Counting My Blessings

Today was a perfect summer's day. I woke up at 7am, popped in a DVD (The Village), read, started on a new TV series (Finally started watching the Avatar: The Last Airbender Season 1 box set I'd bought 6 months ago), fell asleep again, had a late lunch, then went to Greenhills and made some new friends.

The first friend I ran into was this adorable little cutie--I named her Tanya the Tarsier.

My brother's batchmate and my schoolmate from high school, Marnique, has a family-owned jewelry store, and they sell the coolest little trinkets. I absolutely love animal jewelry, so Tanya makes a perfect addition to my family of owls, peacocks, a snake, a starfish, and an octopus.

Then I dropped by Fully Booked, not really expecting to find anything, when the first thing I spotted was Nameless. My Achilles' heel books are: books with gowns on the cover (Anna Godbersen books are probably gown-cover book royalty), and fairytale retellings. I, for one have never heard of Nameless, but hey, it's got a gown on the cover, and it's a retelling of Snow White.

Then I went to the YA section. I was totally prepared to just give it a cursory glance, when I literally did a double take. There, sitting on the shelf in all its glory, was Jen Calonita's third Belles book: The Grass Is Always Greener.

Jen Calonita is my favorite chicklit writer. And that's saying something, seeing how I don't read a lot of chicklit. Any book she writes, I don't care what it's about, I pick it up, no questions asked. My love affair with her books started in 2006, when she started her Secrets of My Hollywood Life series. What was so great about it was that she actually worked in show business, so her writing was spot-on. Anyway, back then I thought it was a stand-alone book. But 6 Secrets of My Hollywood Life books, 1 book about summer camp (Sleepaway Girls), another about reality TV (Reality Check), and 2 Belles books later, she's still going strong.

The Belles series is set in the South, and it shows the world of Southern belles: cotillions, prep schools, politiicans. Each book is a light, fun read.


So today was an unexpectedly good day. I'm happy, no OCD symptoms for awhile, so that's good.

49-Day Book Challenge: Day 13, Favorite Place to Read?

My Gryffindor-inspired room in our house in Tagaytay is possibly one of my favorite places on Earth. I purposely did not place any electronics there (no TV, computer or iPod dock), so I would get the true Hogwarts feel. A side-effect of that was that it turned into a nice reading room.

The wingback chair above is where I love reading the most. It also has a nice piece of family history attached to it. It used to be found in the den of our house, many years ago. Back then it was this dusty rose, flower-patterned chair. I remember my grandfather sitting on that chair when he used to visit. Then it got too torn and tatty to be seen in public, so we put it in storage. Fast foward maybe 7 years, when we were decorating the Tagaytay house. I remembered the old chair and asked my mom if we could reupholster it and place it in my room. And voila, it turned into Sam's Favorite Place to Read.

49-Day Book Challenge: Day 12, No, I Do Not Massacre My Books.

The next 3 questions on the Challenge list had to do with: dog-earing, writing in the margins, yes/no on writing on textbooks.

I consider those as vandalism.

Hotel Alone

At the Marco Polo Hotel. Just ordered what Taylor Swift calls "breakfast at midnight 8:40 pm", finally allowed to watch Criminal Minds after my self-imposed Lenten Reid-fast, free Wi-fi, new book to read.

Life is good.

Step Aside, All Other Literature, Clockwork Princess is HERE!

Alright. Here is the tale of my search for this book.

First, a little background. Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunter Chronicles have been one of my favorite series since I first picked it up about two years ago. I've hated it, loved it, swooned, shipped, bonded with my best friend Samii over it, shouted for joy when news of a film floated around, gasped when I found out the cast, waited for the next book, and the next book, and the next book.

So when a couple of weeks ago Fully Booked put up posters that declared: Clockwork Princess-March 19, I jumped for joy. I didn't bother to reserve, because I thought, let's face it. They're not going to actually run out of copies, eh? So I just reserved on the 18th. Then the morning of the 19th, I stopped by the Fort branch before work to pick it up. I was literally there counting down the minutes till opening time. When I dashed in, they gave me the news: they only received 5 copies, so they would give it to the first 5 reserved. I went to Rockwell, checked National AND Fully Booked, and they gave me similar answers.

I even sent an ask to Cassie's Tumblr, and tweeted her.

Then today, when my dad got home, my mom tossed me a Giordano shopping bag.

And the Clockwork Princess novel was there!!!!!!!!!!!

Like my mom and my bestie Nicole said, "Dude. It's just like that scene from Devil Wears Prada."

Back To Reedley

Yesterday, I attended the high school graduation and awarding ceremony of my alma mater, Reedley International School. I ran into the best high school teachers you could ever ask for, and some of the undergrads. I tell you, it made me quite nostalgic for high school.

With one of the coolest, nicest Kuyas around, Kuya Ramil!

I was there to accept an award for attending the Obama Inauguration, along with 3 other Reesians. Just being with them brought back memories from the DC trip.

                                                

I was kind of going for a Duchess Kate engagement outfit thing, if you can't already tell by my blatant ripoff. 

:) 

Dress from Celine, shoes from Evernew, ring another ripoff of Her Highness herself. :)

                                                                 All I need is the prince.

I was also very happy that I finally received a statue-award, not a medal, not a piece of paper. I felt like I had just nabbed an Oscar

51-Day Book Challenge: Day 11, What Is Your Policy On Book Lending?

I actually love lending books; I want my friends to enjoy the books I've read as much as I do.

Right now, I've got one permanent lender from the Library of Salve, and she's one of my best friends: Samii Sarda. I got her into reading sometime in our junior year, and ever since, she's been borrowing my books. I completely trust her not to mess up the books; she takes really good care of it. And every now and then we do a Book Purge and Binge: She'll return all the books she's borrowed in the past 6 months (which usually literally arrives by the sackful), and load up again from my bookshelf. Together, we've joined new book fandoms like Divergent, Delirium, and The Mortal Instruments, and we're crazy excited for the film adaptations (on a side note, we were 100% disappointed with the I Am Number Four film. Alex Pettyfer, dear, you are a gorgeous example of male specimen, but you can't act for peanuts).

One person who I dearly love but will never trust with one of my books again (I'm...only half-joking) is Tippy dos Santos. She's got about 2 Book Body Counts on her, i.e, she's lost two of my books. I...kind of understand, because she's usually out taping, and stuff can get misplaced in the hustle and bustle of the show business world. But I've told her, and she totally knows too, that I will never lend her a book again. Of course, I still love her dearly.

So that's my policy, I guess. Lend to everyone except celebrities. :)