Monday, May 29, 2006

trains

Suddenly I have this urge to jump into a train and travel. Just pack and leave, the hell with deadlines. That's exactly what Charmaine and I intend to do when we get married: to explore the countryside and become strangers even for a short while. The promise of adventure and anonymity is mouth-watering.

But except for the MRT and the LRT I'm not sure if they still run trains in this country. Even if they do, are train rides here as enjoyable as, say, in London (or China, judging from what Paul Theroux had written in Riding the Iron Rooster)? The last train I saw was rusty and decrepit and overflowing with assorted trash. It looked like it's one strong gust of wind away from bursting apart. How it gets from Point A to Point B is something for the imagination. It's certainly the last thing I want to take me somewhere.

Anyway there's still the bus as an option.

Saturday, May 27, 2006

go! fuck yourself

No Internet yesterday. I tried logging in in the morning but all I got was this message box telling me the "network cannot establish dial-up, check your password and try again later." (Yes, we're still on Dial-Up. I know that's as primitive as rubbing sticks for fire, but so what?) This usually happens when our prepaid Internet card runs out of credit. Since my brother spent the previous night chatting (with a girl he said was "veeeeery boring"), I presumed that was the case.

But lo! This morning, just for the heck of it, I tried logging in using the same Go! prepaid card -- and I got connected! But since today is Saturday, with birds and sunshine outside, I'll contain myself and not rant. I'll just say one thing, though: Those freaks in the Eastern Telecom Customer Service Department must be having a hell of a busy season.

Later Charmaine and I are gonna watch The Da Vinci Code. We'll give it a whirl even though the reviews aren't that good. I have little confidence with movies based on novels anyway. Some directors can pull it off -- Frank Darabont comes to mind, with his takes on Stephen King stories -- but they are a minority.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

chopsuey

I'm listening to a lot of guitars and high-pitched vocals these days: Dio, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, (old) Savatage, Voivod, Hammerfall, the likes. Old stuff -- absolutely no Cookie Monster growls, blast beats, breakdowns, Satanic what-not and stuff. Just heavy metal in its purest, barest, most unadulterated form. Throw these fuckers in a CD-R with some not-quite-fresh tracks from Anthrax and Megadeth and WASP, among others, and that blade will surely cut, man.

The first of my research assignments has started trickling in. I see busy days ahead. I just hope money will soon follow. Kerouac's Windblown World is waiting for me in Powerbooks-Glorietta, and I've been told that the third Headbangers Ball compilation will be unleashed locally any day now. And there's that long overdue driving lesson. Sucks to be broke, indeed.

That's it for now. The heat is unbearable. Dusk is here but still the electric fan is of little comfort. I'm sweating like criminal on interrogation. Pretty damn hard to think . . .

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

hunter

"He's starting to be a headache," Ma said as the last of the terrified, trembling visitors were ushered out of the gate. "Soon he'll chomp somebody's ass and we'll be in trouble."

The headache's name is Hunter, after the late gonzo author, Hunter S. Thompson. Mongrel, male, black and white. Neighbors say he is too big for his seven-month age and too vicious for his own good. They would look at him and wince as they recall the horror of their last rabies shot. Are they secretly cursing us for not putting the damn beast on leash?

Nah. No chains for ol' Hunter here. We are a family of dog lovers, from our grand-grandparents all the way down to us, and discipline by way of shackling isn't our thing. We despise with passion people who treat their dogs unkindly, especially those who pass themselves around as good, kind-hearted, nature-loving children of God. They're everywhere; I can name a few at the top of my head. These are the bastards whose asses deserve to be chomped . . . if possible by a raging T-Rex!

Sunday, May 21, 2006

heavy metal dorks

One gripe I have with metal music is that a lot of bands will go out of their way just to look evil. I get exasperated every time I open a Metal Maniacs and see a bunch of corpse-painted guys glowing with pentagrams and inverted crosses and all, staring at me with this silly wild-eyed goofy stare that is supposed to be menacing. They use grisly props like decapitated animal heads or have their photos taken in a graveyard for maximum effect. They have strange sinister-sounding names that are hard to pronounce. Many openly proclaim all-out allegiance to Satan, arguably history's greatest loser.

Hardly a wow factor, if you ask me. If they are trying to impress fans then they're not doing a good job at it. Nobody buys this kind of stunt except "rock" kids who discovered Dimmu Borgir two days ago. Most of us are intelligent enough to know metal is about 99% music, 1% image. If you want to cash in on image, go to Hollywood. Or enter politics, where image is God. Otherwise, leave metal as Black Sabbath envisioned it to be: free of dorks.

Friday, May 19, 2006

boredom tonight - not!

Should I be disturbed that it's Friday night and I'm at home?

I'm supposed to meet my girlfriend tonight for dinner and maybe some drinks, but this morning she woke up feeling slightly unwell. "Itchy throat," she said, "sneezing fits." So I told her to forget tonight's date. Go straight home instead, gobble some Vitamin C, and sleep for eight hours straight, 12 if it will not kill you. She's been extra busy with work lately, thus needing all the rest in the world. I promised to check her out tomorrow, her day-off, right at her place. Hopefully she'll be fine.

Currently reading Paul Theroux's Riding the Iron Rooster: By Train Through China. Friday night in Shanghai. Why not?

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

hah!

I am now reading Dan Brown's infamous novel, The Da Vinci Code. Cracked open the book yesterday with the intention of finishing it before catching the movie, which will have a worldwide premiere on Thursday, May 18. I'm on page 151 now: Robert Langdon and Sophie Neveu on a break-neck nighttime dash for freedom. At best the book is thought-provoking. That's not to say that it is convincing, though.

So why all this clamor to ban the movie? Is Sec. Ermita suffering from brain bubbles? Sen. Pimentel from andropose? Are Filipinos a bunch of drooling religiously insecure people with nothing between their ears? Forget it. I'm sick of this brouhaha against the movie. I'm even going to pretend that two Manila councilors did not file a resolution calling for the ban of the movie in their city. I'm just going to keep my mouth shut and let fools be fools.

Meanwhile, back to the book.

Monday, May 15, 2006

sentimental blvd.

I was on the road last night watching the rain from the jeep's grimy window and listening to the songs in my head. It was like MTV except the music is not some Top 40 pop-rock drivel. It was Time for Change by Motley Crue. Something from my childhood.

Nostalgia creeps in when you're traveling in the rain. And since Antipolo is not really Cubao's next-door neighbor, more songs followed: Van Halen's Right Now, Warrant's Andy Warhol Was Right, Cinderella's Heartbreak Station, Trixter's Surrender -- songs I listened to during the time when most of my peers were losing their heads over four scrawny bums called the Eraserheads. I remember the bands: Damn Yankees, Skid Row, LA Guns, Firehouse, Tesla, Kiss, Black Crowes, Mr. Big, Poison, even Bon Jovi, who, back then, sent my head banging like crazy with You Give Love A Bad Name. (Bed of Roses turned me off, so bad that I no longer listen to them.) I still consider Guns N' Roses as the band with the best moniker out there despite the fact that Axl was and still is an asshole. Their albums were great, too. And how could I forget Alice Cooper's Might As Well Be On Mars? That song once drove me to tears, along with Hardline's In the Hands of Time.

Then it hit me: why not compile these songs in one CD? It may come handy the next time it rains and I feel like knocking around the proverbial memory lane. It's no longer impossible these days. After all there's Limewire and all those file-sharing stuff on the Net. Download, then burn, or jam them in a portable MP3 player, I-Pod, what-not, and then walk around familiar streets and reminisce life 14 years ago. Magic.

Thursday, May 11, 2006

morons

The scheduled May 18 worldwide premiere of the movie The Da Vinci Code is creating a lot of noise in the Philippines. It is impossible to watch the news these days and not see some plump-faced pseudo-moralist jerk-off clamoring for its ban in local theaters. One congressman is even threatening to throw his weight on the MTRCB. He, along with other bleeding-heart Catholics in favor of the ban, found an ally in Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, who huffed and puffed on national TV yesterday claiming the Ron Howard religious thriller is "blasphemous" and "morally offensive" to the Filipino people. "I think we should do everything not to allow it to be shown," he was quoted as saying. And then he admitted that he is yet to read the book from which the movie is based.

Morally offensive, Mr. Ermita? Is the fact that your boss, that little lady in MalacaƱang, cheated her way into presidency not morally offensive to the Filipino people? And what right does a congressman have to tell us what we should watch and not watch? Jesus Christ! That's not even part of his job, which is to lie, cheat, and steal. A congressman talking about morality, his big fat jowls trembling in phony indignation. Can you think of something more loathsome than that?

I don't know about you, but every time some form of authority tells me what to read, watch, and listen to, I get offended. Why? Because it makes me feel like a dunce. The message is not, "We love you, we want you to be a good citizen, so we're protecting you from evil." No. The message is, "You're an idiot, you can't think for yourself, so we're doing all the thinking for you."

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

groupie

X and I were jokingly exchanging saucy text messages yesterday when she suddenly got serious and said, "Since we're both immoral, have you entertained the thought of doing the 'thing' with me? Honest." This is not the first time I received such an invitation from her. Incredible as it is, her communications are always full of innuendoes. I guess she's still hung up with what we did in college, when we were young and careless and zonked out on libido. Those were crazy but not forgotten times. She was my first -- I still smile at the memory -- but it's history. I have a steady partner now to whom I vow to remain loyal. There's gonna be a wedding on December.

I wish X would get a life soon. She's starting to freak me out.