The Fat Man Today

The past few years, I believe I’ve been posting about the holidays with a rather dour note. That was because back then—as today—the end of the year approaches myself and the people I know with a rather dour ring, a scorching taste of not-quite-defeat. Not quite, because there’s always the promise of a new beginning at the start of next year. Is it because I share a defeatist attitude with the rest of my acquaintances? It’s a possibility. Is it because really, life, at that moment, is that bad ? I hardly hope so. That'll mean that every year, we'll have to put up with an increasing sense of dread quelled only by a faint glimmer of wishful thinking for the next year. This year's hardly any different as opposed to last year. We're all a year older, friends. A year wiser? Maybe. One can't be sure about these things. However! while enjoying oneself is hardly a matter of mind over, well, matter, this time of year is still supposed to be one of merriment. And i...

Wow, it has been a while since I last posted something here, hasn’t it? Well, you know what they say, no rest for the wicked. A lot of things have been happening over on my end, which more or less explains the lack of updates. On the other hand, some of my other friends have been just as lacking in the updates corner of the blogosphere. Which leads me to wonder if microblogging is slowly taking the place of the real thing? Something to ponder about while in the can, folks in the SEO biz. Meanwhile, in the past few weeks, I have undergone the following eventualities: My laptop was taken from right beside me at SM North Edsa. Nins and I were at Sbarro’s at the time, and while I understand that fretting over spilled milk will do me as much good as a swift kick in the groin, I still wish that my old laptop would spontaneously combust whilst being used by the man who burgled me. In the meantime, since I more or less relied on a laptop for work, I had to get myself a new one...

Let me break the monotony, then. By posting about what could possibly be the most important month of the year. At least, for me. So bear with me as I reminisce a little bit. It's been a long four years. I think it was three years ago on this month that I found out about SMSI, and how they needed a writer. It would lead to a nearly year-long battle with reality that ended rather abruptly on the eleventh month of the next year. Two years ago, on this month, my mother had a stroke. That changed my life in more ways than I can ever imagine. Last year, I welcomed the month with news that crushed me terribly. Little did I know, however, that later in the same month, I would meet a lifesaver of sorts. Not the one you pop into your mouth, nor the one you toss into the open sea, but one that is as refreshing and as reliable). And that’s only a small portion of what she does. I do not know how to greet this month. I’m anxious as to how things will go for me, but at the same time, I...

I rarely come across a treat from a fast-food restaurant. You look at McDonald’s, Jollibee, KFC and the like, and you know you’re really not eating anything special. I mean, sure; everybody knows that the fries over at McDonald’s are the best, the hot n’ crispy chicken of KFC is awesome, and Jollibee has awesome spaghetti. But still, that’s nothing out of the ordinary. All that changed—at least for me—last night. I was meeting up with Nina at Burger King along E. Rodriguez in New Manila for dinner. Now, commuting through Taft, Quiapo, and Espana at rush hour is NOT NICE. Not nice at all. I was dizzy with heat and pollution after an hour in the bumper-to-bumper situation ALL THROUGHOUT my ride, and I vowed to cab home afterwards (I did, too, and nearly slept on the cab ride). But the journey was worth it. So worth it, just because of this little baby: Okay, this will have a little bit of bias on my part; I have always attested that the best fast-food burgers I have tasted t...

Actually, I just took this opportunity to say that I need to blog more. Boo to bad time management; that’s a lot of prospective collateral going to waste in this blog. I don’t know. I just can’t find something blogworthy in my life recently. Maybe that’s because I’m stuck sitting my big behind in a desk all day long, but with the Internet, that’s no excuse. Maybe I’m just really lazy to write something that’s non-work. I mean, I’ve a blog post about the unholy dinner sitting in the oven, but I guess I’m just much too disgusted to even spend another minute wasting my time with Her Excellency’s face-stuffing. Anyway. Back to your lives, you kids. What's that, you say? Oh, you want something that makes your visit worth your while? Well who am I to deny you guys. Heh. Back to work, maggots.

To find out more about why people argue correctly that piracy isn’t theft, keep on reading after the jump. Get the picture? Not that I'm pro-piracy; if you can afford the original, go for it. Nothing wrong with that. But if you can't, there's nothing with a little bootlegged copy here and there. Of course Nina will tell me that some films are worth watching in the big screen. To which I will meekly submit. I really have nothing to talk about this week. Maybe later on I'll have something to say about La Presidente's $20,000 meal. Technorati Tags: Martin Cruz , kilawinguwak , Piracy , theft , downloading

So me posting this is a distraction in itself, but I believe that a writer’s greatest bane, and a marketer’s greatest boon, are distractions, and focusing on them and why they come about are just as important as deciding whether this sentence is passive or active. By the way, that previous sentence was a little of both. But let me get to the point. Living a writerly life can be very, very frustrating, especially when distractions come into play. Right now, I’m suffering from a very heavy dose of short attention span-ism, and I can hardly focus on one article before I get distracted by a tweet here, a website there, and the possibility of writing another blog post. It’s insane, I tell you. When your mind is fleeting this fast, you can’t just help but wonder: what the hell do you have to do to get your brain to bloody focus?! Through the years, though, I’ve come up with a list of the things that helps me focus away from distraction. The problem with such lists is that they’re nev...

Like the Orcish peons of Warcraft II, after effectively deciding that the collegiate (or at least the standard collegiate) life wasn’t for me, I knew that I would have to find myself a full-time job. The very first thing I did, aside from freelancing as a magazine writer, was work for this rockstar SEO dude from Manila who pretty much got me into the whole biz of article marketing and copywriting. Four years later, and I’m pretty much still in the same path, albeit with a few skills and a lot of experience under my ever-widening belt. Note: A warning for those with no interest in writing. The next few paragraphs will be heavily devoted to the art and craft of the written—emphasis on written—word. Read on at your own peril after the jump. But this post isn’t about work itself. It’s about the type of work I’m currently doing for one of my clients, and that’s proofreading. Back when I was an editor for SMSI, I just made sure that the articles were made of pure win and awesome, but...

I have no idea who Harry Patch was, and I’m really not the kind of person to care about first-person shooters. But my friend John Pimentel (aka Bossman, also GayPimps) wrote a poignant—albeit geekery-induced—piece about Harry Patch here , and I felt that it was worth mentioning. Because the world is slowly going to the dogs, and we need more thinkers like GayPimps and Harry Patch. Godspeed, Mr. Patch, and may the wings of war not reach you wherever you are.   Technorati Tags: John Pimentel , Harry Patch , WWI , FPS , Imbacore

Unfortunately, my love for alcohol has, shall we say, diminished somewhat the past few months. I went weeks without even a sip of beer, and the scant times that I did get to drink with my peers, I had this nagging worry about work in the back of my mind. The other night, however, saw a blissful reunion between me and the nektar of the gods. Unfortunately, this reunion was cut short—once again, I needed to work, and there were drunks to take care of. Plus, I didn’t really feel too good about getting hammered again. Or ever. Did I just say that? Did hell just freeze over? Jeez. In the meantime, my old, trustworthy laptop suffered a rather critical hit no more than half a day ago. Following are pictures for proof: The somewhat front view. You can see the bend in the top casing there, but it still looks pretty normal from this view. Now you can see just how bad the damage is. You can bet your britches that it hurt when the damn thi...

Technically, you can’t ever feel over the weather. Because y’know. The weather’s pretty much on top of you. So the phrase “under the weather” is literally, logically incorrect. Anywaay , that ends my inane ranting for the day / week / whenever I post. I just celebrated an awesome birthday week, so this is probably lagnat laki (hopefully it ain’t aH1N1, or else dayum, I pretty much infected a whole baranggay of people. Since Nina’s feeling rather under the weather (again with the phrase) as well, I decided to find some things that could probably cheer her up. There’s a possibility she won’t be seeing this today, but at least this has been posted. Firstly, I have for her (and the lot of you) a piece of depressing, yet subliminal, artistry. Replay is a very good animated short that makes one wonder just how valid life can be if it serves to keep us hemmed in: Secondly - to balance out the mood that was probably generated by Replay both in tone and in medium - I have her...

I take the title from the post-war conversation between Mel Gibson and Tcheky Karyo in The Patriot , the film that introduced me to the brilliance that is Jason Isaacs. Now, the question here is why I’m quoting a line about France. The answer, as is usual, lies in something that I just recently read from CNN . Let me indulge my conspiracy theorist urges by saying that if this escalates into an all-out fight between Al-Quaeda and France, this will be a historical first, specifically, the first war caused by fashionable dispute. Vidal Sassoon will have a heyday. Seriously, though. I find this entire brouhaha silly. Al-Quaeda’s being rather silly, declaring  fatwah on a country that won’t allow a piece of clothing. No matter how ceremonial or cultural clothing is, when in Rome, you do as the Romans do. If the country doesn’t want you wearing clothes that you deem to be important, it’s either you suck it up and conform, or you get out of the country, stat. I understand that somet...

.. despite my previous post slamming the Intarwebs. Okay, so today Michael “Wacko Jacko” Jackson passed away. I have a story to tell that connects fond (and recent) memories of mine related to Jacko, but that will have to wait for another post. For now, the geek in me is itching to get this out in the open. (On a side note, Farrah Fawcett died today too, but since I have this bizarre ability to be completely oblivious to the most mainstream pop concerns, I didn’t think much of that. RIP to the two of them, anyways). I am a science fiction freak. I loved “Choose Your Own Adventure” books, I adore the old sci-fi greats and abhor the new ones, like Brian Herbert and his ilk. If I were to draw up a list of the three authors I would personally like to meet and talk to over a bottle of beer or so, it would have to be: Charles Dickens HP Lovecraft Isaac Asimov I’d include Arthur C. Clarke to the list, but Asimov takes precedence. And Ray Bradbury’s still aliv...

I am publishing this without formatting the HTML. Because I believe in what you’re about to read. The past week, I spent more hours on the ‘net than I did asleep. I wrote more than I could ever care to write about without any relation to fiction. And then I heard that Ray Bradbury was campaigning to keep libraries open. So why’re libraries closing down? The Internet. Ray Bradbury to Yahoo: “The Internet is a big distraction,” Mr. Bradbury barked from his perch in his house in Los Angeles, which is jammed with enormous stuffed animals, videos, DVDs, wooden toys, photographs and books, with things like the National Medal of Arts sort of tossed on a table. “Yahoo called me eight weeks ago,” he said, voice rising. “They wanted to put a book of mine on Yahoo! You know what I told them? ‘To hell with you. To hell with you and to hell with the Internet.’ “It’s distracting,” he continued. “It’s meaningless; it’s not real. It’s in the air somewhere.” That quote was formatt...

I did not know this. I seriously did not know this. I love ice cream. A lot. If I can just settle down with a tub of ice cream and not gain any weight, I will be a happy, happy camper. As a matter of fact, I once learned how to make ice cream – the problem was, it was for chemistry class, and I treated it like I would treat any class I have – threw the recipe away when class was done. Now I wish I didn’t. Luckily, while searching for the perfect way to make tea on Videojug (and I found some not so perfect methods, refer to my tweet), I stumbled upon the following video, which promptly enabled my jaw to drop down in awe. I was going “What the fuck?” for several minutes after watching this, and to think this was just a backyard experiment for kids, and I didn’t know. What the hell was I learning back then?? Anyway, I did some research, and apparently, this trick DOES work! I can’t wait to try it out on my own, albeit I’m sure the process will be rather messy. That’s a helluva lot...

And by a break, I mean that I need to blog. It’s twelve midnight, I’m several articles away, and I’m listening to LapidFire in DWIZ. The issue’s still about the con-ass and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s plans of extending her tenure of power in a Marcos-like manner, except that her method is far sneakier, which leads me to say that she is one sneaky bitch, if you’ll pardon my French. I’m drowning in work, though, so let’s take a break from the amateur political commentary of this blog for something totally different after the jump. Yes, that's the Dune-themed techno mix by Fatboy Slim called Weapon of Choice , a classic in its own right. And Christopher Walken burning up the rug - I am inclined to believe that he performed all of the stunts in this video. The man is a hero. One does not simply Walken to Mordor - one does the shuffle. It’s funny though. This song is rather timely, because you need to realize...

I promise, this will be the last Hayden Kho-related post I will be making. This was prompted more by this query of a friend of mine regarding what my stand was on the proposed Internet regulation bill. Well honestly, right now it doesn’t seem to matter. DWIZ’s Bantay Bayan program was right; the way this government runs is absurd to the extreme. First there was all that hullabaloo about Hayden Kho, Internet pornography, and Bong Revilla being a douche. Then overnight – literally – there’s a big turnover of focus when Congress decides to approve a constitutional assembly without any warning whatsoever. Everybody wants to be the star of their own little show here. It’s disgusting. Honestly speaking, I see no feasible way of initiating a constitutional assembly before the elections take place next year, but just like with every big issue in the government, this thing is still making waves up to this day – and for good reason. The topic is timely – the country needs constituti...

Yesterday’s public senate hearing was pretty much an exercise in futility. Some of the questions of the senators were misleading at best, and while I abhor Jamby Madrigal to hell and back, she probably asked some of the more decent questions. It was, at best, a media circus that pretty much reached its climax when the senators called in Kho, Belo’s representative, and Katrina Halili in for questioning. That was when an ex-policeman, in righteous indignation, dumped water on top of Hayden Kho. I don’t really care about the hearing itself. Kho could rot in jail for all I care, and I still think that Halili’s playing the damsel in distress role to the ground. But this stupid series of events is important in that it is a portent of how the Philippine government is finally going to react to Web 2.0 and the free flow of information in the modern world. See, the most basic problem here is that within weeks, the video of Kho was made accessible to millions of Pinoys throughout the world ...

A couple of posts ago , I mentioned the Great Book Blockade of 2009. When I first read about this, I was just like everybody else in thinking that it was all about the government making another quick buck, except that this was money made from information that was supposedly an easily accessible commodity. Needless to say, I thought it was stupid, and proceeded to share it throughout the Internet community. This was during the early days of the book blockade. The only people who’ve made mention of it was the origin source and Manuel L. Quezon III . And then the news hit the fan, and Facebook and Twitter got into the picture. A disclaimer: I am not for the book blockade. I am also against any and all illegal forms of taxation. I believe that the government needs to make money, but the gargantuan amount of money involved in the salary of government heads is ridiculous. You want more money? Cut back on positional salaries, and spread out the corresponding backwash to the rest of the e...

I was listening to the radio this morning, and these disk jockeys from DWRT were going through their usual morning yakkety yak. You know. Stuff you usually don’t listen to, stuff that becomes white noise. But when they started talking about the Hayden Kho stuff, it took all of my self-control to keep myself from tossing my laptop out of the window (yes, I was streaming from the ‘net). You know how it is – the reason people listen to the radio en route to work is to serve as background music. Sooner or later, you just let it stream through your senses. Just like the Hayden Kho scandal(s). The entire thing is just really absurd, and Nina pointed out that the only reason the press is cashing in on this is because unlike previous sex scandals, this involved a rather upstanding member of Philippine society. What I can’t get enough of, though, is the way everybody is handling the entire situation. The media’s trying to be as invasive as possible to get the “truth” out. En route to th...

Firstly, let me make a point - I love books and newspapers, and I love the medium that they use. I love the smell of fresh newsprint, and there's something cool about reading the news over the dining table in the morning. And books without leaves will ever be a problem for me - it just wouldn't feel natural. That said, let me get to the real point of this post. The printing business may have been disastrous for the environment, but the real battle for the newspaper has only just recently reared its ugly head. The upheaval of how information is disseminated through the web has taken a bigger toll on the newspaper industry, so much so that we may be looking at the very last days of the traditional newspaper format. As of last week, several newspapers in the US have closed down due to insufficient revenues generated by a lack of interest in sales. If this trend continues, we could very well be looking at the total death of the newspaper industry the world over. We'll have to ...

Or not. A couple of weeks ago, some aunts of mine were visiting from overseas, so one of the first things we decided to do for them was take them shopping. However, when you're in Manila, there are only two places to take a foreigner at times like these. These two places would be Greenhills' tiangges and 168's location of pure consumerism. Given that they were new (somewhat) to the scene, we decided to go the safe route and bring them to Greenhills. This is Greenhills on a good day. So there we were, looking down the tight aisles that made up the front corridor of Shopesville's interior arcade. There were three things immediately available to the naked eye at a glance: knock-off watches, bags and Crocs. But you wouldn't believe the variety. The various kinds of Crocs you can find in two separate stands alone numbered in the hundreds. My aunt whispered that this was insane. This was, for us guys, comforting - we looked forward to a shopping spree that wouldn...

Or the lack of it. The best thing about planning vacations is that it's an irony in itself since you stress yourself out planning on how you can beat stress. That said, I guess you guys read my short midweek report about Palm Beach, which is one of the most impressive resorts this side of the country. Every time I go there, I get fatter. It is unfortunate, but that is the reality. Anyway, midweek I thought of how people unwind from stress. And then I thought about how I unwind from stress. I figured since everybody's stressed nearly all of the time, we'll all have ways of cooling off - and some of these ways are similar to each other. First is the out of town trip. We leave the confines of what is recognizable in order to break the monotony of our days. You don't even have to leave your work behind - you can bring your work with you and actually be more productive so long as the environment is different. A change of pace, a change of atmosphere is all you need to br...

A couple of weeks ago, a friend showed me this video on TED.com, and I was very impressed by what Shai Agassi was saying all throughout his presentation - that all it takes to reduce car-related emissions to zero within the next decade is a bold step forward. You can watch the full video after the jump. What strikes me the most is that Agassi and A Better Place isn't trying to overcome the shortcomings of an automobile powered by something that doesn't respond from combustion. That's always been the biggest problem of electronic cars, from what I've heard my friends point out - just how will these perform when compared to what gasoline and diesel-powered cars are capable of today. Agassi says that the only way to find out is to take that big step forward, and that's exactly what he's doing. If you look at his business plan, it's economically viable - you replace one expendable source of energy with another, which means that on the most altruistic P...

In my previous Manny Paqciao-related post , I featured a photograph of the train wreck that was Oscar de la Hoya. That was, for all intents and purposes, one of the most impressive boxing shots in the history of forever. That was, also, the real wake-up call of just how dangerous an opponent the Pacman was. Last Sunday's PPV match-up of Manny Pacquiao vs. Ricky Hatton only did what most people thought wasn't possible - cement Manny's reputation as a fighter at the top of his game even more. I mean, what the hell. Let's review the facts. On Hatton's camp, Floyd Mayweather Sr. was directing things from the background. This guy's one of the most capable trainers in the sport, and was partly responsible for the showstopper that is his son. If ever there was a guy you can pit against Freddie Roach in a battle of wits, Mayweather Sr. would be it. There's also the fact that Ricky Hatton is a brawler. I was looking forward to this match because I hoped for an imp...

Taking a break for this week. Meanwhile, I'm here .

Seriously speaking, I'm not the kind of person who goes to clubs. And of course, when I say that, I lie - I like clubs. I like how you can drown in the noise of club music, I like how you get to dance with pretty ladies who pretty much don't care who they dance with, so long as you don't act like a douchebag. Let's see. I started clubbing back when I was in CdO. Lots of things happened back in CdO, if you think about it, but clubbing was an experience I found exhilarating. It was a way of communicating without having to think about what to do while you're out on the dance floor. You let the music get your adrenaline going, and once it's pumping your blood through the entire network of veins and arteries in your body, you know that it's time to break out your jam, brotha. But there's this stigma that clubbing just can't seem to get rid of. See, since this is such a hotbed for the onrush of passions and mindless emotions, the need to get a better kic...

Just because you're a pirate, does that make you a pirate? I'm talking about the recent court ruling in the Pirate Bay piracy case. If you've been keeping tabs, then you'll know that the four founding rulers of the file sharing network were recently found guilty by the Stockholm District court. Their crime: "assisting making available copyright material." What. First of all, that's a structurally unsound sentence. Secondly, you can't prosecute a bunch of friends for lending dvds or cd to each other - which is what the Pirate Bay and other file-sharing networks are doing, except that they're working with digital media. This CNN article does a good job of showing us just what the stand of the Pirate Bay is on copyright material - that it's free for everybody, whether you like it or not. But that didn't stop the big entertainment companies from clamping down on the Pirate Bay , though. But the question in my mind is whether or not the abi...

You might not notice it, but there have been a few changes in the blog these past few days. Some of them have been physical - you might notice that the box surrounding the blog title has become, um, whiter. Or that the links are now orange. Or that ugly-looking widget that people can use to subscribe to my blog. Seriously, it's a nice tool, but it's ugly as hell. I'm thinking of getting rid of that. But it's what you can't see in this blog that really makes this baby rock. Let me tell you, right here, and right now, that my blog - The Mezzanine of the Zeppelin of Burning Dreams - is at least fifty times more kickass than it used to be. If you just hit that "read more" link right there, then yes, that's pretty much the reason why this blog has gone from adolescent boy to pure testosterone-filled manhood. See, I have this penchant for writing massively long diatribes about this and that, and some people just don't have the patience to read all tha...

Up until last year, my mobile phone was the precursor of the sleek, thin phones that became so fashionable that even the iPhone's design is a testament to just how chic my phone was back in the day. The unit I speak of is the Motorola L6, a simple phone with nice functions that was enough to keep me happy since I didn't really use it for anything else aside from texting, phone calls, and as a calendar. I lived without a watch for a pretty long time thanks to my trusty L6, and I could connect my phone to the computer and send and receive text messages without having to let go of the keyboard. I know, I know, that last line reeks of nerd. Sue me. But the fact still remains that after I lost that phone, I had to replace it with a Nokia unit whose proper name escapes me to this day. I now attach my mobile phone to my person at all times, ensuring that people like Obbie will have a hard time reading my messages surreptitiously, and that it will no longer accidentally slip out of m...

I love going to the gym. While it has yet to become one of the things that I absolutely must do in order to call a day complete, I can't say that I mind the sensation of actually working muscles into a physical concept, as opposed to a metaphysical one. But I managed to find an article related to something Nina showed me a link that blew me away. I never imagined that the opposite gender'll be going for their workouts for a reason far removed from fitness and endorphins. Oh yes, the logic behind this new motive still relies on happiness, but the emphasis is more on instant gratification as opposed to maintenance of moods and increasing the body's capacity for hard work. I speak of the coregasm. Read the article here , but let me give you the low down on what it is. The coregasm is, in as few words as possible, an orgasm induced by core workout. I poked around the Internet a bit, and came up with testimonials that validate it's existence, and queries from women who h...

And it came and went. How was it spent? Sorry, I couldn't help myself. Technically speaking, it's the Easter season now, and will be for several weeks to come. But everybody's sure to post their lenten activities, lemme join in on the fray. So here was what I did during lent, in no proper order: 1. I slept. Good lord almighty, I don't think I slept as much as I did this season. I would sleep for hours on end, wake up, and then go back to sleep. It was so bad that my cats nearly thought I was comatose. 2. I played Grand Theft Auto 3 . Thanks to Bruce who rekindled my interest in the mindless gunning down of NPC's in a sandbox environment like Liberty City. I don't think any vacation is complete without a little bit of de-stress activities, and this was it for me. 3. Learned about, and fully utilised, a whole bunch of streaming websites. I am currently loading Harold and Kumar: Escape from Guantanamo Bay , I managed to catch up on House and Heroes , and red...

(This was supposed to be posted way way back. Like a couple of weeks ago. My bad.) I was running an errand for my father earlier, running to the store to buy a bottle of Coca-Cola. Since it's the summer here in the Philippines, everybody who's even halfway enterprising has set up a stall selling halo-halo, which is pretty much heaven in a tall parfait glass or a plastic cup during the warmer months. Glorious. None of that Chowking bullcrap for me. What is it? For the uninitiated non-Pinoy, halo-halo is that holy grail of sidewalk foodstuffs during summer that nobody in his right mind would deny. It is a conglomeration of pandan and coconut jelly, chickpeas, mung beans, saging na saba, corn kernels, pounded dry rice, sugar and shaved ice topped with evaporated milk with a slice of the local custard on top. The really special variants will include coconut shavings and purple yam into the mix. Then you mix, mix, mix the contents around, before you start spooning it into y...