My life in comics and cartoons
These cartoons represent my state of mind right now.
Kim and I are in the thick of preparations for moving out of this house and into another one. We’re moving! The daily travel to the office has taken its toll and me and I really have to live closer to QC.
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So it’s three days to Christmas and I haven’t wrapped a single gift for anyone.
It’s funny how the Christmas season just crept up on me. I haven’t had the chance to walk around Ayala to see the lights, or to visit even one single church to see the traditional Belens. I haven’t eaten puto bungbong, or a single bibingka. I haven’t een heard Gary Valenciano croon ‘Pasko na, Sinta ko’ over the radio.
In the next two days I will be panicking to get gifts for my inaanaks. The good old standbys await: children’s books. Two years ago I got toys for my godchildren and less than an hour after they tore off the gift wrap, they were bored with the toys and left them on the floor and whoosh! they were off to play with something else: the boxes of the other presents they received.
When I was a kid, the best toy I ever received for Christmas apart from the Parisian doll I got (I loved her so much - she was so beautiful! She had a long, flowing walking dress that was a tartan green and ivory. I called her ‘Claudine’ only being six years old, I spelled her name ‘ClOudine’) was this wiggly, pull-along caterpillar with big, googgly eyes.
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‘Cars’ is my favorite cartoon movie of the year. My favorite character is the old, rusty tow truck Mater, Lightning McQueen’s best friend. I’ve seen the movie like five times on DVD, and I haven’t grown tired of it yet. It’s not hilarious, but it’s funny-comfortable, and it makes me miss my friends. I am reminded of my college friends Nova and Elias and all the silly and stupid and hilarious (but at the time I suppose all of of us were thinking we were being serious) conversations. We hadn’t an idea yet what sort of lives we were going to have, and everything revolved around presswork for the Philippine Collegian’s weekly issues (because we were all together, because we were doing something meaningful, because it was a time when we felt most creative and productive and there was no money involved at all. )
‘FoxTrot’ is one of my favorite cartoon strips. The three Fox children drive me nuts, Peter, Paige and Jason. Especially Jason the geek and his pet iguana Quincy.
Earlier this year I bought a Foxtrot desk calendar, and every day when I flip the dates there’s a cartoon that makes me either guffaw or at least smile. This strip makes me wish that I had more siblings (I love my sister Majalla and I’m so lucky to have her for an ate, but I it also would’ve been great if we both had an older brother who would take us to, say, Enchanted Kingdom every time we feel like going nuts and buy us all the Yellow Can Pizza we could eat.
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‘Pugad Baboy’ was my dad’s favorite comic strip. I don’t know where all the Pugad Baboy books we bought for him as gifts have gone. I haven’t seen them around the house for the longest time. Knowing my father, he must’ve loaned them to our neighbors’ kids whom he was always trying to encourage to like books.
After he died in September 2003, it was never the same reading the strip. My dad loved dogs, and sometimes he would pretend that his dogs (Misty and Bruno) could talk like Polgas. We used to laugh hearing him have his conversations with Misty. Misty was also very smart (she died in 2004), and it always did look like she understood everything Papa said: she would prick her ears and cock her head at a questioning angle and look at Papa like if she could, she would tell him "You’re being silly!"
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It’s proof that I’ve become more flexible and relaxed that I’ve grown to like Hello Kitty.
This Hello Kitty is pink - I like the original red one. Hello Kitty and Hello Mimi.
I can’t explain it, but I just woke up one day liking Hello Kitty and I went to the Sanrio shop to get a small button with her on it. I haven’t gone crazy and gotten anything else, because I always fight the urge to buy.
The Sanrio mascot I always liked was Tuxedo Sam the penguin. Because he was a penguin. Hello Kitty I thought was way too cute, and hence way too corny.
Now? Well, I’ve been wearing more colors now apart from blue and grey - I can wear pale yellow and pale pink, so that should indicate that I’m more flexible and I can take cuteness in inanimate, non-live objects now.
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Three days to Christmas and all I want is for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to be ousted from office.
