Public Service Announcement

Hey hey. Finally.

Best Before (that's us!) will be playing a few originals (naks!) and two covers, Weezer and Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Hope to see you guys there.

Please be there.

And thanks to Starshuffler for helping us book Chilitees! Kukulitin ka ulit namin for the next production. *Hugs, with beers*

The Importance of Being Idle

Because He Who Asks asked.

Multi-tasking really means why don't you join the circus since you're a freak of nature anyway. Juggling, trapeze twirling, jumping through hoops on fire, and why don't you feed the elephants, too?

WHAT ARE THE THINGS YOU ENJOY, EVEN WHEN NO ONE AROUND WANTS YOU TO GO OUT AND PLAY?

Reading. My head is already noisy on its own. Throw in a good book with lots of good dialogue and a warped plot and there's a swiftly tilting solar system inside me. Seriously, books are handy time machines.

DVDthons. Since W doesn't share my inhuman stamina for DVDthon all-nighters, this is usually a one-man affair. Or when Faye is around, it's a family affair with ice cream and junk food and serial smoking.

Smoking. Sometimes. It's when I get all broody and sensitive.

Shopping. It's when I get all broody and sensitive over money. And I hate it when someone's hovering and Jedi mind controlling me to make a decision.


WHAT LOWERS YOUR STRESS/BLOOD PRESSURE/ANXIETY LEVELS?

Making mixes. I can be incredibly focused when planning how to get from Miles Davis to Death Cab for Cutie, with a Kelly Clarkson detour in the middle. I can be so focused that I tend to forget everything else.

Musical remedies for this weekend: Transatlanticism, Death Cab for Cutie; Quiet is the New Loud, Kings of Convenience; Vespertine, Bjork; Dummy, Portishead; Nightsongs, Stars; Von Otter Meets Costello: For the Stars, Elvis Costello and Anne Sofie Von Otter.

Smoking. Gotta kick this one. But it keeps me from being violent. So, shrill shrieking Thor or lonely guy at the bar Thor? (Duskwatcher, mind your comment.)

Drinking alcohol. Oh sweetness.

Best Before. Me band. Jamming and just playing around. And then beer and oily food later.

And lots of TV.

Paradise Found

Sometime 1996. Caught up in relationship whirlwinds, desperate letters and bad decisions debris all around. I had been drinking regularly; drunken talk revolver: I love, I think.

One of those nights again with almost constant listener, Dodo. Cutting my blah blah blahs short, he says, "It's like that elephant in the living room."

Huh?

A few days later, he lends me Terry Moore's Strangers in Paradise, Vol. 3, issue 1: Love Me Tender.

In its black and white pages, the elephant-in-the-living-room bit. Massive and towering, yet most of the times ignored. Or simply missed. Like most of the things we look for, yearn for.

It must be difficult to write about love without going all Hallmark and puppies. But Terry Moore makes it seem effortless, the bastard. Francine, Kachoo and Dave are flawed and fragile, flashy and forgiving in just a few lines; their love triangle quietly shifting. Blossoming earthquakes. There are also deep dark secrets, amazons, funny moments. Unpredictable at every turn. The bitter in the sour, with the sweetness of a stolen kiss.

Yesterday, in the newly opened Fully Booked in Greenhills. Scanning the comic book shelves, and there at the bottom:

Happiness.

THORBOT

I repair everything, from sofas to shareware love.

From Cyborg Name Generator

Face Off

Yes, yes. I'm busy and can't be bothered. But while surfing for, uh, ideas, I stumbled across a a site that told me that I'm not polite. One that "reads" faces. Obviously, it's not very accurate (see: Very Low Gay Factor) and I don't think I have Chinese blood. Still, it got the having-drinks and watching-TV right where it hurts.

Neil Pt. 2

Okay. Now, for the babbling fan boy.

Faye and I were in line at 8:30 a.m. I don't even go to work that early. First sighting of Neil was around 10 a.m. And, wow, I just stood there. I wanted to shout "Gwarrrr!" or something that could've been "Welcome to the Philippines" but nothing came out of my mouth. Just a squeak. Then maybe tears. And, "Hmm. He's hot."

10 hours later. More composed now, but stinky. He says to me: Interesting name. I say: Uh-huh. And then I start rambling: You should really see what's outside the city. We have wonderful beaches. And thanks for coming over. He looks up, shakes my hand and says: Thank you. I've been wanting to come over. Then I look at what he wrote down on my Neverwhere copy. It says: Thor, Mind the gap! Neil Gaiman.

Hee.

Sunday. Couldn't move.

Monday. Kristine tells me that Neil said "butt-fucking" over at NU 107. In the context of Batman. Then he plays a Magnetic Fields song.

Went to writers' con at the Music Museum with Anne, Chiqui and Jovan. Saw Paolo, Therese, Maan, Luis and wait ... reunion? There were a few funny questions for Neil like, "How will you use your fanbase for the greater good?" To which he replied, "Ah, yes. All of you, don't leave after the session and wait for my orders."

He also announced that he'll be writing two more titles for Marvel, one of which is the 1602 sequel. And also, sometime in 2008, a six-part Sandman 20th anniversary release.

And for the kissing incident, please check out Chokwit's blog.

Giddy. Gracious. Galing-galing. Gaiman.

Neil Pt. 1

Hanging out with the Dream King. Really.

It's my turn to say: It must be love.

Sheepish and almost tongue-tied. Warm, fluttering wings in my stomach. After 10 hours of waiting in line, and 13 years of feverishly flipping pages, finally.

Neil Gaiman.

I have spent countless afternoons running to the Filbar's in Katipunan (and later on in U.P.) and ComicQuest in Greenhills to ask for the latest installment of the Sandman or Stardust. Never mind lunch. There was telephone-flavored ice cream to devour.

There was also a time when I felt too cool to like Neil. Everybody else was suddenly deconstructing the Endless, some columnist began painting her face like Death, and I didn't want to be mistaken for jumping onto the bandwagon. It's just the way it is. When someting undergound becomes mainstream, the purists who don't even pee in the shower ;-) start searching for the next big thing.

Which was a phase I was really thankful for. But Terry Moore and Grant Morrison raves don't belong here.

I think it was six years ago, after reading American Gods, when I started reading Sandman again. Took the comicbooks out of the boxes and their acid-free wrap and just read the entire weekend. Bled over some of the pages, too.

And fuck it. Fuck the coolness. Fuck the cliques. Fuck the exes who memorized lines. (Well, not really.)

Mr. Gaiman wrote and continues to write great stories. Here's to more running and missed lunches.

First Blogsary

So there was this woman and she was on an airplane and she's flying to meet her fiancé sailing high above the largest ocean on planet earth and she was seated next to this man who you know she had tried to start a conversation with but really the only time she heard him talk was when he ordered his bloody mary and she's sitting there and she's reading this really arduous magazine article about this third world country that she couldn't even pronounce the name of and she's feeling very bored and very despondent and then uh suddenly there's this huge mechanical failure and one of the engines gave out and they started just falling thirty thousand feet and the pilot's on the microphone and he's saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Oh My God, I'm Sorry" and apologizing and she looks at the man and she says, "where are we going" and he looks at her and he says, "We're going to a party, it's a birthday party. It's your birthday party, happy birthday darling. We love you very, very, very, very, very, very, very much." - At the Bottom of Everything, Bright Eyes


Let's disco.

It has been a year, and we're all still here.

Still standing, still singing, still wanting more, still hoping, still smoking, still missing someone, still obsessing, still listening, still laughing indoors, still falling, still dusk watching, still failing, still trying, still loving and loving, still.


Lately, I've been worrying myself silly over (insert danger music) the FUTURE. Not the Star Trek kind of future --- I already have in handy a few Klingon phrases like "GhoS Daq Sop lij vaD!" or "I will eat your son's entrails for breakfast!" --- but retirement and money and insurance policies. I blame it all on the Hello Garci (In Da Club Remix) tapes. With the GloriaGate open, there's no controlling the rushing and consuming 50-foot wave of uncertainty.

And on this high-pitched note of panic, I'm welcoming my sister Faye and Arnie to the blogverse. Geekery is obviously thicker than blood, and if one of us turned out to be normal, then we would definitely hate each other. Thank God it's a perfect world and we are alike in most things, aside from the obvious girly-ness. Arnie, on the other hand, just came from a trip in Spain, so expect architecture details, a hint of loneliness, and a few Spanish words.

And to all you fellow travellers in the landscape of words: Engage!

Something to Fight For

You just have to admire the view.

I really had no choice but to. They closed all walkways and blocked Ayala-Paseo, Makati Ave.-Ayala, so I was forced to walk through the gathering storm of angry protesters on my way to our main office at the BPI building.

They were neither angry nor defiantly demanding for justice though. They were fighting something more immediate --- hunger. Eating from styrofoam plates. Waiting for the promised P500. Waiting for the ride home.