CON AIR: THE AFTERMATH

A 10-headed monster goaded the Firedancers of Gabah to roast a primate for the solidarity dinner but the evil fire burned through fraudulent transactions instead to expose PAL's coded message that for a moment seemed like the triumph of righteousness over darkness.

Still, the acrid aftertaste of being conned lingered until it was finally drowned in a mountain of babi guling samsam, a bowl of delicate gulai kambing, 15 skewers of sate kambing, and a Tim Tam Slam.

Patterns then emerged from chaos to align themes and generate recommendations for multi-source feedbacks with red codified as an approved reallocation for Phnom Penh while olive green is a sanction for the Manila proposal --- the prerequisites for convening the Holy Trinity in Legian Beach for a a unified session on annual employee experiences. 

From the Island of Gods, a pouch of emails caught up at the Kingdom of Pee on a morning too early for the andrologist but just right for a first cut of next year's roadmap and the last remaining tiim na bibe in Bakal 2. 

On her exeligmos minus 33 days, budget constraints aligned with the beneficiaries of two impact stories from Santa Marta that were documented in a dozen Bintang cans and burning meat from an upper middle class warehouse club.   

In Alaminos, the sea breeze smelled of Japanese beer, Argentinian Malbec, and pinispisang kambing, a zephyr that pressed drunk early morning conversations into the crevice of the Old Scout Island's tiny beach where it echoed as a call to lunch for novice snorkelers who, after escaping from the suffocating throng at Pilgrimage Island, jumped from the cliffs off Marcos Island to harvest oysters that were steamed and and sold to the taklobo watchers at Governor's Island before the hurricane was unleashed from the walkway of Quezon Island. 

Then dinner in Binmaley after surviving a traffic jam at Sual, the incident aboard PR 538 obscured for the moment...

SLEEPLESS (almost) AT 56

56 is a plea heard and a covenant with the Great Architect of the Universe.

56 is the angel who encouraged adaption to changes, staying positive, and heeding spiritual signs and guidance.

56 is a Korean-inspired sinadag in Angeles City, a breakfast of kiniing done 2-ways (dinakdakan and pinikpikan) along the dacquel nga carayan in Almaguer, and a watwat lunch of boiled and grilled pork in the mountains of Itogon.

56 is the number of pinuneg slices served with both birthday meals.  

56 is when sleep descends before 9 PM in Bakal 2 and leaves between 1-2 AM long after the din of a garage modification has faded, and escapes early still despite trapping it with beer-infused litson manok and fried luncheon meat.  

56 is when the Phantom Biker rode his bike in gratitude and supplication to the saints, wide awake and loaded with trimmings for the Manila Meeting and Convening, notes from the usual weekly meetings, and a requested ASEAN briefing; haunted by a partners' platform glitch, and chased by a branding requisition, the Global Programs Hub, and a system approval from another project.

56 is a chimaek combo for starters, a full gogigui for the entree, and a dessert of Aling Lucing's sisig and buro just after the gateposts of Fort Stotsenburg.

56 is passing through Balete Pass to pay homage to Almaguer where it all began, to curtsy at the church in Bambang where maidens danced with the Sto. Nino to summon the memories of old Hogwarts --- the gateway to Barat and Salinas that was breached for the first time.  

56 is an abrupt trip to Kayapa to partially scratch an itch, a pit stop in Ambuklao Dam in remembrance of a social studies teacher who a long time ago spoke about a traditional watwat in Itogon, and passing through Baguio where the Phantom Biker, still sleepless in Bakal 2, was conceived in 1969.

SUBDIVIDED AND RELOCATED

13 pages were culled out of a 109-page report on sustainable finance  --- parsed, condensed, and subdivided into 3 lot parcels in Almaguer through a GPS survey instrument. 

It took 3 days but it was done despite an afternoon downpour and the army of red ants who revealed the encroachment that will require a relocation of 30-years old walls and embankments. 

Duplicates of the communique were slipped to Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta before it was dissipated by sign-offs. 

An annual development plan was edited for the last tme to initiate a year-end reporting process.

Emails were read and countered, Adobe repaired and Option 2 agreed through them, a mid-term review and docusigned too.

Somewhere between sentences, a vicenerian dropped 27 moons from Uranus on Ateneo de Manila University that got his van scratched, a gash so ugly not even the warmth of reheated pizza and the assurance of two dollar account deposits can mitigate so reinforcements of ginisang carne norte, dinner sisig, and carinderia tokwa't baboy were sought.

  

But the disappointment was intense, the frustration deep, and anger indignant they need to be exorcised in the trails leading to Labney, beyond Labney, to CLSU, beyond CLSU, to a birthday lunch of provocative pinakbet, inihaw na bangus, and an unexpected tapang usa...

THE CONVENINGS (From Kuala Lumpur to Bakal 2 to Rizal)

There was a 2-hour sleep on PR 530 and another 2 hours on the bus to Cabanatuan.

Several drams of blended whiskey from the Lodge in Baloc induced another 2-3 hours of slumber before the blood of Christ was poured from bottled malbec into canned brytos to celebrate the convening of Almaguer in Bakal 2.  

Five days earlier, the first convening finally arrived in Kuala Lumpur to chase emails at the lobby of the Berjaya Times Square where Ah Hei concocted its Michellin Bib Gourmand-listed meat bone tea (bak kut teh) from 16 Chinese herbs to lead an ingress to an egress.

That was enough to salvage Session 1 and fuel the briefings of Session 2 despite the distracting perfume of what is said to be the best grilled chicken wings in all of Kuala Lumpur but definitely not the case for a spur-of-the-moment nasi lemak at Jalan Alor.

Indeed, the sight, sound, and smell of Jalan Alor is a proper sequel for The Clash of the Titans who hijacked the wifi signal of Manhattan V to enable the notetakers until they were smitten by a podcast and have to be revived with grilled lamb chops and the Malaysian version of Oysters Rockefeller.

That is probably why The Facilitator took control of D-Day to ensure that the ensuing work plan will publish a communique that will nudge the Lao Initiative into concluding the first convening as listed in the agenda of a PMU meeting on [1] how to properly queue for a crispy beef roti, [2] explain the dried prawns in a sauteed pork intestines, and [3] understand why Chinese fried pork ribs have a pink hue.

There were tall beeers too --- Danish Carlsberg, Singaporean Tiger, Dutch Heineken, Irish Guinness --- and high buildings --- the Petronas Twin Towers and Merdeka 118 --- to celebrate Sek Yuen's Bib Gourmand-listed roasted pipa duck and coming to terms with a golden pulp of Musang King Durian as a result of exceeding expectations and confirming three goals for FY 2025-26.

And so it was that grilled SNR steak was offered at the second convening in Bakal 2 and left-over Bicol Express for the third convening in Rizal where two $50 bills were lost, found, and married...

THE CLEANING OF HOUSE #02 (Part 1)

"every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end" (Seneca)

The evaluator evaluated that the mother title and a technical description are needed, that the tax paid should be updated, facts concurred with by the assessor's assessment that Lot 03 is yet to be subdivided into the 5 parcels as it should be, that amilyar is not the imperative at this point but the fixer who said she will call but did not yet again.

Reset for Oplan Land Titling.

"motivation is what gets you started. habit is what keeps you going" (Jim Rohn)

Rote determination conveyed the 7th AWG to Phnom Penh along with the resolution of delayed safeguarding matters, punctuations to a 4th cut of an updated proposal that almost triumphed over the 45th year of vanquishing genocide before succumbing to a rescheduling of the Lao Big Event to February as proposed during three virtual meetings about mid-year report requirements.

New role, clean slate.

"start wherever you are and start small" (Rita Bailey)

Dusty stuffed toys crawl out of empty bottles like abandoned hangers for broken toys and the faded medals and a trophy displayed in the brittleness of ancient plastic furniture like sacks of used clothes and a dilapidated wood cabinet for the garbage truck that smelled like the ashes of burnt grass covering a heavy marble table that will demarcate boundaries of the Almaguer Settlement. 

Fix the roof leak or build a new house?

"the best way to create your future is to create it, one day at a time" (Peter Drucker)

Novelty rides launched between Monday's Golden Bee and Friday's Solid North --- reheated ham that tasted like pinangat sa gata and morsels of grilled chicken and sinigang na lechon for the dog --- an arrest-less warrant notarized for a flight booking to Phnom Penh --- Balong unleashed as the first invoice to RAN during a hospital visit for a moment of cheap light brandy through Pura. 

Lost land recovered in Almaguer.

SANTA'S REINDEER FOR NOCHE BUENA

But it was not venison and there 's not one single red nose. 

In fact, the burnt flesh have the markings of a farmed salmon and wild catch tuna, the sizzling beef and lamb smelled of grass, and it was the stewed lima beans not the salad greens and buttered veggies that triggered hyperuricemia in the  Rastafari's rendition of a Biblical Psalm to serenade a holiday in Bakal 2 with a videoke night of Christmas carols.

With the patronage of St. Rose of Lima, pinot noir was poured from the shelves of Sol & Robert Price into 6-pack Indian pale ales, lagers, and wheat beers that stunned the Thursday Group who were enchanted enough to chill leftover tiim na pata, treat the dogs with a Christmas Eve dinner of tubbed kalderetang baka in a pot of sinampalukang manok and a platter of tokwa't baboy, and threw flakes of inihaw na bangus into a pinakbet casserole.

The offer was accepted, not from NGO Recruitment though, with the caveat that the Lao Big Event should have a chapeau in the joint statement of the 5th AMMW meeting in Nay Pyi Taw despite D's felicitations for missing Monday's Christmas party in Bantug but not Thursday's funeral and a request from Jakarta for additional data.

Thus was how the Phantom Biker rode for P6,000 worth of pork ribs disguised as Christmas trash with trimmings of cat and dog poop, and a fervent wish to win any of the lotto jackpot prizes so evenings of menudo, lechong paksiw, tinapang bangus, patatim, and cold Red Horse beer will last forever and ever. 

 The wine and the cake is Puregold Price Club.

The 12 pieces of round fruit is Supermall.

But the ginataang karpa is for an 84th birthday in Dizol to honor the children with small heads, a twitching chako master from Pantabangan, and the ageing saxophonist of Barrio Militar...