Last week, my grandfather, who has been engulfed by senility since about three months ago, needed to have another operation. If I’m not mistaken, this was his second operation, the first one being the NGT installation in his nasal area.

If you do not know what the purpose of an NGT is, it is administered so food can be suctioned into the body, without the need for someone to chew his/her food, before all the necessary nutrients can be had.

This time around, however, the operation was for the installation of an NGT in his stomach area, because apparently, it is more efficient, and it is easier to maintain. Unlike the nasal NGT, this one is safer since food goes directly to the stomach, and its location also lessens the propensity of my grandfather to pull out the tube unconsciously.

Needless to say, the operation needed four days for my lolo‘s complete recuperation, and it also necessitated huge sums for the operation costs. It’s a good thing though that my grandfather has a seniors life insurance package that covered all the expenses that he incurred from the operation.

I really hope that this new food intake method will do him more good this time around.

I am not usually a music junkie. I don’t keep track of certain artists for their songs, because I tend to just appreciate good music when I hear it, but I don’t actively seek out information about the artist, or the album, or its release date, or its record label. Do you get the picture?

But lately, I have been addicted to one particular artist, and when I say addicted, I mean I play her songs on loop 25 hours a day, 8 days a week. Again, do you get the picture?

I was actually just busily idling my time away on that boring day of April (notice the oxymoronic statement there), when I came across a blog entry that featured one of her songs. Adele was singing ‘Turning Tables’ in an AOL acoustic session, and I was immediately captivated by her musicality, the profound lyrics, her enthralling voice, and most especially, her heartfelt rendition.

Yes, I am talking about THE Adele.

After watching that video, I immediately scoured the internet for more of her songs, and in no time, I was able to download all her songs from her self-titled album. I was smitten, and regardless of how many times I listened to her songs, they were still poignantly painful to listen to.

‘Don’t You Remember’, a hauntingly sad song about wanting a lover back, particularly tugged at my heart’s strings, and I am just in awe at how profoundly honest its lyrics are. Listen:

‘Cause I know I have a fickle heart,

And a bitterness,

And a wandering eye,

And a heaviness in my head.

But don’t you remember the reason you loved me before?

Baby please remember me once more.’

It couldn’t get any more painful than that. Adele says it without restraint, and as she does so, she infuses her rich brand of musicality into her songs.

Brilliant, just absolutely brilliant.

Last Saturday, after doing the rounds in Cebu’s Colon area, I was finally able to look for a boarding house where I can stay at while I study in the nearby University of San Carlos.

It was a great relief when I finally saw a vacant room that was located in a decent place, that had decent amenities, and had a decent floor space (read: I would not need to sleep standing up). The room was originally for around $125 a month, but after using the haggling skills that my mom taught me, I was able to convince the owner to bring it down to $85.

I was so ecstatic to have a found a place after nearly a day of wandering aimlessly around (it was SCORCHING HOT by the way) that I called up my dad and told him of the deal. He immediately advised me to reserve the room, because he also felt that that was a good find.

The main reason why I wanted that room so much was because it was just a stone’s throw away from my future school (fingers crossed here), and its location is rather peaceful. Most of the boarders there, I also gathered, were teachers, so the place is quiet most of the time. Just perfect for law schooling.

The only problem that I saw though, was that the front lawn needed trimming. Oversized patches of grasses were not pleasant to look at, and there were several flower pots that contained lifeless plants.

But anyway, I thought, I could just get a honda mower and get rid of all the unwanted eyesore. That will be my first itinerary right after I move in, which by the way, is slated on the 7th of June. But of course, I first need to pass the entrance exam.

This is it! Wish me luck guys!

Now, I have more reasons not to watch American Idol. I swear, the sentiments are verging on hate, not just indifference, because this talent show is clearly going down the drain with America’s consistently wrong choices for who it eliminates.

The last casualty, as everyone knows, is the extremely talented Casey Abrams. Compared to the remaining AI contenders, Casey was an absolute favorite from the start — and this was not just because of his innate charm, because more than this, his musical chops is just simply incomparable to the rest.

Yes, he may not have the most memorable voice in the bunch, but the soulfulness of his voice is always something that I’ve always looked forward to hearing week after week after week. He may be a white man — yes, conceded — but his musical style is distinctly jazzy and bluesy.

Which is why it evades all reasoning why he was eliminated in the last episode. No one in the bunch deserved to advance further into the finals than Casey, especially with the earlier eliminations of the powerful belter Pia Toscano and the unconventional Paul McDonald.

My personal take on why this fiasco had to happen: unmemorable judges’ comments.

If you listen to what the judges have to say this season, their comments mainly constitute of praises to high heavens, even when at times, even a nincompoop knows that the rendition was boring and sleepy. Obviously, what steered the direction of voter’s choices before was Simon’s unapologetic critiques.

He called an atrocity an atrocity, and he praised a beautiful piece when he saw one.

Yes, everyone may have said that Simon has not been missed thus far in the show, but at the rate things are going, I sure do miss his honest comments — because I think that he has managed, in the past, to keep the really good singers in the competition and prune out those who are mediocre, boring and predictable.

Right now, however, it’s a voting frenzy — as the judges themselves are the ones leading the voters into the abyss.

If there’s one thing that I can’t stand during summer, it’s the unpredictable weather.

Unlike most summers before when one can expect the sun to hold dominion over the sky on any random day,  right now, it’s a different story altogether. Apparently, with the onslaught of the La Nina phenomenon, the past few weeks have been alternating episodes of sunny and rainy days.

The one thing that I hate about the shifting weather is its impact on my facial skin. You see, my skin is rather sensitive when it comes to the weather condition — so much so that each time I went to Baguio City (the coldest city in the country) in the past, my face was usually peppered with zits.

Perhaps, the sudden breakouts can be attributed to the drastic humidity changes — because with these shifts, my skin is often the first casualty.

Sigh.

Because of this unfortunate reality, I will probably need to purchase acne remedies in the coming days so I can better prepare myself for more drastic weather changes as the summer days continue to drag on.

Here’s to better weather in the coming weeks and months (hopefully).

Cheers.