Who Said This?

Two of my favorite things are sitting on my front porch smoking a pipe of sweet hemp, and playing my Hohner harmonica.”

Is it
a. Cheech
b. Chong
c. Choy
d. Tim Leary
e. Harry Pothead
f. George W. Bush
g. Abe Lincoln
h. Barack O
i. Ali

Answer at the comment

Rational Numbers

I Love New Math

Welcome Aboard Wonder Woman Airlines

Odds on a Passing Car and a Winning Shot

From now on, when I bet on lotto (I only do when it gets beyond P200M because if you want to try your luck you have to slam it on the wall), I will notice the plate number of a passing car. The woman who won half of Sunday's lotto (the other half is FG, I presume) can't bet on her age (50) so she took note of a birthdate, anniversary date and home address. And of course the last two digits of a passing car. In my short story, Libro Ng Numero (anthologized in Mga Kuwento ng Lungsod by Ateneo Press), I included a poem actually of the different sumada (number meanings) of jueteng. But that is only from 1 to 37. Anyway everything's just luck. Yesterday was the Nets' Devin Harris's day. That shot is the equivalent of winning lotto.

Kablog!

At noong pauwi na sila, tinanong ako ni Bananas bakit wala si Babes in the City.
Sinagot ko sya ng: "When I woke up this morning, I realized I no longer have a heart."

Lucky 13 Congrats, Kaw

The Cultural Center of the Philippines is pleased to announce the 2009 Thirteen Artists Awardees. The artists who will be receiving the award and will present new works in the exhibit at the CCP Main Gallery on July 9, 2009 are: 1. Buen Calubayan 2. Christina Dy 3. Don Djerassi Dalmacio 4. Patty Eustaquio 5. Kawayan de Guia 6. Winner Jumalon 7. Raquel de Loyola 8. Raya Martin 9. Iggy Rodriguez 10. Don Salubayba 11. Jaypee Samson 12. Pamela Yan 13. MM Yu

The artists were unanimously chosen by jurors Eileen Legaspi-Ramirez, Lao Lianben and Mark Justiniani.

Dondi Ledesma R.I.P.

Dondi, said to be the father of mainstream rock in the country, died today. He was the bass player of Wally Gonzales and Wally and Pepe Smith were supposed to hold a concert here at Overtones on Feb 26 and 27 for Dondi.

Barak's Blackberry

Here it is

New Italo Calvino Story

I don't know how they did it but aren't we glad?

Baguio Minute 7

It's getting hotter in Baguio. The city redeemed itself when a Kankanaey lass from Bakun and a student of Baguio Central University topped the nationwide Nursing Board exam. Six other students from BGU and SLU made it to the Top 10. This after two years of the nursing exam leakage scandal which originated in Baguio in 2006. The Villards Cup of Sen. Manny Villar kicked off in SM Baguio and the finals will be disputed by Jerome Gomez and Django Bustamante. Comelec regional direcotr Armand Velasco is set to become commissioner but an anonymous hate letter questioned his credibility i.e. his academic background including taking the bar five times and being kicked out in SLU and University of the East. There were also allegations of him making kickback money by kicking out candidates who should have won. Velasco said that an inisder is repsonsible for this letter. The Irisan dumpsite will again be open because the city is spending too much money sending its basura to Tarlac. Irisan residents who forcibly closed the site last year leading to its non-use were also charged in court. The city also defended the dumping of garbage at the Archery range in Athletic Bowl saying that these are sacks of compost. Tuba residents diverted the water leading to the Asin hydropower plants which is owned by the city. The Tadiangan-Nangalisan Hydro Ancestral Landowners Association (TNHALA) wanted compensation. The PMA held its alumni homecoming Saturday with adopted senators Loren Legarda and Mar Roxas in tow. Procor Chief Eugene Martin was replaced by a general implicated in the so-called Euro Generals Scandal.

Slumdog Millionaires

Two divided P347-million for winning the 6-49 lotto with the winning numbers: 06-34-20-26-12-33

Edsa

Inquirer banner:
Arroyo: World won’taccept another EDSA
My take:
But we have allowed another Marcos

Watchmen

In Alan Moore's Watchmen, this is Dr. Manhattan. Well, in the movie something was altered. Huge and circum....! I hope it's not the doing of that terrible bald plastic surgeon from Manila

Directors

If your name isn't

1. Steven Spielberg
2. Peter Jackson
3. Martin Scorsese
4. Christopher Nolan
5. Steven Soderbergh
6. Ridley Scott
7. Quentin Tarantino
8. Michael Mann
9. James Cameron
10. Joel and Ethan Coen
11. Guillermo del Toro
12. David Fincher
13. Tim Burton
14. Judd Apatow
15. Sam Raimi
16. Zack Snyder
17. Darren Aronofsky
18. Danny Boyle
19. Clint Eastwood
20. Ron Howard
21. Ang Lee
22. Paul Thomas Anderson
23. Paul Greengrass
24. Pedro Almodóvar
25. Jon Favreau

26. Woody Allen

27. Brad Bird
28. David Cronenberg
29. Sofia Coppola
30. Bryan Singer
31. Sam Mendes
32. Mel Gibson
33. The Wachowski Bros.
34. J.J. Abrams
35. Alfonso Cuaron
36. Hayao Miyazaki
37. Mike Leigh
38. Oliver Stone
39. Roman Polanski
40. Spike Jonze
41. Richard Linklater
42. Spike Lee
43. David Lynch
44. Wong Kar-Wai
45. Wes Anderson
46. Mira Nair
47. Andrew Stanton
48. Michael Moore
49. Mary Harron
50. Sidney Lumet

Then Entertainment Weekly thinks you are not a great director. And if you're great, you're dead. Oh crap

Musafar

Mini Me, Mahal and Mura, you have nothing against this duo

How to Cheat

The explanations

Obama Idolatry

Palindromic Poem

"Dammit I’m Mad"

by

Demetri Martin

Dammit I’m mad.
Evil is a deed as I live.
God, am I reviled? I rise, my bed on a sun, I melt.
To be not one man emanating is sad. I piss.
Alas, it is so late. Who stops to help?
Man, it is hot. I’m in it. I tell.
I am not a devil. I level “Mad Dog”.
Ah, say burning is, as a deified gulp,
In my halo of a mired rum tin.
I erase many men. Oh, to be man, a sin.
Is evil in a clam? In a trap?
No. It is open. On it I was stuck.
Rats peed on hope. Elsewhere dips a web.
Be still if I fill its ebb.
Ew, a spider… eh?
We sleep. Oh no!
Deep, stark cuts saw it in one position.
Part animal, can I live? Sin is a name.
Both, one… my names are in it.
Murder? I’m a fool.
A hymn I plug, deified as a sign in ruby ash,
A Goddam level I lived at.
On mail let it in. I’m it.
Oh, sit in ample hot spots. Oh wet!
A loss it is alas (sip). I’d assign it a name.
Name not one bottle minus an ode by me:
“Sir, I deliver. I’m a dog”
Evil is a deed as I live.
Dammit I’m mad.

Karaokeology

Michael Jackson on the Block

These are some of the stuff that Michael Jackson would be auctioning on April. Also included are lots of crowns, bangles and a Rolls Royce stretch limo. Yes, friends, he got the Edward Scissorhands.

The Most Dramatic Fight Sequence Ever

When I first watched Riki-Oh, I can't sleep. This is a masterpiece! Tarantino, you can't top this.
And of course, the classic head banger!

This Morning

Baguio Minute 6

It's a wet VD week in Baguio. Since VD also means venereal disease, the Health Center said that there were two cases of HIV infection in the city within the year. One is a 17-year-old boy. The ones who made money the most during Valentines were the taxi drivers who knocked on all the motels in the city only to be told that there would be No Vacancy. So many couples spent their dates on the taxicabs with a P200 trip literally around the city. Should have just tipped the drivers. Hmmm. Speaking of motels, Cafe by the Ruins had a ritual last week to drive away evil spirits especially that Hotel Sogo is going to be built beside it. HS is supposed to be a hotel so the zoning ordinance that it is located in front of City Hall despite its ill repute is legally fine. So now we know where the City wheelings and dealings would be. Hmm. A Valentines murder: A 30-year old woman from Samar was stabbed to death last Feb. 14 after entering a motel at Lower Gen. Luna Rd. The suspect in the rape and murder of a young UB Nursing student in Balacbac was nabbed. He belongs to a famous family. The other suspect, the alleged boyfriend, remains at large. The Philippine Export Processing Zone, the city's cash cow, remitted only P7 million in the 3rd Quarter of last year. In the first two quarters, the PRPZ remitted P20 million per quarter. This has a huge effect on the city's budget which is now close to P1 B. The city closed down 20 nightclubs in the city for being too noisy.

How MC Hammer Would Sing the Pasyon

Fox Fcks Top Cop Cox

This blooper by Fox Network is as silly as this and this. But then when you come to think of it, Fox New Network is laughing at the expense of the Iraqi people whose lives the Bush administration fcked up because of the war. The Fox Network News, of course, is the official rah-rah boys of the Bush administration so there is something obliquely obscene with this blooper. Or maybe I'm overreacting

Well I did some ehem research and Shepard Smith, yes, the guy laughing at the top cock joke was in the same situation before, regarding J-Lo and job. This is funnier, actually

Gates's Humor

Saying that "there is no reason only poor people should be
infected" with malaria, Bill Gates opened a jar full of
mosquitoes in front of a crowd of wealthy, influential
attendees at the invitation-only Technology Entertainment
Design (TED) conference in California. Gates later
admitted that the mosquitoes were free of the disease.

Shorts Stories on HR

Short-story contest calls for writers from across the world

Tell your story to the world by participating in a monthly Global Short Story Competition, which is designed to attract writers worldwide. Deadline: end of each month.

Entries on any theme must be no more than 2,000 words and be written in English. There is a UK£5 (about US$7.50) entry fee per story. Each month a winning story receives a cash prize of UK£100 (about US$150) and is published on the contest’s Web site. At the end of 12 months, each winner will be considered for an annual cash prize.

The contest is supported by the Darlington Arts Centre in England.

To learn more or submit an entry, visit http://www.globalshortstories.net/index.html.

Sebalding

Will Self on Sebald:

Reading WG Sebald I felt a growing affinity, although not with the man himself - I never met, let alone knew him - nor with humanity in general. Indeed, immersed in Sebald, the inversion of Schopenhauer's dictum "The more I love mankind, the less I love men" often occurs to me: the more his fictional alter ego reverences individual men and women, the less he seems to love mankind. I couldn't say exactly what my Sebaldian progression has been: there was reading and then rereading, so that passages from one text interpolated, Russian-doll-like, into another, much as his raconteur characters find their voice in the accents of Sebald's style. I suspect The Rings of Saturn came first, followed by The Emigrants, followed by Austerlitz. Then I tackled the lectures Sebald gave in Zurich in 1997, published under the title On the Natural History of Destruction.

Unemployment: You May Not be Unemployed

American Idol's Last 36

Here they are: the AI Finalists
You who believe that there are some talented Fil-Ams among them can dwell on these names: Mishavonna Henson (foto) and Kai Kalama . Or pray that the mothers are the Pinoys.
Here's the complete Grammy winners.
Classical Contemporary Composition: "Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan," John Corigliano (JoAnn Falletta); track from: "Corigliano: Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan" (Naxos)
Musical Album for Children: "Here Come the 123s," They Might Be Giants (Disney Sound)
Yes, there is a Pinoy winner: Tia Carrere
Hawaiian Music Album: "Ikena," Tia Carrere and Daniel Ho (Daniel Ho Creations)

Baguio Minute 5

It is getting hotter and in deference to the California and Australia brushfires, the fire at the PMA reservation last week went uncontained for nine hours and destroyed four hectares. Agno River and Chico River watersheds are among the sites mulled for the $80 million refo project. The Beneco finally bags the streetlighting program of the city for six months after it threatened an expose that some councilors initially denied the bid because they have other business entities in mind. Like the American Idol, the Panagbenga committee said that only nine out of the 17 schools here made it to the Panagbenga parade on Feb. 28 and March 1. Ten other groups from outside Baguio are going to dance, beat their drums and smile like there's no tomorrow. Like the AI, Panagbenga also launched the Baguio's Got Talent! at Burnham whiohc will go on every weekend with Martin Masadao as one of the judges. Yes, the hotels are already fully booked for the event and yes, the city said the garbage during the whole month will be collected. The city planned on using the following for their next landfill: Virac and the open pit mine in Itogon, and OMG! Mt. Sto. Tomas! The council announced that they approved 21 significant laws last year including no-smoking, no-graffiti, no-casino, creation of blue lanes along the roads for wheelchairs, clean air and a ticketing system in drugstores. Councilors wanted City Hall grounds locked during the night to prevent theft and heavy petting among the trees. And speaking of romance, on February 14 night, Chinggoy Alonzo together with soprano Kate Balajadia and tenor Juan Gaerlan will perform "Phantom of the Opera" above Burnham Lake. The Baguio Writers Group will also have a poetry reading at Cafe by the Ruins later in the evening. The Baguio Botanical Park, formerly known as Imelda Park, will now be known as Centennial Park. After two months, the bingo at Otek was finally dismantled. Guess they run out of corpses as lamay excuses.

Unholyhours' Valentine Ideas

How Baguio Students Get to Meet Pretty Girls

make paper dolls, of course

And Now Meet His Brother, Meng, an Olympic Cyclist

Lang Lang

How to Distract Tony Parker

Friday Im In Lowve

Ilocano Pangasinan Writing Workshop

PANGASINAN AND ILOCANO WRITERS' CONFERENCE

The University of Pangasinan, in celebration of its 84th Foundation Anniversary and the conferment of the Degree Doctor of Humanities Honoris Causa upon Prof. Francisco Sionil Jose (National Artist for Literature, 2001 & Ramon Magsaysay Awardee for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts, 1980), shall conduct a Writers’ Conference to be participated in by teachers and students of creative writing, journalists and other writing enthusiasts.

The activity is envisioned to be an opportunity to promote the use of Pangasinan as a medium of literary/creative writing.

Professor F. Sionil Jose will give the keynote speech on "Creative Writing: Towards the Enrichment of Pangasinan and Ilocano Literature."

The Writers’ Conference speakers and discussion topics will be:

• Dr. Ma. Crisanta Nelmida-Flores (University of the Philippines)
  "Writing History and Fiction in Pangasinan"
• Mr. Vim Nadera (University of the Philippines)
  "Creative Writing in the Local Setting"
• Mr. Santiago Villafania (Emilio Aguinaldo College)
  "Poetry Writing in Pangasinan"

The Writers' Conference will be held in the University Library (3rd Flr., Administration Building) on February 11, 2009, 8:30 a.m.

For more info, email the University of Pangasinan Language Institute (UPLI) at uoplanguageinst@yahoo.com.

Separated at Birth or One and the Same?

Sent to me. Now read the dirt