Blinkless Halloween

Some weeks back, there was a press release from Our Favorite Boldstar that she would be back in Wag Kukurap for the Halloween episode. But I didn’t see her shadow in the teasers nor in the episode itself.* Unless she was the poltergeist who was throwing KC Montero’s bed off the wall. It’s either that or she was one of the walk by ghosts who cross the camera and make the bidas look around but see nothing.

Anyhow, the first part featured Sexbomb Girl Aira Bermudez in her grisly tale of an obsessed fan. During one of their shows out of town, some guy asks Aira for an autograph. When she looks up, the guy has a slashed throat. She stifles a scream and then the guy disappears. Aira gets back inside the van and they begin their long treck back to the city. The long dark road was littered with walk by ghosts. You know, the kind wherein you think you saw something but when you tell the others, nothing’s there so you end up like a dweeb with a hyperactive imagination—or in the very least, really bad eyesight.

But of course, since this is a horror show, their van breaks down in front of the cemetery. Of all places to pick, right? The girls get off and decide to pee in the bushes. The other girls promptly leave Aira alone, and she finds herself lost and face to face with the obsessed ghost. He didn’t ask for her autograph this time.

It seems like the show can survive on tales from the Sexbomb Girls alone. First, Jacque, then Aira, and how many girls left to tell their tales?

*It turns out she was in another episode. But I didn't see that, so it doesn't count.

Carrie state of mind

I'm in a Carrie state of mind right now. Not Ms. Bradshaw, btw, but by way of Ms. White and Stephen King.

I found the book at a Diplomat store in SM Baguio, and started reading it last night when I got back home to Manila. Curiously, I'm all doubled up in pain the same way the heroine was in the book. I'm like twenty pages to the end, and I just hope that I won't turn out to be like her.

More later, when the Advil takes effect.

Solid Romnick and Sheryl Forever

Unlike psychicpants, I have no memory of Romnick Sarmenta as Peping. I only know him as the chinito ka-labtim of Sheryl Cruz, whose launching movie as a "serious" actress was "Bihagin ang Dalagang Ito." (Which by the way credits Ricky Lee as a co-writer and the campy Maning Borlaza as director.) That was back in the day when the measurement of popularity for teen actors was the number of screaming fans who belong to clubs whose banners spew variations of "Romnick-Sheryl Solid Forever United" and then buy spiral notebooks with their idols on the ubiquitous cover and with dedications like "Study Hard!!! Love, Nicko. *smiley*"

It is a phase that all teen idols must go through: Be part of a loveteam that the fans adore and shout out their tonsils for, and then try to cross over to the "mature" roles, usually in the form of ST movies, as was the order of the day in the 80s. Thus, Sheryl Cruz gets hostaged in the aforementioned film, and which also explains Romnick's "First Lesson," which must be good since it was produced by Seiko Films. Those who fail would be either doomed to make ST movies and then fade to oblivion, or just that, fade out from the limelight like teenage acne.

Romnick Sarmenta got a spew of good roles in the mid to late 90s, most notable of which was "Miguel/Michelle," in which he played the role of an OFW who went home to his province as a post-op transexual. He was sort of typecasted after that, then sort of hobbled along with the occasional stint and stage play. His ka-labtim went to the States, became a teacher and got married, had a kid, and then suddenly went back home. What followed was a supposed tug of war with Judy Ann Santos for a plum role in Mano Po 3. She started appearing in television, and then there she goes as Linang, the chief fairy of the waters in Mulawin, where she is again paired off opposite Romnick's Habagat.

These past few days, Mulawin's storyline revolves arounds Habagat's past with the fairy, and how the hiyas na walang kupas figures in the whole mythology arc. What previously was a bit that made the Scouts seem like Peter Pan's Lost Boys now has a backstory that involves Habagat, Linang and that other fairy who fancied Habagat but never got the chance. All in all, it's very interesting and the Romnick-Sheryl pairing gets positive feedback. But according to one of the writers of Mulawin, the Habagat-Linang pairing almost didn't push through as the actors themselves "weren't comfortable with each other." Jealousy on part of the spouses were implied, but the old showbiz adage still ruled, the show must go on indeed. And what a show it is. Mulawin is the only soap apart from the now long gone Kung Mawawala Ka that I actually come home to and watch as often as I can, that is, barring school duties and anti-loser night campaigns.

Single Serving the Nation

Mornings in our house is usually filled with the voices of radio announcers giving a rundown of the day's headlines. There's this section by Love Anover about the good news of the day. This morning it's about 6,000 medical doctors pledging to stay in the country and serve the nation and its people for three years. During which time they also vowed to go on medical missions, perform outreach projects for the needy (and almost everyone in this country qualifies as "needy"). They're not flying out immediately and search for greener pastures, they're not going to study nursing and become caregivers out there in the west. And according to Ms. Anover, that is the good news.

Of course, not said out loud is the fine print. Yeah, they're staying in this decaying pit for three damn years just so people would shut up about that entire problem about the diaspora, about medical board topnotcher Elmer Jacinto who's set to fly out and become a nurse in the land of milk and honey. That ought to be service enough, right?

As the ex-art student said: I wonder what Ms Evangelista, she of the rose colored glasses, would say about all this.

Blame game

The previous post generated some comments that could be possible spontaneous combustion material, what with today's warm weather and my despair at the seemingly bottomless pit that is paper checking.

Wayne points out that ABS-CBN/Today uploads their online content same day the print version comes out. I still say they're not consistent because this is not the first time I had come looking for specific articles and they couldn't be found anywhere. They have a crappy archive and a bad really unfriendly interface. The same goes for Inq7.net. I'm just saying that it's time to beef up and organize the way they archive their data. Is all.

As for BnC's comment, if nobody really cares about the UP Presidency anymore, then why do we have nearly a dozen candidates? They all have their own particular peculiarities I'm sure. Not only have they been sleeping under a rock, but someone even claims to be Jose Rizal's girl.

Sana tumakbong UP President si Eddie Gil para may pambara na sa loveteam nina Madam Auring. Nyahahaha.

And yeah, before I forget, here is a link to "Blaming UP" after it's finally been posted to his official website.

Panawagan

Sa sinumang merong kopya ng edisyon kahapon (16 October) ng diyaryong Today. Gusto ko lang naman ng kopya ng column ni Luis Teodoro na may title na "Blaming UP" na tungkol sa kawalan ng saysay ng Unibersidad sa lipunang Pinoy. Puwede na raw i-phase out ang UP dahil wala namang naitutulong sa karaniwang ordinaryong Pinoy. Karerahan nga raw ang UP at PMA sa award na institusyong obsolete at kasayangan ng pera.

Dapat talaga ninenok ko na lang yung diyaryo sa McDo kahapon. Damn.

UPDATE: Siyempre I spent most of Saturday evening looking up Teodoro's column from the ABS-CBN/Today website but it wasn't up yet. And I hate their interface too. The same thing goes with Inq7.net. The Sunday magazine section online contained the stuff from the previous weekend. I don't see the logic in not updating the online content in the same day of the print issue. Surely they have enough web people to run the machinery. So now I have to blog about this way too late, and AFTER somebody else points to it. Nice di ba?

network wars on the web

Have the networks taken their wars to the web?

I was peacefully browsing the web when I came across what seems to be a kapuso blog. It has a listing of the newest shows, complete with story updates and ratings. The sidebar also has links pointing to blogs for Mulawin, Extra Challenge, StarStruck and Darna.

I checked out those blogs and they're surprisingly up-to-date. The Mulawin blog carries episode guides, including the recent developments regarding the Gas and Wis characters. These two were cursed to spend their eternities as children,cast away in a deep, dark forest. They had come across a group of scouts who also don't grow old. All in all, it sounds like Peter Pan with wings. And the blog confirms that, saying that someone named bluedove gave them the updates.

The blog also points us to the upcoming battle of the bird people with Judy Ann's Krystala, who until recently did not have the power to fly. But to combat aerial beings, she was forced to go airborne herself. The Krystala blog points us to yet another blog which carries the myth about the heroine.

I'm just wondering who's behind this blog blitz. The archives of the blogs date back to late August. Are the network people behind this or just some fans with too much time and bandwidth? I'm thinking of the former, since fans usually don't have access to episode guides unless they make it themselves and ratings are only privy to those who have insider access. And if so, then they must also have access to the other network's material. Hmm...

Morning girl, my foot

If today were a real class day, I would have missed my 8.30 class. I woke up at 8.45, the earliest I had done in the last few months. My mother looked at me while I poured tea, and said that I have a long way to go.

There I was, telling kids that the "early to bed, early to rise" blah by Jefferson or whomever was a sham, and it's coming back to haunt me.

Long live idleness!

Secretary Wanted

Okay, so just to convince myself I still have some semblance of a life, I met up with a friend for coffee the other day. We were supposed to check out the newly opened Ayala Museum, but learned that the asking price for art nowadays is steep. *cough350cough*

So we retreated to Megamall, a place I haven't been to in ages. We hogged the corner couch and slurped overpriced coffee and basically entertained ourselves with our life's little dramas.

Since W came back everyone has been telling him to watch that woman with the bagwa movie, but I didn't want to go see it again, fearing more sleepless nights. So we scanned what was showing and discovered that Secretary is playing. (It's the same surprise I got when I learned that Saved!, a film about self righteous Christians, was playing in Glorietta. But it has Mandy Moore and playing to a full house--that's another story altogether.) After all that blah about SM banning R18 movies, here is a film that not only is about plain old bonking, but bonking with spanking! Kinky sex! And this is not destroying our moral fiber? So that's the way to do it? What? Hindi na siya bastos if it's in English?

For the uninitiated, Secretary is about a girl just out of a mental institution and finds work with "E. Edward Williams, Esq." as a secretary. The girl's clearly got problems-cutting herself all over the place. But said compulsion was thrown out when she discovered the joys of S&M. I'm not saying that Secretary is bastos and worthless. I read the short story upon which it was based ages ago. It's an okay film, one that would make you cringe and peek through your fingers at the same time. In fact, I wouldn't object if we get more of this kind of movie. I just want to know what sort of standard SM is using in determining which movies to show and which not to show.

In other worlds, I think I need a secretary. While checking papers yesterday, I came across something belonging to someone whose name had never appeared in my records before. But yeah, no spanking there, I promise.

Sheep noir

Friday's French word of the day was "mouton."

On compte les moutons when we want to sleep. Or if you are the topic of way too many reunion whispers, then perhaps you are your family's mouton noir.

But what interested me the most is this, in a Feng Shui sort of way: That we can spend our lives going with the herd, lost the will to live vicariously. A hundred years of existence as a docile mouton, abandoning the call to forge ahead and be a lion. How sad indeed.

Mieux vaut vivre un jour comme un lion que cent ans comme un mouton.