Menthol-Guy

It’s one of those nights where it’s too late for yesterday and too early for tomorrow.

Well, I was lying in my bed in this Norman Mailer way–I mean, the way Norman Mailer’s character in The American Dream might have done it, smoking a cigarette stick and just blowing it away to the ceiling. It’s a classic way of smoking, methinks, with Cherry or Donna sleeping besides you, the way they must have looked like in the 60s or 70s, or the way those hipster polaroids depict it. I have just finished watching Insomnia from the laptop, directed by Christopher Nolan (I’m finding my way around directors lately; I think that I should know the directors too, out of respect), and by the time I was smoking my last cigarette through the Norman Mailer way (I should reread again that book if I would ever grow up, since I couldn’t exactly grasp the entire plot, sorry) my iTunes started playing blink-182.

When I was in my High School (here we go again) I used to listen to them. Not really non-stop and all that exaggerated fanboy lines, no. This Dell of a laptop first broke down in its first year, in 2007, and all my music files were wiped out from the system–my blogging archives and my music, including my entire blink-182 discography. I soon got tired of redeeming my entire library back (which is full of Saosin and Senses Fail, heh) so I didn’t give a shit about my library until recently, when I tried logging in to my Last.fm account.

I downloaded some of their albums I liked last Friday and it hit me.

One of my personally memorable posts in Utakgago.com is entitled “Songs as Memory Cards”, and though it did fail (unanimously!) in its attempt to narrate or pose this capability of songs to save memories, well, I still liked the thought. I don’t even think the readers understood what I’ve said in that post; they thought it’s esoteric, or that it is just some fucked up delusion I made

What hit me is that whenever I listen to blink-182 songs, I don’t remember High School. At all. BUT it gives me shivers, for in the summer of 2007 at Fort Lee, New Jersey, when I was at the backseat of the Subaru my sister used to own, I was listening to blink-182’s Down. (I do have an unquestionably sharp memory.)

At my sixth puff I was listening to Stay Together For The Kids, and it was eerie to listen to, in a night like that. November. The biting cold.

As I type this I’m listening to All The Small Things and all I remember was their awesome video–they were nude, all right, and they looked like Backstreet Boys and shit and it was beyond hilarious.

I know some of you guys don’t like blink-182 since they’re punk, or that you hate tattoos who happened to look like men (or rockstars, or Pharrell). But to put it generally, there are certain kinds of songs where we develop this special, personal (even biased) intimacy. Our spines shiver, our faces smile, our eyes well with tears out of the nostalgia we stoically deny. May it be blink-182 or that braided Britney Spears singing in the late 90s–or even Sammy Davis Jr. for all I care–the point of those special songs we have on our playlists, on our iPods or what-have-yous, is to refresh memories in our minds. It could torture us to the point that we would want to delete the song or crack the CD (don’t do it; I’m also on the verge of deleting my blink-182 songs because of the same reason) but that’s life: it’s a royal pain in the ass no matter where you go. At least you’re listening to a song. I’d be damned if it’s blink-182, too.

That way, they’re memory cards. I don’t really care if you guys understand it, but this is better than the former write-up (which is so last 2007; bordering on palm-in-the-face sentences and awkwardly written emotions).

It’s funny how I got teary-eyed with that song Jude Law and a Semester Abroad by Brand New. It gives me the shivers. It’s really punk rock and all, from their first album, but the substance it has really knocks me down. It has this lyrics:

Tell all the English boys you meet
about the American boy back in the States,
the American boy you used to date
who would do anything you say.

It’s… I don’t know why I’m feeling sadness over lyrics I didn’t even experience, but maybe it’s the sympathy working on me. It’s just sad. It plays on my head and I imagine this guy brooding over his girlfriend—no communication at all, assuming that maybe his girlfriend had met Jude Laws in England, Jude Laws who are oozing with fucking sexual appeal and all—and he’s left back in the States.

And all he’s wishing is the acknowledgement he wants from his girlfriend, to at least tell her English boys about that American boy back in the States.

I hope I can breathe after this.

On music

Give Jay-Z a chance, I told myself. Lately I’ve been open-minded to listen to any kind of music, and so far, I’m appreciating every song (though some are bullshits, but at least I gave them a fucking chance). You don’t have to chew the song for days; giving it a try (just a single play) is harmless, though.

End of semester

Plans?

1. Three days in Boracay with my Japanese friend. Dad approved about this. He wants to go to the beach and a one-night-stand experience. I told him it’s indecent. He told me he was just joking. Joke my ass.
2. Read novels. I’m planning to read ten or seven!
3. Watch movies. I’ve been listing interesting movie titles for a week! They’re about twenty of them. Which reminds me: how can I balance my time watching and reading novels at the same time? Tough choice.
4. Cook. Since I haven’t gone home for a month (with the exception of Ondoy; yes, I was stranded, and yes, I DIDN’T MAKE A POST ABOUT IT!), I want to make fruit salad, cook pesto, caldereta, and all the food I wouldn’t like to think now ‘coz I’m about to hit the sack.
5. Haircut? My hair has reached its longest, I think, this year.
6. Beer-drinking. I haven’t had any beer-drinking session since time immemorial (i.e. a month ago).
7. Book shop! I miss the local Booksale.
8. Renew my VISA. If Dad won’t let me, I’ll kill him. Mom wants me to go there (in New York) for Christmas (they’re separated like that), and though it’s perfectly fine if Dad wants to show up, too, being the pride of the family, Dad hesitates.
9. Lose more weight. This is in conflict with number 4.
10. Meet with my High School friends. I just miss them.

Just because

My blog post about my shifting to BA Communication Arts last summer (and the practicality vs. passion thing I wrote) is one of the finalists for this year’s Philippine Blog Awards under the category Top Ten Posts of the Year.

This is beyond sanity.

Awards night this Friday, and I don’t think I’ll make it. A tight friend is celebrating his birthday this Friday, and from the look on his face when I told him about the event I’ll be attending this Friday, well, I don’t think I’d risk his disappointment. Besides, I don’t think my post is going to win, given the other contender’s topics ranging from political to statistical analysis; the list even made me wonder how the hell my post ended up fucking there?

Anyway, thanks for the visits and for the appreciation! :)

It’s nice to wake up in the morning and listen to Explosions in the Sky. I hate this band for even knowing what I’m craving for rock bands these days. Their music is transcendent, very much reflective, wistful, even retrospective at some point; they’re an instrumental post-rock band (and it’s my first time to immerse myself in such a genre; what the hell is post-rock anyway?) from Texas and they kick ass. They’re really good!

Try finding their albums online through this format: [album name/artist name], [hosting site: e.g. Mediafire], album. I always use that format and it never fails me. :) Google it!