racoma.com.phJ. Angelo Racoma on technology, economics, writing, problogging, and getting things done

Here’s a sneak peek into what I’ve been up to the past few weeks. My home office.

When I was working at NEDA, I used to drive my pawis steering* Mitsubishi Lancer to work every morning, and then to grad school class in the mid-afternoon, and then back to the office again to wrap up some work before returning home. It was a round-trip, actually since my place was near UP Diliman. When I wasn’t driving, I took the MRT–I walked the half kilometer distance between the Shaw MRT station to our Amber drive office back and forth.

When I moved to dotPH, I walked the half kilometer (or was it) distance between the Ortigas MRT station and Emerald Avenue both ways every day–lugging my eight-pound ThinkPad at that! It was also at dotPH where I learned to drink water instead of juice and coffee, and to eat packed lunch instead of the greasy, fatty fastfood or canteen fare.

When I quit the corporate grind to be a freelancer and a problogger, I usually stayed at home when I didn’t have meetings and events to attend–which are actually quite infrequent and irregular. I found myself going out only once in a while to do my banking transactions–those I couldn’t do online–and to take the wife and kids out during weekends. And then there are the cupboard raids for sugary and salty snacks, and of course the unlimited supply of coffee.

In short, turning problogger has caused me to live a sedentary lifestyle, compared to the relatively mobile and healthy daily routine I had before. I watched my waistline grow a couple of inches from its usual. I also sometimes feel sluggish because my muscles have atrophied from non-use! (Okay, exaggerating here.) The only muscles I get to exercise these days are my typing fingers and my coffee mug-lifting arm.

*Pawis Steering: A play on “power steering,” intended for cars without this feature. Pawis is a Filipino term for sweat, hence the phrase implies that the driver exerts so much effort in steering. Yes, the tropical climate, plus sometimes malfunctioning airconditioning systems and the wide 15-inch wheel rims makes one sweat at times.

Working Out

During our college days, Caren and I used to work out at a small gym near our respective homes. It was great. We felt healthy and happy. We didn’t get to achieve those ancient Greek god physiques, but we were active enough to keep our bodies and minds healhty. And just recently, we did what we’ve been wanting to for a long time now–we signed up for membership at a nearby gym! And we just started working out (again).

It’s a both an achievement and a challenge. I’ve always thought that if I ceased to follow the demands of the bundy clock, I would have more time to attend to life’s niceties. But working independent and having no time to follow might sometimes mean working all the time, actually. And this can sometimes be stifling to one’s creativity (and on one’s personal life), particularly if you set no boundaries between work and personal life.

Activity Begets Creativity

Boy, am I glad we took this first step to doing something out of the ordinary. Perhaps this way I’ll get to boost my creativity and productivity. Pumping healthy blood into my brain would sure help get me those fresh ideas!

I’ve always believed we become more creative the more we get to immerse ourselves in reality. Art imitates life. The more we experience life, the more interesting ideas and perspectives we get out of it, even from the most mundane of things.

So if you’re thinking of going into the problogging business, don’t think you can just sit around all day sifting through your RSS feeds and doing the click-copy-paste routine. Again, go out and live life!

It’s great to stumble upon old photos at home. You get to reminisce about days past (perhaps not too long ago), and you get to marvel at how thin and young and perhaps foolish you used to be. Never mind that you’re currently still considered to be young, being in your quarter-life stages, but ten years ago is ten years ago. And you’d feel O-L-D comparing yourself to 15- or 16-year-old self.

Sometimes you also reach a point when you just ask yourself “What the heck made me wear that?” or “What was I thinking?” Remember the 80′s? Fortunately I still wasn’t in my teens during those times. Otherwise, I’d be wearing stuff that’s just so … tacky. That’s not to mention the hair. Mullets, anyone? What about teased hair?

Reminiscing

Remember the days when digital cameras were toys for the rich boys or for the professional photogs with the dough to spend? We used film-based cameras and had to have the prints developed at the local photo shop. And then we’d be digitizing them using our trusty ol’ handheld scanners (and later on those big, bulky, expensive flatbeds).

Having no handheld nor flatbed scanner these days (don’t need them anyway), I just resorted to taking digicam-captures of these old prints. Not perfect, as there are some distortions owing to the prints’ not being laid flat, but it’s probably good enough for sharing over the Web.

Right now, just the thought of not having a digital camera makes the shutterbug in me shudder.

And here they are!

Here’s a random selection. You may also wish to visit “my Flickr site”:http://www.flickr.com/photos/jangelo itself for “photos tagged with ‘oldpics’”:http://www.flickr.com/photos/jangelo/tags/oldpics .

Ah, the good ol’ days. To quote from the Pet Shop Boys, Life is much more simple when you’re young.

I’ll be heading to Caren and Pia’s school this noontime for a book reading. I will be reading the Gruffalo, which I chose for the cool and exciting characters (scary, but in a funny way). And of course, there’s the lesson. Be smart!

I almost avoided the call yesterday, as I’d been avoiding calls from people not on my phone’s contact list lately (I think readers took my Stalk Me! feature on ForeverGeek much too seriously; and I think I might still owe some people money ). Fortunately for me–and my caller, perhaps–I texted to say I was busy and could only receive SMS. My correspondent texted back, and she turned out to be Ms. Monique Lachica, news desk editor for one of the country’s largest networks, ABS-CBN. They were looking for someone to interview for a fathers’ day special, and stumbled upon my blog. They thought I would be the ideal one, due to my, umm, alternative lifestyle/set-up.

The Work-At-Home Dad

No, I’m not gay, you blockhead! I’m a dad and I work from home. Now that’s not very common for guys, especially men my age. While everyone else is climbing up corporate ladders with some multinational company or bank, I chose to, well, build my own ladders. While many of my classmates are finishing their postgraduate studies here or abroad, I’ve put a hold on my own (much like Sergey Brinn and Larry Page?). Why? I chose to pursue a career and a business that would allow me to be closer to my family.

So I left the full-time corporate grind many moons back, and I now work from anywhere I can connect to the ‘net. It’s a remote-working / telecommuting arrangement of sorts, which also gives me room to be more creative (for me it’s difficult to create when in a very very stressful and pressured environment). Then, of course there are the great projects (Go-Ogle, Isulong SEOPH and other great stuff I’m doing with great people)–some of which I earn from, others I do for fun or because of passion!

Plus, I earn a heck of a lot more.

I remember my own dad tried a similar set-up when I was a bit younger, but things did not turn out to be as good as what I’m experiencing now. Things were different back then–businesses and enterprises were not as connected as they are today, so management and coordination were more difficult. And I deal with knowledge and content, and not bulky, concrete stuff that was fashionable back then, which can be very, very expensive and very, very risky. Anyway, I credit it to a bit of luck that I’m doing what I’m doing now (and of course, mostly to effort on my part and that of my colleagues, correspondents, and partners).

The Interview

So back to the interview, the good fellows over at ABS-CBN thought of interviewing a dad who stayed at home to take care of the kids while also making a living at the same time. You see, staying at home to attend to domestic matters is a very difficult and daunting task–ask any housewife homemaker about that and I doubt they’ll give a different answer. I’m not too good at it at times, actually, and that’s where shared responsibility comes in handy. Add to that the need to work and earn, and you’ve got yourself an interesting situation, which I get to pull off well, nonetheless.

When? Where?

I’ve still to meet with my interviewer, Mr. Willard Cheng, who works the field for ABS-CBN’s various news programmes. We’re set to talk this evening at one of my safehouses in Quezon City (he’ll be blindfolded and led to walk in circles before reaching me–just a standard measure I ask my visitors to undergo, to guard against stalkers. Really.).

So I hope you catch the programme later tonight. If you’re in the Philippines, the interview will be aired on Insider, which usually comes out about 10:30 to 11:00 p.m. on Channel 2. If you’re abroad, it would likely be telecast also on TFC (likely a delayed telecast).

As for me, I’m pretty nervous!

Update: Insider is set to air about 11:30 p.m. tonight. There’s a trend for news programmes being pushed later into the evening because of the evening telenovelas (and these days there’s no definite schedule for shows)! Talk about prime time.

Update: An online copy of the video may be viewed here.