JDDavao

That stuff really pisses me off. Early on after we relocated here, I was shocked almost to laughter to go into a BDO branch at the mall and see all of the "bank girls" looking like Japanese kabuki actors with their bright white faces. Lately, that's diminished and the girls don't looked so drained of blood.

My first real exposure to "kayumanggi" color was visiting Hawaii. There aren't many people afraid of the sun there. Japanese, Hawaiian, Filipino, and all of the mixes get that nut-brown tone. I think it's beautiful. I stand in the sun and just glow brighter white.

We just watched this whole episode on tiny house living from Bright Now. You might be able to find the episode on file sharing networks (which, of course, I don't ever, ever do). Part of it covers the solar power system they used. Flexible, ultralight solar cells, lithium-ion batteries. Very intriguing. So much depends upon availability of components here, though. https://curiositystream.com/video/3128/tiny-house-living-off-the-grid

My brother-in-law was just here with s-i-l and the young niece and nephew. He cooked for them. When he served the food, the kids' plates were literally 95% rice. I was shocked! He had just cooked a huge pan of pork adobo but I guess he felt embarrassed to eat the meat. I was about to urge him to give the kids more meat but my wife shushed me. Later, she told me, "That's how they have to eat at home." I'm glad she stopped me before I embarrassed him but I think for Christmas, like Scrooge, I'm going to send them a big, fat Christmas goose!

Holy crap! I pray for his wife. And I ain't religious.

Oh, the freezer! No, I did not. But I will from now on!

Lucky! I looked at the lamb there a few days ago trying to sate a hankering brought on by a cooking show and it looked terrible!

You have convoluted the conversation. Go back and read it in order. Anyway, bastonjock, places where grenades are thrown rather frequently are bad. But the prune's place is all daisy fields, butterflies, and rainbow unicorns. Gird your loins as you see fit.

The question I answered was about "Cotabato". Not specifically South Cotabato. Your high-handed response to me roped in the whole of "that area", projecting your South Cotabato experience onto the the whole "area". Stop being so defensive.

Yeah, well, a woman shop owner was killed by a thrown grenade a few doors down from my mother-in-law's business a while back. Try to realize that your reality is not every else's.

Too many grenades for my taste. My wife is from there but we've never been.

The contractors used a little bit of that in our condo refurb before we sold it. Cool stuff!

You may be able to find "first flush" kits at Trust Home Depot on Ecoland Drive near John Paul II college. They are spendy (we sent ours ahead of us after ordering in the US) and can be a pain to keep clean but they will help keep your rainwater containers cleaner. We have two 1,000-liter blue Best Tank tanks, one on each side of the house. Basically a 3" downspout comes out of the gutter and branches off from the T included with the kit into the tank. A portion of the downspout continues from that T down the side of the house. At its end is a plastic ball and a weeping nipple. The first bit of rain washes dirt off the roof. That water comes off the roof, into the gutter and down the pipe. Since it can't rush out of the end of the pipe, the water makes the ball rise in the pipe until it seals the end of the T which then forces the rainwater to go into the tank. Essentially, the "first flush" of dirty water fills the end of the pipe and cleaner water goes into the tank. The dirtiest water drips slowly out of the nipple. Our problem is that the roof is so large, and the area so damned dirty, the end of the pipe gets filled with dirt quickly and I have to clean it after every rain. But it you're going to have large tanks, it will keep you from filling them with a ton of dirt.

Just like I test bars by asking for a martini. In Tagbilaran City, at a hotel that billed itself as a convention center, I asked for a martini. The waitress came back empty-handed and asked me, "Dry Martini?" I said, "Yes." She brought back a small glass half-filled with vermouth. It came from a Martini and Rossi Dry Vermouth bottle you see...

Oh yes! We have three. One at the end of the driveway, one at the back of the house and one on the far side of the house. Truthfully, we've been using rainwater for most things, including watering plants when its dry. But we needed that spigot in the back to water the piggies.