Please mark your calendars, dear people! My Arn‘s new novel is coming out in April 2006. We sent out about 15 teaser ads, each one sporting a different character/design, to different sets of email addies and thanks to Technorati‘s watchlist feature, so far I’ve seen 7 of them pop up in friends’ blogs (thank you, thank you!): ONE / TWO / THREE (A) (B) / FOUR / FIVE / SIX / SEVEN

Special thanks to Shei and Neva for helping us with the Tagalog translations (:

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And since I mentioned it above, don’t you just love Technorati? It’s sure a big leap from the vanity search phase we all went through when Google was new (admit it, I know you do it too) because, for one, it can list mentions of any topic, an assigned URL, or yes, your name in any blog according to “freshness”. We always use it to research on how our mag is doing in the blogosphere (and thru it we even learned that Arn and I figured in the #9 spot of Adam David’s list of top moments in comics, naks naman!) Go and sign up.

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Oh boy this is turning out to be a really busy 1st quarter… but definitely not too busy to meet up with dear friends, especially ones I haven’t seen in ages (months=ages).



One of my bestest pals Sheila was in town (to attend a creative guru’s Bora wedding) last week so we moved hell and high water to meet up for a long lunch at the Fort. Shei is based in Singapore and both she and Tippi had just returned from a month-long US trip (with their respective hubbies) so there was a lot of catching up to do! I missed you girls, let’s do it again soon ok?

Captions: 1. Sherbet Sundae: strawberry, lemon and pistachio hehe. 2. Shei and Tippi- both sought after in their respective fields! 3. Tips and I showing our identical ponytail clips (given by our friend Pia last Christmas).

Still on proud-wifey mode: my Arn designed and illustrated these Harajuku-style cartoon characters for a McDonald’s Singapore ad campaign promoting seaweed shaker fries and teppanyaki burgers* conceptualized by our good friends Mike and Sheila dela Cuesta of LB Sing late last year. Since it’s been 5 months already, I guess it’s safe to share the tv commercials with you — go click! one and two. Enjoy 😀

*Soundz good! Dear Ronald, won’t you please bring them to Manila too?

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Do you sometimes wonder if your physical neighbors are bloggers too? Now that almost everyone in the Philippines has access to the web, it certainly is possible that the person across from you at Sunday mass has a blog you’ve stumbled upon once or twice and you just didn’t know it. Well if everyone signs up at GeoURL, maybe we can find out. Try it, who knows we could be neighbors after all.

By the way, these are the people blogging less than 1 to up to 10km from where I am. Holler if you’re one of them!

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On the drawing board: two websites — one for an innovative picture studio run by dear friends, and the other for a talented wedding cake designer; some stuff for MB and of course the next issue of WE.

If you like wearing, using, or making (and yup, making money off) one-of-a-kind items, check out Etsy, the place to buy and sell all things handmade. I just came from a one-hour ogling spree and if I’m not $10-or-so shipping dollars away, I would’ve gotten my hands on the following items:

I enjoyed making this collage too! All items are from Etsy.

These pretty creations actually inspired me to seriously look through and attempt* to make something from the old clothes and curtains in my parents’ attic before the moths beat me to them.

*attempt being the operative word. Wish me luck!

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Have you tried out Pandora yet? I discovered it via my friend Earnest ‘s blog and believe me, it’s had me at “page loaded”. Really! It’s dooper fun, you enter a song title or artist and their engine will generate a playlist of tracks with interesting musical similarities to what you entered. As it says on the site, it’s just like having your very own DJ (minus the ego too, right Nest? ;)).

So anyway I entered “Cibo Matto” and was recommended songs by Moloko (close enough), Supreme Beings of Leisure (I have their fist album and I think their sound is more Morcheeba-ish actually) and surprise, Deep Forest?? Well of course a script can’t be 100% accurate. I also entered “Ivy” and discovered the excellent Ultraviolet by Anubian Lights. Do let me know what gems you find.

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It’s 2006, have you made the switch? If you do so right now, apart from the reasons listed here, I promise that this blog will look prettier on your screen too. 🙂