Alexandra’s Neighborhood

Go forth and fill your libraries with media.

Seriously, thanks to everyone for being so amazing and patient. You are the reason I love Vox.

~daisy

I was just told that the Amazon Conduit will be fixed by tomorrow. I will post here as soon as I get word that it's back up and running.

I know this has been frustrating and I am sorry there wasn't more I could do to make it less so. I really appreciate your patience though.

Cheers,

daisy

Bad news. As many of you have probably noticed, the Amazon Conduit was not fixed in the last week's release. Unfortunately, there was an undetected bug that is preventing the conduit from working.

We are working on this bug fix and hope to have the Conduit back up and running this week.

I will keep you posted.

Thank you for being so patient.

~daisy

Blog Action Day

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Blog Action Day is every October 15th, when blogger are asked to post something about a single issue to show our strength and conviction as an online community. It's a great way to feel connected to the greater good, and the participation of so many bloggers to support the world's leading non-profit organizations is something you can do to help, right now. By blogging today, you're supporting some of the world's leading non-profits and sharing your voice for change.

This year's topic is climate change, and we'd love to read your thoughts on the topic. If you participate, leave us a link to your post in the comments, so we know to check out your post!

Go to www.blogactionday.org to learn more, get a badge for your blog showing your participation, and see some ideas for your post on climate change.

Can't wait to read your posts!

~ daisy

Promises. Promises. Promises.

Either from people or from organizations, this time,-I'm talking about what I thought was my reputable review center- you shouldn't get you're hopes that much. Because sometimes, they just fail to follow through with it. You put your entire trust into it, and then, "POOF!", it doesn't even come close to what has been offered and promised.

Hayy.

What's better?

To hope that it will push through, and then just be disappointed when it doesn't, or to just stop keeping your hopes up just to stop being disappointed altogether??

Hmm. For an eternal optimist like me, I think I'm still going for the first even if it's too draining sometimes. Option two is out for me.  I don't know how to live that way.

Sigh.

I hope I still have a future. I bet I still would have a future. I just don't know if its going to be as bright as I expect it to be. Hmm. Maybe I can make it brighter. ^^. Here goes Miss Eternal Optimist again. Haha.

There's plenty of cathartic energy unreleased. I need an outlet. Hmm. Writing about it is writing it, etching the anger even deeper, so I wouldn't write about it. Maybe I'll count backwards again until Monday comes and that means confrontation time. Woohoo.

Haha.

Trust, not only mine has been broken. And I cannot afford not to trust them especially since, whether I admit it or not, they're in this fight to pass the board with me and my friends.

No turning back, I guess.

No turning away.

Just moving forward.

And hoping, still hoping for the best possibilities.

em

Saying goodbye makes you wait for hellos.

The thought of saying hello once more to you makes the goodbye bearable.

Last Sunday was the funeral of my dear Mommy Lita. She is my mother's aunt, making her one of my many grandmothers. It was a bittersweet day. In a way, the goodbye was made with a smile, for finally, she was free of the sufferings of this world and is now together with Him. But still, there's the pang that you feel when you realize that tomorrow when you wake up, you can no longer see her sweet reassuring smile or her beaming eyes. I went to Daddy Mar today. He called for me to check on his blood pressure. Hayy. I guess it's safe to say that it might be one of the silent pleas of Daddy that he misses his daily companion... His wife who stood by him against literally all odds.

Theirs is a sweet love story, after all. Good Girl meets Bad Boy. Bad Boy turns to Good Boy with Good Girl by his side.

^_^

I hope he gets to wait for the time of saying hello once more to Mommy. I hope he bears the waiting with joy and patience. And I hope when that day comes, sooner or later, I hope he'll see that same smile that is of Mommy's. And there they'll get to enjoy unending afternoons of sitting together and just enjoy each other's company.

Cancer took you away from us a bit earlier. Hayy. Mommy Lita, you never did deserve the pain that you have undergone. And I know, that it was never meant as a punishment for you are one of the kindest souls I have known. Perhaps it was a test for all of us, for your family and the bigger family that we share. Perhaps, it's for us to appreciate the presence of each and everyone more. Perhaps its for us to be grateful for every day that we get to spend with family and dear friends. We never were that close. But you always welcomed us with the cheeriest smile whenever we drop by. Well, guess what? Even silly me misses you. But I know you're happy there to sip a bit of Coke and a bite of your favorite snack. Just look over us with your kind eyes. And especially your children. And especially Daddy... Until you say hello once more.

^__^

The two things in the title of this post are unrelated.

Haruki Murakami

I was reading a few Haruki Murakami stories again. One of them was about the 1960s and about a man who was hard-working, an excellent student, a natural leader. However, he always felt alone until he stumbled upon a girl in school that was just like him. This was during the 1960s, the era of free love and all that, which figures into this story. This couple never went very far though they did remain a couple for many years. The girl was traditional and would wait till marriage and she had this idea of marrying an older man and not having a career after doing so. This was contrary to what the guy thought the future would be...he thought she could do much more than that. It's a strange story and I'll maybe try to find a few quotes that I like from it.

The more interesting thing I read was actually a dialogue between Haruki Murakami and another person. I think the other person was a psychologist or a writer, I'm not exactly sure. In any case, they discussed individuality and the responsibility of the individual to the group(s) they're a part of. Apparently in Japan the students needed to be explicitly told that they had to be more individual and act on their own, while in America, the students took that idea for granted and never had to be directly told. The implications of this are that Americans feel like individuals and they drift from group to group and this is accepted but in Japan, an individual will be seen as anti-social for not acting like a group member and not showing up to enough group meetings or whatever.

What really interested me was when Murakami discussed marriage. He asked the other man if marriage could be a form of mutual therapy,

MURAKAMI: There’s something I wanted to ask you: Do you think marriage is, in a sense, kind of mutual therapy?

The man replied that marriage is like that and that it's like digging a well. He said that it cannot survive on romantic/passionate love alone but needed something more. People who marry, divorce and then marry again could be afraid of digging a well, of doing the hard work necessary for the marriage to survive due to the misconceptions they inherit from their parents, the media, etc. He says that,

In the old days, marriage was just two people cooperating. If they did that until they died, then it was considered to have been a good marriage. These days, people want to understand one another, not simply work together. But if you want to understand one another, you have to dig a well.

It's very interesting to think about because I know a few people who around my own age that are already married. But I also know many more people who are either single or are in medium-term relationships (meaning more than a few months but less than a year or two). Some people think they won't ever get married now and the very thought of it is senseless to them, because what do they have to gain aside from tax benefits or whatever other monetary benefits there are? Then there's the trouble of maybe having to change your last name and other things like that. So what's the point?

I'm undecided on the matter for now. It's still nice to read what others have to say about it, especially if they've been married for a while and especially if they've thought about interactions between groups and individuals in different societies.

Pinball, 1973

I also started reading Pinball,1973 which is also by Haruki Murakami. It's supposedly about the guy who invented pinball but it's also about the narrator who starts a translation service with some bottles of bourbon and desks and 10 dictionaries. I didn't get too far into it but so far it's entertaining. It's great how the narrator described the administrative assistant they hired as a nice girl with long legs but an annoying habit of whistling and humming Penny Lane 20 times a day while working.

Club Of Rome

The Club Of Rome is an independent organization that takes the long view of things. They look at long-term impact of human actions and look at all the interactions (economic, political, etc.) that make up our globalized world. Right now I'm reading their 1993 report called The First Global Revolution and the main message, as I've seen stated elsewhere, is that the enemies of humans are humans. We're destroying our own environment through careless planning and they proposed that to unite as all against a common enemy we need to unite against ourselves in a sense,

The common enemy of humanity is man. In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill. All these dangers are caused by human intervention, and it is only through changed attitudes and behavior that they can be overcome. The real enemy then, is humanity itself.

I'll dig up some quotes once I get through more of the report. It's around 180 pages which isn't a heavy read. I should be done reading it within a few days.