Had some trouble thinking about what I wanted to write for this year’s birthday post. And while I was thinking about it I accidentally published an empty draft of this post earlier today. Sounds about right.
I like to consider myself an optimist, but it’s been a challenging 365 days. We are still very much in the throes of a pandemic, threatening to overrun our vaccine defense with mutated variants. The entire twelve months since the last birthday have been spent in quarantine.
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Aug 2021
Aug 2020
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Forty two is of course the “Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.” (if you haven’t yet read the 5-book Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, I suggest you do so, you are in for a treat.) For some reason I imagined I would be able to take at least a couple of days off of everything else I’m doing to chill and actually craft a well-written, deep, introspective post for the occasion, but alas, various things I’m working on and all the usual distractions means I am here in the early morning hours of the day itself typing this out.
Aug 2019
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Such an uninteresting number. And it hasn’t really been an exceptional 365 days around the sun either, but this has become a bit of a yearly tradition now. Things I considered doing today: spend the entire day offline (Hah! As if.) go out for a walk at the old university (unlikely to push through, given the gloomy weather recently) go to the mall and buy a new external hard drive and a new monitor and eat at Yabu (I like Yabu) and maybe watch a movie in the cinema (I don’t really feel like going to the mall on a Friday, and there aren’t any good movies to watch apparently) play through Ducktales Remastered on Steam, which I bought last night because it was about to be removed from the store, and stream it live on Twitch binge one of the shows on my TV backlog read through a book.
Aug 2018
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"Life begins at forty" -- Walter B. Pitkin It’s supposed to be a milestone of some kind, isn’t it? Like any other birthday though, I don’t feel much different. I still feel like a kid (hence the “kid-at-heart” in this blog’s header), no more an adult than I was twenty years ago. More or less still the same person. I still enjoy the same pursuits, prefer the same foods, have the same hobbies, appreciate the same things.
Aug 2017
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I haven’t had much time to write recently. Been busy. (I’ll write about that some other time.) But I’ve kind of been posting regularly on this date for a while, so here we are. Ah, time. And the inexorable passage thereof. There’s some kind of big milestone for me in around three hundred and sixty-five more solar cycles. Well, I don’t personally consider it big, since that’s kind of arbitrary. But as people are wont to say, life begins… maybe I’ll save that for next year.
Aug 2016
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Thirty eight lessons I’ve learned through the years, in no particular order: Do not be beguiled by pretty things; not all that glitters is gold Remain true to yourself in the face of adversity You can’t help people who aren’t willing to change People will believe what they want to believe You don’t have to do what everybody else does Happiness often comes from small things Be thankful for what you have and appreciate the people who are there for you Other people think about you a lot less than you think Time you enjoy wasting isn’t wasted time Spend some time alone with your thoughts regularly; solitude has its benefits In most situations, a balanced approach will serve you well.
Aug 2015
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(Click to view full-size) 9 Aug 2015 6:39amClose I like to be optimistic, or at least to try to. And to believe the best of people, or at least try to. It’s not always easy. Sometimes people disappoint you. Sometimes you feel lost. Or stressed. Or stuck in a rut. And you don’t know what to do. You have to be able to look within yourself to find your own drive, to find the ability to move forward in spite of the tough times.
Aug 2014
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Thirty-six is a semiperfect number, meaning it is the sum of some subsets of its natural divisors. Like thirty-six, life isn’t perfect either. But there’s still much to be thankful for. I am grateful that I have a roof over my head and am able to eat at least three square meals a day (if I so choose). I am grateful that I have wonderful parents and siblings who are always ready to support me no matter what shenanigans I get into.
Aug 2010
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I maybe getting older but as anyone can attest, I’m still a child at heart. As they say: life is a journey, not a destination. I still don’t know what my destination is, but I’ll keep moving forward one step at a time. Looking forward to the next power of two.
Aug 2009
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Days seem to fly by at such an unforgiving pace. Has it really been thirty-one years now? I have a lot to be thankful for the past thirty-one years. Family, friends and other wonderful people that provide love and support; a roof over my head, three square meals a day minimum and a nice, stable and well-paying job. For all of these, I am thankful. One would think that at such a point in my life, I would be very satisfied for having been so blessed.
Aug 2007
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Check. Yeap, I turned 29 a couple of days ago. There’s a typhoon signal no. 8 over HK right now as I type this. For people in the Philippines, that’s hard to imagine since our local indicators only go up to storm signal no. 4. But it’s really a bit calm where I am right now, some wind but not much rain. I’m not inclined to go out though, I’m running out of clothes as it is.
Aug 2005
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Yeah, so there. It was an impromptu hiatus anyway. Unplanned and whatever. Work has been hell lately. Not a tedious kind of hell though. Just the sort that sucks up a lot of time. I spent more than 15 hours in the office on my birthday. Twenty-seven huh? I wish I had more to say, but birthdays seem to matter less and less as I get older. I’m in a good place right now, but I’m still not where I ultimately want to be.
Aug 2003
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Well, not exactly. But I am now 25, in any case. Looking back, there are many things I might have regretted, but my life philosphy tells me that there can be no regrets. The past is past, and the future is yet to come. Somehow, I’m only a few steps closer towards achieving my lifetime goals, but my gut tells me to keep on dreaming. Such is the folly of a dreamer.
Aug 2002
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I turned 24 yesterday. Generally uneventful birthday, as usual. I’m glad I got the whining done in the last post. Spent the night before at David’s (whose birthday is a couple of days before mine). Dave, Mon and I played approximately seven hours of CvS2, watched a Jet Li flick then played around eight hours of Warcraft III. WC3 is the bomb! (And it further highlights my craving for a new computer) Anyway, went home the next morning, got some sleep.