Weekday, early in the morning. My alarm goes blaring approximately two hours before office starts. I press the snooze button, and go back to half-sleep. It's just the first of eight alarms anyway. Five more alarms later, I wake up, turn my laptop on, and check my internet requisites: Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, and Google Reader. Of course there's barely anything new, save for maybe a couple of Engadget articles, because I just checked them right before I went to bed. After thirty minutes, I finally muster enough willpower to drag myself out of bed and take a shower. By the time I'm done preparing my sandwich and my office paraphernalia (keys, phone, handkerchief, wallet, earphones), I'm already on the brink of running late.

I head out the gate, and bask in my surroundings. I've lived in this crappy apartment for months now, but I'm still smitten by the idea of living inside the UP Diliman campus. I'll never get tired of it. Walking down the moldy pavement with the birds singing in the trees and the sun peeking out from beyond the dense foliage of the Acacias is certainly one of the best parts of my day. I consider making a run for Rodic's (for my office lunch) but I know that I have no time. So I just continue walking till I get to Romulo Hall, and wait for my jeepney ride to Katipunan.

I get off at Elizabeth Hall across La Vista, climb the footbridge, and make a run for Jollibee. I hate it, I'm sick of their food, but I don't always have a choice. The guard promptly opens the door. I have a feeling that he knows me by face already, and probably calls me 'The Guy Who's Always Running Late' in his head. I order my regular --- a breakfast meal with plain rice (their garlic rice is disgusting) and hot chocolate, to-go. I don't have to tell the staff to hurry --- they can just tell that I'm pressed for time, probably by the no-nonsense way in which I recite my order to them, or by the way that I closely watch their every movement, or by the way I peek at my watch every twenty seconds. 

Speaking of my watch, I don't know know exactly what time it is. It's probably ahead of the office clock by half an hour, a quarter of an hour, I don't really know. The reason I made it that way is so I'd panic every time I feel like I'm running late. Like how I'm panicking now. If I knew how much time I had left, I'd probably calm down, give up, and take my sweet time because I'd probably be late anyway. So this is one rare case where not knowing is actually a good thing for me.

I sprint across Petron to the tricyle terminal at the La Vista gate. I board a tricycle, and tell the driver to take me to Loyola Grand Villas, and hope for the best. If I were religious, I'd probably be praying now. I look at the mirror in the tricycle and realize that I forgot to shave again. (I stopped combing my hair a few years ago, so no, I didn't forget that one.) The moment we reach the gate, I frantically hand the driver a twenty, jump out, and run again. My hot chocolate is spilling all over the breakfast container because of Jollibee's crappy new lids. I know I'm supposed to sign the log sheet at the guardhouse, but I'm late and I know that the guards know me by now anyway. I fly down the many flights of steps in my boss's garden until I get to the office entrance, five storeys later (it's a seven-level house). I run to the Bundy clock, and breathe a sigh of relief when my time card comes out with 8:41 freshly stamped on it. 

I fucking made it, with four minutes to spare. I'm getting really good at this.

I go down to the basement, which is where most of the office is located. Almost everyone's there, save for the regular latecomers. (I'm one of the regular in-the-nick-of-timers.) I turn my computer on, try to catch my breath, and sigh a little bit while trying to remember what it was that I was doing yesterday and what it was that I was supposed to do today. I really need to start writing things down. It's the start of a long day.

CAD, CAD CAD. That's 90% of my work now. Which is kind of funny, since I barely knew how to use CAD when I started working six months ago. Sometimes I glance at the wall clock to see how much longer I have to wait before I can whip out my sandwich and pacify my rumbling belly. I glance at the opposite stations and see Glenda and Claire working quietly. Sometimes I'd see Tom near the ref, drinking water. Sometimes JM would approach me to ask a question and I wouldn't really see the point because I couldn't answer it any better than he could. Back to CAD.

12:00 noon. The Bundy clock goes off in the tune of some nursery rhyme. It's lunch. I grab my takeout and head for the microwave. There's quite a line. People seem to be getting in on the microwave craze. I heat my food, take it a bit too early in fear of the food scalding the styrofoam, and head for the pantry. My food tastes like cancer. Note to self: wake up early tomorrow and buy lunch from Rodic's.

This dining table is crowded. There's a lot of people in the office now. I'm the first on the table to finish eating, as usual. I eat fast. I leave the table right away: I've never been a lunch table person. I don't really know why, but I always leave as soon as I'm done eating. I go back to my station and play with SketchUp, a bestfriend that I sorely miss. I make a 3D model of my water bottle, or look at a car component and try to take it apart. I make a mental note to try to study how to make complex curved surfaces in SketchUp, a mental note that I know will invariably end up in my mind's recycle bin a few minutes later.

The Bundy clock strikes again. It's 1:00PM, back to work. CAD, CAD, CAD. The longest part of the day, AKA lunch till end of day, begins. I feel sleepy from lunch, but I manage. Sometimes I take a cup of coffee, most of the time I just go to the bathroom and wash my face when I veer dangerously close to full-on dreaming. The Bundy clock sounds another alarm at 5:30, but we keep working. We are on a weird schedule these days. To keep from adding Saturday to the workweek, the office decided that it would be better to just add two hours to the regular workday, effectively extending the schedule to 7PM. It's hard, but it could be worse. I'll definitely take this over coming in on Saturdays like in other firms. 

7PM comes, and it's time to pack up; everyone's anxious to get home. The divide between the oldies and the newbies could not be any clearer than at this time: the oldies leave together, the newbies leave together. We the newbies squeeze ourselves in Tom's car, which he brings to work most of the time. He's generously giving us all a ride out of La Vista, as usual. He drops us off at the Katipunan gate, and we say our thank-yous and goodbyes and see-you-tomorrows. 

I walk to the footbridge and wait for a jeepney to take me back to UP. The wait usually takes five to ten minutes. Rush hour. I get off at the shopping center, and head straight for Lola Lita's to buy dinner, to-go. I check to make sure they included a paper plate and plastic utensils with my meal, because I really hate washing the dishes after dinner. I walk back to my apartment, drop all my things on the bed, and take a quick shower. I put on a dry-fit shirt and my running shoes. I take a swig of the leftover Real Leaf Lychee Tea from last night's dinner. It's quickly becoming a staple --- I have so many empty big bottles under the table. I grab my earphones, my keys, a hundred peso bill, and head out into the night.

I walk down a very dark Agoncillo Street, past the UP Chapel, the School of Statistics, and the new building they're constructing behind the Engineering Center. This walk is my warm-up, I don't like doing stretching. I get to the College of Law, make sure that my shoes are tied tightly enough, summon my running playlist (I like starting with Boys Don't Cry), and start running, phone in my right hand and my keys in the other. I run against the traffic, and against most people in the process. Not really because I think it's the right way to run (although it is); I mostly do so just out of habit. 

Sometimes I wonder if I know any of these runners (there are many of them), or if any of them are celebrities. But I know that there's no point in wondering because even if there were familiar faces in that crowd, I still wouldn't see them because I'm practically night blind. Running two continuous rounds around the Acad Oval used to be formidable, but now I'm used to it. A few Foster The People and Cut Copy songs later, I'm almost done with my second round. For the last stretch (from the statue of Oblation back to the College of Law), I whip out All These Things That I've Done by The Killers, and imagine the Nike commercial with the athlete running to the tune of  "I got soul but I'm not a soldier." I don't know, but that song really gives me extra energy. 

I stop at the College of Law, and walk back to my apartment. My running professor used to always tell us to never just stop after a run --- there had to be a warm-down. And that's this walk. I walk quickly because I'm so thirsty and because I don't want anybody to see me all sweaty and panting. I get inside my apartment, take another shower, turn on my computer, log in to Skype, and eat dinner. Time for RareJob, my part-time job that pays way more than my real job. I'm exhausted but I do it for the money. Besides, it's not really that much work. It's just talking.

Smart Bro's being a bitch again, but I soldier on. About four lessons later, I log out of Skype. I check my requisites: Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, and Google Reader. There's not a lot of new stuff, since I already kept going in and out of them throughout my RareJob lessons. But I keep doing it. After a few minutes, I realize that nothing is happening anymore, and staying up for nothing will be a big regret the following morning. This is my cue: time for bed. I turn off all the lights, make sure my phone has enough battery to wake me up in the morning, close my eyes, and dream of things I'll have no recollection of the following morning. 

My alarm goes blaring approximately two hours before office starts. I press the snooze button, and go back to half-sleep. It's just the first of eight alarms anyway. It's the start of a new day.

Yeah, I guess I've fallen into a routine. And guess what? That's not necessarily a bad thing.