espresso dating

dating seems more complicated these days - what with the rules, precautions, and unconscious judging of the person in front of you. i stumbled on this and thought - heck, if you need a book to guide you thru a date... whatever happened to old-fashioned serendipity and having fun without the fuss of thinking of the next hundred steps?

hmm it's a good thing the dating part is over for us... i'm not too good with following rules or going by the book - i would have failed at dating miserably!

it's a cool site though... i love The Drink Says It All - know someone's personality by their favorite drink hehehe.

i personally wouldn't go for the Starbucks pastries here though... i prefer manila's corned beef pandesal and cakes over the uber healthy choices like low-fat berry muffins sold here (which, other than cardboard, include berries that are rather on the sour side). the only thing i like so far is their chocolate chip cookie which is on the chewy side. =) for muffins, Tim Hortons is better - especially their Strawberry Surprise Muffin which is cakey-soft and has a strawberry-filled center.

preferably dark with orange chips please

You Are Chocolate Ice Cream

Dramatic. Powerful. Flirty.

What Flavor Ice Cream Are You?

an ice cream fetish

so i've been asked endlessly about food cravings... to which i reply - no i don't have weird mangga-bagoong-with-salt cravings or whatnots. nowadays, i just want to eat anything. mention any restaurant you've tried the past weekend and i'll want whatever you had that's good. yep, that crazy kind of eating. and much as aldo would want to go out in the middle of the night for some crazy craving, i have never had it. except, he says, for my constant need to have ice cream in the middle of winter and early spring.

come to think of it, everytime i see a tub of ben & jerry's in the grocery or the nearby 7-eleven, i feel the need to have it. LOL.

hmm... it IS odd that i don't get attracted to any other brand. so the ice cream fetish must count as a pregnancy craving then.

and this week's flavor...
Turtle Soup - vanilla ice cream with fudge & caramel cashews & a caramel swirl



but my top 2 would be





... and i wonder why i'm expanding like crazy!

from this




to this... in just 6 months (hmm that sounds a lot like an old whitening soap ad LOL).





*thank God for wedding pictures... at least we have proof that we were once a few pounds lighter!

waddle, waddle, waddle

with only 3 months left, we decided to take the maternity tour of st. paul's hospital last thursday. (a maternity tour is a walk-through of the maternity wing and rooms.) apparently, there were 15 couples who also needed to take the tour that day - so imagine 15 pregnant women in all shapes, colors, and sizes, all waddling along the corridors to get to the maternity wing. talk about seeing penguins. LOL.

i guess the tour was created to make parents-to-be less nervous about the big day - by literally showing us where we have to go, and how things are done. pretty cool too - at least we saw what things were going to be provided, and what needs to be brought in. the room itself is pretty big, most probably twice the size of a suite in makati med, or 3x the size of a small private room in asian hospital. the nurse in charge also showed us the special care nursery where 2 preemies were. (babies are roomed-in here, and are only sent to the nursery if and when they need special attention. otherwise, he/she is all yours - complete with a stack of cloth diapers that they provide.)

the only sad part is, while the mommies get a comfortable bed (plus a jacuzzi in the bathroom), the dads get this really sad-looking, beaten chair that folds out into a (practically) child-sized bed. aldo and i looked at each other and nearly laughed out loud - i just hope he fits into that thing. LOL. sabagay, he'll only have to endure 48 hours in the hospital anyway.

yikes, only 3 months left... where did the time go???

why you should leave husbands home while you shop for maternity clothes

in a maternity clothing store....

aldo: what are those?

pia: nursing tops... see the hooks that easily come off? easy access for breastfeeding.

aldo: hmm... i think we should have one of these... so even when you're sleeping, i'll just slip our son/daughter under you, unhook the thing, and then you can breastfeed while sleeping.

pia: err... since when have i become an automatic breastmilk dispenser???


hay... men talaga when they're in a maternity store too long.

a haiku inspiration for you

It's apparently the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival (and St. Patrick's Day too!) this March.

FINALLY... after what felt like an eternity of rain, ice, and grey skies... the cherry trees have started to blossom!

this morning, as the bus turned to the nearby bridal shop i always manage to stare at while the light is red, i noticed not only the sunshine, but the cherry blossoms right in front of its gates, lining up the streets. hmm... on second thought, even the cherry tree right outside our apartment building has started blossoming too!

finally, something to define Beautiful British Columbia (printed on all license plates - something that i have scoffed at the past winter).

*** this image swiped from vcbf.ca

pimp my ride

The Peg Perego Venezia stroller in black sable!

it has 4-wheel swivels (you can push/pull the thing sideways - good for grocery aisles!), reclines into a full bassinet (no need for a separate infant seat), collapses neatly into a compact heap, and has a really cool reversible handlebar... plus a really cool "boot" that covers the stroller carriage during chilly fall/winter days!

it took us 2 hours in TJ's Kiddie Store to decide on a stroller and pick a color... it was a toss-up between a Silver & Red (my choice) or Dark Blue (the papa-to-be's pick)... in the end, the sales associate told us that she had one last piece in Silver & Black at the stockroom... so voila, baby penguin's cadillac!

we also got the crib since we were at the store anyway...



next on the list: the crib mattress - who would have thought baby mattresses would be complicated??? in the store there were all kinds: hypoallerginic, coils, springs, foam, cotton covers, etc.... nakakahilo!

crappy, crappy weather

just when i thought i could keep my winter boots and sweaters because it's getting warmer... it starts snowing.

in freakin' March.

ACK! how much crazier can vancouver weather get???

last night aldo and i were walking home after Don Giovanni at the Queen Elizabeth Theater and it was drizzling slightly... 20 steps later, shaved-ice-like drops was falling... and before we even reached the apartment doors (one street away), snow was falling. i watched the snow from the bedroom windows (yes, i am still quite mesmerized by snowfall but was perfectly happy with watching it from indoors) and was quite entertained by the whole swirly motions and size of the flakes falling.

when i woke up, it was still snowing and rooftops now had white blankets... a pretty sight but definitely not a good thing if you have to go out! since downtown is a degree or two warmer than the suburbs, by 9am there were no snow-capped buildings or snow-filled sidewalks -- everything had melted just as quickly as it had come. and by lunchtime, everything went back to normal... even better than normal because the sun decided to come out, complete with blue skies!




argh... i don't know how much more of snow-rain-sun days i can take!

spring, where art thou????

a first baby-related purchase

a few days before our wedding, aldo came home to manila with an iPod for me... little did we know that it'll be part of the baby's things when he/she gets here!

we've been looking for either a CD/MP3 player, or iPod speakers with good sound quality, but at the smallest possible size. so we narrowed down our choices to either Altec Lansing speakers or a small component... but when we went to Futureshop, the Altec Lansing speakers weren't too impressive (sounded like computer speakers bought in quiapo), and the small components were to bulky. just by chance, we found this.


perfect! now we can send our alarm clock to storage.

now baby lullabies and classical tunes are a part of the growing playlist!

good riddance Brenna, and a sad byebye to Sway

finally... Brenna gets kicked out of American Idol! her ego was way bigger than her talent so buti nga! LOL. it's sad though that Jose "Sway" Penala got the boot... sayang, he was the only asian pa naman... maybe he ought to go back to the Philippines and become South Border's new vocalist na lang... but damn, he was good though... i would have been happier to see either Bucky or Kevin go though, if only for vocal power.

with Sway gone... i'm rooting for either Taylor Hicks or Elliot Yamin (don't you think he looks like a chipmunk with a real gwapo voice? LOL!)... and Paris Bennet, Mandisa, or Kellie Pickler for the girls.

my sentiments exactly

here's a great post by former-princess-turned-domestic-goddess-Lars at pinoyexpat.org. (great job Lars... more, more, more!)

i think anyone who has had to move to another country has experienced and is experiencing the uphill climb towards a semblance of normalcy... i know i am. three days into my new job and all i can say is... i have a looong way to go. more on this next time... as for now, i'm just glad i survived another day.