Ack, apologies that I didn’t have this up sooner. I was (or, still am) nursing a stomach bug. No cause for alarm—I think I’m on the mend, just in time for the Manila Food & Wine Festival this weekend!

This four-day event (Feb 22 to 25), divided into four parts, is the perfect weekend escape for food lovers. The MFWF starts off with a Food Truck Cook-Off on Friday, February 22, at the SM Mall of Asia grounds. It will feature creative concoctions of some of the country’s biggest celebrity chefs like Robby Goco (who will be serving Porchetta: the Italian Lechon) and Sau del Rosario (Jumbo Dumplings with Fried Rice). The trucks start serving at 5PM and end at midnight.

For the duration of the MFWF, over a hundred participating restaurants are giving amazing deals–up to 50% off—on their meals. Click here for all the participating restaurants, to see if anything tickles your fancy.

There are also Culinary Classes scheduled across the entire festival (which means you can take more than one!). I’m taking a class called “From Flabs to Abs” by Nadine Tengco so I can learn more about 350-calorie meals. Other classes include artisanal ice cream and French macarons. Click here to learn more about the offered classes.

The last part of the MFWF is a Gala Dinner featuring a five-course meal by Chefs Par Excellance Paul Lenz, Area Executive Chef, Makati Shangri-La Manila and Bruce Lim of the Asian Food Channel. This specially created menu will use locally produced ingredients from small organic farms through out the Philippines.

Now, onto the Awesome Part, I’m giving away 2 Manila Food and Wine Festival Shirts and 1 Food Truck Festival Pass.

Post a comment stating your favorite food. Please use a valid email address as it will be used to contact you if you win.

You may enter more than once, but be sure to make each comment different. :) Winners will be announced and contacted tomorrow, Feb 21. Good luck!

If you want to book tickets on your own or for the other events, click here.

Contest is closed.

Full Disclosure: This post was sponsored.

I will keep referring to my Singapore trip as a Long Weekend, even though it isn’t, technically. Nonetheless, it was fun. When we landed on a Thursday afternoon, we decided to swing by Orchard Road then just to get it over with. I think we had Orchard Road overload from our last trip. Because of this brilliant decision, we had time (and energy!) to explore the rest of the places we haven’t been to. But that’s another story.

Here’s a slideshow of Instagram photos. I was going to do a collage, but I like big photographs! The following are from Laneway, the house we stayed in, and weird ice cream.

[meteor_slideshow slideshow="sg2012"]

Part II of this post: Our winner for the Field Notes Giveaway, Via, didn’t reply to my email for the last few days, so I picked a new one, alliekabok on Tumblr. I forgot to take an iShowU video of my randomization, and I obviously can’t re-enact it, so here are screencaps. Anyway, I just sent her an email and am expecting a response within the next 24 hours. Allie’s been a loyal reader of Nothing Spaces and has been a keen commenter.

Thank you again to Avalon.ph for the goods (haha) and for all y’all who joined. It’s been fun!

In other news, I’m so dreadfully sick of this layout. Aren’t you? I hope I find the time to change it soon.

After 384 entries for the Field Notes Giveaway, a random generator picked a lucky winner: Via! Congratulations, I’ll be sending an email to you shortly.

In the event that Via doesn’t respond within 24 hours, I will re-draw again from the existing list of entries. Thanks for joining, everybody! It’s been fun. Thanks to Avalon.ph for the Field Notes pack and calendar.

PROOF OF RANDOMNESS

I might be the hugesest Field Notes fan that I know. It all started when eliepstein kindly sent me a Just Below Zero 3-Pack, and the rest as they say, is history. I can’t help it; they are so useful, and so pretty.

A lot of people have asked me where I get my Field Notes fix and are dismayed when I say that I order all the way from Chicago, IL, where these beauties are made. I’m happy to announce that Avalon.ph has now made the classic Field Notes books available in the Philippines!

Avalon.ph and Nothing Spaces (me!) are giving away an original 3-pack (ruled paper) and the 2012 18-Month Workstation Calendar to one lucky winner!

I use Field Notes for everything. It’s a no-fuss notebook, that is both useful and easy on the eyes. I’m a huge Futura nerd, so I love the design to pieces. It’s also great for lists, sketches, notes (for reviews and blog drafts), and full-blown sketch battles with my dad in the emergency room:

Field Notes is a super portable notebook, great to keep in the back of your jeans or shirt pocket. It’s slim enough so that it’s not a nuisance to bring around, but the 48-pages are just the right amount before you’d need to whip out another one.

Did I mention that it’s beautiful?

The paper is lined with a soft brown soy-based ink.

The back of the calendar has a list of useful dates.

FIELD NOTES GIVEAWAY MECHANICS
Winner of the Field Notes set (Ruled 3-pack and 18 Month Workstation Calendar) will be picked at random using a randomizer. Do at least one of the following; each counts as an entry for you. Open only to residents of The Philippines.

1. For Twitter users: Tweet “Dear Nothing Spaces and Avalon.ph, I am joining because I want to remember now. http://bit.ly/ns-fieldnotes #NSGiveaway” You can tweet only once during the contest. Don’t forget to use the hashtag.
2. For Tumblr users: Follow my tumblr and reblog this entry. Each counts as 1 entry.
3. For Nothing Spaces readers: comment with something you want to remember
   or link http://bit.ly/ns-fieldnotes in a blog entry and comment on this post with the link.

Good luck! Comment if you have any questions or clarifications.

———

Avalon.ph has been up and running since 1999. It’s a great resource for wonderful limited edition and signed books, among others, gift and novelty items, and stationery, including Moleskine journals, and now—Field Notes! They carry all the original variations, but will eventually make other products (Steno pad, pencils, etc) available as well. For more information on Field Notes products available on Avalon.ph, click here.

You can also check them out here:
Google+: http://gplus.to/avalonph
Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/avalonph
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/avalonph

Quick post to announce the winners of the Chabon giveaway! Congratulations to Diane Cortes and Angeline Arcenas. I’ll be mailing said books off on Friday. Another contest is currently going on, so join while it’s still up! Click to join the contest here.

As of yesterday, I’ve imposed a strict 30-hour workweek on myself, effective next week. The reason for this is because I’m a horrible, lazy person. I found a pretty effective spot for productivity. I know this to be true because I’ve been up here since four this afternoon, and save for a quick bite of dinner, I’ve been crossing off things on my to-do list. It’s been eight hours.

I would give myself a pat on the back, but I have this unspoken resolution for myself to be less annoying. So, I won’t.

I can’t wait to fix this workspace up and post photos. It’s totally Person 2.0 of me, but I don’t care. I’ve sort of embraced it. I think I’m more Person 1.0 now than I used to be, though. I should tag this post as #Progress2k11, huh?

Hello, all!

Winners for the Chabon contest will be announced in about four days. For this leg of giveaways, I have three books up for grabs. Honestly, a part of why I am doing this is because I have no more room in my room for new books. Another part is because of International Literacy Month—which is a “cause month” that I can get behind. And yet another part just likes being nice, I guess.

I got all three of these books in 2008 on a trip to the States, and they’re all what my friend would call airplane books. Which is to say, they were entertaining to read to pass the time, but I haven’t really formed any close bonds with any of them.

First up is Water For Elephants, which was apparently a NaNoWriMo novel. It’s been developed as a film with Robert Pattinson and Reese Witherspoon as the leads. It’s about an old man who reminisces about his days in the circus as a young man. It was a pretty quick read—I read it in a resort in Florida.

This book, I actually read on an airplane, and shuffling in airports before my flight from Florida to New York City. Possible Side Effects is an entertaining and amusing collection of personal stories by Augusten Burroughs.

Fangland, I got from CostCo. It’s a vampire novel. To be honest, I only reached until chapter thirteen, but it was a sufficiently creepy novel. It takes part in a shady part of Europe where vampires are said to roam.

Anyway, same general rules, but as there are three books in one entry, I had to tweak them a bit. People outside the Philippines are welcome to enter, but please be open to paying for shipping.

GIVEAWAY RULES & MECHANICS:
Winners will be picked randomly.

1. Comment on this blog post. Indicate which book you are trying to win. This counts as one entry. (Make sure your email address is valid.)
2. You can comment only once per book. (Make a new one for each entry.)
3. Tweet one of the following:
   - “I want to win a copy of “Fangland” from Nothing Spaces! http://bit.ly/ns-three #BooksAreSoCoolLike”
   - “I want to win a copy of “Possible Side Effects” from Nothing Spaces! http://bit.ly/ns-three #BooksAreSoCoolLike”
   - “I want to win a copy of “Water For Elephants” from Nothing Spaces! http://bit.ly/ns-three #BooksAreSoCoolLike”

   This will qualify as your additional entries in the lottery. You can tweet per book once daily.

   REMINDER: If your Twitter is locked, I won’t be able to see your Tweet.

4. You can comment until 11:59 PM on September 25, 2011 (+8:00 GMT).
5. Winners must reply to the email alert within 24 hours of receiving it. Otherwise, I will pick another winner.

Feel free to share this contest (link: http://bit.ly/ns-three) or to join the first leg.

Thank you! I have a bunch of other books to give away, so stay tuned.