Menthol-Guy

It’s probably in my genes to get rid of my blog for a while and realize that my blog’s becoming one huge empty mass of shit, but of course I still manage to come back and update it. Aaaand I miss my Tumblr blog more than this citrus-colored blog.

BORING DAILY UPDATES:

Friday - Dad got this pharyngitis thing going on in his throat (specifically and obviously, it’s the pharynx) and he’s losing his voice so I quickly cancelled dining with friends at Trinoma at that very night. Then I got home and I saw him smoking. He’s still smoking after all. WTF IS THIS PHARYNGITIS THING ANYWAY?

Saturday - went to someone’s debut at Hotel Stotsenburg somewhere in Clarkfield, Pampanga. We got wheels provided by the debutante which brought us straight from Bulacan to Pampanga. Coolness.

Also, that Saturday - bought that brand-new Monopoly board game for 800 bucks just because of my nephew’s birthday. It’s actually my first gift to him and needless to say, my bank account dwindled even lower than expected. But I quickly deposited money from my dearest Mother.

Sunday - I think the kids and I played three Monopoly games (all of them ended due to bankruptcy).

_{Wait, the phrase “kids and I” is just so fatherly.}

Monday - I went straight to Laguna since my Speech Communication professor ‘last-minutely’ announced an emergency meeting. I’d rather not vent it out here for a while: it’s really maddening. Also, we played DotA from 8 to 1 in the morning, Tuesday.

Tuesday - I woke up and realized that I’m slowly forgetting my blog. :D

And I watched Stay Alive (with Frankie Muniz in it) a while ago. Simply kickass. The movie’s plot is interconnected with a Playstation game (also using the same name) and it’s really thrilling and mind-puzzling.

WHAT KEEPS ME BUSY:

• Shifting papers
• Dad’s resume (I can’t find the french-like e)
• DotA as usual
• Debuts
• Essay writing books!

Dad’s buying me something this Halloween. He told me he’d buy me a vest (Jonas Brothers-like vests, anyone?) or suits (Armani?) for debuts. He said I should be masculine in style, but still fashionable. I can’t get it. Whaaaat does that mean, you GQ*-overloaded father?

_{*GQ means Gentlemen’s Quarterly. It’s a magazine for dirty old men and men’s fashion.}

Who wouldn’t be drooling over the idea of going to some stage, any stage, and receive applause with the job you’re doing? Who wouldn’t be drooling over the idea of the mere action of thanking everybody for the appreciation and the acclaims?

Of course it must have felt good.

Of course I should have gotten another cellphone. That I should have at least voted is my greatest mistake; that I should have at least thought of my number, 2093, as one of the hundreds of slips of paper inside the fishbowl, waiting to be caught.

All I thought, history could repeat itself.

I actually brought (and this is unintentional) the same cellphone unit I had brought with me at last year’s Philippine Blog Awards. I was also situated right next, if not near, to Billycoy, which was the same guy I am sitting right next to during PBA 07.

But it must be bad luck to walk from Mall of Asia to One Esplanade just because some dickhead by the name of Rens to go to MOA. Of course I asked the driver, the ever-attentive taxi driver, if he could bring me at some place called One Esplanade, and he nodded several times. Yes sir, he probably said.

Maybe things conspire against you in its most unexpected. Right after I paid the taxi driver and just a couple of minutes after I slammed the cab’s door, found myself in front of some chicken restaurant and went to the sidewalk, I found my way to a security guard or anyone - just anyone who has this impeccable credibility with regard to directions. At that time, Ian sent a text message saying that “a cab would be great since One Esplanade’s quite far from Mall of Asia.”

I darted my eyes towards the bay and sifted the buildings until there stood One Esplanade, twice the distance of what I usually walk during Thursday classes here at UPLB (man, it was faaaaaar). It was outrageously far that I blamed both the taxi and the dickhead for this well-deserved walk I had to traverse besides the fact that I came all the way to Bulacan and that I am late (this is yet to become my personal trademark, being late). I did not enjoy the abandoned then-Manila Bay savannahs. I did not enjoy my being confident about my knowledge with the venue; that I should have at least looked at the map the organizers have provided carefully.

But behind my personal disappointments with the taxi driver and the cellphone raffle, I would still call this year’s Philippine Blog Awards as better: better and well-planned (and Shari suddenly wondered why I even thought it was well-planned).

By the way, the breaded porkchop wrapped in fried wonton was - in every sense of the word - delicious.

Also, I would like to congratulate Benj for bagging this year’s Personal Blog Award (all hail!). And of course, THE Mr. Gibbs Cadiz for bagging this year’s best Arts & Culture Blog Award and for finally meeting him!

For the company: Aaron, Ian, Ferbert, Alan, Micamyx, Poyt, Jeff, Mariano and Xienah.

And, by the waaaay, I’m so much into Lostphotograph, Octwelve and Dino Latoga’s Una theme (and I’m tempted to download it and install in here - but NOT, since I’m still digging Derek Punsalan’s masterpiece).

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When I was on my way home, I suddenly thought of changing URLs. I don’t smoke anymore (two weeks and counting). Heck, how many times have I been telling myself to stop smoking but after three weeks or so, I’d still do it. But I think this one’s permanent.

I don’t know why but the sight of abandoned ATMs with the blinking green light and the “insert ATM card here” sign right after the mouth of it made me lonely and blue for a while. I’ve seen two ATMs last Saturday night on my way home, and all two of them were abandoned. The green light blinks continuously like a buoy in the middle of some spacious sea at night, and it looked hopeless that way. And then there’s the bank lights - the fluorescent lights carved somewhere, and that’s it. No cars parked nearby, no one’s using that damn machine. I don’t know why but ATMs look horrible and depressing when they’re left alone in the middle of the night. The sight could have been better with a security guard standing right besides that ATM - surprisingly, when I’m imagining it, I don’t feel lonely for the security guard.

_{“Bakat brief mo!”, some fan shouted. Damn them. I’m with Ramon Bautista so STFU!}

Last Thursday night, I was invited to be one of the guest speakers at the UPLB Communication Arts Society’s symposium entitled IPod, IFilm, IBlog, which talks about the media and its reinvention through the years. I was lucky enough to be with THE Ramon Bautista, my co-guest speaker, and have a panel discussion about the said topic (and sit with him on the stage and be friends with him). His appearance simply starstrucked the avid fan in me: I was a reckless fan of his David Blaine-like video clips (search for “Dan Michael” on Youtube and you can see him) featuring him bleeding after walking on broken shards of glass, and of course his stupidity in MTV’s “The Ramon Bautista Show” where he jams with rock bands and teaches his audience the A chord and his “that’s a lot of fun” motto. He was surprisingly affable; very much approachable for (in my opinion) a much-celebrated UP Film Institute professor and a kickass comedian. I really adore him for all of those things I’ve listed, and now I have to move on.

_{I’m the guy wearing violet. The rest are members of the UPLB Communication Arts Society, and I must say their girls are definitely one of the hottest on campus. No kidding. :)}

The speech I delivered includes my side of story - that I discovered blogging in July 2005 at Friendster and December 2005 at Blogger, that there are food blogs and video blogs and all of those stuff. I made my speech a bit informal - though I haven’t heard someone laughing so loud with my jokes (I suck at delivering jokes in English). It was an awful fifteen to thirty-minute speech and good thing I survived.

_{I HAZ A FANZ CLUB! YAYZ!}

The entire Saturday I was in Pulilan, Bulacan since my beloved organization launched an UPCAT Review at St. Dominic’s Academy - if I’m not mistaken - and it was fun! I had fun teaching the Language part of our mock test: mentioning past perfect tenses and subject-verb agreements. During that day, I suddenly missed that feeling of taking the UPCAT, of being nervous and numb about everything around myself - thinking that it’s the only life-changing examination in my life and I have to seize it. But anyway, UPCAT was moderately easy for me (compared to ACET, dammit). I skipped a lot of numbers on the Math part and I was really sweating when I sort-of analyzed the way I answered all those questions: it’s as if I’m a hundred percent sure that I’ll flunk the test.

_{I’m the big guy wearing gray.}

After the exhausting UPCAT review, my orgmates and I went to Cafe Narciso, ten blocks away from the abovementioned school, and there we had dinner and beer (I only drank a single bottle of Red Horse since I have no plans of going home tipsy). We also watched a reggae band and a rock band.

_{One thing: GAWDDAWESUM!}

The reggae band was definitely awesome and professional with what they’re doing - they got Bob Marley and Santana songs (you wouldn’t believe on how they did the guitars - it’s almost impossible) and the vocals! Pure awesome! I was there sitting in front of them and they were just really, really awesome.

What killed my day was the rock band. Okay, I admit I’m an advocate of rock music, but this band definitely stank. Their vocals could kill your day with her Yeng Constantino songs and her “pop-ish” rendition of Colbie Caillat’s Realize. Their guitars and their drums are both great but their vocals just killed my day. I literally turned my back on them - I know it was really rude of me but I just can’t help hearing the vocals and her tap dancing as if she’s sexy. Hers is more like a beerhouse kind of vocals with all the artsy-fartsy vibrations her throat does to kill every song they play.

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I literally forgot what I did yesterday. I’m positive I haven’t done anything remarkable on that day.

Now I have to go pack for LB.

Four days a week (Tuesday to Friday) I go to school. Two of them only have three classes a day (relatively short - it only occupies four hours), and the remaining two days got this disastrous eight-to-twelve and one-to-four combo, which is why I hate Wednesdays and Fridays: it’s a coma-inducing hectic schedule with all the running and waiting for jeepney rides at yellow-painted curbsides.

But the academic routine ends there. Every Friday I go home to Bulacan, three hours away from my beloved university, and I take two bus rides and it takes me three hours to reach the house and untie my shoes and entertain my attention-seeking laptop with the free Wi-Fi.

And every weekend I would sleep and go online all day long. Or do reports, read books, cook our lunch meals, shop for books, or if my friends are kind enough to share their repressed feelings with a case of beer I’d be cancelling all those shits just to have a night of booze.

In short, I’m satisfied with the way everything’s running these days.

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And then my sister would be buying me a FlickrPRO account real soon (first week of July, she said)! Maybe it was because of my much-prepared persuasive approach I sort of used on the e-mail I sent her, including the line I highlighted with green (I almost chose orange but whatever) which says:

“but please, I’d love to know you’re taking your time thinking about it (buying a FlickrPRO account)”

Well, I have read this column on some magazine I got from Dad’s pile of magazines and it says that when communicating through e-mail or even phone and you are about to request something to someone, the use of “love” would be an excellent word to persuade or provoke that someone (only for your opposite sex) to really consider what you are saying, without them knowing that you have this ulterior motive in using it.

And maybe I also used the “appeal to pity”, which I once tried on my position paper way back when I was enjoying my Creative Writing class. LOL.

I don’t really know if the trick worked, but the e-mail sure did something miraculous.

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I’m currently reading two books. John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath so far envelops me into something very philosophical: one chapter clearly personified the bank as some “master” of those bulldozers and those workers wearing gas masks destroying farms during the Depression (this book, I think, is set first on Oklahoma - though I haven’t finished it yet but I have this feeling the Joad Family would be migrating to California for a new life). Uhh, I just can’t explain it right now but I’ll try to make a book review about it.

I’m also reading Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles. I’m digging every literary piece of this world-class Japanese author these days (since I almost finished Salinger’s, except one book with Seymour on the title). What I really love with this book is it’s modern setting - which I can totally relate - and its explicit exposition on sex (the part where the protagonist has his wet dream after some steamy blowjob he got from his dream with some girl! I have not heard of any book that would really narrate something like that even in fiction - yet he still narrated it without a tinge of vulgarity, and I like it very much) and death and every topic worth digging.

I’d really love people who would donate second-hand books may it be from Murakami or from any other kickass author. But since a personal meet-up would be quite difficult (I study in Laguna, I reside in Bulacan), you can just send me some e-book at utakgago@yahoo.com okay? :) Thanks!