Deetsie's

Case in point: Investments are not just about saving for the rainy season, retirements, memorial lots and accident insurances.  It’s also about inner and outer beauty, relationships, health and wellness.  Here’s why.

When I was about 11 years old, I had the privilege to take care of my grandmother whom we fondly called “Nanay”.  On one of those days, I sat really close to her and placed my cheek right next to her.. then I noticed how fine her skin was and how smooth in spite of her age.  She was then 79.  I know my Nanay has always been beautiful but I never realized how finely she took care of herself when she was younger.  Her daughters would say she has never ran out of her beauty tools and sets back when she was younger and able.  And even when she was lying down and ill, she’d ask me to clean her face and help her put powder on.

Growing up, I’ve also been a witness of my mom’s beauty regimen.  While I was boyish and pretty rough for a girl, my mother was very “kikay” in more ways than one.  If you open her bag, you’d find that Continue reading…

(Excerpt from the book “Kontento Ka Na Ba Sa KaPERAhan Mo?” by Vic and Avelynn Garcia)

Ano ‘yung Kurot Principle? Ay, ang ganda nitong Kurot Principle na ito. To better understand this, I will tell you a story of a person na balak bumili ng cellphone worth P1,000. Nagkataong mayroon siyang P100,000 na savings. Puwede ba siyang bumili ng cellphone? Puwede, kasi yung P1,000, KUROT lang ‘yon sa kanyang savings.

May pangalawang taong balak bumili ng cellphone. Ang bibilhin niya ay worth P1,000 din. Mayroon siyang savings sa bangko na P1,000. Bumili siya ng cellphone. Anong tawag dun? DAKOT na ‘yun! Dinakot lahat ang pera niya!

May pangatlong tao, balak bumili ng cellphone, pero walang savings. P1,000 lang naman ‘yung bibilhin niya. Bumili siya. Anong tawag ‘dun? UTANG na ‘yun!

Ang tanong: ano’ng prinsipyo ang ginagamit mo sa buhay mo? KUROT, DAKOT, o UTANG?

Magtataka pa ba tayo kung bakit tayo naghihirap o baon sa utang? Ang gagaling nating dumakot! Ang gagaling nating umutang! Gusto mong yumaman? Starting today, matutong kumurot. Kapag may bibilhin, dapat kinukurot lang! Nagkakaintindihan ba tayo? Kapag ginawa mo ito, pangako, yayaman ka.
Continue reading…

THRIVE CDO is a core team organized to help create awareness about the most common cancer – Breast Cancer.  It is a non-stock, non profit organization formed by cancer survivors and supporters.  Yesterday, I was privileged to join an awareness forum with the Ladies of THRIVE.  The event was also graced by one of the best Cancer Surgeons in the Philippines, Dr. Rhoel de Leon.   I’d say it was a very productive session, fun and informative because it corrected a lot of my wrong notions about breast cancer.   Ms. Karen Lluch put it perfectly when she shared “Cancer is not a sentence”.  It’s not the end as many people think.   There is an ever present stigma that comes with the disease – once diagnosed, most patients would shy away and would step back from their social life.  What’s more interesting is the fact that CDO as a city and a community does not have a ready support and acceptance to afford to breast cancer patients, survivors and families.  As Karen shared, their goal is to spread the advocacy, share their cause and let everyone know what breast cancer is all about and how each and every one of us can extend help and support to those in need.

THRIVE partnered with Spruce CDO and Media groups.  For this cause, Spruce released a new line of fashion and trendy shoes – “Spruce PinkEd” where for every item sold, a portion of it goes to THRIVE fund.    The objective is to raise funds and offer a Community Based Breast Cancer Screening to women in the local barangay communities who cannot afford the expensive but necessary tests and screenings such as mammograms.  The group also welcomes invitations to lay-forums to companies and groups.  If you’re interested to know more about THRIVE and would like to support or invite them for a talk, feel free to contact 0915-483-1225 or visit their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/thrive.cdo.  Your support will go a long way!

I woke up feeling hyped but at the same time reflective and sentimental so I thought I’d drop by YouTube and play some songs I missed.  I’m an avid fan of old love songs as my Daddy used to sing a lot to me as he puts me to sleep (brushing my hair – super missed this!) He sings when he’s tending to his orchid garden. He sings when he cooks, he sings when his sitting by the doorstep alone with a cup of coffee.  When he was not around to sing, I’d play the cassette tapes.   In short, I pretty much grew up hearing old songs being played and sung again and again.

Remembering those sweet love songs now, I opened my PC, eased in and sat cross-legged on my chair, pressed in my earphones and rocked myself to the tunes of 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.   After I listened past “The Nearness of You” and “I Wanna Wake Up with you“, the next song was “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” (I like Roberta Flack’s version best).

I was closing my eyes and rocking, feeling every sweet beat.. when my memory drifted me back to the time when my mom and dad were young and healthier.  Back to the time when Continue reading…

Aromacologysensi, a Filipino beauty product line is relaunching its business center in Cagayan de Oro City!

If you’d like to buy Aromacologysensi online or read more about the benefits of each product, please visit http://aromacologyonline.com/.

For orders and inquiries, please call: 0917-798-8187 or 0939-939-8731 and ask for Ann

I was skimming through my facebook updates and read about an article my younger brother shared on his timeline.  He tagged my mom’s account so I thought I’d check it out.  Here’s what I read:

One young man went to apply for a managerial position in a big company. He passed the initial interview, and now would meet the director for the final interview.

The director discovered from his CV that the youth’s academic achievements were excellent. He asked, “Did you obtain any scholarships in school?” the youth answered “no”.

“Was it your father who paid for your school fees?”

“My father passed away when I was one year old, it was my mother who paid for my school fees.” he replied. Continue reading…

After a massive heap of suspended websites, Google is yet again bound to lash another algorithm update across the web space. Matt Cutts , the head of Google’s SE spam quest announced that a large Penguin and Panda update will be released this 2013. The last update was released October 2012 – for Penguin 3. Prior to that, we had Penguin 2 back in May 2012 – following an the initial release just a month before that. And the Panda update will be either March 16th, Friday or March 18th, Monday.  What can I say? Google loves me and he’s giving me a new Panda bear for my birthday! LOL

We felt the ripple effect of these three updates – industry wide.  And in what way for me, you may ask?  I have no big website to worry, really.  So on a personal standpoint, this shouldn’t be an issue at all, right?  But it is.  The webmasters we’re working with are now standing still, in silence, waiting for the wave to rise.  We’re getting quite a bunch of replies saying they can’t afford to add any more outbound links, at least not at this time.  Most of them clearly expressed they can no longer work with the placements and that they’d rather stay away from it altogether.

They’re saying that this new update will zoom in deeper on those operating in a link network.  They will target entities that seem to run campaigns across similar domains.  This is where our part as media buyers gets critical and our evaluations more stringent.

So yes, I guess everyone on board this SEO-boat are getting too concerned of getting shoved off-board.  Who isn’t?  But I hope the webmasters out there realize that there are ways not to get hit.  Every system has a work around – you just have to be creative and informed.  I can’t discuss these creative ways in here – there are self-made experts out there who posted lengthy discussions on this matter.  I guess I’m just a little upset about Google’s superiority complex over the SEO industry.  Argh!

I’m now on my office desk cramming to finish a quarter-long list of proposals for the project. I seem to be spacing out so I thought I’d re-channel my thoughts by logging in here and writing anything that pops out of my head. It’s been a very long while since I blogged anything about me and what’s going in my world.

So yes, I’m plugging back in And for good.

This age of Social Media has brought new shape and meaning in ways that people keep in touch with each other.  More than just a means of checking out how your families and friends are doing, Facebook is in fact a fantastic, powerful tool to search for people you might have lost contact with.

I’ve read about one father who finds his long lost son and ex-wife – and for sure you have your own share of losing and finding someone.  Be it a prodigal uncle, a high school chummy chum, a school mate, past office buddies, etc.

Facebook has neat features and ways to reconnect people.  Let’s look at this list:

1. FB Friends Page

Go to the find your friends on Facebook page. You have a number of options here: find people you know by email, find people you know by last name, find people on your IM (instant messenger) list, browse for people alphabetically (this is somewhat tedious) or browse Facebook pages by name.

2. Finding Friends of Friends

This is simple. Recall a common friend and use this friend’s FB list as a resource.  Choose the “See All” option to scroll through their list of friends. This is actually a great way to find someone in common that you might have forgotten about.

3.  Finding Phone Numbers

You can also scour for phone numbers via Facebook.  In fact, you can use Facebook to create a personalized phonebook with a customized directory of your friends, family, relatives, etc.

4.  Facebook Profiles

Facebook has a page designated especially for the networks that people choose to belong to. On this search page, you can search by name, email, school name and graduation year, and company.

5. Search for two things at once

Facebook (unfortunately) doesn’t have much in the way of advanced search, but you can search for two things at once by using the | character (you can make this character by pressing “shift backslash”). For example, you could look for Davao and Ann Laureano with this search: “Davao | Ann Laureano”

6. Search for Networks and Groups
Once logged in, the search field is displayed over to the upper left (a bit close to the middle). You may type any profile, group, school, post by friends. This is especially helpful and pretty easy to navigate. As soon as you enter values, a drop down menu showing all possible results will appear and then you can just choose.

And oh, by the way, the “Like” button actually serves as a bookmarking tool especially when used on any fan or group page that you’re interested about. All “liked” pages will appear on the ‘interest’ section of your profile page.

I may have paused playing MU since I started WOW but this is a game I will always ever hold dear to my heart. Why? because this is where me and my husband dated back when I was still living in Davao and he in CDO. No, we didn’t meet in-game. We we’re friends from the very beginning and when we were in the relationship, we played just to be together. It’s just like strolling downtown and discovering new streets and crazy places together… but on a virtual map with mobs, monsters and co-players ready to slay us anytime. LDR does not work for everyone but it did for us. We played at Wiggle Server and later migrated over to Titan. We attended quests, events, sieges and avatar weddings. We were married in Mu, mind you. My very first blog (eetsie.eklaboo.com) had grind stories and pictures of my toon, Annjee, an Energy Elf with +13 Excellent Vine Set. She is a powerful buffer and healer and definitely a charming toon to pilot. Jeedo and I played long hours and I think it took years to fully upgrade the entire set. We didn’t even get to save it when Mu decided to close down. So whatever happened to Mu? Here’s what I found out.

Mobius was contacting Webzen before the expiration for contract renewal for the same terms like it has been for the past three (3) years. Webzen replied and sent outrageous terms, far different from the previous three (3) years. They have since not backed down from their bargaining posture and refuse to lesser terms after months of negotiations and given that MU is a 7-year old game with so many more other games in the market place.

Sadly, they have stopped negotiating and have demanded the closure of MU PH. MU PH will close eventually, but the time table for that is not yet set. We will do the MU community justice and keep the game up and running for as long as we can. When the actual time table is set, we will announce it through official channels.

Yes, I was a full-fledged Mutizen. And I still feel so even today. To give a little background of Mu, it went live as Mu Philippines in December 2004. Prior to that, the game was open globally where we had in-game players from Asia, USA and Australia. Global MMORPG is always thrilling and fun. Afterward the first two servers of Maya and Wiggle were merged to form Titan community, the server where Philippine players migrated to directly from Global. Bahr was the server of choice for those who wanted to start anew, and Muren was the commercial test server. Then came the Castle Siege patch in the second half of 2005. This game feature would be a game changer and to this day a source of competition and animosity between rival guilds. In the middle of 2007, MU Philippines saw Season 2, also known as the Crywolf patch. Soon after, Ion server was born. In September 2008, the three worlds of Titan, Bahr and Ion collided to form Tarh. Almost two months later, Rance, the first free-to-play, server went live. In September 2009, MU Philippines received its first major update when Season 4 was released in our servers. It introduced so many different dynamics like 3rd Wings, 3rd job classes, socket weapons and armor and a new class, the Summoner. In March 2011, Season 5 was released with it’s new faction system.

There have been many events and changes over the years. Some that were disappointing and some that quickened the spirit of the game. Change will always be synonymous with a game that has aged well over the years.