Day Twenty One and Twenty Three - Ciao Bella!

14 August 2008

So, after getting drunk the night before, I woke up hella early to go meet up with a friend in Mariahilferstrasse. No pictures of that, 'cause I was hungover and I lacked the sleep required to operate a camera.

Funny thing, though, ang tagaaaal ko nang wala sa Wien... So little ol' me got lost in Mariahilferstrasse. I know, right?!?! How the heck do you get yourself lost there? LOL.

I blame the booze.

Anyhoo, I finally found the place an hour late. Had breakfast at Mickey Dee's and had coffee at one of the cafes, before I had to head back to the Hof to get ready to go... Never had to use the word 'to' so much in just one sentence. Sheesh. What is happening to the grammer of myself?

Anyhoos, pictures!

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5.Bye, Wien.

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We left at around 1pm and arrived in Pordenone at around 8-ish (?). RB picked us up from the trainstation and back home to Fontanafredda where I packed the life out of me. LOL.

Our flight was scheduled at 3pm the next day, 15 August 2008...

Woke up at around 9am. Got ready. Was out of the house by noon.

...Everything seemed to be going ok, but I had a wildly weird feeling that we weren't going to make it. And when the railroad crossing thing went down (with one car in front of us. Just. One. Car.), my wildly weird feeling was somehow solidified...

All the other roads were blocked. New diversions were put up. RB's GPS thing was going all cray-zay... And to top it off RB's iPod kept playing 25 Minutes Too Late by Michael Learns To Rock.

Got to the airport at 3:15. Said our goodbyes. Went inside. Gates were closed. Plane was getting ready to taxi. So, we ran outside to try and catch RB & Irog and get this...

...It started to rain. Hard.

Talk about movie moments.

I'm tellin' you... You just can't make stuff like this up!

I was able to find a nice young Italian couple who lent me their cellphone and I called Irog. Thankfully, she, too sensed that something wildly weird would happen, and so they stayed in the airport instead of driving off immediately.

We rescheduled our flight for the next day, thankfully for no extra fees. Then we headed on back to Fontannafredda.

16 August 2008

Woke up earlier. Left earlier. Got to the airport way earlier. Good thing.

Gave us enough time to have breakfast.

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16.
Hugged goodbye for the 2nd time. Haha.

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25.Couldn't connect. Tsk.

26.
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29.Far

30.Pretty close

31.Close.

32.Too close.

33.Friggin' flight was delayed...

34....And K was gettin' antsy.

35. Ciao Bella...See you again, soon.

36. I think we were flying above Turkey at this point... ...or somewhere or other.

37. Dubai at night.The view that made me cry... Not because it was beautiful... I mean, it was.

...But I cried, because I didn't really want to ever come back.

And thus endeth the Trip 2008 series.

Hella fun. Hella awesome. Hella nostalgic. Hella wanna do that again, baybee!

Trip 2009... Soon.



Haha.

Kissy kissy!

Happy Birthday!

So, we're here... Now's the time for everyone to start posting their Christmas blogs, pictures, and greetings; all with the same message - Merry Christmas!

And why not? That is after all a completely wonderful message and I could just go ahead and do the same...

...But aside from greeting everyone Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and Season's Greetings, I would like to go a little further and greet my Lord and Savior a Happy Birthday. And thank Him for all His many blessings, but most of all for being born to save me, and all of us, from our sins.

Happy Birthday, Jesus. I love you more than I can explain.

Danabelle in Christmas Eve Eve Shorts

Merry Christmas Eve Eve! :D Ain't it awesome?

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Last night, I dreamt that I was surfing.

Gaaah. What a fabulous feeling.

...Of course, I also dreamt that there was a fabulous storm... And the waves were just cuh-ray-zayyy.

Of course, I had to stop wading in the water and start taking fabulous pictures of the storm.

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Oooh... Yesterday... :)

Mommy wanted some frames up on her wall too. :)

I couldn't get this picture right with the flash on camera...
Tinatamad akong kunin yung pang wireless ng flash, so you'll have to live with this badly lit thing.

Unfortunately I ran out of double-back tape. LMAO. So, yeah, I'll just have to continue the thing when I get my Christmas gift from all y'all. ...Remember it's the kind that can hold a couple of kilograms... Preferably from ACE Hardware. Blahahaha.

...And they say I'm high maintenance. Pfsh. Double-back tape for Christmas, masayang masaya na talaga ako... San ka pa????

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I spent the whole day baking. How fun. Actually I'm still baking... I'm just taking a teeny tiny break.

I made one batch of Oatmeal White Chocolate Chip


...and I might make another batch after I make shortbread presents to go with the shortbread Christmas Tree that is currently still cooling...



I hope it doesn't break. :(

I also finished boiling the tripe,


which I'll cut later tonight along with the chorizo, right after I poke the turkayyy.

...Which reminds me I still have to make the broth. Hmmm... Blog first. Cook more later.

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How is your Christmas Eve Eve? :)

I hope everything is well and that y'all are ready for the big day.

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I don't have too many stories for today, sorry.

How about a song to make up for it?



Merry Christmas Eve Eve! Kissy kissy!

Look who's singing and all that jazz...

Nyahahaha!

I told you to expect sauce. LMAO.

BTW, I might have been a flapper in my former life...

Danabelle in Shortening Shorts

Aha!

I'm on leave. A-yayyy!!!

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Friday, we had lunch at our favorite hella cheaps, but hella yummy Jap resto.

Mami and her 100% paper hat.

Teatah wearing the gift I gave her for Mother's Day 2007

Me, modelling Mami's 100% paper hat. Haha. (Shot by Teatah)


After lunch, we met up with Mami & Teatah's officemate, Donnabelle and her sister.


We were supposed to have coffee, but we got a call from Dang that they were on their way to Trader's... Which Teatah forgot about. So we cancelled the coffee date with Donnabelle (They had to leave, too, anyway so it worked out well.) and went to Trader's instead.

Mami & Dang waiting for the doors to open.

Teatah with her loot.

Mami & Dang with their loot. (Actually those were all Dang's loot. Kinarga lang ni Mami). LOL.

At the counter, the guy saw Mami's 100% paper hat in her bag and asked to see it, when we told him that it was made of paper, he was like "What? Really?" and he even kept showing it to everybody. LOL.

Anyhoot, after the kaguluhan at Trader's, we went to Ghurair for some nommy-nommy coffee at M&B.

The weather was awesome, so we were able to sit outside.

I miss nightshoots... And since, I don't have a tripod, yet. Lamesa na lang muna. Hehehe.

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Yesterday night, we went carolling. :)

I wasn't able to preset the camera for Teatah before we sung at Westin, so this was the only shot from there. :(




If you ever go to Le Meridien Mina Seyahi and you see a bite on one of the Gingerbread Houses... Forget that you ever saw this picture... IT WASN'T ME, I promise! Hahaha.




On our way back, I wasn't able to change the settings fast enough to get a good shot. :(

Teatah, EB (our conductor), Mami & Joe.





We took the car from Westin and drove back again to Le Meridien. Had dinner at Ciro's. Mmmm... Deyyyummm. Their Italian food is good. The servings were hella big, though, I wasn't able to finish my plate. And I was hungry... Imagine, that's how big they are.

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Yesterday morning, I tidied up my room and finished my giftwrapping.

I started Thursday night, but was only able to finish yesterday.

Busy ako. Anuvey? Haha.

Oooh... I was also able to put up these old postcards from Ikea which I bought a couple of hundred years ago...

Kitchen.

Guest bathroom

Master's bathroom. The bottom part looks a little bare... I'm thinking of putting something there... Like so:

Hehe.

Master's Bathroom other wall

Now, aside from being on leave, y'all should know that the reason of this incessant putting up of everything is due to my recent introduction to double-back tape.

I <3 it!!! So much so, that if you still haven't gotten me a present for Christmas, just head out to your local hardware store and get me double-back tape. The weather-resistant one that's able to hold a couple of kilograms.

I'm serious. I'll love you like mad if you get me that for Christmas. For reals.



...I only wish I knew I about it before we made swiss cheese out of my bedroom wall...

Yes, I drilled holes for all these frames...Oh well. Double back tape, bakit ngayon ka lang?

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Today... I baked nomnoms.

Cookie love.

Cashew and white chocolate chip cookies.
 Oatmeal white chocolate chip cookies

I used half butter/half vegetable oil on the oatmeal cookies (I usually just use vegetable oil), because I ran out of both butter and oil. I had just enough to make one cup of shortening from both. LOL.
 I am absolutely enamored with white chocolate!

So much so, that I think I might not make my Christmas Tree chocolate cake this year... I'm gonna make blondie bars for dessert instead. :) Ahihihi.

So... Since, I ran out of ingredients to bake with... I decided to paint instead.

I've been meaning to frame Gerk's pictures for the longest time... And I bought these frames exactly a month ago. Didn't have the time to work on them until now...

Polka polky dot.

The paint dried up real fast so I was able to put them up right away.

...with double-back tape, of course.

...Oh and I only meant to paint Gerk's frames, but then I've also been meaning to paint that huge frame in the middle ...

... because it just looks so boring. Never had the chance to do so, but so I thought, well since I'm painting Gerk's frames, here's my chance.

And lookie. :)

Frame says "Who you callin' boring now, punk?"

Along with the frames that I bought for Gerk's pictures, I also bought a frame for the Prater picture of Irog, Baby AJ, K and me.

I wanted to give the frame a sort of an antique-y kind of feel.

I painted it black and "swooshed" gold paint over it...


Unfortunately, the picture doesn't fit the frame perfectly... At first I wasn't sure whether to just cut up some black cardboard-type thing and patch the empty space up... But then, I was having so much fun painting. I painted this, to fill the space instead.

Yes, I painted the paper thing that came with the frame. LOL.

:)

I just heart that splattered texture thing. Hihihi.

And there it is up on my wall.

Not too shabby for Danabelle. :)

Hihi.

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Oooh! This morning, while I was checking my inbox, I saw that Des posted a holiday album...

Y'all have got to see this girl.

Great photographs. Awesome concepts.

Kind of like Casey Arakawa.

Very simple and very fresh. Love it.

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Thus endeth my day... Well, not entirely. There's still plenty of time to do a bunch of stuff.

Haha.

I just realized that I started writing this blog at 9:41am.

It's now 6pm.

4 days til Christmas.

Turkey's in the fridge defrosting.

Gifts are wrapped.

Christmas songs are playing...

...And the house smells of cookies and cinnamon.