Good Day, Sunshine

I am now officially living in my own time zone. Of course, I'm gonna miss all the benefits of a graveyard shift but it is also refreshing to be updated with all the going-ons around me. More importantly, it feels great to be at the office in the morning, smelling fresh from a morning shower, with the rest of the morning workforce.

Risen From The Fiery Depths

"Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."

Meet Dante. He is my voodoo doll.

I have always wanted one, most especially at times when I wanted to hurt someone without actual confrontation. Call me a coward all you want but that's how it is.

But now that I actually have one, there is not one person that I want to prick needles with. There is always that girl next door. Hmm. But it seems so petty so I won't even waste my energy on that.

Anyway, I got my doll's name from the writer, of course. He is one of my favorites although God knows I'll probably be dead before I get to finish reading any of his works. If I do get around to reading them, I'll probably be the first person in history to die of profuse nosebleeding.

Where was I?

Being a voodoo doll, I had wanted a more menacing name for him. One of the names that came to mind was Charon, the ferryman of the underworld who, coincidentally, also figures in the first book of Dante's Divine Comedy. Unfortunately, although it implies menace, it just doesn't sound right for the very reason that it sounds like a cute girl's name. It sounds like Karen. I knew one Karen from Day Care and another Karen who was my seatmate in elementary. Both girls were cute. On a side note, when I was a kid, my brothers and I used to watch this show entitled The Young Hercules. Apparently, it was very popular because when the show ended it's run, the producers had this dumb idea to do a rerun, this time dubbing the whole show in Tagalog. So there was this scene where Hercules went to the underworld and met Charon for the first time. Their conversation went like this (everything pronounced in Tagalog):

Hercules:  Sino ka namang matanda ka?
Charon: Ako si Charon. Bangkero ng mga kaluluwa sa kabilang mundo.
Hercules: Sharon?
Charon: Hindi!!! Cha-ron! Mukha ba akong artista?!

Admit it, that was hilarious. The ferryman of the underworld, a movie star. Not Sharon Stone, the silently sinister bitch (also a writer) in the movie Basic Instinct, but Sharon Cuneta who, despite her apparent lack of cuteness, sings cutely the song Mr Dreamboy (or was that Mr DJ?) to the detriment of the word cute. So I settled for Dante whose main protagonist he named after himself and in the first book, Inferno, literally went to hell. Morever, Dante is also the name of another movie star. I am referring to Dante Rivero who almost always gets the role of the villain or the grumpy old man who makes everyone around him miserable. And he does look scary.

I actually have another voodoo doll, of a different color from Dante. His name is Montressor, from the vengeful guy who buried his friend alive in his wine cellar in the short story The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Alan Poe, who is also a personal favorite. However, I have assigned Montressor as a permanent decoration to one of my bags so it's usually just Dante who keeps me company.

My voodoo dolls have yet to serve their real purpose. But make no mistake about it. They are voodoo dolls and their purpose will be fulfilled. Someday. So if you value your life, try to avoid becoming the object of my wicked voodoo spells. Don't annoy the hell out of me and get out of my way.

"Nemo me impune lacessit." (*evil laugh)

Song of the Moment: Don't Stop Me Now

I'm burning through the sky yeah!
Two hundred degrees
That's why they call me Mister Fahrenheit
I'm traveling at the speed of light
I wanna make a supersonic woman of you

I know. It's another one of my Queen fixations but I need to drown out Shakira's Waka Waka coming from the next room and this song is the only song in my phone that is loud enough to do the job. Don't get me wrong. Waka Waka is an okay song especially during the height of the recent World Cup. It was great for community singing while watching the games. But the World Cup Series is over and when you hear it one million times in one day it's annoying. It's great that my neighbor finally had another song that she likes other than songs from the Steps and this choice is obviously an improvement. But, seriously, one million times? Give Shakira a rest already. Or better yet, start paying royalties.

Since we are on the subject of Queen, it case you are blind and missed it, please check out 1:40 of the video. Is it weird that I'm finding his overbite and spittle sexy? I know, I'm creepy so it's probably just me. And it is a great song. I do not care about the gay innuendos of the song. Freddy was gay so it should not be surprising that everything he did and made were gay or had gay hidden meanings.

I have the hots for a dead gay man. I should probably be institutionalized. Freddie, darling, wherever you are, I hope they are treating you well if not giving you the royal treatment that you so rightly deserved. If not, give the bitches a slap for me, will you?

It's Steven Spielberg's Fault

Why, oh why, did I watch this movie? Every movie that I see from here on out will be compared to this film and most of them will fail miserably. Damn you, Steven Spielberg! Why didn't you just stick to making movies the like of E.T. and Jaws? Why do you have to go and challenge my perception of what a great movie should be like?

I never would have thought that I would even consider a repulsive movie to be great. Because that is what it was. It was repulsive and scary but I cannot not watch it. There was a part there where, to make room for more Jews from other camps or settlements, the Nazis conducted medical inspection on the existing Jews on the camp and pick out those who look unhealthy so that they will be sent to Auschwitz. The process involved all of the Jews going out to the yards, falling in line and stripping completely naked. They were then made to run around in front of several doctors. The doctors pointed out those who they think were unfit and immediately a guard would grab that person and pull him out of the line. For the Jews, Auschwitz meant certain death so they did whatever they could to avoid being sent there. During these inspections the women had to resort to pricking their fingers to draw blood and use the blood on their lips and cheeks to appear flushed, ergo healthy. It was the most inhuman proceeding that I have ever seen. Imagine what it was like in real life. Damn you, Steven, for shattering the shield of ignorance that had enveloped me my entire life. How can I go on with my blissful existence now that I know... these?

My favorite part in the film, the part that truly broke my heart, was, toward the end, when Oskar was preparing to leave his employees to flee with his wife after the German's were defeated, he started counting how many more Jews he could have saved with the properties that he still had, even if he was basically bankrupt at that point. It didn't matter that he spent his entire fortune to buy and support more than a thousand Jews for seven months. For him, what mattered was he could have saved more but didn't.

After watching the film, with my brain still on Schindler's List overdrive, I googled Oskar which, of course, only made me hate Steven all the more. After the war, Oskar made several attempts to start other businesses, all of which failed. He lost his wife, he lost money and he was living off of donations from Jewish organizations. By the end of his life, he was penniless. Arguably, he was surrounded by friends and family and perhaps the love of all those he had saved. Many would say that this was better than having all that money and pursued by the Allied Forces for being a "profiteer of slave labor". But I wonder, for a man of such ambition and fine finesse as Oskar, was he happy? Did he ever regret that he went and spent his money to buy every single one of his workers instead of going back to his hometown with more money than he can spend his entire lifetime? Are there still Oskar Schindlers left in this world?

Liam Neeson was perfect as Schindler. He certainly had the aura that would convince a Nazi officer to release all those Jews to his care for a certain fee. Ralph Fiennes was even better as Amon Goth. I didn't even recognize him. He was... portly. The Ralph Fiennes I know was from American Patient and, of course, Voldemort, stately and elegant. In this movie, he was a madman who kills on a frenzy, kills for no apparent reason and kills Jews working on the fields for target-shooting practice from his balcony. Then Schindler told him that real power is when you know should kill somebody but you choose to make him live instead. Oh, the struggle he had to go through to gain that kind of power, it was hilarious. I could almost see his face in contortion as he was stopping himself from killing his stable boy.

I am reminded of another film I saw more than a year ago entitled A Beautiful Life starring Roberto Benigni. It was a comedy about the Holocaust, which was ironic. But I ended up laughing and cringing at the same time. I thought it was a great movie. I still do. But compared to Schindler's List, it was a feel-good movie. That's how heavy Schindler is. It is the best movie I ever saw, one of my favorites, but understandably a movie that I would only like to see again after a considerable lapse of time. It has been a week since I saw it and I have yet to recover.

I still hate you, Steven, but thank you for slapping me in the face and making me realize my mediocrity. I owe you big time.

My Favorite Stuff #1: McDonald's Cheeseburger

photo from here

Actually, my favorite is the double cheeseburger but I can't find a decent picture. The picture alone is enough to make me salivate. I do not even consider the calories or other bad stuff that I get from eating a cheeseburger. In this case, ignorance is really a bliss. I do know that they are bad. But the prospect of death by cheeseburger is infinitely better than death by deprivation. I'm a cheeseburger junkie. Got to go now and get my fix.

Food for Thought: Burger Paralysis

This was taken from The Big Bang Theory season 1 episode 5.

Sheldon (exasperated over the many kinds of burger in the new restaurant that they were eating in): Can't we just go to Big Boy? They only have one burger, the Big Boy.
Waiter Penny: Our Barbeque burger is like the Big Boy.
Sheldon: Excuse me, in a world that already includes a Big Boy, why would I settle for something LIKE a Big Boy?
Penny (yelling): Because you're not at Big Boy!!!

My dear friends, you cannot always have a Big Boy. There will always come a time when the tried and tested choice will not be available to you. But fret not because the galaxy is overflowing with a million other Big Boy substitutes and, with that kind of odds, one of them is bound to be as good as, if not better than, the Big Boy. So get out of your comfort zones and try all the other Big Boys that are available to you because if you do find something better that the Big Boy, which you thought was the best, it will be priceless. In the event that the Big Boy substitute you tried tasted like card board or worse, then spit it out. If you already swallowed it, then don't worry. You will eventually expel it, right? Then it will be out of your system for good and then you can go ahead and try another Big Boy substitute. That my friends is why life is good. Let's go out and grab some Big Boy sometime.

My Devotion To Freddie: A Continuation

Freddie, dear, why did you have to die? There are a lot more people who would have looked better inside an urn. Not you.

It's probably because you are way too good for us. We did not deserved to be graced by your genius. That you were on this planet for 40 years should be a blessing enough for us. And it was. Some of us just wish that it could be longer. If you have an incarnate anywhere in this world right now or in the future, please let him show himself before I die.