How to Maintain a Healthy Level of Insanity

1. At lunch time, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on and point a hair dryer at passing cars. See if they will slow down.

2. Page yourself over the intercom. Don't disguise your voice.

3. Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.

4. Put your garbage can on your desk and label it "in".

5. Put decaf in the coffee maker for 3 weeks. Once everyone has gotten over their caffeine addiction, switch to espresso.

6. Finish all your sentences with "in accordance with the prophecy".

7. Don't use any punctuation.

8. As often as possible, skip rather than walk.

9. Order a diet water whenever you go out to eat, with a serious face.

10. Specify that your drive-through order is "to go".

11. Sing along at the opera.

12. Go to a poetry recital and ask why the poems don't rhyme.

13. Put mosquito netting around your work area and play tropical sounds all day.

14. Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because you're not in the mood.

15. Have your co-workers address you by your wrestling name, rock bottom.

16. When the money comes out the ATM, scream "I won! I won!"

17. When leaving the zoo, start running towards the parking lot, yelling "Run for your lives, they're loose!!"

18. And the final way to keep a healthy level of insanity... Send me ways you maintain your own.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

Hope you maintain your insanity this season so that happiness shall be untarnished with the worries of the world!

Happiness is your choice... Hope you choose the right thing!

See you next year... Gotta sign off for the Holidays.

GOD BLESS YOU ALL!!!

How to do what I want (Daily Message from Paulo Coelho)

When he died, Juan found himself in an exquisite place surrounded by all the comfort and beauty he had always dreamed of. A amn dressed in white spoke to him:

“You can have anything you want, any food, any pleasure, any diversion,” he said.

Delighted, Juan did everything he had dreamed of doing while alive. Then after many years of pleasure, he again searched out the man in white.

“I have done everything I wanted to do. Now I need a job, so that I can feel useful,” he said.

“I’m sorry,” replied the man in white. “But that is the one thing I can’t give you. There is no work here.”

“How awful!” said Juan angrily, “That means I’ll spend eternity bored to death! I wish I was in Hell!”

The man in white came over to him and said softly: “And where exactly do you think you are, Sir?”

“Laughing out loud!”

Sometimes, that is exactly what we humans do. We search for the most comfortable place to stay where grandeur and extravagance is the name of the game. Freedom ain’t in question because we can do whatever we wish to do in any way, whatever time of the day or wherever and whenever we please. But at the end of the road, we feel that what we have done is worthless and we would die just to change the life that we have tried to live. Yet, life is done and over with us. Chances are... there are no longer chances left for us.

"This is life!" so we claim. But is it?

Biggest mistake! For the beauty of life and the happiness we get out of it is our choice and sometimes our option, well, I mean, more often than not, our alternatives are guised in the meanest and ugliest features that our immediate tendency is to strike the goal with equal meanness and ugliness we shun away from it without knowing that such is our ultimate source of well-being. Success is but just temporary. For a minute of euphoria is an indication that we have to move yet another step -- to another height of our human existence. And life is never all triumph, unless we earn the stripes to have it.

I’m not an expert on this, but I have tried it many times in my life.

Oh, whining!

I’ve been doing that… but little by little I am learning to appreciate the wonder of numbers. Really beautiful!!!

A Woman's Light

The Woman more often fights with those she loves than with those she does not care about.

The Woman who shields her love ones is never overthrown by the turmoil of living. Her light is strong enough to shine through thick clouds of struggles and shares that light to others.

She, however, is often confronted with inevitable circumstances humans call trials but for her is just a variety of blessings. She tries to transfer these thoughts to her kin, that when her soul may part from her body, somebody else’s light will continue to scintillate. In so doing, she inflames her family and friends into discussion. Mind versus mind. View versus view. Until her mind is no longer hers but her family’s. Until her view is no longer just her own, but her friends’, too.

The Woman establishes her stand and proves her worth through her words, every inch manifested in the life that she lives. And everything follows. Every piece fall into their right destined places.

“Why do you take the trouble in doing that?” asks a bystander, “When the world is a many-faceted evil. What you do is just a grain in a vast ground.”

“Indeed I am just a grain but I belong to a greater ground. If I would just expose myself into the heat without using this heat to transform me into something of greater value, then you shall not be wearing that diamond necklace.”, replies the Woman.

Silence…

Then she added, “And Sir, hope you do know that minerals form in mass that starts in a single grain sharing to its neighboring grain the power of the heat.”

A Woman's Status

There was once a visitor who had been to the same barrio five years back. He wanted to see for himself the progress and processes of rural development. For many years, he had donated money to his favorite village projects. It was natural he would spend a full day visiting the farmers and hearing accounts of their achievements.

At the end of the day, the visitor left even more convinced and thoroughly impressed. He especially liked the self-help dimension and the evident pride exuded by the farmers. Income had doubled over the years. The people’s economic organization enabled them to manage their own credit, consumers and marketing needs.

There is only one thing the visitor found unacceptable during that visit. The status of women was below his expected standards. The women took second-class position yet they were as able and as hardworking. There was not a single woman among the leadership structures of the barangay council and the cooperatives. The visitor was particularly turned-off when he observed women walking a few feet behind their husband on the way to the farm.

It was natural that on the second visit, he looked for any change in the role of women. True, the economic and health aspects continued to advance. But it was the improvement in the position of women he keenly observed.

As the visitor strolled the familiar main road, he noted a farmer and his wife walking towards the wide path leading to the rice fields. He could not believe what he saw. The woman was actually walking in front of her husband. She was at least ten feet ahead. A sight unseen in the past and not heard of in all the years.

The visitor approached the farmer who trailed behind. “Hey, women have come a long way in their status. Why, your wife actually walks ahead of you now where before she had to walk behind as a sign of submission and difference to macho man.”

“Well, yes, my wife now has to walk ahead of me,” responded the farmer almost meekly.

“That is great!” said the visibly pleased visitor.

The farmer thought for a while and added, “Yes, she now walks ahead because recently, rebel bandits left behind a number of land mines and other booby traps.”



Now how about you, have you treated women you meet the same way as the farmer treats his wife? Hope not.

Frantic Mom!

I brought Gabrielle Yumi, my one year old daughter to her pedia today. She had flu since Wednesday so I gave her Dimetapp. I thought it will work like it always did. But last Saturday, she woke me up with a cough. I gave her Loviscol. Again, I hoped it would perform the same magic as it did the previous times she had cough and flu. Last Sunday, she had fever. On and off. We gave her Tempra. It worked a little because yesterday the whole day and last night, she had no fever. She was able to eat. Played a little, too. But this morning, my husband texted me while I was on field for the school’s promotion dissemination. Gaby had fever. Doesn’t like to eat and drink her milk. She seemed so tired. She cried a lot. So we decided to bring her to Dr. Gwendolyn Ang.

Her temperature reached 38.6. She listened to her breathing. Her facial expression changed. She made a good full view of her throat. Then sighed. Gaby has an infection in her throat and her lungs seemed to be covered by phlegm. “Dangerous sign,” she said. She wrote some antibiotics on a sheet of paper and recommended Advil. Then she added, “If her fever will continue until Saturday, including her constricted breathing, call me and confine her directly to the hospital. This may result to pneumonia.”

I was frantic. Pneumonia. One of the causes of death among children. The more I worried when I browsed the internet and visited some sites discussing pneumonia. And here is what I have read in http://www.medicinenet.com/g6pd_deficiency/article.htm :

Infections, such as pneumonia, can also precipitate the hemolytic anemia in persons who are G6PD deficient.

Yes, Gaby was diagnosed to be G6PD deficient. Just an information taken from the same site:

What is G6PD deficiency?

Glucose 6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency is an enzyme deficiency of the red blood cells. G6PD deficiency leads to an abnormal rupture (breakage) of the red blood cells called hemolytic anemia (abnormally low red blood cell count). G6PD deficiency is the most common known human enzyme disease, affecting 10% of the world's population.

What is the cause of G6PD deficiency?

The abnormal gene responsible for this inherited enzyme deficiency is located on the X-chromosome. Therefore, the illnesses associated with G6PD deficiency occur more frequently in males than females, since males only have one X-chromosome. There are different degrees of G6PD deficiency, which vary according to the magnitude of the missing enzyme.

G6PD deficiency occurs more frequently in African Americans, Italians, Greeks, Asians, and other Mediterranean peoples.

The degree of red blood cell rupture (hemolysis) varies according to the degree of enzyme deficiency and the drug exposure. Usually, the hemolytic anemia occurs after exposure to certain compounds with oxidant properties, including drugs such as malaria medications (such as primaquine and hydroxychloroquine), sulfonamides, antiitching drugs, dapsone, and others. Compounds with the property of inducing hemolysis in G6PD deficient persons are also found in the fava bean. This condition, known as favism, occurs within a day of ingestion of the fava bean. Favism can cause fever, back pain, headache, nause, and chills.

How is G6PD deficiency diagnosed?

Patients with G6PD deficiency and hemolytic anemia can develop jaundice (yellowing of the eyes). Sometimes jaundice can occur in newborn babies who are G6PD deficient.

The diagnosis is made by blood testing which can demonstrate the inadequate levels of the G6PD enzyme activity by blood testing.

What is the treatment for G6PD deficiency?

Treatment of G6PD deficiency involves discontinuing the offending drug or compound and treating any accompanying infection. Recovery is the rule. Sometimes blood transfusions are needed when the anemia is severe.

Reference: Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine, McGraw-Hill, edited by Eugene Braunwald, et. al., 2001.

Frantic? I am. Now I am hoping the medication will work this time. Please help me pray for the health of my little angel.

Thank you so much and I shall keep you all posted.

CABAnata 13: Geometric Postulates... Life in a Mirror of Figures

Last week, I was whining about being an alien in my Graph Theory class. Last Saturday, I felt not much alienated in my Geometry class even though they were talking about coplanar and collinear stuff. Maybe because I got interested in the postulates our professor was discussing. I found them a good topic for my blog.

Ain’t that nice?

Oh well, it was almost a month since I posted my blessings. Not because I can’t recognize the grace of the Lord pouring down on me but because I was busy whining. That’s too bad of me!

Now I realized my disgrace. I am turning my challenge into a blessing.

Like what I have said, I found Geometry a little like my Graph Theory class. The postulates were stated so inspiringly that I nearly clasp my hands and sigh, “Can’t wait to blog!!!”

But what are Geometric Postulates?

Well, postulates are statements accepted as true. There is no need for us to prove. It’s like a law in Science compared to that of a theory or a concept.

We have learned five postulates and here are they with my every realization attached herewith:

Postulate 1: Space contains at least four non-coplanar, non-collinear points. A plane contains at least three non-collinear points. A line contains at least two non-collinear points.

Realization: Each of us, human and animals and all of God’s creation belong to a space in this universe. God has set forth a plan, a scale unique for each one of us. We may not be alike, moreso, we have great variations, but four of us gathered all together can form a space worth a majestic view of kaleidoscope. Three of us can make a plane with equal beauty. Two of us may create a point we can call friendship; which of course may be our source of happiness and contentment and peace and love and everything nice.

Postulate 2: Two points are contained in one and only one line.

Realization: You and I, as we connect belong to one and the same wavelength. This is the energy that binds our hopes and dreams. Whatever that is, I believe in the magic of the cosmos.

Postulate 3: Three non-collinear points are contained in one and only one plane.

Realization: God has a plan. It is not true that it takes two to Tango. In life, I believe that there should be the mythical three so that every dream would come true. Who are these three? It should be You, I and God. Always making the Creator the center of our lives.

Postulate 4: If two points are contained in a plane, then the lines joining these points is contained in a plane.

Realization: This is a confirmation of the previous postulates. When you and I connect and God is with us, everything shall fall into place. It cannot be that when our intentions are good, our dreams will collapse alongside a simple snap of a finger, because we are inside God’s ordained plane.

Postulate 5: If two planes intersect, then their intersection is a line.

Realization: People are for people. People are for animals. People are for all of God’s creation. We don’t stand alone. We interact. We connect. We intersect. Thus, we all belong in one and only one line – God’s line, the Cosmos.

These are the wonders I have realized in my Math class.

Now, I need not whine but thank God for the new horizon He has opened up for me.

The challenge?

To write a blog after every Saturday class.

Geeeezzzz!!! I’m just kidding.

My challenge is to accept the challenge and make every shadowy figure come in colorful hues of graphical representations for life is a compilation of mysterious but beautiful (and worth thanking) figures – literally and figuratively speaking.

Have a blessed week everyone!!!

CABAnata 12: Whining!!!

Geeeez… I still have the jitters of workload all piled up on our counseling cubicles. For one, accreditation is nigh. Then we have the annual Teachers’ Evaluation. December, we have Enrolment Promotions. All these at the side dish for our main menu – 100% counseling of students with follow-up and thorough completion of their Guidance Record Forms. Oh well, let me add a written report for every counseling session aside from the anecdotal documentation of some cases.

Then of course, I have this MA in SpEd to attend to, minor in Math which I claim to be my waterloo, but unfortunately, I have to live by and with it for the rest of I don’t know until when so that I am able to increase my marketability for my great American dream. Not that I am anti-Filipino, but because I love the Philippines I want to have my homecoming soon after I have earned enough fortune for me to build a school for kids with special needs – for my Filipino family. You know… great dreams!!!

But I must admit, last Saturday, I was in total mess. I wanted to run to the Graduate College Dean and hand her my class card and shout directly at her face, “Hey, I’m quitting!!!” or maybe, “Girl, I’m dropping-out!!!” or simply put it, “I think I’m dead meat!!!”

You know the feeling of being in a room where everybody knows everybody and everyone knows what they are talking about while you look so terribly dumb in a corner by yourself where all the jargons you are hearing for the first time are simply put on your face yelling at you, “Get the hell out of here, you alien!!!”

Hey, that is what I felt in that little room in my Math class. Graph Theory. Hell! This was my first time ever to know there is some theory about graphs. I encountered a number of graphs in my Statistics class, but never discussed Eulerian G and D or Hamiltonian G and D (whatever these mean?).

And for a little application on our first meeting, we had a seatwork which ended up to be our assignment and ended to be my burden that ended up as my topic in this blog. To share my little problem (that is!!!), here’s a sample of the Problem Set I brought home to answer:

1. Floramel has invited Noemi, Lucila, Jodi and Patricia to her apartment for lunch. She has prepared four sandwiches for them in advance, namely ham, bacon, tuna and chicken salad. Noemi likes tuna and chicken salad, and Lucila prefers ham and chicken salad. Furthermore, Jodi likes bacon and tuna salad, while Patricia enjoys ham and bacon. Can all four have a sandwich they like?

2. Draw the graph G with vertex set {u, v, w, x, y, z} and edge set {uw, wz, vw, wx, wy, wz, xz, yz}. What are the order and size of G?

3. A Chemist wishes to ship the chemicals A, B, C, D, E, F and X using as few containers as possible. Certain chemicals cannot be shipped in the same container since they will react with each other. In particular, any two of the chemicals A, B, C and X react with each other. Furthermore, A and B both react with F and D. Describe a graph that models these relation between the chemicals. Use this graph to find the minimum number of containers needed to ship the chemicals.

4. Janet plans to invite her friends Alex, Bert, Cindy and Dave to dinner. Alex, Bert and Dave all know Cindy. Construct the acquaintance graph of this group of people (which includes Janet) and use it to determine whether the people can be seated around a table so that every two neighbors are acquainted. What is the order and size of this acquaintance graph?

5. Construct a graph of order 5 whose vertices have degrees 1, 2, 2, 3, 4. What is the size of this graph?

6. a. Construct a n r-regular graph of order 8 for each, 0 is less than or equal r less than 8.

b. Determine the complement of each graph constructed in (a.)