Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Even though I concede...
Even though I concede that the huge gap between my life and one in which there's a woman in my life (in a relationship.. not some person to whimsically yearn for) is BADASSNESS... it still socks me in the gut when she talks about her new boyfriend. She seems happy. That's good. I shouldn't be so selfish.. since.. it was a major decision on my part to never pursue that, but still I'm tempted to ask her straight up, "When did you decide it was a good time for you to have boyfriend". You know, as I posted in previous emotefests that she "pushed" me away because she said it "wasn't the right time".

Whatever. Part of me still thinks you dig me. Not that there's any solace or dignity in that, but I do.

It's okay. I wouldn't have been willing to chase after you, anyway.

I love her as a buddy, though that's a loosely used term (buddy.. not love.. well, actually both). She's never cared enough to ask anything of me but attention. And of course, we wouldn't have lasted more than a nickel's worth of cliffhanger (you know, in Radio Flyer days.) Unfortunately, I don't feel she has that BADASSNESS.

The BADASSNESS like of the ladies in my past. Maybe it was because I was in my second stint of discovery (post college), but the people I met at the time were just oozing with BADASSNESS. Well, some, not all, as I now have much more of a retrospective appreciation of it. One, as you, my audience of none, know, was the situation of 01-02 and though I loved the woman I thought she wanted to be, I don't know if that was what was really there. You know, cuz in the end, all I really offered was attention and good intentions because that's all that was ever asked of me. And, alas, she, of today's variety, swims in a parallel stream of the same misguided perception. What they both had with me was chemistry - but they didn't want me, they don't want me. I'm an amoeba to them. Asexual. Wait, amoebas are asexual right?

The BADASSNESS I talk of were verbalized in two poems - one still held, the other lost in the privacy of that (all-too-un-often) courageous moment. I wish I had a copy of it - just to relive the feelings like I can with my experiences with the original C.. the other C.. the K.. the countless others who may or may not have meant my sanity, but felt like such at the time. So, that BADASSNESS lives in our friendship today - in random moments that we can still share with the most innocent of smiles and appreciation. But even THAT BADASSNESS lost its luster, though still remains.

This is what happens when you blog with a lack of sleep and a long ass day at work full of semi-disappointment and unfulfilled whatevers. It sucks that she still rattles my diaphragm - at least that area. And that's what I have to end the day with. (Until I go home and hopefully play a few minutes of Halo).

Ulam cooked @ 5:52 PM

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Tuesday, October 23, 2007

I'm doing a WRITE-A-THON!
National Novel Writing Month

Ulam cooked @ 11:43 AM

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Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Damn you
You don’t want Mr. Right.
You don’t want Mr. Right Now.
You want Mr. Right When You Say So.

And that’s going to get you nowhere.

She kept telling me that it wasn’t the right time. She told me that her time alone was what she needed. But not she’s found someone new.

Where have I seen this before?

It seems familiar.

If this dude’s the one, then I’m still the baddest (meaning goodest) damn Rebound boy there is. You're vulnerable? Need some peace? Like me for a second. Then push me away. Then boom. There’s your meaningful relationship.

I am the epitome of a rebound - no matter how big or small a role I play.

Sweet.

At least I mean something.

Ulam cooked @ 12:09 AM

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Push Pull Factor
Push pull factor.
Push me away. Pull me back in.
Pulled.

She pulled me in with needs for affection.
Not necessarily mine, but she didn’t mind
Nonetheless.
Glances and exchanges
Of laments and laughter,
Every syllable cryptic
Culminating in one message.
She was into me.

But I played it cool.
And playing it cool began engulfing the warmth.
Playing it cool transmitted a signal
Of hypotheticals and mixed manifestations.
We were elementals
Partaking in volatility.
We were big words and overthought hesitations
In a simple sentence:
We were into each other.
And in essence,
It made sense.
But as I played wallflower
To her initial gestures at a soire',
She mistakenly thought I didn’t want to dance,
When instead, I was just worried
That it wouldn’t last.

The complexities faded. Ease settled in.
Our brains decided to push in a
Synchronized prance.
If I played it cool, then she’d play it colder.
Coolness and coldness
Until ice coffins halted
The flow of blood from our senses.
Coolness and coldness
Until our self-inflicted bruises
Were numbed.
At least that was my story.

I ignored the chemistry of our equation,
Resisted the overwhelming rush
When images of our bodies entangled
Overcame all my thoughts.
Decided that my imagination was wrong
once it told me that when moonlight struck
exhaling the long day and unfolding into you
wad the only thing that really mattered.

So here I am.
Pulled into your gravity.
And there you are,
Finally pulled away.

Ulam cooked @ 12:08 AM

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Tuesday, October 09, 2007

The Root of the Desperate Housewives joke?
FROM NYTIMES.COM

Scandal Over Nurses’ Exam Stirs Unease in Philippines
By CARLOS H. CONDE

MANILA, Aug. 20 — After disclosures that test questions for Philippine nursing board examinations in June were leaked to hundreds of applicants, officials and industry experts are warning that the country’s status as one of the world’s top producers of nurses could be threatened.

The country’s Professional Regulation Commission has confirmed that questions in the board exams taken by more than 42,000 nursing graduates in June had been provided in advance to hundreds of examinees. The initial accusations were made by students, who contended that the president of the Philippine Nurses Association had provided the exams to students who took his coaching classes.

The president, George Cordero, has denied the charges, but he has resigned.

Industry groups, meanwhile, are calling on the commission to compel the students to retake the exam to repair, according to one of the groups, the “tainted credibility of Filipino nurses here and abroad.” They also gone to court to stop the new nurses in Manila from taking their professional oath on Tuesday. The court ruled in their favor on Friday. Students in the provinces have already taken their oaths.

Those who passed the June exams say it would be unfair to force them to retake the exam or to delay their certification.

The Philippines is the top supplier of nurses to the United States, sending several thousands a year. Earlier this year, a change in American immigration law lifted the cap on the number of foreign nurses American hospitals and clinics can hire. The move created more opportunities for Filipino nurses, who are also in demand in Europe, Japan and other more affluent Asian countries.

The scandal, officials said, could greatly damage this status of Filipino nurses abroad. Already, Philippine officials said, American recruiters are turning away nurses who took the fraudulent board exams, while those who remain in the Philippines are having difficulty finding jobs. Questions also have been raised about the integrity of previous nursing board exams.

The Philippine Senate has started investigating the scandal. “American hospitals, Japanese hospitals, European hospitals are watching us,” Richard Gordon, a senator, said during a Senate hearing last week. Health experts at the hearing said they feared a moratorium by other countries on hiring Filipino nurses.

Although officials contend that the quality of Filipino nurses hired in other countries would not be affected in the long run because the new nurses generally must pass tests in destination countries, the credibility problem could persist.

“The credibility of the Filipino nurses has been tainted,” said Rosalinda D. Baldoz, the administrator of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, in an interview with the Middle Eastern newspaper Gulf News.

The Philippine economy is heavily dependent on the remittances sent home by millions of its overseas workers.

While Filipino nurses have always enjoyed some kind of a favored status in the United States, the emergence of other countries that supply nurses, like India, has been a concern in the Philippines of late. This scandal, officials said, will certainly add to the problem.

Mr. Cordero, who led the nurse’s association, was accused during the Senate hearing of leaking the exam in order to favor students who took courses at a nursing review center that he owns, thus improving their chances of being recruited abroad.

He has also been accused of bribing examiners so that he could get advance copies of the test questions, and of paying for a trip to Switzerland for some members of the Board of Nursing, which administers the exams.

Mr. Cordero has denied the allegations and has threatened to sue his detractors for libel. He declined requests for an interview.

Dr. Kenneth G. Ronquillo, chief of human resources at the Philippine Department of Health, said the government and the medical profession “should do its best to erase all doubt about the integrity of the nursing board exams.”

Senator Gordon criticized what he called “a culture of cheating” in the Philippines.

“We have a tendency to want to beat the system, in the elections, in sports accreditations, and even in civil service exams,” he said, referring to other scandals here, among them the accusations that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo cheated in the 2004 elections, though that has never been resolved.

Ulam cooked @ 11:29 AM

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Thursday, October 04, 2007

Umm.. my ideal partner?

Your Score: ENFP - The Champion


You scored 75 I versus E, 0 N versus S, 40 F versus T, and 40 J versus P!




Your ideal mate is known as the champion. As a romantic partner, they need to talk about what is going on in their lives. They are strong supporters for their partner's efforts to grow and change and be happy. They need to feel that same support from their partners. Expressive, optimistic, and curious, they are eager to enjoy new experiences with their partners, whom they wish to be their confidant and soul mate, as well as play mate. They are uncomfortable sharing negative emotion, though, and tend to withdraw from confrontation and process their feelings privately. They feel most loved when their partner appreciates their creativity, accepts their uniqueness, and sees them as the compassionate person they are. They need to hear their partner tell them how much they mean to you and would love if you did thoughtful spontaneous things to demonstrate it.

The group summary: idealists (NF)

The type summary: ENFP







Link: The Best Personality Type for You Test written by unpretentious2 on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Ulam cooked @ 1:23 AM

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Wednesday, October 03, 2007

some responses to this Desperate Housewives situation and to some stuff I was talking about...
From one of my best friends:
"I was torn about that, moreso though because of free speech. that is the problem i have with political correctness. but then do you just be a silent witness when people are being racist? we are our actions, so if prejudice exists, then prejudice actions are a reflection of that...you are talking about challenging institutionalized racism in your blog, but i think that one [form of racism] is not expendable over the other?"

MY RESPONSE:
And you're absolutely right. We shouldn't be silent about it. But like you said, one form of racism isn't expendable over the other... but it IS treated like that. And that's my whole issue with this sudden outrage like the rest of the 51 weeks of our lives as Americans are free from this type of stuff on a more wider level. That, again, is my REAL issue...

And, like you, I'm torn with freedom of speech issue because it is a two way street. If we want to be able to call the president the &#^% he is, we shouldn't expect a double standard. It's a sticky situation and I think there's more proactive things we could and should be doing than sending in petitions to ABC.

ANOTHER RESPONSE:
"i've been getting all these emails from various people about it and one girl was really pissed off about it. then one of my friends replied and said something to the effect of, "at least Filipinos are on the radar for jokes in mainstream media now" and he stated that other races have gone through the same sort of shit - mexicans, chinese, japanese, korean, etc."

MY RESPONSE:
well... i don't necessarily agree with that.. i don't think it's right.. but it's amazing how pissed off we get about a stupid statement and as a community we're so nonchalant about... say.. all the innocent people dying in iraq (american and iraqi). i don't think being targeted is a necessary step towards media relevance

(IF you can't tell, a lot of this was happening on IM.)

AND ANOTHER ONE:
"It makes me sad in two ways: 1) that hollywood still thinks it's okay to made these kinds of remarks without consideration of the consequences and the messages that those kinds of statements make, and that 2) *all* that will come out of this will be an online petition (no disrespect Kev, for putting it together) and perhaps some short-fused reactionary activism. I wish that for once, with the rage that seethes, that we channel that kind of energy into more long-term solutions to our problems: healing the youth culture, finding real solutions to retention issues in the schools, and learning to accept ourselves as a vital part of society rather than be happy to sit on the fringes with whatever trivial pittance is granted to us by society. And by the way, turn off your television every now and then."

MY RESPONSE:
Amen.

Ulam cooked @ 9:47 PM

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Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Why the Fil Am Community's going to hate me:
ooh, sometimes it's fun to get irked and write about. who am i kidding? it's ALWAYS fun to bitch. Haha.

my response to all the hoopla of the "anti-Filipino" joke in Desperate Housewives. I'm sure I'm going to get voted off the Fil-Am Community now. Oh darn.

SORRY Y'ALL...

...but until the Filipino American community is up-in-arms hollering at their local city councils/local agencies/local churches/local changemakers/local legislators about:

lack of gang prevention/intervention programs
increased socio-economic and racial segregation (of physical space and of access to resources)
lack of mental health services both clinical and non-clinical
lack of 1st generation and 2nd generation communication
why a fun and important conferences like FAYLC don't get more consistent attendance (especially around the Sac area)
lack of voting representation during ALL elections
increased high stress for our college-targeting youth
decreased access (both physically and monetarily) to PUBLIC higher-ed
decreased access to holistic learning opportunities in our public schools
continued alcohol, tobacco, and other drug abuse by our young people
abuse of power by the previously-known-as INS on our immigrant brothers and sisters
etc.
etc.
etc.

I'm not going to give a damn about what a fictional character with no real status in public domain from an unimportant, satirical, notmeantobetakenseriouslyasevidencedbynarrationbyadeadcharacter soap opera said rather ignorantly and incorrectly about Filipinos and our Health Care qualifications.

Was it racist? Yes. Ignorant? Yes. Unnecessary? Yes. Unfunny? Yes.

But, isn't there some solace to the fact that we DO have so many of our community members who have those high-paying, self-sustaining jobs? Is a Desperate Housewives-spoken untruth going to suddenly convince hospitals, HMOs (who are bastards themselves), and other health care providers to NOT hire Filipinos? No EFF-ing way.

If someone gets medical care from a Filipino/Filipino American and questions the authenticity of their possibly foreign credentials then they are the ones with the problem with or without a stupid show's stupid comments.

Had one of our legislators said it? Different story. They're at a level of real swaying at a local or national policy level.

Don't get me wrong. I was there - angered and torn apart by racist comments in fictional media. Still do at times. But why do we get up in arms and sign petitions regarding ignorant statements when our communities still suffer from the everyday real problems that we've either ignored or forgotten still really bring us down? I'm not saying those who were angered, offended, and will sign that petition don't care about those other issues. But, unless I'm completely disconnected, I feel like those everyday issues have left our daily dialogues, our daily foot-soldiering, and our daily diatribes.

What do we do with the FACT that our education system is much more of a GREAT DIVIDER than a GREAT EQUALIZER as it was envisioned to be? In retrospect, don't you feel like your ability to think critically has served you much more than your basic algebra?

What do we do when we got our younger brothers and sisters not getting jobs based on their clothes, their choice of music, their built-in lack of hope? Oh wait, that happens to our Fil-Am kids?

The last time I saw any REAL Fil Am folks on national TV? When there were people petitioning for the Apl Song to make it onto TRL. I may have missed some shit in between then and now, but tell me I'm wrong. (And, btw, I love the Apl Song.)

There are so many Filipinos and Filipino Americans working in non-profits, community based organizations, as teachers, as lawyers, as experts in public policy, in government systems (and I don't mean POLITICAL systems) - folks who bust their balls or their ovaries to work with the community whether they're ethnically Filipino or not - who probably never attended a rally, never signed a petition, never walked around with "Activist" tattooed on their forehead and they'd RARELY - IF EVER - get mentioned in any recognition as a Filipino Community Leader unless they're platforming a specific Filipino-issue Flag.

I'm just babbling in a bit of an angry tone. This isn't a note to the author of the petition or any of those who were likewise offended by what they said on Desperate Housewives or what they say on 30 Rock or what they say on Scrubs or what they say on SNL or what they say on whatever television show that says an insensitive remark (because all them, aside from being some of my favorite shows [sans Desperate Housewives] say some racist/sexist/religionist/etc bullshit that I shake my head at, disapprove of, but move on to more important life or community matters). It's not that I don't care? It's just that stupid jokes don't matter that much to me in the course of everything else dooming our society.

(Funny, call me a hypocrite, because I was pretty uncool with the Japanese character and the song "Everyone's A Little Racist" in Avenue Q. I think the song, in particular, missed the boat on the social commentary it was supposed to be making... or not making. Whatever.)

Too many of us are caught up in this idea that RACISM exists only on an individual plane - meaning that RACIALLY BASED (or anything-based) DISCRIMINATION thrives only in an individual's biased and bigoted thoughts towards another person due to that specific trait receiving PREJUDICE. We live in a nation and world of systematic RACISM - a CASTE SYSTEM based on RACE - where a majority of certain "races" maintain most power and most access to power and where certain other "races" maintain the other, fucked-up end.

And, in the end, that's the RACISM that I'm going to get more riled up about and rally against (or say, rally to change no matter the steepness of the course). So, the next time I see a petition to protect immigrant rights or laborers rights or students' access to either more college prep courses or more career courses, I'll take notice then. Cuz it seems like enough people are going to take care of this Desperate Housewives problem.

Ulam cooked @ 2:43 PM

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Monday, October 01, 2007

A Message from the Mets
This is the official release from the Mets after those damn Amazings completed the worst collapse in MLB history. It's so sad I'm laughing. Condescendingly, of course. Just another notch on my estranged beloved (2nd ranking). Haha

T H E F L U S H I N G F L A S H
----------------------------------------------------------------
THE OFFICIAL ONLINE NEWSLETTER OF THE NEW YORK METS
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Monday, October 1, 2007


Dear Mets Fan:

All of us at the Mets are bitterly disappointed in failing to
achieve our collective goal of building upon last year's success.
We did not meet our organization's expectations -- or yours.
Everyone at Shea feels the same range of emotions as you -- our
loyal fans -- and we know we have let you down. We wanted to
thank you for your record-breaking support of our team this year.

Equally important, Ownership will continue its commitment in
providing the resources necessary to field a championship team.
Omar will be meeting with Ownership shortly to present his plan
on addressing our shortcomings so that we can achieve our goal
of winning championships in 2008 and beyond.

You deserve better results.

Many thanks again for your record-breaking support.

The New York Mets

Ulam cooked @ 2:36 PM

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