The Wheel and Axle

Archive for October, 2016

The Walking Ghost of the Diplomat

by on Oct.31, 2016, under My Life, Travel & Culture

The Diplomat Hotel, Baguio City, 03 August 2015

Since it’s Halloween, I thought it would be apt to share a little throwback ghost experience we had in 2015. It was my birthday weekend, and as a huge fan of horror and the supernatural, I decided my friends and I would do a ghost tour on my exact birthday.

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A Strange Doctor

by on Oct.30, 2016, under Film & TV, Geeky

Doctor Strange is the best Marvel movie since Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

I know it seems anathema to think Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man, Captain America: Civil War (i.e. Avengers 2.5, let’s not pretened), and the much-revered Guardians of the Galaxy aren’t as good as the general populace would opine. However, while I did like all these latest films and think they’re good enough, I also feel they’re over-rated – especially Guardians. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has become fairly one-note, and in my opinion they’re dragging the entire arc much longer than they should be doing. The formula has become repetitive.

Not so with Doctor Strange, and I feel the film is the one that has finally breathed fresh air into the MCU and not Guardians of the Galaxy.

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Magandang Gabi ng Kababalaghan

by on Oct.29, 2016, under Film & TV, Travel & Culture

My 90s experience, as with a lot of Filipinos in my age bracket, would not have been complete with the Halloween specials of Noli De Castro’s Magandang Gabi, Bayan.

Every year, I looked forward to the Saturdays just preceding Halloween. It was when the show, which was a typical somewhat square news magazine program, would switch gears and feature interviews, footage, and reenactments, documentary-style, of supposed real life supernatural tales around the country: ghosts, aswang, tikbalang, dwende, the living dead, white ladies, black ladies, possessions, ghouls, fucking floating caskets, and more.

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Here’s to a long weekend of fun and chills!

by on Oct.28, 2016, under Film & TV, Society, Travel & Culture

It’s the start of a four-day weekend (for the Philippines, anyway), so here’s to the coming holiday full of remembering our dearly departed and, of course, some halloween fun!

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Walking Down The Plath

by on Oct.27, 2016, under Literature

27 October 1932 – 11 February 1963

Cinderella
Sylvia Plath

The prince leans to the girl in scarlet heels,
Her green eyes slant, hair flaring in a fan
Of silver as the rondo slows; now reels
Begin on tilted violins to span

The whole revolving tall glass palace hall
Where guests slide gliding into light like wine;
Rose candles flicker on the lilac wall
Reflecting in a million flagons’ shine,

And glided couples all in whirling trance
Follow holiday revel begun long since,
Until near twelve the strange girl all at once
Guilt-stricken halts, pales, clings to the prince

As amid the hectic music and cocktail talk
She hears the caustic ticking of the clock.

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I Heart Hartley

by on Oct.26, 2016, under Film & TV, Queer

Ellen is probably the only lesbian who loves having shirtless hot men frequently appear on her show. And we are eternally grateful for this.

I’m glad she recently got one of my faves, Justin Hartley (Smallville‘s Green Arrow), to come and do this water thing. Because, well, wet Justin Hartley is a hundred times even better than regular Justin Hartley. Too bad his Aquaman show way back when didn’t get picked up.

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Gorgeous at 75

by on Oct.25, 2016, under Film & TV, Geeky

Here is the latest publicity shot of Wonder Woman in next year’s Justice League.

Stunning, isn’t she? To think she’s 75 years old.

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Stupid? No, you’re just self-entitled. (Part 3)

by on Oct.24, 2016, under Snark, Society

Continued From:

Stupid? No, you’re just self-entitled. (Part 2)

7. “Stupid Rules For Performance Reviews.” First off, let me just say that many companies are now doing away with the bell curve. The remaining ones, however, usually have controls to ensure a fair assessment.

There’s a financial component to a stack rank: a company cannot give 100% of its employees a 20% annual raise. It needs to bucketize. Top performers get higher raises, those who meet goals get basic raises, and those who under-perform… well, why reward a lazy freeloader?

Top performers also get to be considered for promotions more often.

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Stupid? No, you’re just self-entitled. (Part 2)

by on Oct.23, 2016, under Snark, Society

Continued From:

Stupid? No, you’re just self-entitled. (Part 1)

4. “Stupid Internet Restrictions.” No matter how diligent you yourself are, there will always be that person – or several persons – who will abuse privileges.

You might not be an abuser, but if you belong in a company of 1,000, I guarantee you there will be many who would be. Multiply that by individual lost productivity as well as strain to network bandwidth, and you should have an idea why such restrictions exist.

However, the more important reason for such restrictions is risk management, especially for companies that deal with financial and personal information.

There have been cases of fraud where credit card data weee stolen and sent out via social media or personal email, costing some companies millions of dollars in penalties, loss of business, and damage to reputation.

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Stupid? No, you’re just self-entitled. (Part 1)

by on Oct.22, 2016, under Snark, Society

I recently came across this article that complains about “stupid” policies that basically ruin office life and chase employees away. Supposedly.

The author of this stupid article has obviously never been in a leadership role that requires one to manage productivity, quality, risk, and profitability, among other things.

And when I did some research and found her LinkedIn profile based on information on her profile on the website she posted on, yes, it’s true. She is an R&D employee who doesn’t seem to have any legitimate qualifications to discuss how a company should be run. Now, I do not think all millennials are self-entitled, but this one certainly fits the stereotype.

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