasn't the only one who realized that analogy because the branch relocated to another place near the old place but far enough from corny robin hood jokes.

So I wasnt able to reactivate my account today. It will have to stay dormant fir a while longer. At least until I can figure out how to convince the sheriff of Nottingham that I'm alive and out of corny references.

Gregorian My Ass

Gregorian Chant albums have the most misleading covers. Whereas you'd be expecting a hard-rocking epic doom choir to herald the Ghost of Christmas Post-Apocalyptic Future from the illustration, you'll actually get 50 minutes of men singing in falsetto to the tune of songs like "Kiss from A Rose" and "My Heart Will Go On". That'd be like watching a DVD with an Expendables cover and an Eat Pray Love content.  
 
On a related note, I once entered a strip club that made women dance to Gregorian Chant songs.  It blew my mind. I wonder if Pope Gregory had this in mind when he first thought a bunch of guys singing together in unison would be pretty badass.

Rufo's Famous Tapa Vito Cruz Delivery Number

5220936 You're welcome.