4 Random Things About Me People Need Not Know but I'm Blogging Them Anyway

Let's get right on to it.

1. My mom just got me a smartphone.

I don't know why but when a former tenant of ours showed up the last week and tried to sell my mom a Huawei Ascend phone, my mom sent me a text message asking me to go downstairs and check it out. It was actually not that bad for a phone that's been in our former tenant's possession for a year. It has all the signs of being "pre-loved", all right but I'm okay with secondhand stuff (except for food and cars).

Well, I honestly don't know what to say. Initially, I thought she asked me to look at the phone because she was thinking of buying it for herself. Yesterday, while I was in one of my "other world trances" (I was trying to finish my modules), she handed me a wad of cash and told me to get myself the phone. In my mind's eye (which at that time was already mercilessly saturated with drug names and surgical procedures), I saw my face make a colossal jaw drop. After pulling myself together, I took the wad and gave it to our former tenant who was actually waiting for me at our little canteen.

Everything after that was pretty much a blur. Other than remembering how freaked out I was because of the new novel I just started reading, I remember feeling ridiculously giddy about owning a smartphone. The whole time I was like, "I OWN SOMETHING WITH AN OPERATING SYSTEM NOW. I FEEL SO MONUMENTALLY COOL."

I know this goes without saying but thank you, Mom. You've been awesome especially when I don't deserve it. I love you very, very much.

2. I've been book-impulse-buying.

Let me just state for the record that while I've been a book lover for more than a decade now, I've never been this frantic about buying them. I don't know why and I'm actually worried that I may be clinically depressed and it's manifesting this way. And now I'm being paranoid.

Every time I enter a bookstore, I just lose it and I don't leave without at least two books in my hand. When I get home, I just stash them somewhere and it'll take me at least a week before realizing I had them. Last week, I found four books lying around my room like forgotten carcasses and it was only then that I had the decency to grant them a loving space in my shelf. While I was at it, I stood in front of my beloved bookshelf and stared. At the back of my mind, I adored the chaos of silent, paperback voices in front of me and thought about finally transferring them in my head. Is this how most book lovers feel about the books they own? I really need an opinion about this because every time I stand in front of my bookshelf, I feel like a serial killer at large, standing in front of a wall full of gruesome photos of his kills.

God, I should really go easy on the medical and forensic thrillers.

3. I've been consuming caffeine like a frickin' maniac.

I used to hate coffee and that's because of what it did to me when I was in fifth grade. Instead of eating my cereal, which my mom sternly instructed my puppy dog, fifth grader face, I asked my yaya to fix me a cup of coffee (to this day, I don't understand why she obliged or why I asked her to make one in the first place) and I drank it to the last drop. I practically spent my whole school day asking my teacher every 10-12 minutes to let me use the bathroom. She was worried and even attempted to send me home but I begged her not to because my mom's gonna throw a huge fit about me drinking a grown-up breakfast instead of being a normal kid who has kiddie breakfast.

Later on, I learned that you're not supposed to drink coffee on an empty stomach because coffee is acidic. If you can drink coffee on an empty stomach and not spend your day in the toilet, you're probably immune to it. Clearly, I was neither full that time nor immune. I count that to be one of the most traumatizing food and beverage experience of my life.

But as we grow old, we change. The stomach I had when I was in fifth grade is no longer the same as the stomach I have now. So I took advantage of that change to abuse caffeine, technically a drug everyone makes use of without having to explain themselves to the police. It actually helps especially if you need to stay awake beyond your normal awake hours. In my line of work, I need all the awake time I can get. At least for now. And boy am I glad I don't have that fifth grader stomach anymore!

NOTE: I consume at least five (maximum of seven) cups of black, brown or white coffee a day.

4. I just set up an Instagram account.

Which is what most of my friends have been badgering me to do. I didn't see the point then because I didn't own a smartphone and I certainly wouldn't go around the trouble of taking a picture of myself (or anything that I'm currently eating or staying in or pretty much everything) using my sister's laptop. Now that I don't have reasons anymore to not set up, let alone have, an IG account, I figured I'd just frickin' make one and join the bandwagon. Which I seriously believe contributed greatly to my "coolness level".

And yeah, follow me please. [INSTAGRAM USERNAME: fuhmelamela]

That's all.