his and hers

i was supposed to generate a MomentCam avatar for a male friend and was surprised to see that the hairstyle choices were the usual options i see for a female.  wahaha...  i unintentionally picked female as gender in the previous step!

back to square one.

anyway, i noticed that in the app's new (october 14, 2021) version, the bald 'hairstyle' is already available for female avatars.  i dunno whether it's because of my suggestion.

i sent email last july 23 requesting them to add the bald 'hairstyle' for women.  (there are templates where i don't want hair to show, e.g. templates already with fixed hair or those with certain hats or headpieces, but i have had to make do with some hair because the avatar could not be assigned a bald head.)  i moreover said, "better yet, please make the men's hairstyles available for women, too."

well, the latter does not appear (yet?) but bald is available now.

one gender stereotype down 😊

to each his own

friend sent me a pic of his cat lying on his iPad.

i went, 'aw...  it might get scratched!'

he said the iPad has gorilla glass and the cat's nails are trimmed.

i replied if it were me, i still wouldn't allow it.  "develop good habits."

he said simple joy for his cat so ok with him.

well, as long as it doesn't affect mine, he can pile all his pets on his gadgets all he wants and i won't stop him.

your gadgets, your rules. 😊

regain control of compromised facebook account

how to regain control of your compromised facebook / messenger account:

assumptions:
- you are still logged in
or
- you can still log in
to yout facebook account.

while logged in in facebook:

1.  CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD
1.1.  Menu (hamburger icon / three stacked horizontal lines icon / gear icon)
1.2.  Settings & Privacy
1.3.  Settings
1.4.  Password and Security
1.5.  Change password
1.6.  Current password

1.7.  New password
1.8.  Re-type new password
1.9.  Update password

2.  LOG OUT ALL SESSIONS
2.1.  Menu
2.2.  Settings & Privacy
2.3.  Settings
2.4.  Password and Security
2.5.  Where You're Logged In
2.6.  See All
2.7.  Log Out of All Sessions
2.8.  Log Out

opposite

friend telling me his cat is always gnawing at its tail so he put tabasco sauce on the tail.  well, contrary to his intent, instead of making the cat stop it all the more persisted.  the cat liked the hot sauce!

wahaha...  deterrent turned incentive...  sometimes life throws you a curveball ⚾

prevail

to some people, being kind means tolerating their obnoxious behavior.

to some people, keeping the peace means keeping silent when they do bad.

to some people, moving on means forgetting context and turning a blind eye to their ceaseless wrongdoing.

you don't give wrongdoers a run of the place.
you stand your ground.

you don't give up because the bad are stubborn.
you build resistance.

for evil to triumph all anyone has to do is nothing.

cold comfort

i told someone i fill disks so very easily.  i'm used to "you're running low on disk space" notifications.  even my gmail tells me it's almost full 🤭

he tells me he has four 8TB drives at home and two more still waiting to be deployed.

wahaha...  rub it in!  😭

balance

it was a facebook friends's birthday so i posted a pic with the two of us in it.  the pic was taken 14 years ago 🤭

i received a message telling me it's a "nice rare photo with [me] smiling with teeth showing."

ahahaha...  yeah, i rarely go all out with smiles in my pics now...  i noticed before i had such BIG, toothy smiles in my old pics while my companions had this sort of regal smiles.  you don't notice it in just a few pictures.  but when you go through albums and albums of photos, it becomes noticeable.  i look too happy, hahaha...  i therefore started closing my mouth.

not that being too happy is a bad thing.  i actually have simple joys.  i get happy just choosing what food i'll order for the day...  i get happy with no-rush showers...  i get happy with newly-changed sheets...  i get happy winning 5 centavos in shoppee 🤣

it's perfectly fine to be exuberantly happy in real life...  i just don't like it for myself in pics especially when everyone else looks chill...

not that i'd like to join the bandwagon.
"eagles fly alone; pigeons flock together."
but there should be some sort of harmony in the big picture.

plus i don't wanna look like the jester in a royal group photo 🏰🤴👸🃏🤣

authentication

our renewal credit cards were delivered yesterday.  the principal cardholder is supposed to activate each card through SMS.

my mom told me she has sent SMS to activate hers.  uhm, she's just my supplementary cardholder.

me:  'let's see whether <issuing bank> will activate your card.  it's my number that's registered with them not yours.  i'm the principal.'

mom:  'they've already replied.'

me:  'that's auto-reply.  it's just an acknowledgment of your message not confirmation of activation.'

this afternoon i received a text message from my mom saying her card activation was not successful.

good!
it would have been dangerous if the card company allowed activation from any number.  imagine if a card were intercepted/misdelivered and the recipient was able to activate the card from any phone 😨

step 1

my phone died so i connected it to the charging cable and turned on the AVR.

eh?  phone didn't start charging!

ok.  troubleshooting 101.

check the cables.

ta-daaannn!  the cable was not plugged into the adaptor!

ahahaha...  that was easy!

basic 🤭

no egg

1:12 p.m., i ordered pizza some place 3.2 km away.

2:08 p.m., i ordered chicken someplace 6.1 km away.

same group of restaurants; same food delivery app; same delivery service.

the two orders arrived 10 minutes apart, the chicken being delivered earlier.

the chicken came first 🥚🐔🤣

mental health

october 10 is #WorldMentalHealthDay.

i would like to share a very unpleasant experience i had two months ago.

on august 11, 2021, someone accused me of charging at her.
->  sinugod ko raw siya.
she called the barangay.
she was having a fit on the street.  she was describing how i approached her!
she was pointing to where i went!

i was disputing her statements.  she was insistent.  we spent so much time repeatedly contesting each other's story.

bottom line, footage from the security camera shows i did not go near her at all!

good thing there was a camera.  what if there was none?

her explanation for her behavior that time:
-  wrong timing
-  she was stressed
-  she was thinking about so many things.
 
i told her parents to bring her to a psychiatrist.
they just shrug it off.

there are things you can brush aside.  this is not one of them.  this is grave.

i know we should be understanding of such cases.  but we should look at the big picture and also consider the risk to others.

she is a working adult.  she deals with people not just on a personal but on a business level.

not all places have a camera.

stress, thinking about a lot of things and wrong timing are part of life.
it is not normal to suddenly burst out screaming and conjure up false accusations when stressed, overwhelmed with thoughts or caught at a bad time.

can someone guarantee that that will not happen again?
is it the first time it happened?
or has she done something like that before?

i don't know whether her parents are just in denial or they're already used to it.  either way, they should consult a psychiatrist.  it will be good for everyone.

retrograde

friend telling me a drunk neighbor he had an altercation with later went to his house to apologize.

me:  'that's good...  but me, i don't need apologies...  what i want is for the incident not to be repeated.'

there are those who say sorry but keep on repeating the offense.

there are those who just continue with the offense and do not say sorry at all.

worst are those who keep on repeating the offense and have the gall to get mad and *demand* understanding when you complain about it.

there are levels of good and there are levels of bad.  it's crazy how some people keep on topping their bad behavior.

progress, don't regress.

the giver

friend told me
he wanted to close his business
but did not have the heart to
given that his employees have families to feed.

what he instead did
was go the extra mile,
not just figuratively,
to keep the business afloat.
he did things he normally would not do.  he did things others viewed as beneath his stature to do.

my dad told me before, "the true measure of giving is in the level of sacrifice."

hats off to you, friend.

through the lens of time

i was looking for a pic of my dad's yesterday and came across this 2-second video of him which is what i posted instead.  moving over still.

the video is very short because i was supposed to take a picture of him that time.

i pressed the wrong button eleven years ago and now i am very happy with it.

some mistakes are fine.

appreciation post

i was supposed to share a blog and post birthday greetings in facebook last night.  i couldn't.  i was able to share the blog to twitter just a minute prior!

i checked whether facebook was down.  i saw a basically blank graph that suddenly had a spike.

i went to twitter.  facebook (and instagram and whatsapp) was indeed down!  a rare occurrence.

i read today that it was down for more than six hours.  uuuhhh!!!  that is long.

i know users are not happy.  but i also could just imagine how it was for the technical team.

i feel you, guys.  thank you.

free lunch

i logged in to my shopee account and was surprised to see P100 in my ShopeePay.

i don't leave money in my e-wallets (except for minimal amounts left over from rounded transfers).  i just load them when i'm going to use them.

the money cannot be from a refund because i have no pending order.

i checked.  it was a Bonus credited to ShopeePay, Adjustment Reason:  Free MoneyOct 4 Injection # 9999.

i remember seeing a "Get P100" in shopee a day or more prior.  i clicked.  that was it.  i thought nothing happened.  now i have P100.

easy money.
i wonder what the trade-off is. 🤔

concurrence

i was having second thoughts about opening a box of chocolates because i exceeded my self-imposed limit yesterday.  i'm supposed to have only two per day but yesterday i had five 🤭

finally i decided to go ahead.  just as i had taken my first bite, my phone rang.  it was a courier  ->  delivering chocolate! 🍫

nyahaha...  the universe just gave me a resounding yes!

life is sweet and i am thankful 😊

stars

friend sent me a message...  there was mention of a first name...  i thought it was the movie star...  turns out it's an ordinary person 🤭

it called to mind something very remotely related.

i had this poster in my room when i was much younger:
"shoot for the moon.
even if you fail, you'll still be with the stars."

i loved it and, when i was already much older, got to mention it to my husband.

his reply:
"the stars are higher than the moon!"

wahaha...  what a douse of cold water!  🤣


i wonder what elon musk would have said.  i love his vision of "being out there among the stars"  ->  a "multi-planet species and space-faring civilization."

scientific 🔭...  romantic 🥰...  you can have it all 😊

strike

there are these garlic noodles that i really like.  it's one of only a handful of items that i order repeatedly from foodpanda.  (i try to order different dishes from different restaurants.)

monday, i ordered it and for the first time i did not like it.  the noodles were almost plain.  unlike the previous deliveries which were flavorful and tasty, this one was bland due to lack of sauce.  i think the one who prepared it was not able to properly put sauce on the noodles.

i sent a feedback to both the source and foodpanda.  foodpanda refunded me.

wednesday, i reordered.  the noodles had sauce this time but seemingly not enough for the amount of noodles.  i wondered whether the one who prepared it was scrimping on the sauce.

i wasn't happy with my two orders so today i ordered again (hope springs eternal, haha).  this time, i ordered from the branch where i used to order.  the last two orders i placed were from a new branch and i was thinking maybe the staff have yet to learn the proper preparation.

guess what, when my order arrived, it was not just the sauce that wasn't up to par (too little) but the noodles themselves were not well-cooked!  they were hard!  🤦‍♀️

i dunno whether they changed their recipe, their ingredients, their method, their commissary.  whatever it is, it's been three unsatisfactory orders  ->  in a row.

i love you, goodbye 😢