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It was more expensive to book a flight during Philippine Airline’s Midnight Sale. Well at least by $94.

I booked a flight during that May 9 midnight sale for a roundtrip ticket (MNL-SFO). The price was $1,444.70.

That caught me off-guard, because I distinctly remembered trying to book a day or two before, & got a cheaper price. Ergo, after the sale, I attempted to book again for the same dates. The price has dropped to $1,350.70.

But that’s not all:

When I arrived at the airport, the girl at the counter said she will only release my boarding pass after I pay the travel tax of P1,620.

I rummaged thru wallet, hoping I have enough for the travel tax & the airport fee, and breathed a sigh of relief. Yes, I was carrying sufficient pesos.

Wait, you mean I can’t pay at this counter? I, traveling alone, need to wheel two huge luggage & a handcarry towards that counter in the middle? And so I did.

You know, who would’ve thought that travel tax is not included when booking online? According to the confirmation email, I paid a tax rate of $286.70. Which we now know is not travel tax. Just regular old “tax.”

The fine print did mention this, though:

For international tickets purchased online, Philippine travel tax, if applicable, shall be collected by the Philippine Tourism Authority (PTA) at Philippine airports. For information on travel tax, please contact the PTA.

So convenient no?

So here are my lessons learned when booking a flight online with PAL:

• Try to book a flight the day before, without actually confirming the transaction. Just so you’ll know how much it really costs pre-sale.
• Use Internet Explorer. I was persistently getting a blank page on Firefox & Safari for the Mac. But all went well when the site was accessed using Internet Explorer on Windows 7.
• Get offline & book thru your local travel agent. Even the girl behind the airport’s counter advised me to. And she had stories which I promised not to tell.

Being our flagship airline, I still would like to continue supporting PAL’s business. I have to admit, though, that they are not ready for online booking. Online transactions are supposed to make it convenient & cheap. PAL failed me in both.

It’s been a month, and I’ve been essentially meat- & dairy-free. I still can’t glide across the windows of Tapa King & Dairy Queen without looking wistful, but I’ve generally been a good girl. And you’ve probably heard this a million times, but I do feel great. Even better than I did 10 years ago.

Since June of 2010, we’ve been eating a low-fat whole food plant-based diet. That’s quite a mouthful. It’s much easier to say “vegan” & get it over with. But the only similarity is the “plant-based” part. The differences are in:

• Whole foods. Vegans can eat processed food. Potato chips & softdrinks are considered vegan.
• Low-fat. Vegans do not mind having drops of olive oil, sunflower oil, & the like. We, on the other hand, avoid oil as much as we can. Yes, even the so-called healthy olive oil.

And yes, I’ve been strong. I’ve learned it’s better not to answer questions on where I will get my protein, calcium, iron, etc. Especially if those questions come from someone who is trying to discourage us from pursuing with the diet, or someone who uses his questioning as a way of defending his choice of eating meat.

I’m also immune to the number of well-meaning requests for me to read the Vegetarian Myth. Because I have my own reading materials – medical journals from the last 20 years, and books of the likes of Dr. Esselstyn, Dr. McDougall, Dr. Pam Popper, & Colin Campbell.

Why did we do this? The short answer is for our health. The long answer requires a bit of storytelling involving hospitals both in the United States & in the Philippines, & us realizing that all the pills we’ve been taking are merely there to help the symptoms, & not the cause, of the disease. It goes without saying that we have lost our faith in the so-called health industry, whose beneficiaries have always been the pharmaceutical companies & providers of health insurance.

So what do we eat? In a nutshell:

• A lot of starch. Complex carbohydrates are the center of our meals. Includes whole grains, unrefined flours, legumes, roots. We eat a lot of brown rice & beans.
• Fruits & vegetables. Merely as add-ons to the starch.
• However, we do avoid nuts & certain fruits like avocado, olives, & coconut because of the fat content.
• No meat. Not even chicken. Not even fish.
• No dairy. Includes milk, butter, cheese.
• No eggs.
• No coffee or colas. But we do drink tea.
• Very minimal processed foods. Even if they are labeled as “vegan-friendly.” We make our own vegan versions of mayonnaise, burgers, etc.

So there you go … the weird eating lifestyle of yours truly. To my meat-loving friends, thank you for your support & understanding. We may not say it, but it’s really quite touching that you are very concerned on where we’re going to eat, etc.

(To those who have waged war every time I tweet about anything vegan: I have never forced anyone to follow this eating lifestyle. But it seems you are with yours. If you can’t live & let live, and if you can’t keep your snide remarks to yourself, I won’t back down. I swear I will irritate you back. So bring it.)

Booger the Dog is now officially a resident of Makati City. We got his miniscule yellow dog tag, which is now required to be placed on his collar.

It seems like the dog tag’s sole purpose is to prove to the powers that be that your dog is registered.

It does not have any identification number. If it did, it would have been useful. Instead, it just makes our dogs walking advertisements for Merial.

Very tasteless, Makati City. You too, Merial.

This lazy susan, also called a turntable, was bought from Ikea Singapore. It makes it easy for me to browse thru all my cleaning solutions with a simple flick of my fingers.

Although anything circular is definitely not me (I usually go for the rectangles), I needed its efficiency.

Lazy susans are darn useful for deep shelf spaces, hard-to-reach areas, or for heavy items that you regularly need to rummage through.

Needless to say, I was so pleased with the results that I just ordered 10 more turntables, this time from Amazon. Giddy.

In cleaning, the goal is sanitation & appearance. It involves less thinking, as there are usually set standards or ways on doing it.

In organizing, the goal is efficiency & productivity. It involves more thinking, as each situation & individual is unique.