Alternative to Google Reader

Google has announced that it will shut down it's popular RSS aggregator - Google Reader on July 1st. I've been a user of Google Reader only for the past year and I've grown to love its simplistic features. Knowing that the end is near for my beloved Reader, I searched online for alternatives but it's not as near as simple and functional as Google Reader. Then I hit gold when I bumped with The Old Reader.



It's interface is more stylish but still simple enough to make your move from the Old Google Reader to The Old reader seamless. Import your data now and give it a try.

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Taiwan Fishingboat incident - Rejects Philippine's Apology

It's sad that there has been a casualty with the fishing boat incident a couple of days ago. Taiwan has pressured the Philippines to issue an apology only to reject it. I don't think an apology should have been issued in the first place. As detailed by Max Montero's blog, if our coast guard was right in their actions then our government should have maintained their position in doing clarificatory investigations.

As an OFW, I feel for our countrymen who are currently in Taiwan. With reports coming in that some of them have been physically harmed by some angry Taiwanese. Taiwan already have frozen the hiring of OFWs and I think our government should do the same and send back all the OFWs in Taiwan to protect them and bring them safe back to their families. They can get jobs from other countries or maybe even in the Philippines with our economy getting strong by the day and maybe Taiwan will also realize how important our OFW's roles in their economy.

Our country has been poached by Chinese fishermen for a while now. We kept silent to keep our good relations with them but this is not the right way to do things. We have a territory to protect and I don't think they will react differently if we do the same thing on their own waters.

We just hope that this issue will be resolved in a peaceful manner. With both countries finding common ground to agree and settle the differences.

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The Best of #IpasokSiDick Twitter Posts

So far the May 2013 results have been dissapointing. If you need to cope here is the best hashtag in twitterverse in the past 24 hours:

People will really feel good if Dick's in. #ipasoksidick

— pyoning (@FionaElgar) May 13, 2013

#IpasokSiDick Need to push Dick hard! Dick is firm and hard, yet straight. Lol

— Myrna T. Soriano (@myrnasoriano) May 13, 2013

DICK GORDON + NANCY BINAY + GRACE POE = #IPasokSiDick sa Maitim na #POEssy.

— Ayyy Grabe!! (@AyyyGrabe) May 13, 2013

LMAO on this photo. I just died hahaha!!! Everybody wants the D! Top position na! Dick FTW! #ipasoksidick twitter.com/Meggymeister/s…

— Meg Gomez (@Meggymeister) May 14, 2013

Even famous twitter peeps joined the action:

Dick Gordon is 1 spot away from making the top 12 for Senator. A Dick hasn't faced this much drama since Kobe was in Colorado. #IpasokSiDick

— Not Bill Walton (@NotBillWalton) May 13, 2013

mag-titinginan nalang ba tayo?#ipasokSiDick

— Sam Gogna (@sam_yg) May 13, 2013

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Philippine Elections 2013 : Quick Results

So who will be the new 12 senators for this May 13 Philippine Elections? Official results here.

These were my picks:

1) Teddy Casi᠋no

2) Risa Hontiveros

3) Jun Magsaysay Jr.

4) Eddie Villanueva

5) Sonny Angara

6) Koko Pimentel

7) Richard Gordon



I'm going with a lot of "new breed" of politicians. I do hope they can make a difference.

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Philippines Election 2013 : A Democratic Practice?

Warning: I'm letting off steam.

Voting should be a democratic practice. But election has tainted this with widespread cheating, terrorism, violence and dirty politics.

Three decades has passed in my life and I'm still seeing the same names and surnames in the ballots. I can't wait for the new breed of politicians to arrive from my generation or the younger ones and just breathe new life to the Phillipine public office. And maybe new idealism and less corruption will drive our country to new heights.

Please vote wisely in May 13, 2013.

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A 100 Posts Later

For my 100th post, I look back and can't believe it's been 5 years already and still only 100 posts. I have slacked off posting on this blog for the past couple of years. I was infatuated and got disinterested with SEO. The landscape of blogging has changed tremendously in the past couple of years. Blogger's influence have grown now that businesses acknowledged the shift of media from conventional TV & radio to Internet where majority of the consumers generation spend more of their time with.

I'm far from a perfect blogger because most of my time is pre-occupied with real life stuff – Work and Parenting. Now that I'm finding balance with my career, finances and family... I expect that time for travel and leisure will be finding it's on my schedule. A scheduled 1 month long vacation is highly anticipated and that is what will be in store for the rest of the year for this blog – a chronicle of a well-thought (I hope) schedule to enjoy a well deserved rest.

Food, travel and shopping – probably the best trio of things to look forward to after 12 months of hard-work and sacrifice. More experiences = more content for this ageing blog.

I find my inspiration knowing that someone out there will be reading my blog and being able to share my adventure.

Cheers to a hundred more posts!

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World Balance Base Camp

The pair of men’s Base Camp Sneakers from World Balance comes with synthetic leather uppers with suede and perforated panels. It features a round toe with front lace fastening, a lightly padded collar, cushioned lining, and a vulcanized rubber outsole.



I'm not a big fan of World Balance but the style of this sneakers is too cool to pass up. If you're looking for casual shoes you can wear any day, for Php 1,399 you can buy this at Zalora through this page.

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Crushing on the Sony Xperia SP

Fearless Forecast: Sony will be the 3rd leading mobile manufacturer in 2013. With a strong line-up of new phones coming up in a few months, Sony is poised to take on a bigger share of the smartphone market. Starting with their flagship release and in my opinion the prettiest looking mobile phone - the Xperia Z. Sony will follow this up by releasing what I expect to be a mid-level category phone Xperia SP.



Sony Xperia SP boasts of the following specifications:

4.6-inch 720p HD Reality Display

1.7GHz dual-core Snapdragon processor

3G and LTE capable

1GB RAM and 8GB internal storage (expandable via micro SD slot)

Pre-installed with Android 4.1

8MP rear camera capable of recording 1080p videos

Available in 3 colours: Black, White and Red

My favorite part is the he notification light, which is more than an eye candy since it can change the lighting color based on an activity such as playing music content the lighting will resemble the album artwork and pulse in beat with the music. You can also assign lighting color to your contacts so you will know instantly who is calling you without even looking at the screen. Pretty neat right?



I'm psyched at the direction Sony is taking to be competitive in the on going smartphone wars and pissed off at the same time by being tempted to buy a new phone.

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Fantasy Hoops Recap 2012 - 2013

With two more weeks before the regular season of Fantasy basketball ends, here's just a recap of my 2012-2013:

Best Waiver wire Pick-up: Tie between Nikola Vucevic and JJ Hickson - Both of these guys have been monster off the boards and averages double-double in points and rebounds. Honorable mention: Chandler Parsons, Greivis Vasquez, Larry Sanders

Best Rookie: Damian Lillard. By a mile.

Most Disappointing Season: Ersan Ilyasova - a couple of good games here and there. But has been pretty decent in the last four weeks but his start until the middle of the season was horrendous. After a stellar season last year and signing a big contract, Ilyasova's current season is far from a succesful one. Honorable mention: Pau Gasol, Dwight Howard, Deron Williams

Overachievers: Brook Lopez, David Lee, Steph Curry - these players were under the radar due to their injury history but being healthy this season, they finally hit their stride and more.

My top 3 players for the season (and maybe until next season): 1) Lebron James 2) Kevin Durant 3) James Harden (i have 1 team with both Durant and Harden - monster kill).

Players to watch out next season): 1) Paul George 2) Larry Sanders 3) Ty Lawson 4) Kenneth Faried - these guys will be very high on my list.

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Futureproof Technology

I have a 2011 Samsung Galaxy Ace android phone. At that time, it was still running Gingerbread version out of the box. That seems to be lightyears from now the way that updates are coming out. Samsung has stop supporting updates for my phone after Gingerbread. Then came Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean updates and my phone is proper-outdated.

Luckily, there are people from XDA Forums, who still develop custom ROMs. WTF is a ROM? If you're living under a rock (in a techy geek's perspective) One of the best things about the openness of the Android platform is that if you're unhappy with the stock OS, you can install one of many modified versions of Android (called ROMs) on your device. Thus, my outdated device is not so outdated anymore:



If you compare 2011 smartphone specifications to that of 2012, you'd be surprised to see the gap in terms of chipsets and display. But functionality is unique to every individual. If you use your mobile mostly to play games then graphics and memory specifications are gold to you. But if you're like me who just use it for calls, sms, social networking and playing music - then you don't need any cutting edge specification to get your fix.

Ever since the Nokia 5510 days, Filipinos are enamored by the use of Mobile phones. It has become almost a necessity for any individual. There's also comes the unecessary pressure of trying to keep up with the latest releases if you're that type of person. But to me, I don't feel like I need to invest that amount of money to something that will depreciate in value in a matter of months. I'd rather put my money into traveling - invest in experiences... they last a lot longer. Futureproofed.

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Summer on a Budget

What I like most about the Philippines is you have tons of things to do and places to go without having to spend much money. Summer is approaching and I know everyone has set their sights on Boracay or Palawan but both can be on the expensive side even if you do some cost-cutting by using cheap lodging facilities. These destinations can also get very crowded during peak seasons.

If you're exploring some alternatives here are a couple tips for you:

1) Go to Ibilik and browse for condo accomodation rentals. You can rent it with your barkada and use their amenities (pools, gym). No need to buy expensive meals since you can use the kitchen to make your own meals. Rates are usually around Php 800 to 1,500 / night. Cut down transportation cost and look for condo rentals near your place.

2) Go for day trips to Country clubs. Usually these places are for exclusive to members only but due to the low-membership subscription, most of the country clubs offer guest entrance fees. Some examples of these country clubs are the Palms Country Club in Alabang and Mills Country Club in Canlubang, Laguna.



Well that's just some ideas you might want to ponder about when spending your hard earned money and precious vacation leave for this year.

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Cherry Mobile Fusion Tablet - Price and Specs

I admire Cherry mobile for coming up with low cost alternatives for the budget conscious. They recently launched The Cherry Mobile Fusion which is priced at Php3,699. Here are the full specifications:

Screen Type: Capacitive Camera: Front VGA Camera Memory Internal memory: RAM: 512MB Internal Storage: 8GB Battery: 3000mAh Data Connectivity: Wi-Fi and USB Port CPU: Android Ice Cream Sandwich; Single Core Display: 7-inch display WVGA resolution Bluetooth: None



This is something I would buy if I don't have a smartphone but since I do it won't make sense to buy a tablet with a much lower specs. If you plan on buying those cheap ass no-name china brands, I'd say just buy this tablet. The 1 year warranty will give you some peace of mind and the facility of customer & technical support.

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Room Fit-Out Inspiration 01

I'm planning to redocarate our room and I've been sifting through some designs over the web and found this one:

Eclectic Bedroom design by Little Rock Interior Designer Tobi Fairley Interior Design

I like the idea of putting curtains to separate the bed area from the mini-living room area. Every now and then I'll put up some pictures of some design inspirations for some sort of "reminder to self"post.

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The OFW Life

The very bright outlook of the Philippine's economomy can be attributed to two things: 1) The remittance from OFWs and 2) The BPO sector. The latter has been from the longest time the source of many families income. When I was a kid, I often hear a parent of a cousin or a playmate working in Saudi or Abu Dhabi. I don't even have an idea where the hell in the map thouse countries are and in Abu Dhabi's case it's not even a country.

Here I am working as an OFW and from my early experience, I have nothing but the utmost respect to all my countrymen who worked or still working abroad. OFW's are a "different breed of animals" and to get a deeper understanding of this you need to go through the process yourself. I liken an OFW's life to a soldier that has been sent to war. Like a soldier, you get sent to the "enemy's" terrritory. You only hoped that your life experiences have prepared or trained you to face all the obstacles along the way.

You fight the "war" for 1 or 2 years depending your employment contract. Then you get to go home but at the back of your mind nothing will ever be the same. You're not the same person who left the country for the first time. You came back hardened by the tough experiences you went through abroad. Along the way, you meet people who will try to break your will and people who's will have already broken. You keep yourself sane and balance by thinking about the people you left behind. I see myself as a ranking officer of the platoon, who needs to be strong-minded to lead the other soldiers to war and keeep them safe so they can come back to their families.

Like a soldier, you fight for the "cause" -- to liberate your family from proverty or secure them a brighter future.

We often hear that the OFWs are our modern day heroes. People don't know how much of an understatement this is and why I think like soldiers who fought the war, they are not given enough credit due to them. While the Philippines' economy enjoy the fruits of our labor, we OFWs continue to fight everyday to provide food on the table and roof to shelter our families. Maybe it's about time the government do something more for us.

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Real Friends - Three Songs About The Past Year Of My Life

Just noticed that it's been a while since I got hooked on some new music. My fave bands like Quietdrive, Yellowcard and Dangerous Summer have been producing subpar music compared to their debut albums. So I browsed to my favorite music site with hopes to discover some good stuff. After reading reviews, I decided I might try this:

Three Songs... is the perfect pop punk EP. It’s made up of three honest, catchy tracks that will bounce out of the traps and into the hearts of the pop punk fans of the world. “Dirty Water” is an organic feeling catchy opener with a fresh, but tired air to it. The lyrics, whilst somewhat simplistic, have a relatability to them that is irrepressible and incredibly likable. They also have an honesty to them that sets Real Friends apart from others. Lyrics such as “I said I'm selfish, I'm a liar and I'm broken/ Shit runs through my head everyday that I would never tell anyone” - Kelly Doherty (absolutepunk.net)

Next stop... download site. *evil grin*

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Readability - My 2012 App of the Year

Smartphones have changed the landscape of how we use the internet. Gone are the days we are fixed to our Desktops and bulky laptops to view e-mails and browse the web. I stumbled upon an app called Readability while searching for a bookmarking tool for my Opera browser (yes, I'm no longer a Chrome user).



Readability is an application that converts web pages into a clean, comfortable reading view, with syncing to allow for the reading of articles at a later date. The interface is also very clean and simple. The ability to cross platforms is also a very neat feature. Supposed you came across an article in your browser but have no time to read it you can just save it in Readability and on the way home use your Smartphone or your Kindle to load the article. Converting the web page into a more readable format makes it faster for you to download the page in 3G connection and also make it easier to view it in smaller screens.

Easily the app of the year in my opinion.

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8 Suites Tagaytay - Review

Last December 2011, we had a 1 night stay in 8 Suites Tagaytay from a deal I bought in DealGrocer. It was a perfect December weather -- Cool and the air is moist from the constant drizzle.



The elegant bath tub positioned beside the window.



Linens and pillows are of very good quality. Slept like a baby.



How about having breakfast on this breathtaking view?



A+ for the quality of the drapery used.



Being on a remote location, the cable signal is not too good. Their Wifi was not working the day we went there but the good thing is you can request for DVD and books. B



Dock for your iPhone.

Aside from the bland food and menu choices, we enjoyed our short but luxurious stay in 8suites.

Grade: B-

Best Feature: Chocolate themed colors for the rooms

Website: http://www.8suites.com/

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Fantasy Basketball 2012 - 2013

NBA 2012-2013 season has just started and it only means my favorite past time has begun - "NBA Fantasy Basketball". I'm currently playing in 20+ leagues. How I will manage that? I don't know. But I'm pretty sure it will keep me busy until May 2013 and just a couple of months after will be my long awaited homecoming to the Philippines. If you want to play just go to Yahoo! Sports Fantasy site or ESPN Fantasy Basketball.

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Reboot - Restart - Refresh

Call it however you like it, this blog is back with a vengeance! It's been a while since my last post (1 year and 4 months to be precise) and now I'm back. Older, wiser and with a lot of stories to tell and nasty(?) opinions to dish out.

I've contemplated if I should close this blog and start a new one. But my sentimental side has gotten the best of me when I realized this site is 4 year old not to mention having a Page Rank 1 isn't too bad also.

To start with, I'm officially an OFW. Rewind to 2008, I quit my then 3 year job for an opportunity to work in Abu Dhabi. Then the sub-prime crisis came in and destroyed my dreams. Fast-forward to 2012, I'm here somewhere in the Middle East working for my newly reformed aspirations. I'm married and have a daughter to come home to after a few more months which could not have been possible if the recession didn't happen in 2008. Interesting how life works. I can throw all the cliches out there like "every cloud has a silver lining" but it's the truest of words.

With new experiences and challenges ahead, there will be changes to this blog because I'm not looking at it as monetary tool anymore. Hence, no ads or paid posts only fresh and unbiased opinions.

So now, here's to a frest start and let The Brix Life ver 2.0 experience begin!
(commencing blog walk to get some audience.. ^^)

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Blessings

Just got back from Asian Hospital as dad was confined again due to his asthma. Watched TV for 1 1/2 day which is a good thing to relax after a busy week and before another hectic schedule. The room was nice and the environment is like staying on a three star hotel. Of course, the bills will be expensive but thank God for health cards.

This previous year I've learned a lot about Architecture due to my new project which is a Mixed Use Building. I've also got more experience on stuff like Elevators, Aluminum Claddings, Stone finishes etc. Now I have a deeper appreciation when I see stuff such as those. I walk inside the elevator and notice the mirror finish for the interior walls. I learned the difference between a Mirror and hairline finish.

I now appreciate the small nuisances about glass walls and it's aluminum frame. I've learned a lot. It's a good thing knowing that I'm gaining such valuable knowledge that I can use in the future specially now that I'm a father.

I also wonder about the Nurses working in the hospital. Knowing how hard it is to find worse a nurse here, I feel that they appreciate and feel very lucky working in a high end hospital. I noticed that the scrubs for men were not as bad I thought. The cloth feelsl itchy though.

http://www.blueskyscrubs.com/categories/Scrubs/

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