Listen, to the song here in my heart

i was asleep when God was giving out voices like these. but this girl was wide awake. this is charice pempengco singing Listen by beyonce. naka pyjamas pa sya sa video na yan. nakaka tindig balahibo, she's sooo good for a 14 year old. brava




Too much of a good thing is wonderful. - Mae West

Civil Engineer Examinees for November 2007 will RETAKE the exam on January 12, 2008

so it's official. those who took the exam last november 17-18 for the civil engineering licensure exam will retake it. ***make face here***

i haven't seen the decision posted on the prc site or any of our local news channel's' websites. but i heard that it was announced over the tv on a local station.

my brother told me that he and wilbert just came from PRC and was was already informed that due to the statistical improbability of the results in geotech/hydraulics and structural design the examinees will have to retake those two subjects. he did say that design was easier than they expected since it's mostly specs and not much about the difficult stuff. they thought it was such a blessing and now it turned out to be a curse. since it looks like so many of the examinees were able to get exceptional scores on those two subjects, they will have to retake it.

statistical improbability my ass. (it's a statistical improbability that a virgin should conceive a child, but i don't think they'd count religion in this argument =)

there is of course the rumor that there is a leakage down south. if you want to know where the supposed leakage happened, read the comments here and here. they are so funny, i read them to pass the time at work. laugh trip talaga. someone said PRC - Philippine Retake Commission rawr! =) those poor kids...going out of their minds waiting for the damned results. and prc telling them to retake. ***curse like a sailor here***

so i guess you can expect the exams on geotech/hydraulics and structural design to be even more harder. if math was sooo annoyingly over the top hard. goodluck with design! too many formulas so little time.




Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. - Albert Einstein

Computers can figure out all kinds of problems, except the things in the world that just don't add up. - James Magary

that was how it started. it just doesn't add up.

i was searching google for information about urchin but i keep getting directed to google web analytics. my frustration was so palpable i can taste it. ok so analytics is the new urchin but i really need urchin 3 information. unfortunately, that is what we're still using. we haven't even upgraded to urchin 4 or 5. very old school...i know, i know.

i was so pissed. going home at 2 am in the morning would do that to you. especially if you've been combing the net for hours and haven't found anything relevant, just websites trying to sell you their services to launch your website at the top of every search engine in the kingdom. rawr. i am so not looking for that.

so as soon as i arrived at the office and after 5 computer restarts (pesteng computer) i was seriously considering sending the computer overboard (read: outta the porthole errr the 32nd floor's window). i thought i was going to get the blue screen of death but finally it started to respond on the fifth restart and so my evil thoughts receded. amazing (sarcasm, sarcasm).

out of desperation i even emailed our senior quality engineer, but i only did that because i was sooo desperate and i hate being desperate. and honestly he scares me, i would have rather have myself burned at the pits and die but since even that is more painful than asking for his help so i sent the email. duh. the fact that i'm still breathing today can attest to the wisdom of that desperate act; but that is neither here nor there.

now my problem with urchin is how can you have more visitors than pageviews? my understanding was shouldn't every visit count as a pageview? since you'll be pulling up the site and pulling it up means you'll be pulling up a page from his site so that is a pageview, right? so i thought there must at least be one pageview per visit.

my searches last night were futile. but i got lucky today. it pays to play thestone. my searches finally directed me to a website that has a link to urchin info. not exactly urchin 3 (it looks like google have wiped out all documentaion regarding urchin 3 because i couldn't find any specific documentation regarding that version). but i found a documentation that compares the 3 versions - urchin 3, 4 and 5 and it does contain an answer as to why pageviews may not equal/exceed your number of visitors. it's right here:

Urchin 3
* Visitor tracking is done by incoming IP address only. There is no distinction between a visitor and a session.
* All MIME types except images (gif/jpg/png) are treated as pageviews.
* Pageview hits with a HEAD request type are logged as treated as actual pageviews.
* Pageviews are not required to count a visitor, so a request for a single image file could be counted as a new visitor. (-> ano daw? labo! but not necessarily a pageview? but it's a hit?)
*Hits with error codes of 404 or 5xx are considered legitimate visits and could increment the visitor count. (-> would it count as a pageview even if it's a 404 or 5xx?)
*Traffic->Hourly report and Tracking reports (e.g. Top Entrances, Top Exits) data is stored on a monthly basis, therefore the only report granularity is for a single month date range.


That was still too vague for me. But this website gave me the cincher:

Page View - The opportunity for a page to appear in a browser window as a direct result of a visitor's interaction with a website. The term "page" is used to represent the visitor's view of a website through the browser window. A page request does not guarantee that a visitor actually viewed the requested page. It only measures the opportunity for that page to have been delivered to the visitor. A page request will be valid even if the resource or information requested does not load to completion or otherwise become fully available to the requesting visitor. Pages may contain text, images, media objects or other online elements. However, only one page is counted per request. A request that is followed by an interstitial page (a page that appears in a separate browser window while a web page is loading), will only count as one page request. Cached pages (pages held in processor memory) are not counted in page-hit calculations, so as to have a system of measurement that replicates web log file data.


So now you know. Spread it around.


Ain't life grand when you get an answer for what you need. - I say so.




Only exceptionally rational men can afford to be absurd. - Allan Goldfein

Between the wish and the thing life lies waiting. - Unknown

what did i say about waiting?

yes, it's such a bitch.

waiting for the CE board exam results is nerve-wracking. my brother had been losing sleep since monday. i've been losing sleep since he told me that his chances of passing is maybe 50-50. yeah how encouraging. he told me that math was the bloodiest. they weren't expecting it to be like that. (i don't know what they were expecting but i've always equated math with numbers. so did something happen with the numbers? i'm hoping they got sucked by some blackhole and they're never coming back - i wish). he said that situational probability is the pits. (i hate probability, permutation. i hate math period and it hates me back). design and geotech was ok. whatever OK means.

last week did not come up roses for me either. after accidentally deleting that site? i was so damn lucky jade wasn't on his rest day yet =)

on the lighter side, i finally cracked the abstract images of illustration. i didn't get the answer exactly but at least i have the quote from the images. of course the close is too broad but it's still better than having nothing.

on the downside, the last outside stone puzzle has been revealed and solved. and i still have 66 puzzles to go. i am starting to panic. panic. eeeeeekkk


there.


i feel so much better.


***sigh***


It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers. - James Thurber

i don't think luck has anything to do with it

i finally had my sonomammography results explained to me 15 days after my ultrasound. last night i even dreamt about it. in my dreams i have a cyst on the underside of my left breast. that creeps me out. the first thing i did after i woke up was feel it. nothing there. whew. but the lump at 1 o'clock is there. i've had it for some time. no biggie. really. because if there's one on the underside that would make it two on my left. i was told that most breast cancers occur on the left. my mom's cancer was on the left and it was (almost) under her arms that is why we never noticed it until she told us because it was mostly hidden. now you have something to look out for.

my results said:

Assessment slash Recommendation:

BIRADS CATEGORY: 3

Distinct hypoechoic masses with suggestively benign (encircled by my doctor in blue) sonographic features, bilateral. Short-term follow-up by sonography ater 6 months suggested to monitor stability. Simple cyst, left.

According to the footnote on the results BIRADS category 3 means: Probably Benign Finding; Short Interval Follow Up Suggested.

the probably there gives me the heebie jeebies but my doctor says that they don't operate on them unless they are bigger than 20mm. it makes me happy that i don't have to go under the knife but it's unnerving to know that i'd be living with "distinct hypoechoic masses at 1 o'clock position(left) and at 3 & 4 o'clock positions (right) ranging from 3.6mm to 12.6mm."

the biggest is on my right at 4 o'clock. they could not be certain whether these are solid or cystic in nature due to lack of distinguishing characteristics. but i remember how i came to notice this lump on my right. i felt a little pain there after wearing bra with wires all day. upon checking it out i found the lump. i stopped wearing bras with wires after that. i don't have any illusions on living longer but why tempt the divil, roight?

the second biggest is on my left at 1 o'clock at 6.8mm. that one i've had it for some time. even before my mom notice hers. it's the only one noted as simple cyst. walls are distinct with no evident irregularity or solid component.

overall diagnosis - No features suspicious for malignancy seen.


i guess that means that i get to live a little longer. small reprieve.


yeah big deal.


let's see what happens in may for my next check up.




and if you're wondering why not a mammogram?

*Patients ages 25 years old and below are not subjected to mammography due to sensitivity of breast tissues to radiation and low incidence of breast cancer in these age groups.




"That's the secret to life... replace one worry with another.... "- Charles Schultz

everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege.

oh god i am so stupid.
cleaned out a 732Mb site

every webmaster's nightmare
now mine

somebody kill me now.

downloaded everything bawal
filezilla
explorer
because i.ftp is fucked up
when downloading directories

desperate times
even more
desperate measures

i'm stuck downloading the files from back up
until god knows when.

then i still have to edit the site from frontpage
because it was built in frontpage
and then reupload the files again

but it doesn't like uploading that much files
i can just see it timing out


oh yeah


it's gonna take forever
and ever
ever
.

damn
double damn
triple damn


arrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!



there are nightmares you never wake up from

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in my heart)i am never without it - e.e. cummings

it's been six months today since my mom passed away. while i was in naga, my father and i argued about the babang luksa. it's the official end of the mourning period. one year later.

i argued because don't feel like celebrating it or marking anything. i don't care what others think. fuck them.

i'm happy she is no longer in pain. i don't want her to suffer. but i want her back. i want her back before she got sick. but wishing and wanting doesn't count after the fact

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)

i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)



--
e.e. cummings "i carry your heart with me"

life is like a roller coaster ride

by next week i'll be having a new work schedule. i'm not sure if its a boon or a curse. all i know is it means i can sleep until lunch time and still have enough time to go to work. but it also means that by the time i go home, it would be too late to ring anyone much less watch tv. no weekends off either, which is a bummer.

but at least i'll be able to squeeze an appointment with my doctor. it seems she only works in the morning. hmm, that doesn't perk me up.

i'm feeling restless again. i'm in one of those flight modes that says " i want to get out of here!"

...but then i have no idea where to go.



i did say waiting is such a bitch.

and it looks like i would even have to wait longer. my ultrasound results were released last november 9. it was picked up by my doctor's secretary and she did not even tell me. i went to makati med's breast clinic last monday and waited for more than 2 hours just to be told that. by the time they finally managed to trace where my results went, it was too late to schedule another appointment with my doctor because she went home early. duh!

i don't understand why they don't save these information on their computer. if it was, it would've made searching easier - just a click away. for such a big hospital, they can't manage to store these things on their computers. they need a better IT consultant.

i'm glad i'm done with my breast sonogram, i overheard one of the attendants say they're booked solid until december 17. unbelievable. if i ever need one next time, i'll have it done in naga.

i had mine last november 5 before i went home to visit my mother. it was kind of weird. they put a gel on this thing they put over my breast and you can see these weird lines on the monitor which i assume were my breast muscles or tissues. funny, there doesn't seem to be a lot.

but seriously i was nervous as hell. the gel was cold and every time the lady doc stops as if she's taking a picture of something, i can feel my heart skip a beat. 1.25cm what the hell is that. so i stop looking and just sang a long with hugh grant and whoever was singing along with him; their song was blaring across the speakers. neat.

i now wished i asked if i have "you know." but i was a little spooked then. now i'm more than a little spooked. thinking about it makes my stomach roll and all it's content seem to be on zero gravity.

speaking of gravity, while i stayed in my aunts house i discovered danny forster of extreme engineering. he is such a geek. but a cute geek. i watched the episode he made about roller coasters. it was amazing. now i know why coasters don't fall down while it's traversing the loop and what makes it go round the loop. mathematics, physics... yeah all those yucky stuff that riding it would be so much easier that trying to comprehend all the computations that explain how your coaster goes through all those twists and turns and loops.

he went to the Griffon's construction site in virginia while they were still building it. the guys on the site made fun of the host's fit designer jeans. what a very becky moment. danny couldn't think of a retort. that really cracked me up. and it's amazing how a massive steel coaster like that is supported by what, 53 A-beams or whatever? anyway, i don't think my stomach is up for that kind of ride - 205 foot 90° drop. there goes my lunch. what can i say, i'm not that brave.

if you want an old school roller coaster ride, there's the wooden roller coaster. for that he went to the construction site of the Renegade in Minnesota. compared to a steel coaster like the griffon this one has thousands of wooden support to keep it steady. but wooden coasters shakes like crazy when you ride them. to find out why, you have got to watch the episodes at discovery channel.

since these two roller coasters were still under construction, he couldn't ride them. so he went to florida to ride a steel coaster and a wooden coaster (gwazi) in the busch gardens. another discovery you'll make, he screams like a girl. haha!

but between riding these roller coasters and being a passenger of my cousin's driving, i'd take these roller coasters anytime.

He who hesitates is sometimes saved. - James Thurber

undas

before i slept last night i called shoty. he's the only one of the 3 of us who was able to go home and visit mama since my sister and i were stuck working. lala yin and papa were disappointed we couldn't go and so are we. i was looking forward to a graveside reunion with cousins and share scary stories with the younger ones to keep them awake for the rest of the night.


my brother said that it feels very unnerving that he's now visiting mother in the cemetery instead of another relative.


so i decided to go home next week and visit my mom. it's nice to visit just after all saints day since the cemeteries won't be so crowded. it will already be clean by then and the graves would still be sparkling white (most of it are painted white). my brother said that we should buy the lot being sold next to ours. but none of us have any money to buy it. i joked that we couldn't even buy our own house and lot; and yet we're gonna buy a cemetery lot! that cracked me up somehow.

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome. - Isaac Asimov