green thumb

i've always thought that i have poor relationship with plants or flowers. first, i dont like flowers. second, im not sure if im the type of person who can take care of a plant. i have been telling my friend that i want to buy a plant for my place but i only said it in passing. last christmas, to my surprise, my friend gave me a plant (supposedly a common bamboo plant) -- she loves plants and has a garden -- so she took a piece of her bamboo tree and planted it in a vase and gave it to me.

i was so excited!! i couldn't wait to bring it home! but at the same time i was nervous.. what if it dies under my watch!! i would feel like a failure! so being a bamboo plant, ive decided to name her.. Bambi. i remember taking a pic of the plant when i first got it but i guess i wasn't able to save a copy.

so i got Bambi around dec 15 or 16, 2011. during the christmas break, i went to subic with my family (dec 23-25) so i made sure i gave Bambi a lot of water. then i came back home on dec 26, watered her like crazy, then i went to cebu the next day until dec 30. on dec 31, i saw some of poor Bambi's leaves turning yellow. oh no! less than 2 weeks and she's dying?? i felt guilty so i poured so much water that the water overflowed and i had to place a mat under the vase to keep it dry. dec 31 to jan 1 i went back to my family's house.

my life returned to normal starting jan 2 and i was able to care for Bambi daily.. to my surprise, on jan 13, i saw 2 shoots (?) of leaves sprouting from the top part of the plant!!! i was so excited i immediately took a pic of the leaves.

can you spot the two light green leaves? yes, i was such a proud 'mama'.

on jan 28, again i was happy when i saw another new leaf sprouting.. this time at the lower area where most of the leaves used to turn yellow. yes, i thought Bambi's alive!

a long leaf standing tall amidst the grown leaves.. below you can see the yellowed leaves that have fallen from its branches.

here's a pic of the top area yesterday.. the 2 sets of leaves are now in full bloom!

maybe i have a secret green thumb after all! i dont think this plant will ever sprout flowers.. maybe next time i can grow flowers too. my friend did tell me that if ever Bambi dies i can give the vase back to her and she will give me a new plant!!

i will try to upload Bambi's growth for the next couple of months :)

dec 2011 booklist

54. katie klein - cross my heart
3.5 stars: while i liked the overall story, i thought the lame twist at the end seemed forced just so to have a dramatic climax. but working of the premise that parker is an undercover cop, can't believe the girl took long to forgive him. yes, he lied but that was his job. i think she was just too young or immature to understand. on the other hand, what is a 22 year old doing, messing with a young girl while on the job. you can say it's love but still have some professionalisn and he even put her in harm's way. so overall, i felt that they were too young to have this kind of relationship. maybe if the girl was in college and he was a fresh cop, the story would have been more reasonable. and why does blake have to be the bad guy in the end? why can't they just break up because the relationship is not working anymore? i think that's the trouble with some stories dealing with third parties... the boyfriend or girlfriend should not always be the bad guy or girl. sometimes relationships just dont work out.

55. jennifer jabaley - crush control
3.5 stars: the story spent too much time with quinton and the girl and less on max and the girl. all we know is that max and the girl have communicated all these years but when she was back in town, there weren't a lot of scenes of max and the girl.. so i felt like either what they were feeling was due to their puppy love when they were kids or their constant communication has turned the crush into love. and i felt sorry for quinton, all through out the story he was "controlled" by the spell so we didnt have the chance to really meet quinton as normal person.

56. toni blake - holly lane
4 stars: ive never really liked sue ann that much in the previous books but i was surprised and felt for her when jeff cheated and left her. her confused feelings and refusal to love adam back maybe a bit painful to read chapter after chapter but it was a reasonable concern. however, if i were her friends, i wouldn't encourage her to start another relationship so quickly after her divorce. she should have let her heart heal first before diving back to love. on the other hand, adam is someone everyone knows and is considered a good guy so i can understand why her friends were fine with it. i didn't like adam's scroogy side and his xmas carol-like side plot, it was cheesy and didn't add much value to the story -- i skipped those parts. and jeff was portrayed as a good guy for the past three books and he suddenly changed to a jerk without reason. hope there were also more scenes of sue ann and jeff to better explain why he did it.

57. abby mcdonald - boys, bears and a serious pair of hiking boots
3.5 stars: the green teen was a bit extreme, other wise this is an ok story, a bit predictable coz even though there were 3 guys, it was so obvious from the very start who she will end up with (it's always the rude mysterious boy!).

i was only able to read half of what i read in 2010, but that's okay..i still enjoyed the books.. looking forward to another year of good reads!!

Eggplant with tomato sauce recipe

Im not a good cook. Ive never even had training in cooking aside from the few times my mom taught me some dishes at home. Now that im living on my own i wanted to learn how to cook. At least just enough not to starve and resort to buying take outs everyday coz that would be expensive and unhealthy.

And so i have invented my own recipes using whatever food supply i have at home.

Last friday my friend and i ate at cantinetta and ordered baked eggplant. It was so good it tasted like lasagna. Tonight i opened my ref and saw that i only have 2 pieces of eggplant left. Inspired, i decided to create my own version.

Ingredients:
2 eggplant, sliced into pieces
1 small can of chili corned tuna
1 pouch of spaghetti sauce

Procedure:
Mix eggplant with salt and pepper and cook til it softens. On the other side, heat the tuna with the spaghetti sauce. Once eggplant is cooked mix them with the sauce and add quickmelt cheese and let it simmer. Voila! Instant dinner!

I substituted tomato sauce with spaghetti sauce to add flavor. I used tuna instead of beef as a healthy alternative. Then i added cheese to have that cheesy lasagna taste. The chili in the tuna also helped with the taste.

Movies 2011

I must admit im a huge movie fan. I love catching all the blockbuster movies in cinemas and watching not too popular or indie or foreign films at home. Im not a movie critic though i prefer to watch and rate a movie solely based on whether i liked it or if i would watch it again. My goal this year was to watch 100 movies either in the cinema, at home or inside the airplane. Unfortunately with simulataneously traveling for work, reading books and watching all my fave tv shows and korean dramas i wasnt able to meet my target. But thats okay.

So here are a list of the movies i watched this year in no particular order. Most were released in 2011 with a few from 2010.
1 charlie st cloud
2 love in disguise
3 lady shogun and her man
4 k-20
5 green hornet
6 the rite
7 tangled 3d
8 easy a
9 thirst
10 just go with it
11 muk gong
12 cirque du freak
13 black swan
14 i am no four
15 transformers 2
16 adjustment bureau
17 red riding hood
18 rango
19 catch me im in love
20 limitless
21 lincoln lawyer
22 how do you know
23 rio
24 taken
25 beastly
26 thor
27 king's speech
28 something borrowed
29 pirates of the caribbean 4
30 kungfu panda 2
31 i love you philip morris
32 country strong
33 the dilemma
34 arthur
35 source code
36 hall pass
37 cowboys vs aliens
38 harry potter deathly hollows
39 hop
40 xmen first class
41 paul
42 hangover 2
43 super 8
44 green lantern
44 mr popper's penguins
45 transformers 3 3d
46 captain america
47 remember me
48 sorcerors apprentice
49 larry crowne
50 one day
51 crazy stupid love
52 no strings attached
53 zombadings
54 johnny english reborn
55 the change up
56 whats your number
57 horrible bosses
58 real steel
59 bad teacher
60 in time
61 puss in boots 3d
62 tower heist
63 immortals
64 new years eve
65 tucker and dale vs evil
67 attack the block
68 trespass
69 trust
70 fright night
71 happy feet 2 3d
72 adventures of tintin 3d
73 prom

If you ask me what were the 10 movies in 2011 that i watched that left an impression on me, i would say in no particular order:
Source code
Limitless
Lincoln lawyer
Kings speech
Xmen first class
Captain america
Crazy stupid love
Zombadings
Adventures of tintin
Real steel

Special mention to green hornet - the movie wasnt that good but its jay chou's first hollywood movie and his portrayal of kato made the movie fun!

Films that i had high expectations of but got disappointed were adjustment bureau, pirates 4, cowboys vs aliens, in time, immortals.

One movie that i missed watching because i was out of town was mission impossible ghost protocol!! Grr!!

Looking forward to next year's movies!!