Got my new glasses. Well, guess my vision isn’t all that bad. I couldn’t tell the difference in my right eye except for image displacement, and the left only cleared up a little. And when I sat down in front of the computer, everything was all sorts of blurry.
A quick call to the eye doc and there ya go: for driving and distance only.
Niiiiice.
Who you calling four eyes?
Well, here it is: that time they told us about in high school when algebra would save our lives.
So I went to the eye doctor yesterday for the first time in seven years.
Good news: my vision has not deteriorated.
Bad news: I have a genetic affinity to develop clogged pores in my eyelids. So now I have to spend the rest of my life unclogging them by washing my eyelids in the shower with Johnson’s baby shampoo.
Ah, well.
Oh, and I finally replaced the pair of glasses that were stolen four years ago from my tutoring desk at AAP.
As Han put it, “”What up, four eyes?”"
Why should I agree to swap one tyrant three thousand miles away for three thousand tyrants one mile away?
I won’t bore you with the details. Let’s just say my little two weeks of vacation went quite well.
Manila, city of my youth, how you need to get your act together. Rereading Cryptonomicon only makes it more poignant that the Philippines has entered the 21st century and STILL can’t get itself together enough to revitalize its economy and make serious efforts to pacify and resurrect Mindanao.
Amidst such thoughts came the happy event of my cousin Xandra’s wedding. The Church of San Agustin inside the walls of Intramuros, the old Spanish Manila of long ago, stands as one of the few buildings to survive the destruction of the city in 1945. Here my cousin wed her Ollie, and I got bumped from groomsman to secondary sponsor: veil due to an absentee. As Philippine Catholic weddings go, it was nice and short. Only an hour. The reception in the inner courtyard of the church, though hindered a little by a light drizzle, came off nicely.
During the evening the cousins, at least those of age, were settled at the Manila Hotel lounge along with Xandra’s friends from New York. That evening I won the 10 peso bill challenge. A couple of years ago my cousins Carlo, Sam, and Moe started this little bit of fun. Do a dare, win 10 pesos. It became THE 10 pesos when a bill was formally stuck to a little metal stand to wave about like a flag. Carlo won it for getting out in the middle of traffic (traffic moves at 2mph in Manila) and crying out his frustrations to the world, or at least, the street. Moe got it for walking up to two girls and telling them since they were so pretty he wanted to wish them a Merry Christmas. Sam took it for wishing an entire video store the same greeting. And I won it that evening because Xandra’s NY friend Hamilton decided I should sing “”Like A Virgin”" on stage with the hotel’s cover band with its two cute vocalists. Eh.
And that was seven days in Manila, abridged.
The next five days in Tokyo with Satomi… well, that’s none of your business, is it. =)
