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a) again, I'm leaving my 20's and
b) I'm attending a work friend's wedding and I'm part of the liturgical entourage ( I always get assigned that).
So six of my work friends surprised me with an advanced birthday gift. This is what they got me:
YAY! It's on my Must Buy Then Read List and I happen to have mentioned it to one of them, so fishing expedition expedited.
I am thankful, oh yes, I am not a perma-bitch. BUT one of them who gifted it is someone I have edited in my life. Because he was a jerk to me and I've erased him. I just know this dude doesn't deserve my kindness nor do I want his. AWKWAAARRRD.
I sent a thank you email to everyone and those who went to the office today, gave them a hug. Luckily, he was out. I wouldn't know how to thank him, having known he was forced to share in the gift and he knows I loathe him. Like for serious.
To which I say, YES WEEKEND!
Naabutan ko lang ang episode na 'to while on commercial ang pinapanood ko. Nag-palitan kasi ng girl housemates from House A to B and vice versa. Ang siste: naghiwalay ang love team ng PBB ngayon, sina Melissa at Jason.
Ininterview sila pareho pero di sabay. Tanong ni Kuya kay Jason, 'Anong nami-miss mo kay Melissa?'
'Tuwing nagsu-swimming kami. WALA NA AKONG MATUTULAK SA POOL'.
Yan ang TRUE LOVE.
Tawa ako nang tawa mag-isa kasi ang kulit ng sagot. Naintindihan ko ang ibig nyang sabihin. Masaya kasi kasama ang Melissa at isa sa kasiyahan nila ang magharutan sa pool. Pero kundi mo alam yun, maiisip mo ang brutal naman ni Jason. So Chris Brown.
Kaya girls, kung itulak ka ng guy sa pool, LIKE ka na nya. (JOKE!)
Its failure relies heavily on the mishandled, misconstrued, and mismatching of its Love Triangle.
Based on books, movies, and situations I've read, a 'good' Love Triangle should have the following:
1. The meat in this love sandwich -- girl/boy/whathaveyou -- is not-so obvious on his/her/its choice. There is no evidence of leaning towards anyone; that the person who came first is not always first.
2. The choices -- the loaves of bread -- should be at least equal in looks, pedigree, skills, powers, etc.
3. You must let the audience believe that the girl/boy/whathaveyou does get involved emotionally in believable ways with BOTH. By the time the Choice is to be made, the audience knows there's a bond, an affection that will be lost for either choice.
'New Moon' already showed you No.1; Bella had Edward's name tattooed on her arm in a proverbial sense.
You know which film did the Love Triangle justice?
And hey, it also involves the white man versus the native! Moving on...
This is actually one of my favorite films. I saw it in theaters because of Colin Farrell who I crushed at the time. Then there's my fascination with the Native American culture and how similar their struggles were with the early Filipinos, once the European colonizers occupied their lands.
Also, Q'orianka Kilcher was 14 when she played Pocahontas, and she got to kiss Farrell and Christian Bale. They were her First Kisses. Lucky bitch.
I shouldn't compare yet it's hard not to. This period film is much much more than just about the Love Triangle, of course, but the way it's portrayed is engaging, particularly Pocahontas' heartbreak.
Capt. John Smith (Colin Farrell) falls in love for the Princess (Q'orianka Kilcher) when he is captured (you will too if she saves your life and she looks like that). To the natives it's capture, for the settlers, he's on a diplomatic, peace-keeping mission. The Chief spares his life and asks him to teach his favorite daughter English... and more. They have trysts by the shore, in the woods. Those are their 'dates', but it seems wrong to use this word for a movie such as this.
When relations between the new settlers and the natives escalate into war, Captain Smith leaves the Princess, telling one of his mates to say he has died.
Instead of breaking up with the teen girl, he skips town without saying goodbye. And for optimum effect and maybe, closure, let's add I'm also dead. What a jerk.
So the Princess mopes and walks around like a zombie -- until John Rolfe (Christian Bale) arrives and woos her. This is the kindest I've seen Bale (besides his role as Laurie in 'Little Women' though, another favorite) and it translates on screen. There's earnestness with the way he looks at her and how they relate to each other. You are made to believe that when they playfully tumble on the field they toil, that they could already be in love. And yes, they marry and have a little boy.
And then Capt. Smith invites himself back to the Princess' life by giving word that he's alive!
When Capt. Smith and the Princess meet again, you're conflicted. Well, I was. I wanted them to at least hug but I already considered Rolfe, being the good man that he is, the Princess should go back to him. Even though I knew how this turned out in reality (Pocahontas stayed with Rolfe and died being his wife; heck, who knows if she was really in a romance with Capt. Smith), I was watching a movie and anything can happen in a movie. That's why it's a movie -- you can make things up as you go along!
That my friends is a good Love Triangle... which is why I may have to re-watch this on a weekend on DVD.
What happens in 'New Moon' is 'Pretty In Pink', and I mean no offense to the John Hughes classic (it's also a favorite!).
But really, did you ever see Andie (Molly Ringwald) going off into the sunset with Duckie (Jon Cryer) instead of Blane (Andrew McCarthy) after Prom?
If you were a kid then, would you choose Jon Cryer over Andrew McCarthy?
I won't. I love Andrew McCarthy. So cute.
Oh 'New Moon' -- where and how do I begin?
Let me start off with this: Over the weekend I watched 'Paperheart' starring Charlyne Yi and Michael Cera. It's a fictionalized version of Yi (which I learned is part Filipina 'cause her mom is) and Cera's then relationship. It's like a match made in awkward-cute heaven. The scene is this: They're having lunch at a diner, and while they decide on what to order, Cera goes on a rant on how Yi didn't like him in the beginning and she ignored him every time they met. He stands up and walks out of the diner and Yi waits. And waits for a minute or so, with a look feigning fear and hurt. Then, Cera re-appears from her back; he went around the diner and entered the backdoor, only to realize he miscalculated the amount of time it would take to walk out and return to Yi. And they have this exchange:
Yi: You grabbing me? You grabbing my heart?
Cera: Yeah.
In the words of Yi and Cera, their movie grabbed my heart. 'New Moon' did not.
Hey, what did I expect right? It's the second book where Edward leaves Bella and she goes on full emo mode. The novel makes us want to believe that Jacob can fill in the gaping hole in Bella's heart by a) fixing beat-up motorcycles with her, b) taking off his shirt and showing his abs (I didn't count; Sharkboy's only 17 and is not my type), and c) telling her about his 'secret' -- you know, he's a werewolf with a gang of other pups that transform a la Incredible Hulk (they retain the cut-off shorts when science says it should rip to shreds).
Truth be told, I had an idea this film would be unbearable based on the poster itself.
Sure, the characters are better dressed this time around, their wigs fit, the makeup still awful (WTF Edward Lipstick), but at least the first movie's poster had 'art direction' (?) There's a concept behind it. They just didn't stand around, squinted, and came to the photo shoot wearing their own clothes.
Back to the movie: It tries so very hard to get the message across that Jacob is the Rebound Guy; that we should 'feel' for Bella's emo-core-ness; that we should understand why Edward had to leave to 'protect' her; and unfortunately, my sort of audience cannot sympathize and fathom the orchestrated mess because it's just that: a mess. My friend E kept on saying 'Gumanda si Bella ah' but he also encouraged, 'Pakamatay ka na' every time a cliff was on screen. Another friend said it's over-scored; agreed, every so-called pivotal moment almost has one of the tracks from its soundtrack. Although I love most of the songs in there, they managed to ruin the moments (except I love how Thom Yorke's 'Hearing Damage' is utilized in this one). And lastly, we laughed all right, but not as much as we did on 'Twilight'; the crowd all went berserk when Jacob takes off his shirt to dab a little wound on Bella's head. Really, an entire shirt? To which a male work friend asked me, 'Ganun ba yun - dapat bang hubarin ng guy ang shirt nya kapag nasugatan ang girl?' And he was serious.
E also had another point: 'Pelikula na sya - di sya tulad nung dati na parang high school project'. True, it's more polished; you see that director Chris Weitz made sure it's worth the big-budget treatment. But he fails because he worked on a dime store-ly written novel, the one book in the series where NOTHING REALLY HAPPENS. A mismatch of epic proportions. So, no it's not Weitz's fault. He did the best he could.
The difference between 'Twilight' and 'New Moon' is worlds apart. Although, sure 'Twilight' is shot like an indie, as if high school kids made it, yet there lies the beauty: in its smallness and I suppose, simplicity. It reels you in for its subtlety and human nuances found on the humans themselves and the vampires. My friends and I enjoyed that film for its sheer cheesiness and kilig. For me, it felt like riding the Anchors Away in Enchanted Kingdom and I'm seated at the farthest row, where you can see the entire amusement park as the ride swings you back and forth, and your butt lifts and the sensation of butterflies flutter on your stomach you can't even scream but just laugh -- IN ENJOYMENT. 'Twilight' was like that. It was juvenile, with bad lines, hair and makeup, FX, and acting but you easily forgave afterward. By that time there's vampire baseball, you're okay even if you know Lestat is ready to cut a bitch. And the sparkling, oh the sparkling is tolerable.
'New Moon' jerks you around for two hours and no Jacob and wolf pack abs can console you. No reunion between Bella and Edward will ever make up for how bad you've been treated. The saving grace for me is Michael Sheen as the head Volturi, Aro. That man can do no wrong.
I've been told Pattinson cannot act his way out of a paper bag, but I disagree. He can combine the lovingly pained (or constipated) look, and use it to the utmost, especially on Bella. Lautner can't; I think that can be remedied by having Taylor Swift as his girlfriend for real. It seems this kid has yet to experience what love really is. That's how young he is, and it shows. Also, Lautner may have the abs, but he doesn't have the gravitas that Pattinson has. I suppose the are-they-dating-or-aren't-they dance between him and Stewart comes into play. I'm no shipper though. But the way they play it on screen, you'd root for the Bella/Edward pairing. Again, I have trouble validating a couple that looks like they could be siblings: one that is of the Kuya-Bunso or Ate-Bunso dynamic. And Stewart and Lautner fall on the Ate-Bunso category.
So I say it's like 'Harry Potter & the Half-Blood Prince' Deja Vu because it's a yawn. Really, a yawn. The werewolf CGI is good but they're not scary. They're big, but big and burly do not a scary make. At one point, my friend E called them kapre. I even want one to take home... as a pet.
In the end, I'm glad I watched with a free ticket. I don't believe I'd pay for this kind of aggravation. So, C, my friend -- I think I'd skip our tradition this year. Please forgive me.
And for the burning question: Team Edward or Team Jacob?
I'm too tired to care.
I will shut my pie hole till almost everyone has seen it.
Let's just say that what I felt after seeing it was this: 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' Deja Vu.
Anyway, posting this because it's refreshing to see RPattz not as that pasty vamp. Also: MASHUP! In this film, he makes out with Emilie de Ravin aka Claire from 'Lost' and most importantly, aka Tess from one of my beloved TV series, 'Roswell'. So 'Twilight' and 'Roswell' universes on a collision course. Awesome.
the Books You’ve Been Planning To Read For Ages,
the Books You’ve Been Hunting For Years Without Success,
the Books Dealing With Something You’re Working On At The Moment,
the Books You Want To Own So They’ll Be Handy Just In Case,
the Books You Could Put Aside Maybe To Read This Summer,
the Books You Need To Go With Other Books On Your Shelves,
the Books That Fill You With Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified.
With a zigzag dash you shake them off and leap straight into the citadel of the New Books Whose Author Or Subject Appeals To You. Even inside this stronghold you can make some breaches in the ranks of the defenders, dividing them into New Books By Authors Or On Subjects Not New (for you or in general) and New Books By Authors Or On Subjects Completely Unknown (at least to you), and defining the attraction they have for you on the basis of your desires and needs for the new and the not new (for the new you seek in the not new and for the not new you seek in the new).
All this simply means that, having rapidly glanced over the titles of the volumes displayed in the bookshop, you have turned toward a stack of If on a winter’s night a traveler fresh off the press, you have grasped a copy, and you have carried it to the cashier so that your right to own it can be established.
You cast another bewildered look at the books around you (or, rather: it was the books that looked at you, with the bewildered gaze of dogs who, from their cages in the city pound, see a former companion go off on the leash of his master, come to rescue him), and out you went.
You derive a special pleasure from a just-published book, and it isn’t only a book you are taking with you but its novelty as well, which could also be merely that of an object fresh from the factory, the youthful bloom of new books, which lasts until the dust jacked begins to yellow, until a veil of smog settles on the top edge, until the binding becomes dog-eared, in the rapid autumn of libraries.
No, you hope always to encounter true newness, which , having been new once, will continue to be so. Having read the freshly published book, you will take possession of this newness at the first moment, without having to pursue it, to chase it. Will it happen this time? You never can tell. Let’s see how it begins.
— Italo Calvino If On A Winter’s Night A Traveler
TANGNA. SO TRUE.
I therefore conclude, WANT.
But a set of my friends thought worse about my being 'incommunicado' as one of them dubbed. Yesterday, if I still hadn't replied to their emails or texts, they were supposed to show up at my office to check up on me. I found this out how? I bumped into two of them at the nearby mall a few days ago and they told me their plan. When I found out, I told them they didn't have to do that. They didn't know how to reach me and it seemed like the best thing to do. It felt like a confrontation/intervention/raid type of thing. Also, it was OA (overacting).
The having-no-means-of-communication-due-to-S
Now about this set of friends (it's not you D, E, or C -- I actually like our set-up. We actually know the concept of 'space'): I just made the SIM card an excuse for not communicating with them. I did read their emails that turn into chat threads in my inbox but refused to join in on the fun (sarcasm there). I have not hung with them since May. After that trip to Bicolandia, I was spent. Something clicked. That trip was full of laughter and drama on all sides, and I found myself being in the middle of it. I was also OUT of it. I brought my original ninja plushie Ninji (see melodiscontent.tumblr.com/post/83421384/c
Then I realized: They look at me differently because I am totally different from them.
Here I am, pushing 30, and I still do not have the adult accessories they own: boyfriend/husband, kids, rent/mortgage, car, house/condo, insurance, credit cards -- you know, the works. I once had a talk with one of them; told her about my creative pursuits and there was pity in her voice, even if she said, 'Kahit anong gawin mo, susuportahan kita.' To them, I'm never-do-well, good-for-nothing, and maybe, sad.
And what I really don't get: They always want to get together. ALL THE FUCKING TIME.
Always with the: 'Dinner tayo!' 'Karaoke tayo!' 'Punta ka sa binyag ng anak ko!' 'Sleepover kayo sa bahay namin!' ALL THE TIME. It never ends.
I suppose I get exhausted when I'm with them. All of them are so gregarious and always ON, and I can't be like that. I need time to recuperate from socializing so much. Sure, I'm up in my head most times, but dude, I'm an introvert and I know they don't care if I am. To them, you should be ON. Always ON. I may not have plans tonight yet it doesn't mean I'm free. Again, introvert here. I want my solitude. I have things to do. I have places to go too.
I don't know. I'm still figuring out if I should let myself back into their energetic fold. I would like to believe they're just as confused as me, whether or not we should keep each other as friends. I do care for them. But for me, they care too much. I just want them to back up a little. It seems like I'm going against their flow and they're making it real hard for me to be ME.
Am I bitch about this? Am I the only one who feels this way?
At some point, I'd like to have an original idea. And I'd like to be fancied, or maybe loved even, but I'll wait and see. And as for a job, I'm not sure exactly what I want yet, but something that I don't despise, and that doesn't make me ill, and that means I don't have to worry about money all the time. And of all these are the things that a university education's going to give me.'
That my friend/s (whoever reads me; wait, are you there -- really?) is a page of prose from David Nicholls' 2003 novel, 'Starter For Ten'. It's about Brian Jackson, an 18-year-old freshman in university on a quest to join TV's foremost general knowledge quiz show and impress the girl of his dreams.
It's about a nerd -- go figure!
I've forgotten that I purchased this book at the bargain bin at National Bookstore Cubao for 75-pesos. It was with my crafts supplies, so it felt like discovering something for the first time all over again when I spotted it. After the last book, I needed something light and delightful. This is a romantic comedy, basically. And I love English self-deprecation too much to pass this up.
There's already a movie based on this book, starring a pre-'Atonement' James McAvoy as the lead, but I haven't seen it. I will, when I'm done. For now, it's funny... and I'm all nerd-ed out! Every chapter begins with a trivia. (I might use it when another Quiz Night happens, right? *wink wink*).
After finishing Kazuo Ishiguro's 'Never Let Me Go' (Quick review: It's okay. It's the third in what I call 'contemporary sci-fi' novels; the first two being P.D. James' 'Children of Men' and Margaret Atwood's 'Crake & Oryx'), I am left with piles of books to choose from as its successor.
And I am unabashedly lost.
Because the titles on the piles, I'm not sure most of them I want to read.
This is the downfall of a bookworm -- You buy LOTS of books, especially at the bargain bin, and think, all those titles you get at half the original price, would eventually be the ones you want.
Doesn't happen.
I still keep on buying titles that I do like, and the ones I bought beforehand, will collect dust instead and be jealous. (Yes, to me, books have feelings too).
Currently, I am perusing a copy lent to me: Stieg Larsson's 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo' and it's USO, so I'm not enthusiastic about it. It's supposed to be 'Da Vinci Code' good, but I'm still on Chapter One and it's been with me two weeks already. I'm actually more interested on why the author died mysteriously after shipping this and other novels to his publisher. THAT I'd read.
Also, every night, I come back to 'Harry Potter & The Deathly Hollows' but since I'm in no rush to read it, since the film adaptations crank out June of 2010, it's still not NEW reading, you know. Now it feels like an obligation to finish it and be let go from my shackles.
So, I'm weeding out the titles that will stay on the Will Read Pile, then if I'm ho-hum about the titles, they will now be transferred to the Will Gift Pile, to friends and my brother, who needs to read big time.
And here are my Want To Read Books based on quotes I find on blogs:
'There are many differences between a baby and an I-Pod. And one of the biggest is, no ones going to mug you for your baby.'
- Nick Hornby, 'Slam'
'She wants to know if I love her, that's all anyone wants from anyone else, not love itself but the knowledge that love is there, like new batteries in the flashlight in the emergency kit in the hall closet.'
- Jonathan Safran Foer, 'Exteremely Loud and Incredibly Close'
'I wanted so badly to lie down next to her on the couch, to wrap my arms around her and sleep. Not fuck, like in those movies. Not even have sex. Just sleep together, in the most innocent sense of the phrase. But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was hopelessly boring and she was endlessly fascinating. So I walked back to my room and collapsed on the bottom bunk, thinking that if people were rain, I was drizzle and she was hurricane.'
- John Green, 'Looking For Alaska'
'The pen will never be able to move fast enough to write down every word discovered in the space of memory. Some things have been lost forever, other things will perhaps be remembered again, and still other things have been lost and found and lost again. There is no way to be sure of any this.'
- Paul Auster, 'The Invention of Solitude'
'And it's not "clever lonely" (like Morrissey)or "interesting Lonely" (like Radiohead); it's "lonely, lonely," like the way it feels when you're being hugged by someone and it somehow makes you sadder.'
- Chuck Klosterman, 'Sex, Drugs, & Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto'
'East of the sun and west of the moon.' As unfathomable as the words were, I realized I must figure them out, reason it through. For I would go to this impossible land that lay east of the sun and west of the moon. From the moment the sleigh had vanished from sight and I could no longer hear the silver bells I knew that I would go after the stranger that had been the white bear to make right the terrible wrong I had done him.... All that mattered was to make things right. And I would do whatever it took, journey to wherever I must, to reach that goal.'
- Edith Pattou, 'East'
You know why I'm doing the editing of my book piles? Let Nick Hornby speak for me:
'All the books we own, both read and unread, are the fullest expression of self we have at our disposal... But with each passing year, and with each whimsical purchase, our libraries become more and more able to articulate who we are, whether we read the books or not.'
I want my purchase not to be so whimsical -- this is my recessionista self when it comes to books. Also, I see the books I've read and those I will read and may or may not read, and they don't make sense. It's all over the place. Like a scatterbrain on liters of Coca Cola. I want to focus on what I like and just purchase them. In the end, you never really know how you feel about a book until you open, flip the pages, sit down, and read. Some of my favorites come from the bargain bin, some I yell WTF internally for ever succumbing to them. But I read and that's what matters.
Any book suggestions? I don't like what's uso and best-sellers. No series. (Although I might try Suzanne Collins' 'Hunger Games' since it reminds me so much of Stephen King's 'The Running Man' and 'Battle Royale').
Disney's Beauty and the Beast + Oliver! + Bram Stoker's Dracula = Fashion Math that may look like these:
I'm all for a re-vamp of my wardrobe. I already bought tights. More tights and dresses and oxford shoes then.
All photos from Vogue Girl Korea.
