Rommel's Random Ramblings

Happy Thanksgiving! No recent updates until now, so here are some highlights of the past week:

We went to Magic Mountain last Saturday along with the junior high and high school kids. The park closed early at 6pm, so I got on only three rides. That's okay. We had 50 free tickets, so the only things I paid for were parking and food. The day was worth it, though, just to go on the new ride X. I have to agree with one of the high schoolers when he said, "That was the first ride I was really scared in." I don't think anything can beat a ride that has seats that rotate up and down around the horizontal axis and includes a few seconds in which you are lying face down with a clear view of the ground with nothing holding you up but the harness.

The Thanksgiving presentation on Sunday was fun. Each Sunday School class had a song or skit about Thanksgiving and/or promoting Sunday School. Our College and Career class had a skit video that segued into a 50's-style dance routine set to "Sunday School Rock" by Carman. I'm glad that Richmond and Eric were able to participate while they're here. That night, we had our early Christmas party since the Devotion guys wouldn't be around then. Rommel Cruz, you make awesome crepes!

I got a flat tire late Tuesday night while driving home from worship team practice. I must have run over something really hard since the rim on my wheel was bent, too. It's a good thing this was already on a side street instead of the freeway. Then, here's where Murphy's law takes effect... About a minute after I started driving with my spare tire, the spare tire goes flat as well. It turns out there wasn't enough air in the spare tire in the first place. I did eventually get the wheel fixed the next day.

I feel sick, and yet I blog. Yup, I finally succumbed to flu-like symptoms I've been having for the past couple of days. I went to work this morning, but after an hour and a half, I realized that won't be able to last the entire day feeling nauseated and such, so I went home early. One thing I've learned: coffee and tylenol don't produce desireable effects from my system. For the most part, my jaw muscles would be tense and I'd be shaking a little. After it wears off, I would be yawning excessively and feel more tired than before this all started. Actually, I've learned this lesson before already, but I keep forgetting to avoid combining caffeine (from coffee) and pseudoephridine (from tylenol) together. Hopefully, writing this down would help me remember.

At any rate, I should rest and get my strength back. I have to go to LAX tomorrow night after work. My brother and the rest of Devotion are coming back tomorrow. For those of you that don't know, Devotion signed a three year recording contract with Viva Records in the Philippines. They left for the Philippines on February earlier this year and released their second album this summer. However, they have a break from their busy schedule of performances and appearances to spend Thanksgiving and an early Christmas here in the US. The international music stars return. Haha.

A really strange but somewhat scary thing happened to me during today's drive home from work. While on the freeway, a truck (I think it was a truck) started following me really closely. There was traffic at that part of the freeway so I didn't think much of it. However, when the general flow of traffic sped up to at least the speed limit, I found that I couldn't drive any faster than 50 mph or so. (And that was with a little bit more pressure on the gas pedal.) All the other cars were zooming on ahead, but that truck was still tailgating me. I changed lanes to let him pass, but he changed lanes as well. Fast forward to at least half an hour and 15 miles later... he finally left me alone when I exited the freeway. At that point, I thought that I probably had a flat tire or something, and he was trying to let me know about it. I didn't feel any difference in the handling, though. In fact, the only thing I noticed wrong was the slower speed. I also didn't hear any peculiar sounds or anything like that. Besides, if that driver noticed something, I would think that he would either flash his high beams, honk at me, or turn on his hazard lights - none of which he did. Anyway, when I got home, I checked everything out, but all seemed to be okay. There were no flat tires, no leaking fluids, no smoke or flames coming out from anywhere. Come to think of it, my car seemed to behave normally once I exited the freeway. Then again, you can only go so fast on side streets. It would have been an amazing coincidence if it turned out to be a flat tire, though. Two of my co-workers have had flat tires in the past two days. The entire experience still feels a little unsettling, and I can't help but be thankful that God was protecting me and keeping me safe. I'm still not sure exactly what from, but I'm thankful nonetheless.

Ahh!!! I lay down for a few minutes when I got home from work, and I ended up sleeping through Smallville. I must have been really tired. I'm not sure why, though. I took a nap in my car during my lunch hour. That reminds me... While in the middle of my lunchtime nap, I was dreaming of a song. It wasn't like I was dreaming of singing a song or watching someone sing a song. There was no event associated with it. The entire dream was just the song "You are Holy (Prince of Peace)" which is a great song, by the way. I don't think that's ever happened to me before. I've dreamt of movie scenes, of data from work or school, even of falling Tetris blocks, but not a song by itself. Oh, and no, I didn't have my car radio on at the time. Needless to say, the song was stuck in my head for the rest of the day. One of my friends would call that LSS -- Last Song Syndrome.

I must say that this is a bad time to get an idea to go with the upcoming Thanksgiving skit. I feel like working on it, but I should go to sleep soon. I shouldn't go on into too much detail lest it ruins the surprise for anyone reading this that isn't involved in it. ^_^ I just had to get that out...

We just had a birthday party/worship team get-together at Tito Rey's house. He's the worship team leader and the birthday celebrant. I finally got to see their recently installed koi pond. The best feature of the pond was the Scarecrow. It's basically an infrared motion detecting water sprinkler that they placed to keep the raccoons away from the fish. However, it's also a fun way to play a prank on someone. The few of us who knew what it was tried to lure some of the unsuspecting guests to the Scarecrow's detection area. We would say things like, "Check out the other side of the pond. It looks nicer there." or "Let's go take your picture on top of that bridge." Little do they know that as they walk in front of the device, it would spray water at them for a few seconds. We all had a big laugh from it... at least, until everyone was finally in with the joke, and we couldn't do it anymore.

I went to Shark Club last night. Listening to the music in the trance room makes me want to either play DDR or drift my car downhill a la Initial D. The bouncer almost didn't let me in, actually. He thought my keychain/watch was some sort of brass knuckle type thing. But then he recognized it for what it was and let me through. That reminds me of when I got stopped at a sobriety checkpoint without having had anything to drink... twice. I'd like to think that they stop cars at regular intervals instead of me doing something that made the CHP single me out. Oh well, only me...

Been kinda busy lately. I had a bunch of stuff to do after that day I missed work. Nothing too hard, though. Just a whole lot of everyday tedious stuff. Anyway, I've been listening to the WOW Worship 2003 cd (the yellow one) a lot these past few days. There are a lot of good songs on it. Most of them may be familiar, but it's a good compilation, I think. I bought mine at Sonshine. The copies they had there had an attached coupon for $4 off. Plus, they also had a promotion in which you get this cd called Blur for free. (I haven't listened to it yet, though.) Anyway, I've been listening to The Wonderful Cross by Chris Tomlin in particular. We're finally singing that at church tomorrow, so I'm excited. During practice on Tuesday night, we kept wanting to play it over and over. However, we still had other songs to practice, so we reluctantly moved on. Anyway, I would just love to grab a musical instrument and keep singing worship songs with no end. I could keep doing that forever if it weren't for things we occassionally have to do like eat or sleep.

Okay, impromptu survey time: Which looks better on a green car? This or this?

I'd like to quit my job and start looking for another one. Realistically speaking, however, I don't think I can do that until I have another job lined up first. If I quit first, I might be okay for a month, but I won't last very long financially. Ideally, I'd like to work in something related with video production, something I really love to do. Many people have suggested to me that I should just go into business for myself instead, at least in a more professional sense than the videos and slideshows that I do as "favors" for friends and family during birthdays and stuff. My friends, Vince and Steph, started their own videography business up in San Jose. I'm not too sure, though. I think in some aspects I feel more comfortable working in a structured company than in being self employed. If I start a formal video service like that, it will probably be something I do on the side (like what I do right now) rather than a full time job. That still does not get me out of my predicament involving my current job. Then I'd be worried about having too many things on my plate and suffering from burnout (if I haven't already.)

Anyway, I didn't even go to work today. I had to take my dad to UCI Medical Center for eye surgery. With God's grace, it seemed like it proceeded smoothly. He's going back tomorrow to having his eye patch removed, but my mom's taking him instead. Well, at the hospital Pastor Vince and a bunch of other people from church were with us. Ahh... that's another great thing about being a part of God's family. We can always get together to offer each other support and encouragement. Plus, they kept me company while I waited for the surgery to finish. After it was over, a funny thing happened as we were leaving the hospital. With a smile, one of the nurses told my dad, "Thank you. Come again." O_o What was that? My dad thought that sounded kinda weird, too. Granted, this was the third time he had surgery on his eyes, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't really want to go back. Ahh, we'll just give her the benefit of the doubt and assume that she was referring to any followup appointments in the future.

I was speaking with a couple of friends yesterday, and we were discussing working at a job you want to do and not just because it brings a paycheck. Not to sound like I'm joining the bandwagon, but I'm not too sure how much longer I can stand being at my job. I started out almost four years ago as a tech, but through various circumstances, I ended up being a supervisor over at the customer service department a couple of years ago. I still did tech stuff for a while, but now, especially with all the layoffs we've had this past year, it's pretty much mostly data entry with setting up replacements for people. I realized today that what I've been doing the past three or four weeks feels very much like balancing a check book, but with computer monitors as currency. I have to make sure that I balance the demand for replacement monitors and the supply from our inventory without making it seem that people have to wait too long for their replacement units. Not something I'd want to keep doing for years on end.

I'm not too sure what I'm going to do, but I do know that it takes a lot of prayer. That's probably the main thing that's keeping me from going insane. ^_^ Just being able to talk to God and tell Him how I feel. Even typing my thoughts in this blog does not compare to pouring my heart out to Him who is sovereign.

Here is a picture of my nephew, Landon, dressed as eda mame. A couple more pictures (from other times) may be found here and here.

I've edited my last post to include some links to some pictures. Hopefully, I can add some more as I get them.