A Little Goes A Long Way

# 1

In the office, I am the fire exit.

To be able to escape from the smoke and fumes of a fire on the second floor of Xavier Hall, people will have to clamber over my desk to reach the Fire Exit, which does not have stairs or even a ladder. The Fire Exit simply consists of a window that people must jump out of, down a height of almost 20 feet.

If the fire doesn't kill you, the fall probably will.

# 2

I am constantly surrounded by young boys now. They are all studying college here in the Ateneo. These are our student volunteers, who man the phones for us and take care of our backroom operations (folding, priting, etc.). They call me their sugar mommy. It is slightly disturbing, but I take that as a compliment: if all my children were as bright and beautiful as these boys, what a grand gene pool mine would be.

# 3

I dreamt of crows feasting on the remains of a doodoo dodo (hee. thanks maryanne!) bird (which has been extinct for almost a century now). They were cawing out songs in the key of G as they ate. By the time they were done, the doodoo dodo bird miraculously regrew flesh and came back to life.

# 4

Happiness is an empty box, said poet Jimmy Abad.

# 5

Mine would be a box full of books, chocolate, free round-trip tickets to India, Africa and Spain, and buttons. Why buttons? Because I always seem to lose my buttons. They pop off or roll away or disappear behind trees and bed posts and cabinets.

# 6

Today Mr. April Capili from the Philo Dep came in to give his class' donation to the Annual Fund: two whole canisters full of coins and cash, overflow from the revenue from his readings, and his monthly gift from his own salary.

It perked up the whole office, so that the boys have now given in to our request that we play Kylie all morning.