word of the day: tethering

thanks to the boy genius (www.boygeniusreports.com) for the word of thd day!

so that's what it's called. i've been using my mobile phone, a nokia 6170, for my mobile internet needs, even if i'm at home. our phoneline has a dinosaur 56K dial-up connection, and it can get messy if my dad has to use it or my mum has to make a call. we've been considering upgrading to a dsl plan, but for some reason we haven't made the big switch. which is why i rely on my company-provided smart line, and now on my personal globe line (which just recently offered the 5pesos/15mins browsing thank merlin) for connecting to the internets. now i'm making good use of my previously impractical high plan limit to waste countless hours composing (and not finishing) blog posts, or getting updated on my favorite harry potter fan fiction.

anyway, tethering is the term they use to describe that process of using the mobile phone (connected to the computer through cable or bluetooth) to make use of the phone's data connectivity. whew.

just chillin

saturday night is party night. but for now, it's all in my head.

i've been taking full advantage of my gprs connection and vegetating in front of my pc for, like, hours. really can't get enough of internet. i'm so addicted.

i'm also addicted to my windows media player. version ten. my officemates swear by apple's i tunes, maybe i'll take their advice when i get my own mac. for now, wmp is just fine, and i've gotten so used to it.

and when you're surfing, great background music guarantees hours and hours of virtual entertainment. over the last few weeks i've been so fixated on mp3 downloading, i even tried to trade links a couple of times. here are the choice tracks i've been keeping in my playlist tonight:

garbage -- bleed like me (album)
garbage -- special
plumb -- stranded
jennifer paige -- stranded (plumb cover)
lemonheads -- into your arms
lemonheads -- it's about time
everything but the girl -- my house is in my head unless it rains
everything but the girl -- cross my heart
everything but the girl -- rollercoaster
the cardigans -- rise and shine
the cardigans -- carnival (including acoustic version)
barenaked ladies -- call and answer
foo fighters -- big me
jimmy eat world -- last christmas

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last night i watched mr. & mrs. smith with a bunch of friends. it's a good movie, flawed in parts, and very entertaining. though i found that i got tired after watching. all that action i suppose. or maybe my legs got tense because my handbag was too heavy and most of the time it was on my lap. grrrrr.

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gee, i wonder how much my cellphone bill is now? don't think i wanna know.

staying alive (the morning after)

what happens when you pull an all-nighter, with none of the results you were aiming for to begin with.

it's back to reality.

i got to work late again, for the second straight day. though the guard here at the office offers consolation whenever i complain ("ma'am, officer ka naman eh"), i really dislike being late for work. i do try to compensate by staying the whole nine hours, but it's a bit hypocritical when it was my fault in the first place.

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so i stayed up until 3 this morning. big deal. the other night i fell asleep waiting for my roommate to finish with the bathroom, so obviously i accomplished nothing. last night i managed to tweak what little i have of my paper, but i got preoccupied with backing up my mobile phones. however, my biggest accomplishment was not my paper, but finally getting internet access through gprs. yippee! i can now check email, friendster, and my blog at my convenience anytime and anywhere through my underutilized globe plan, using my laptop. no need to be limited by the library hours at agsb, though i would still love to go there because of the connection speed. and i wouldn't be at the mercy of the sky-high hourly rates at my neighborhood 24-hour internet cafe. plus, i would be spared from endless scrolling when i use my phone gprs. i am so happy, i can almost imitate tom cruise on oprah. almost.

this is one instance when a bunch of bad decisions work out after all.

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i started late last night because i met up with roge and ness at galleria earlier. i felt a bit guilty about not putting my strama first in my life, but when did i ever? so i decided i might as well go, and to paraphrase stephen covey, i also wanted to invest in my emotional bank account especially with roge. (or did i just feel coerced? just kidding, roge!) we had a great time window shopping, eating at chef d'angelo and chatting over coffee at starbucks. we were reluctant to end the night, but it's a workday and reality should be faced eventually.

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i'm in lss (last song syndrome) mode again, and my song of the moment is stranded by plumb. but what i want to hear now is the jennifer paige version, which is the first i heard of the song. of course i'd prefer to get an mp3 copy (hint, hint) but for now i'll try to bug the guys over at klite... anyway that's where i heard this song in the first place.

huwag mo nang itanong

date: 09 june 2005 (thursday). time: 2.50 a.m. what the heck am i doing staying up till the wee hours?

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finally! i've got my internet over gprs working! thanks to a few hours tinkering with my 3230, pc suite 6.5 and my trusty laptop (which would have been better used editing my strama background -- sheesh!), i am now on my way to internet freedom! can't forget my new mobile phone plan... ooops! the smart gprs configured in my office mobile (a 6600, so technically unreliable) wouldn't work. for that matter, gprs over bluetooth wouldn't work. so i relied on my globe connection and my data cable, incidentally from my aunt's 7610 (tenkyu ene!).

so after that techie outburst, i just meant that i'm doing this in the safety of my room and not in my suking internet cafe at makati ave. now i have proven that globe does make great things possible. and i won't be hankering for a blackberry in the near future.

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i've been trying to make some headway for my paper, which is why i'm still up. but heaven knows, that's not why i managed to stay awake. pretty soon i'll have to go back to my open word documents, and my radio station will eventually lose its appeal as the hour hand approaches 6. the wisdom of staying up late has been debated over and over in my head, especially in the aftermath. but even if this is the worst time to get an insomnia hangover, *you gotta do what you gotta do*.

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guess i have to thank the dj for at least playing great songs, like this eraserheads track from cutterpillow.