Since my last blog entry . . . (Part 3: December Snippets)

On the way to a mall weeks ago, we drove past a man in a red shirt who was selling white towelettes on the street. On the front of his shirt were huge capitals, saying: ALAK ANG SAGOT. At the back, in tiny white text: Ano nga ba yung tanong? Haha. I know several people this shirt would be perfect for.

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Michael's question, over beer and burritos the night that Vince performed High and Dry: "What is more important, the truth or the story?" I'll tell you my answer if you'll tell me yours.

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This past month, I have been called both incendiary and ice queen.

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Best non sequitur of the season: during a family dinner, Auntie K was telling us how all her kids took after her acerbic, smart-alecky humor. When my cousin G contested, she said: "You see, bananas do not grow out of mangoes."

G replied, with conviction: "Yes, but monkeys also eat mangoes."

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Papa flipped the TV on to the horseracing channel, saying, "Where's the moon? They were showing shots of the moon kanina."

I said, "Why don't you just go outside and look?!"

He said, "Maganda yung framing ng shots e."

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After walking away (more like running, chicken-like, as if my head had been chopped off---and maybe it had been) from my fashion magazine stint years ago, a few days ago I was interviewed and shot for a teen magazine story featuring 50 young achievers. Haha. And I wore pink. Haha.

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Despite last night's Conan O'Brien episode where a guest made fun of people who enumerate items on their holiday menu, I can't resist making a list:

December 23 dinner with the V's: inihaw na liempo, prawns smothered in butter garlic sauce, dinuguan, pinakbet, gaddo-gaddo salad with peanut sauce, blueberry cheese cake, melting mantecado ice cream.

December 24 dinner with my immediate family: French onion soup, Romaine lettuce salad with ginger mango dressing, smoked porkloin marinated in beer and pineapple syrup, barbecued fish fillet with salsa.

December 25 lunch with the S's: pancit molo, morcon, lumpia ubod, potato salad, fish pastel, chicken enchilada, mango float, gelatin & lychees.

These are the culprits that have been making my tummy more bloated. Next time you see me, blame them.

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Favorite non-book Christmas gifts:
- a white t-shirt with a lovely ironed-on image of Neil Gaiman's Death
- a Putumayo Presents Women of Spirit world music CD
- Marks & Spencer gift certificates
- the first season of The Sopranos
- a hardbound orange journal with smooth, white, unlined pages

But the best Christmas gift I received was verbal, not material. My Uncle I (who is Mama's most jovial brother, the youngest of 7 siblings), the only Uncle who texts me on my birthday and every time he reads a poem of mine published in the papers, reminded me of something.

When he was in drug rehab around 15 years ago (a consequence of wild teenage years), Mama and I visited him somewhere in Cavite. I vaguely remember grassy hills, seeing men in orange pants and being amazed when a strangely bald Uncle I said they had to finish lunch in less than 10 minutes to make room for the next batch of diners. I was 8 or 9 then, and still a slooow eater.

Anyway, apparently, I had given him a handmade card during that visit. I don't even remember making or writing it. But Uncle I said yesterday, "You know, when you're in a place like that, you cherish whatever visits or gifts you get. The card you gave me kept me going for months. I still have it, in fact. I'll show it to you next time we have a family event."

Wow. To discover now that something I had written and forgotten fifteen years ago meant and still means something to somebody---that's precious. Priceless.