Ilocos, Wedding, Teaching Demo, Contest and Used Books

Well the title is really lame and blatant, sorry for that. I should really be sleeping now but I just really want to blog about the past three weeks. I know I should have blogged sooner, like right after I got home from the four day tour to Ilocos, but work load seemed to have piled up in an instant when I got back. So here I am, writing this late at night, powered by caffeine. This is going to be another lengthy post, so please bear with me since I tend to forget things easily that I just had to write everything down.

Ilocos Tour

I finally did it! After years of waiting for the right time to go on a vacation in Ilocos it finally happened and who would have thought that I'd be doing it with the entire College of Education?

As you know (if you have read my previous post) I wasn't really psyched about going to Ilocos when the tour date was finalized and announced because it was sooner than I expected and I was just starting to save for my pocket money. Luckily, my mom was generous enough (as always) to provide me with everything I needed prior the trip. Mac also bought me snacks for the bus and he bought me an iPad too, partly so I wouldn't be bored during the long trip and I guess it's an advance anniversary present :P

Anyway, Ilocos was wonderful! I never thought I'd enjoy it as much as I did. The following were our itineraries for three days:

First Day: Vigan, Pagudpud, Polaris Beach Resort, Bangui Windmills, Patapat Bridge, Burgos Lighthouse, La Elliana Hotel, La Preciosa Restaurant. Second Day: Paoay Church, Malacañang of the North, Bagnos Laoag Sinkung Bell Tower, St. Monica Church, Marcos Mausoleum and Memorabilia, Museo Ilocos Norte, Pidig Chirch, Salcedo Hotel, Third Day:The Miraculous Vigan Church, Plaza Burgos - Burgos Museum, Juan Luna Museum, Hidden Garden, Shrine of Our Lady of Charity

I loved every bit of it, no matter how long the trip was and no matter how tiring it could be to tour and walk around different places all day. It's an experience I wish to do all over again, perhaps in other places too. Here are photos by the way, I'll let them speak for me.



My Kuya's Wedding

So my older brother got married last Saturday, February 9th, I was part of the entourage and it was just simply fun and exciting. I am really happy that he finally decided to settle down and start a family of his own. I honestly admire him for being able to hold it too long to get married, I mean he's already in his mid-thirties and he just got married. Although I think he should have done that years ago, but I guess he wasn't ready then and it left me thinking how does one know that he or she is ready to get married and start a family?

The musing just got worse when I caught the bouquet during the reception...I know it's too early to be talking about weddings, but I guess that's just a wake up call for me, that I should be doing my best to attain my goals and finish project "Mia" first before I think about starting project "wedding". Perhaps one needs to finish certain things first, you know like accomplish career and personal goals before planning for the big day, and I think that's what I should really do now before I start considering hiring a pre-nup photographer.

Apparently, the divider between student life and reality becomes thinner as graduation day comes closer, making me think about what I really wanted to do first after I graduate. I need to get my plan laid out once and for all, although I know I won't always attain them all, but it's worth a try and it may also just serve as a guide as to what I should accomplish in the following years to come before I finally throw my own bouquet on my wedding night. ;)





Final Teaching Demonstration

In other news, I have been preparing for my final teaching demonstration. I have been under a lot of mental and a bit of physical stress lately just trying to get my presentation done and sensible, hence the reason why I wasn't able to blog immediately. So far though I am doing great, I have finally pulled my head off stand-by mode and started working on my learning guide and invitation designs.

I finished all three today, the final presentation, my learning guide and my invitation card. I will be having my final lesson dry-run on Monday, hopefully this time I'll be able to discuss my lesson about Les Miserables (the novel) in just 30 minutes so that I'd still have ample time for the group enrichment activities, reporting and closure activities. I tested my first presentation last Monday and I wasn't able to give the group activities within one period because of the long discussion. So I made major adjustments with the help of my cooperating teacher; gosh, I really don't know where I'd be without her, I wish she knows how grateful I am to have her as my cooperating teacher since I'm not really good in expressing my feelings verbally, hence the reason I keep a blog. :))

Anyway, Felice had her demo earlier today and I'm just happy that she finally got over with it and she was able to pull through perfectly. I am really proud of her and I'm extremely grateful that all her hard work had paid off and it paid off well. Mine will be on Tuesday and I'm fervently praying that I'd get similar results.


Contest and Used Books

I won first place in PixieChronicle.com's giveaway! :D I won a .info domain, a $20 coupon for romwe.com and three months advertising on Marinella Rose's blogs! AWESOME right? :D Will announce my new domain soon :)

Late last month, I discovered a second hand book bargain shop online and what's better is that it's totally legit and some percentage of the books you buy gets to be donated to charity. It's BetterWorldBooks.com!

I ordered a couple of books that I have been dying to read for ages. I know I could have just settled with the ebooks, but there really are some books that I want to read in print. Although while waiting for my books to arrive today I did finish about five books, all zombie novels and four of which were written by Jesse Petersen ;)

So yes, that's right. The books I ordered finally came in the mail today and I am so excited in reading them all! But perhaps I won't be able to pick up one of them until after I finish my final teaching demo and after I finish my narrative reports too. So it kind of sucks but it sort of adds to the excitement anyway. :P

By the way, before I end this post I wish to apologize to my blog friends for not being able to visit their sites in the last three weeks, I promise to do it ASAP. Cheers!

The Zombie Whisperer by Jesse Petersen

Although the story is quite predictable and the cover is a little off, still this final book in the Living with the Dead series is a better ending than I have expected.

In this last book, we follow Dave and Sarah who are living a quiet life in a farmhouse somewhere in Montana after their heart pounding adventure in the previous book. This time though, Dave was reluctant to leave the farm but Sarah thinks otherwise, until a chopper landed on their yard revealing Nicole and The Kid asking them to go back to some lab in Seattle with them, wherein they have continued the research about the cure and the process of exterminating hordes of the undead using the cure.

Eventually, Dave got Sarah to agree to go back to Seattle where the apocalypse began, and there, a new adventure began. They met new people, fought more zombies to clear out some parts of the university, fixing the fence, unfolding secrets in which Sarah had her fair share of and betrayal.

Towards the middle of the novel, Sarah confessed that she's pregnant and she have been keeping it from Dave and everyone all along, that is why she didn't want to leave for Seattle in the first place. But there seemed to be something wrong with their baby, it seemed that it has acquired Dave's 'bionic' traits and it grows faster everyday. With this, Sarah and Dave have attracted some unexpected guests from the previous book and are now after their little Zombie.

I honestly find it quite unoriginal, with the fast paced pregnancy and the physical toll it brought to Sarah, add to that Dave's cold reaction and feelings towards their baby. It really reminded me of Stephenie Meyer's Breaking Dawn, but then again, it's entertaining, especially that readers get to read about Dave's thoughts about the events and an additional narrator was added when Sarah was knocked out and kidnapped towards the end of the story. At the end, as expected, they managed to survive another breathtaking and life-risking event which saved the world from further destruction and slowly restored it to become a safer and livable place.

It was still action packed and still gives me the urge to keep on reading until the very last page. And although it has become quite Breaking Dawn-ish and had some errors in the text, I still loved it. Four cookies!

Eat.Slay.Love by Jesse Petersen

Yes, I pledge guilty for being addicted in reading the books in this series and you can put all the blame to Jesse Petersen. I just had to buy the third book (in ebook form) in the Living with the Dead series after finishing the second one. Although the second book was lengthy enough, still I can't get enough of Sarah and David; I just sort of fell in love with them and their story.

I honestly liked this book better than the previous ones in the series. I guess it's because of the less predictable scenarios and more action filled pages. Zombies doesn't seem to be the main problem of Sarah and David now in this part of the series, and I liked that the author was able to look into the fact that fellow humans are also a huge threat to other survivors but she was able to balance out the situation with Kathleen's character and her crew.

Found bits of errors in the text though, like misused words and wrong use of linking verbs, but it may just be because I was reading the ebook format. Anyway, the ending was a bit lacking as usual, but at some point I really thought that it was the last book in the series. I just sort of fell in love with Sarah and David, that at some point I got disappointed thinking it was the last book, but alas! It is not.

It was a short read, but it's something zombie novel lovers would definitely enjoy. :) Four cookies and a high five! haha :D

Flip This Zombie by Jesse Petersen

As I have mentioned with my previous review of the first book in the Living with the Dead series, the story left me asking for more and true enough, the second book in the series filled the lacking space that the first book left. So I acquired an ebook of the second book and started reading away as if I've nothing to do at all.

In the second book, we follow Dave and Sarah forming some sort of a trade business during the apocalypse by means of zombie extermination. They were tasked to kill zombies for other survivors in exchange for supplies, and with their team work and what seemed to be a stronger marriage, they slashed and fired away every zombie in their way.

Until they came across a scientist who claims to have been studying the "epidemic" and who is in the process of finding the cure in an underground lab of an old military warehouse. The scientist hired them and sent them to missions where they encountered stronger zombies which apparently revived some of the logic left in them, that made Sarah and Dave call them "bionics". During their first mission, they have also come across with a pre-teen boy, whom they address to as "The Kid" throughout the story.

Towards the latter part of the novel, the couple discovered far difficult challenges more than the apocalypse itself, and it's the mad-scientist, the cure and Dave getting bitten.

The second book is definitely better than the first book. Far more exciting and action packed and more witty, if I must say. Not as disappointingly short either. I honestly liked it better than the first one. The language situation was practically the same though, but it gave the book a more personal diary feel to it, as if Sarah was really writing it herself rather than just plainly narrating it.

I really can't wait to read Eat. Slay. Love. :) This deserves four cookies.

Married With Zombies by Jesse Petersen

Thanks to Manel Loureiro, I decided to go on a Zombie novel reading marathon. I am having my internship and the vacant time could get really boring, so I decided to give Jesse Petersen a shot with the first part of the Living with the Dead series, Married with Zombies.

Married with Zombies tells us the tale of a married couple Sarah and David who, at the time of the spark of the apocalypse, were at the brink of divorce and are going to couple's counseling. During one of their sessions they noticed that the road was unusually practically empty, considering that they live in Seattle wherein traffic was just part of their lives. Apart from that, they found their therapist ripping the client before them into shreds.

With the world starting to fall apart and humanity into shambles and hordes of the undead, Sarah and David realized and learned far greater things about themselves and their relationship, which eventually saved their marriage and made them stronger.

This is really a good book to read if you are a fan of zombie novels or if you're just looking for an easy, adventure packed, book. Although it lacks more story towards the end, still it was action packed and a really enjoyable book to read. It will definitely leave you asking for more of it, so I'm giving this book four cookies for the awesome, action-packed adventure.