Bed Time Monsters: Jas Story

"San si mama?" asked Jas sleepily, as his small silhouette blocks the moon light seeping into our window. "Nasa baba, nagwowork" I told him annoyingly for waking me up for the nth time. Then an airplane zoomed above the silent night, followed by a jerking movement of my son trying to penetrate into my embrace. Jas was very afraid.

Then I realized that Jas can't sleep, not because of Jody's absence, but because of discomfort and lack of security against his midnight monsters.

I never enjoyed my bed when I was young. It's not because I have to stop my playing, but because I have to fight my demons and monsters lurking underneath my soft discomfort. The top part of my sleep is covered by the safety of my brother's slumber since Our bed happens to be a double-deck bed.

So what's underneath my bed? -- I never knew. I never got the courage to check; but I always imagined them. Every night they would come in different terrifying form. Sometimes they appear uninvited in my nightmares.

That's how I got my magical pillow and blanket. The saliva-smelling pillow wards off evil imaginations, while the blanket covers me into a carbon-dioxide-filled shelter, somehow making things a bit safer for me. I usually dozed-off, probably from the lack of Oxygen, or from the comfort of my actions. But some other times, I would run towards our parent's room to have someone to sleep with.

Jas doesn't have a magical pillow and he also happens to hate blankets -- And that very evening, I knew that I should protect him: May it be an imaginary foe or not.

The Dords Band Photoshoot ni tePhuts

Galing ng photographer. Thanks tePhuts :)

http://whitelabs.multiply.com/photos/album/21/The_Dords_Band

Name 3 things - Jas story

After watching the movie "The Orphanage", Jody got the idea of a new way of story-telling. Jas would name three objects as bases of a story -- and it worked well. In fact, it was very helpful in developing Jajas imagination and his skills of relating things.

But the other night's scene was a bit comical. Jody asked Jajas three things like usual and Jas turned silent thinking for a few seconds. Then he was suddenly excited naming what he had in mind:

"Alam ko na 3 things ko: TAO....POPO....KUTSARA"

Jody and I stared at each other, obviously having the same funny scene in our heads -- then we burst out laughing.

Jas, on the other hand, was deadpan silent waiting for the story and innocently wondering what was the laughing all about.

HellBoy Drawing

Just another Hellboy fan art I made using Photoshop and Tablet. Enjoy!

Incredible HULK - drawing

Hulk at his best : unleashing havoc!
Drawing made using pencils, Wacom and Photoshop

Batman Drawing

Another pinup of the Dark Knight. I liked the idea of Frank Miller's Red and Shadow style for the bat.

The right panel is the pencil, while the left one is the photoshopped work. Hope you enjoy it!

Help Mozilla Set Guinness World Record

Pledging to help Firefox

Pledging and join our effort to set a Guinness World Record for the most software downloads in 24 hours. Don't forget to tell your friends, family and colleagues to pledge to download Firefox 3 during Download Day!

Gonuts Flash Game

A new Flash game I've worked with for Toshiba. I handled the programming and the animation part while the design was made by one of the great artists in Tolemy Communication.

I'll post the site url once it's fully done. In the meantime you can check the game here :)

Self Steam

I'm balding. Well, at least that's what my friends joke about a few weeks ago. They think my hair is thinning and my scalp is showing. "Finally it came" I told myself; I've been asked for so many times since college about my hair line or about my thin hair. I've heard the lines "ow nakikita rin anit mo?" or "shiny forehead, kasilaw dude" and things like that. So I told Jody about these issues -- she simply stared at my forehead and said "dati pa rin eh." then she joked "Nakakalbo ka pa rin". After a few grins, she said that "diet" and "hair thinning" comes in a package. I told her she was probably biased because she loves me, but her remark gave me a great relief "Matakot ka kung ako ng nagbiro, kasi totoo na yun." She was right.

But still I've decided to cut my hair short and the joking was replaced with my ifeminate hair style: my office mates now call me Gretch, since my hair looks like that of Gretchen Barreto. "Better than being teased as Aiza" I told them, pointing out that I was teased as Aiza a year ago. But then again, Aiza is more masculine than Gretch.

I guess you'll never escape the teasing part, no matter how well you look (or the opposite). Though the good part lately is that I get to joke about it and feel not a strand of self degradation. Though I got a stash of hair volumizing gel in the rest room courtesy of Jody; probably just to make me stop talking about my hairiness.

We sometimes feel low about things: about how fat or thin, about how broke or unhealthy, about our decaying relationships, about our unchanged appearance. But we tend to forget that all people share their own discontentment with life. We compare, then feel bad. We take notice of what we don't have then we feel bad. We linger for more then we still feel bad about it. So there's no other escape but to change the mindset.

I remember a joke about the man who took a plunge in a smelly septic tank for a million dollars bet. After winning, he took a bath but still smelled himself bad -- so he spent more than a million for cleansers, deodorants and other medications. After going back to being broke he scratched his nostril with his finger and felt a small uncleaned speck which remained after his unfortunate plunge. This small dot made the smell.

Lesson learned: never take a plunge with a hair like Gretchen.