The Road to 40 Day 56/365: Party on the road

The big plan for the day was to attend my uncle’s birthday celebration in Quezon City, but not much for the day.

Che went to work, but not so early this time around. She at least had time to eat a sandwich and watch a bit. It’s a good luxury for being able to stay around the area while she worked – at least we don’t have to drive for hours to get her to the office and back home.

I got Vino a sandwich when he woke up and told him we were going to have adobo for lunch.

While ramen would be the first thing he would request if given the choice, adobo is his go-to Pinoy meal. I know he’s not just saying that because I see how he finishes his meals at home or when I pack it for his lunch.

The downside of having a room with no separate kitchen is that the smell lingers.

I had 300 grams of adobo, which was good enough for the two of us. Che said she would come home for lunch, and I wasn’t prepared for her coming back. She had to buy food and eat it here.

We went down with Che to take her to the office as I wanted to look for a gift for my uncle. Vino wanted to come up to Che’s office, but we were told that I couldn’t come up because I was wearing shorts.

Vino and I walked around to find something to fix his tablet cover. After accomplishing that, we went to find a gift. In the process, we found an amusing occurance outside the mall. Four cats sitting down on almost similar distances apart were outside the entrance of the mall like they were guarding it.

Just a random thing we enjoyed, took a photo and we left.

My uncle was my boss before, and I spent a good 5 years working for the company. After seeing him on a daily basis, I have a good sense of his fashion, and I felt confident that I would pick a shirt that he could use either for work or for casual trips.

As I was waiting for it to get wrapped up, Vino was enjoying himself with the sunglasses and doing his dance.

Che initially didn’t want to come so she could rest, but with us canceling our original Saturday plan, she said she could join the dinner and rest the next day.

She said she will be done by 5PM, and it became 5:15, and then 5:30. Vino and I left the parking lot at 5:30, but with her meeting extending, we picked her up at around 6:15PM.

The app said we will arrive in one hour and 30 minutes, but it’s always a lie when you drive in the PH traffic. I had a couple of routes in my mind, and I since we did end up in one of them, I wondered if I should have took a bit of a detour earlier than we did.

The drive lasted a solid two hours and 15 minutes for a nine kilometer drive. It sounds stupid anywhere else in the world but Filipinos living in the metro would understand it as Friday night.

We caught up with my uncles for a bit at Ponce. Usually a long table would only allow us to catch up with whoever we were sitting with. Che was able to talk a bit with my cousins, while I was able to share stories with my uncles.

It was good food, as always, because my uncles usually put a lot of effort reading up on restaurants before we try it out. Unfortunately, the cochinillo was a bit overcooked to our liking. It was still pretty ok, but we felt like it could have been better.

We ended the night with a bit of an extended talk outside the restaurant as we said our goodbyes. We even had a goodie bag of pineapples from my uncle.

Unfortunately, we didn’t take photos. Not of food, not of us. This part of the family is very much for the experience, and as my cousin put it, they want to be “mysterious”.

My mom slipped Vino an envelope for his birthday and Vino was very happy to receive it. He knew it was money, and he was trying hard to keep a straight face as he was so giddy.

Vino doesn’t really spend much, naturally, because we hold the money. When he wants to buy useless things, we remind him that we don’t have money for it. I guess he wants that power of having actual money when we tell him we don’t have it.

When he asked for a gift on his birthday two years ago, he requested for Robux for his Roblox. It costs actual money to buy the virtual money he could use in the game. I expected him to spend it all quick, but because it was technically his money now, he kept it for things he just really liked.

He still had Robux by his next birthday.

When we got back to the hotel, Vino counted his money and was super excited, he was practically rolling on the floor.

I took a video of him thanking Grammy and sent it to her. Che said he will add it to Vino’s savings account (there’s a separate account in Che’s bank for Vino, but no card has been issued for it) and he can ask to withdraw money if he wanted to buy something next time.

The hope is that he will have learned from his Robux experience and he will be able to take care of money as well as his mom does now that it’s his money.

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