10 Thoughts on Jesus Camp

• Five minutes in and already I found it a tad unsettling w/ the Children’s Prayer Conference.Evangelical Christian kids are up at ‘em, hands and heads held up high like at an El Shaddai gathering. And of course the little girl was getting teary-eyed; you’d be too if you stared up at the ceiling lights w/o blinking.

• Funny-strange (not funny haha) scene: 9-year-old Rachael giving a teenager a religious pamphlet and proselytizing just after she prayed for a good bowling game. Silly girl; doesn’t she know that God’s too busy answering the prayers of professional athletes?
  
• I really prefer my Christian hiphop songs to be satirical in nature, and not used like in a Hi-5 concert. Oooh, and preacher Beck Fischer hates Harry Potter and made the kids cry. Bitch!
  
• Like any fancy camp, Kids on Fire camp has clean air, sunny skies, Go-karts, nature hikes, anti-abortion presentations and… wait, scratch that.
  
• Funny-strange (not funny haha) scene: the kids praying over a cardboard cutout of George W. Bush. Geez, how young do Republicans have to be?
• I really can’t stand seeing religion being used for political purposes. Religion alone is trouble enough.
• Already knowing Ted Haggard’s final fate, it’s great to watch his sermon, now dripping in irony.
• Granted, this documentary focuses on the more intense and hard-line Evangelicals and probably doesn’t represent the majority of born-again Christians. That’s why I’m okay w/ comparing them to the Hitler youth leaders.
• The focus is on the kids, and rightly so. These folks are walking the fine line between preaching and indoctrination. Kids should be having fun, not deciding on the fate of their immortal souls.
• Jesus Saves. Save these kids, Jesus!

10 Thoughts on 300

• I know it's adapting a comic book, but there is such a thing as too much narration, especially the you'd-have-to-be-blind-not-to-see-what-he's-narrating-about kind.
• The dialogue made me cringe at some parts, as it reminded me of the script I wrote for my high school Passion play. Better read than heard.
• Since no-one can really say what the ancient Greeks sounded like, Gerard Butler's Scottish accent was more-or-less forgivable. (Hey, Kevin Costner made Robin Hood American.)
  
• Yes, it's been said the Queen Gorgo's scenes w/ the council just padded the story, but w/o the female presence the audience might suffer from testosterone overload.
  
• It's the good thing it wasn't a scene-for-scene adaptation of the comic ala Sin City, 'coz in the bonfire scene of the latter they weren't wearing their loincloths, and 300 wangs would've been a definite distraction.
• Once again Frank Miller conveys his fascination w/ Asian and martial arts, giving them superhuman skills. First it was w/ Miho in Sin City, now it's with the Immortals. Orientals swordsmen w/ iron monkey masks. We get it, Frank. Everbody was kung-fu fighting...
  
• The fight scenes are the highlight of the movie. Definitely out-Matrixes The Matrix trilogy. The handling of the corpses of the... losers was... creative, to say the least. And isn't it nice that Leonides could enjoy a fresh apple amidst the stench of death?
• And speaking of which, where did he get that apple? I'll take their word that 300 guys were there, but who brought the food? No caravans, mules, or even pockets. Unless they ate those mushrooms that sent you into berzerker rages before/during battle like the Norse Vikings of old.
  
• The gayification of Xerxes could not escape my movie companion's notice. Hard to miss, really. Eyelined brows and more jewelry than a dozen Mr. Ts. Sure, the Spartans made fun of the "boy-loving" Persians, but given Greek history w/ homosexuality, I think it was a "thou dost protest too much" moment.
  
• I'm not spoiling anything by saying all 300 Spartan soldiers snuff it (not simultaneously). It's happened in similar war movies like Glory or The Last Samurai. Suicidal bastards. Klingons would've been proud.
  

Something I'm Telling Myself to Do Right Now

Do NOT get hung up on someone living in another continent, as the chances of you two hooking up were as likely as any Marvel comics character staying dead.

Still, it stung to see "In a Relationship" where once there was "Single."

UPDATE: Good news! It was use-that-so-guys-won't-bug-me-online trick. Well, I'm outta my funk.

Family Ties

Today is my parents 40th wedding anniversary. This is the non-Christmas family portrait. Lessee: 'rents, 2 brothers, 1 sister, 1 sister-in-law 1 cousin (and her son), 3 nieces and 3 nephews. Feel free to figure out w/c is w/c, but there are no prizes.

Happy V-Day, Peeps!

And by 'V' I don't mean venereal.

Though it wouldn't surprise me if a few of you end up with one, thanks to the unrealitstic expectations brought about by this unofficial holiday.

(Don't mind me if sound bitter. Pretend I'm being facetious.)

Commence Dick Cheney Jokes... Now

Snorkeler mistaken for rodent,

shot in face

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/02/10/snorkeler.shot.ap/index.html

• Shooter says he thought swimmer was big rodent
• Victim in good condition after 8 hours of surgery
• Gunman, 60, charged with assault, drug possession

Audition Update

Well... didn't get a role for the Tuldok Animation project. Geez, I hope they haven't typecasted me for "worm" characters. That wasn't even my staple character voice! Gimme a streotyped Brit or Aussie dude/ old guy anyday.

In good news (for her, anyway) Rachelle got a role as "little girl." A bit literal, true, but I'm sure she'll do them proud.

(Wilson's) B-day Dinner Highlights

• Family initially had trouble finding Palm Grove restaurant. Didn't help that the first time I went there was at the SJCS Batch '86 Reunion... in the daytime. Then again, every place is harder to find the second time...at night...if the first time was during the day. ('Kay, wrap your head around that awkwardly worded sentence first.)
  
• Wilson's old buds from Ateneo Glee Club also attended. I've never heard Happy Birthday sung so melodiously before, and I didn't even have to buy orchestra tickets.
• Food wasn't anything to write home about (to blog about, mebbe). I admit being fooled by a menu that described the food like it was from TGIFridays but presented like it was made by Pancake House. (Hint: only order pancakes from PHouse, 'coz everything else they make is mediocre.)
• In a other private room met "the Wednesday Group" of Francis Pangilinan, Joker Arroyo, Ralph Recto and Manny Villar (whom I mistakenly said was Mar Roxas to everyone I told). Why they're meeting on a Friday escapes me. If it was to throw the media off their scent it didn't work, as we saw reporters from ANC and GMA waiting outside.

Noises On

As as addendum to the previous post:

It was exactly one week ago when the whole mess started. What was supposed to be a routine motherboard replacement went from worse to vorse. No audio from the PC, busted a harddrive, wrong RAM, etc. After much trial and error I finally got audio back. Just in time, too, since there's a huge backlog of TV shows to catch up on.

RIP PIX

Long story short: PC went kaput. Lost my picture files.

ALL. OF. THEM.

Yes, there's the ones I placed online, but I never got around to saving the rest. The past 2 years worth of pix on CD . All that time photoshopping them, gone. To. WASTE.

Couples pix. Group pix. Sexy pix. Oh, the sexy pix....

Deep breath...

...ffffffFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCkkk!!!!