Bo Planet - Great Friends of Bo Sanchez

Advance na lang ni kay I can't wait til midnight. Sooo sleepy na me. (Yeah, right! Eat pa me spaghetti. Mi favorito! hehe.)

I am grateful for 3 major things:

1. The gift of life -- here on earth and the one that awaits us in heaven -- life everlasting. Thank you, Jesus for coming here on earth, becoming one of us, suffering the indescribable agony on your cross, our cross, and saving all of us from the slavery of sin. I praise you Lord Jesus, now and forever. Thank you, Lord. Your love truly is incomparable. I am utterly humbled by your love for all of us, sinners that we are.

2. The gift of love -- from God, from my family and friends. Thank you everyone, for making 2009 memorable for me. May God continue to shower all of us with blessings, good health, good cheer and endless love, peace, joy and happiness all throughout the coming year. Peace be with all of you!

3. The gift of yet another year -- hope I make it til the end of 2010. Hey, only God knows what's in store for me, for all of us so cheers to everyone! Have a blast tonight but please, please be safe. No firecrackers, I hope. Basta, be safe lang jud. Much love to you all! Hugs and kisses! Happy new year! La buona fortuna! (Hope I got that right. In any case, good luck, everybody!) Praise the Lord for another year! I can't wait to unravel what He has in store for me. Yipee! Nyt nyt Peepz! See you next year! And the countdown begins. Mana daw ang new year sa New Zealand, ingon c Marjo. Hahaha. Ka late pud nato oi. :)

The trouble with most of us that, while ambitious to succeed, we do not put ourselves in a condition to win; we do not try to get rid of the entanglements and obstruction that hinders us.  We trust too much to luck.

We are all more or less conscious that we are not living up to our highest mental capacity; in our daily work we are not expressing our very best ability; when we undertake some enterprise we do not see it through with that measure of power of which we believe ourselves truly capable.   How many times we come to the end of the week, or reach the completion of some task with the regretful feeling, that if we could only retrace our steps and try it over again, we should succeed much better. 

Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves.

1 John 4:4 . "You dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world."

We have power within ourselves to succeed in life,  we have our Lord Jesus who takes control of everything.  Why we struggle,  if we can surrender to God all our plans and ambitions in life.

Year 2010 will be our year for you and me and for all of us who has faith in God who is within us. 

GLORY TO GOD.

Year 2010 is coming and every year to come, we always had some new year's resolution or having some plan to fullfill. In the game of life,  success or failure is up to us.

Too many people are like goldfish swimming around and around in a goldfish bowl, never getting anywhere.  Life is not a game of chance.  God did not put us where we would be the sport of circumstances, to be tossed about by a cruel fate, regardless of our own effort. There is something wrong when people are so worried and absorbed in making a living that they cannot make a life.

Nothing within the realm of the possible can withstand the man or woman who in intelligently bent on success.  Every person carries within the key that unlocks either the door of sucess or the door of failure.  Which shall it be?  All desire success; the problem of life is its winning.

There was a balloon salesman and he was very good salesman.  When the ballon business would go down a little bit, he would let one of his red balloons go and this would attract the attention of people in the vicinity.  In a few minutes his business pick up.  Then a little later when it slowed down again, he let a white balloon to go up and the same thing happened again.  In a few minutes he let a yellow balloon go up and the same thing happened again.   Then a little boy who noticed it and walked up to him and the boy said, " mister, if you let one of the black balloons go, would it also go up?". And the man looked down at the boy, and with the wisdom that you normally don't expect , he said to the boy, " Son, it's what's inside these balloons that make them go up."   So it is with us--- it's what's inside us that determines whether we stand still or whether we rise in life.

God has given us the power to get wealth and be successful in life. 

I know. I wasn't able to make my usual list for Christmas day. Sorry, I got too caught up in my blog about Father Bob's sermon that I was too tired to write anymore after that. In short, tingbon lang nako karon. hehe.

I am grateful for:

1. The birth of our Lord and Savior. Thank you, Lord Jesus for saving poor wretched sinners like us (hmmm... too much ra pud ang wretched no?). I am forever grateful for the gift of salvation and life everlasting. Thank you, Lord!

2. The chance to spend quality time with my half-brother and cousin. Thanks, Vin and Don! I had a blast! Even though nag cramps jud ko from all the walking we did... sakit from feet to upper thigh. But what the heck, these muscles need to adjust kay I intend to start walking again, bahala na maabot na pud ko ug airport ani walking. hehehe. I sorely need the exercise so Evz! :P

3. Hanging out at the mall with my best cuz, Donna (and almost running into her old karela. wahahaha. now that would've been one very awkward moment!), and then eating Mais and sharing a 500ml-bottle coke on the way home. Mas lami pa kaysa mga fastfood sa Gai Mac. As in! :)

4. Coming across some of my old write-ups during our local general cleaning. Forward mags, natch! As in napa ako pic didto nga naghiyong ang mata pag first year! Tawn pud oi. hehehe. Nice man diay mi mo write even back then. Char! Self-promotion ayo. I'm thinking of bringing these mags gai to our reunion tomorrow though not sure pa ko if katunga ko kay sunod2x jud ako laag ron ay. Medyo kutas pa... yeah right! Ako? Kutasan laag? Now that will be the day!

5. The prospect of seeing some of my oldest writing pals from college. Forward Fipol reunion tomorrow -- for those who have not received the memo from our ever responsible organizer, Belle. Now this, I have to attend! Wish me luck, peepz! Cuz I need to convince the fam to let me go pa. Kinda feeling Britney, er, "overprotected" here...

6. The promise of yet another warak, este, kodak moments come Tuesday with K2y and the gang. Looking forward to that jud! Bahala d ko sugtan ana, moipsot jud ko. Ing ana ta mo ka love Noemz. (Diay to, ikaw na pud ako alibi Noemz. hala ka! hahaha. peace wui!)

7. Hearing about Marvin's call center antics. I never realized lingaw man diay ang call center jobs, irate callers and all. Thanks for the advice pud, bro! Will chill re the job thingy. I know God has a plan for me so I'll wait for His go-signal. Kay I wanna be in for keeps this time. Lord, your will be done! My calendar is yours, iuli na pud nako Lord, kay You're much better at planning my life than I ever will be. I surrender my occupation na pud this time. Thank you, God!

8. I am grateful for all the laags pud this month, and all the laags that are still coming up. Can't wait, y'all! Looking forward to more chika, sungog and perhaps harassment suits? aw unsa ba? wahahaha.

Seriously though, I have a lot to be grateful for this month alone. I'm sooo psyched I embarked on this journey of documenting my gratitude on a daily basis. Gives me something to look forward to each day and maybe something to look back on in the near future? When I'm old and gray, I hope my blogs will still be around cuz I sure would love to reminisce about the things I have been grateful for. I bet magbalik balik ra jud ni ba. Life, love, good friends and loving family. Ah, God truly is good! Thank you, Lord Jesus! Happy birthday again! :)

This afternoon I'm reminded why I absolutely enjoy listening to one of Father Bob's sermons. His theme for today's mass was, of course, about the birth of our Lord. Never in a million years would I have guessed that he had a list of other "lords" waiting. Seriously!

First, he talked about drug lords. Now who doesn't know one of those. Admit it, even if you don't know one of them in person, surely you've heard who they are and what they are now infamous for -- their business, I mean. For those who are still in the "buffering" stages, drug lords are best known for heading drug "rings". Okay, I have to admit, I kind of inserted the rings part. I was really tempted to shout "lord of the rings" earlier so you're gonna have to forgive me for that pun. It was intended. Sorry.

Anyway, Father Bob talked about the next set of lords, the warlords. You know, like the ones who staged the whole bloody massacre in Maguindanao. For those who are offline, (not even buffering), the Massacre was a whole bloody mess, pardon my British accent (?). Well, these lords are even worse than the druglords. They kill... actual people! And they don't have any qualms about getting their hands (or someone else's for that matter) really dirty!

At this point, I'm gonna have to stop and say a short prayer for those who died in Maguindanao. May they rest in peace. Lord, please forgive them for all their sins and may they see the light of your presence in heaven. Thank you, Lord, Amen.

Next, Father Bob talked about the gambling lords. You know, the ones who made jai-alai infamous in the Philippines. Those who "manage" casinos and other gambling rings, legal and illegal. I won't go on and on about it since I really wanna get to the next bunch.

At this point, I was really fidgeting a lot, dying to shout out my favorite (sugarcoated!) set of lords -- the ones I came to know quite well back in college during my rebellious years -- the landlords. And yes, Father Bob mentioned them. He even said the word "sugar lords". I think he was referring to those who owned haciendas in our provinces and oppressed sugar farmers.

I was really tempted to giggle at this point cuz I was just watching Spidey 3 earlier and I couldn't help but think about Sandman during the time of his transformation from just another fugitive to, well, Sandman. That's how I pictured sugar lords would look like. But that's just me. Yes, I'm that weird. Sorry. I didn't giggle though. I was in church and the topic was serious. Talk about inappropriate. I still have my manners, thank you very much!

Anyway, I'm quite familiar with the brand of "killing" landlords do. I won't bore you to tears with my version of that tale. Needless to say, they "kill" farmers little by little with each passing day simply by withholding Filipino farmers' God-given right to own the land that they till -- the land they work on from daybreak to sundown until they go home bone-weary to their families to eat their meager dinners and get a few hours of sleep before waking up in the wee hours to go back to the same routine. Day in and day out, they till lands they don't own. That's how our farmers "die" a slow death.

Well, some landlords have no problem about killing farmers point blank, no questions asked. I've met quite a few landlords who were not afraid to show off their different guns. Yes, I mean the ones that blow people's brains out! But the rest of them are even more brutal. Forgive me Lord for my harshness but this is such a sore topic, I just had to write this down.

And so, the point of the entire sermon was simple, really. Father Bob stressed that we have only one Lord, the one who became man, suffered and died on the cross to save all of us. He became sin so that our sins would be forgiven. He was God, even before our creation. Yet, when He came here, His people would not accept Him for who He was and still is -- our Savior -- the promise of the Father. And so, all those mini-lords are or should be put to shame! Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior came here to save us. Yet, these mini-lords still have the gall to lord it over others, to put it bluntly.

Now you see why Father Bob made mention of all those lords -- to put into contrast the damage and devastation they have made to the salvation that our true Lord brought us. Yes, the offer still stands, eternal life, the forgiveness of sins and your salvation. Your choice!

As a footnote, I admire the way Father Bob used his own personal loss to highlight a silent killer, an epidemic of sorts -- lung cancer. His exact words were, "to all men out there, if you want to die young, then keep on smoking your sticks of cigarettes!" You see, his younger brother died of lung cancer due to chronic smoking. They buried him yesterday, the day before Christmas. My condolences to you, Father Bob.

And so I will end with a short prayer for Father Bob's brother. May he rest in peace. Lord, please forgive him his sins and may he see the light of your presence in heaven, this I ask in Jesus' name. Amen.

I have so much to be thankful for, not just for this day, but every single day that I've been blessed with in my oh-so-dramatic life. In the spirit of Christmas, I would like to focus on one thing, just one single blessing that I am and always will be grateful for.

Thank you, God, for:

1. The gift of unconditional LOVE.

Thank you Lord, for loving me and the rest of us sinners in the most precious, amazing, unconditional way. And thank you for giving me such a wonderful family and fabulous friends. My cup is overflowing, Lord. Truly, I am blessed. I love you, Lord Jesus! Happy Birthday! Mille Grazie!

Buon Natale peepz! :)

A beautiful video I came across with while trying to explain to my 5-yr old daughter where babies come from.

JM: Mommy, how did Daddy give you a baby?  Did you swallow it?

Me and Hubby:  What????  No!!!  







This next video generated a lot of follow up questions (both serious and silly) from my daughter:


Oh, why did I ever show that video?  LOL

Sorry for the major delay. Would you believe I slept for almost 12 hours last night? Or should I say early this morning? Hehehe. After painting the town bright red with my favorite bunch of friends, I got home at 1am, slept past 2:30am after the inevitable txt barrage, woke up past 2pm, stretched until almost 3pm and woke up just in time for the 3 o'clock prayer. Well, I must admit, it's way different than my normal routine but I simply could not care less. I had a blast! So much fun, in fact, that I can't wait for the next "warak" (I'm beginning to love that word! lol).

So here's my list for today, albeit a bit late.

I am grateful for:

1. The gift of life, love, laughter, great friends, good cheer, and a very understanding and supportive family.

2. My 3 helpings of Gelatissimo last night, c/o our balikbayan bff, k2y. Boy, those calories were worth the intake. I had two chocolate macadamia and one chocolate biscuit. Hey, I still believe in the ice cream diet, can you blame me? Hihihi. All I can say is (other than mille grazie, k2y!) is oh my ice cream, how I love you! :P

3. That chat-filled taxicab ride from SM to Ayala. Who cares about traffic when you've got friends who won't stop gabbing, right?

4. Roaming through all the Ayala terraces restos for the best dinner place (free, thanks again k2y!) and finally settling down at Cafe Laguna. Hey, I forgot La Tegola was in Ayala too so forgive me for not taking everyone directly to my all-time favorite resto!

5. The mouth-watering staples of Cafe Laguna -- Lechon Kawali, Dinuguan, Pancit Canton, Tanguige and their oh-so-yummy shakes and juices. Free plugging na pud! Pastilan!

6. The inevitable banter that led to me being labeled as "Lady-boy" which, according to them, is what they call transsexuals in Thailand. You know, those who have had their breast implants inserted and their adam's apple taken out. You won't believe how many times our waiter left us giggling like a schoolgirl because k2y won't stop telling him I'm a guy? Man, that was sooo embarrassing yet sooo much fun at the same time! Me, a "Lady-boy", who would've thought? Oh well, my attitude was, grin and bear it. I almost went into the men's room even... nah, that's stretching the truth. I could never get away with that, even after a dare. lol.

7. Heading over to Starbucks after meeting Amy and polishing off two different cheesecakes (with their help, of course), my all-time passion, blueberry cheesecake and another one with choco on top. Amy won't tell us what that cake was called, sorry peepz. You have to ask the Starbucks peepz or else take me with you to identify the perp, er, the cake. :P

8. (Over)Staying at Starbucks (we left at 1am), talking, exchanging personal and work-related fiascos, chatting up a storm and laughing the whole time. I'm still reeling from all the sugar, let alone the laughter but I can't help but say this -- kulang pa!!! Rematch! Rather, take two please! Can't wait to meet up with Irene, Noeme, Amy and our resident balikbayan (from oz, natch!) k2y! Sa uulitin peepz ha? Dapat may part 2 jud kay we've got sooo much ground to cover.

9. The feeling of peace and contentment that comes from knowing that no matter where each one of us will end up, even as a "Lady-boy" (hahaha), we would still be the best of friends. Nothing beats grade school friendship, we may still be sip-onon until now but that's not the only thing that remains the same. The bond is still strong, stronger now, even, and for that, I am sooo grateful! Thank you, God for giving me friends like these -- fiercely loyal and protective, kind-hearted, sooo much fun to be with and way libug! As in!

10. Going to bed in the wee hours with a huge smile on my face and Alicia Keys' "The Element of Freedom" in the background. Nothing beats a fabulous night out on the town with good ole friends. I can't believe I'm still on a natural high until now. That's how fantastic these people are. I love you all, you know that right? See you soon, after Christmas, I hope. We've got lots of ground to cover and even more waiters and people to harrass. Hehehe.

And so, this list is obviously centered around my friends. I am forever grateful that God has showered us with so much blessings and yet He still gives us the chance to get together, even though it's not that often, to share these blessings with each other. Peepz, your mere presence is a blessing, so mille grazie, I, Noemz, My, and K2y! I mean it! Praise the Lord for giving me berkz like you. God bless you all and Merry Christmas!