Hear ye, hear ye! =)

Bedside reading
The Spanish Film Festival has ended its run for this year. I saw a total of 9 films. It was a great experience!

Now I have a 'mission' - to finish reading this book before next month. I bought it for only P30.00 last year during the National Book Store warehouse sale. The author, James Bradley is the son of one of the 6 flag raisers immortalized in that famous photograph taken at Iwo Jima. He has a very descriptive way of writing and is very detail oriented. It is a well researched book. He painstakingly traces the lives of the 6 flagraisers during the Depression era to the time they are drafted into the Marine Corps. This eventually leads to that important moment in history when they raised the American flag on a tiny island called Iwo Jima . From the few pages I have read so far the book is quite engrossing.

The movie adapted from the book is directed by Clint Eastwood, stars a solid cast of young actors and it is produced by Steven Speilberg. It is scheduled to open in theaters here in the Philippines, sometime next month. I am looking forward to it but I do want to finish reading the book first, all 356 pages of it.

Now kindly excuse me as I bury my nose within its pages.

In case you're wondering ...

No, I haven't gone on a blogging hiatus.

I have just been pleasantly distracted by the art of Cinema.

I managed to see 2 German films last week at the Shang Cineplex.

So far I've watched 4 Spanish movies from Pelikula: 2006.

I got a few more I want to check out this week.

I might as well bring a sleeping bag to camp out at the Greenbelt cinemas.

A bientot! =)

Foreign Films Fest Galore (yet again)
Ok so I'm back home. Nice and cozy in my little nook. We now have electricity but no cable TV. The phone lines are working so I can access the Internet albeit it is back to my dial up connection but hey I ain't complaining.

The 3 days, 2 nights stay at the Linden Suites was a major relief. We had cable TV, broadband Internet connection, a bathtub with hot water for our showers, a Jacuzzi (on the 9th floor) and a microwave oven for those butter popcorn I've craved for the longest time.

Now it's back to the nitty gritty grind of my routinary life. What better way to feel normal again than to indulge in my biggest passion - movies.
This week 2 major film festivals commence.

• Pelicula 2006 - the 5th Festival of Spanish and Latin American Films. October 3 to October 15, 2006.
  Cinema 1 Greenbelt 3. Ticket prices are only P50.00!
  Click here for the schedule of films to be shown.
  
• The German Film Festival October 04 to October 08, 2006.
  Shangri-la Cineplex. Ticket prices are only P50.00.
  Click here for the film sked.

See you at the movies! =)

Celebrate good times, come on!

Today my sister dearest celebrated her birthday. My baby sister. My only sibling. The taller one.
The more mature, more responsible and more sane than silly old petite ME.

This is the picture of her birthday cake. The one that Linden Suites gave her. The yummy Sans Rival textured cake that melts in your mouth. The one with a lone candle which she had to blow out in front of people who were having breakfast this morning at the coffee shop. She tried to keep a straight face although deep inside I know she hated it. She doesn't like to draw attention. She thinks it is really cheesy and embarrassing when the waiters in the restaurant show up with a cake to greet someone on their birthdays. I had to control myself from bursting from laughter from the cringed look on her face when she heard them singing "Happy Birthday" as they approached our table. The cake that I am now currently bingeing on (this is my 3rd helping, yes I'm a glutton) as I write this post using the broadband Internet connection in this hotel room.

Happy Birthday lil one.
I swear I had no idea they were going to do that to you, this morning.
I sincerely hope you won't take revenge on me on the 19th when I turn a year older.
If you do, I would absolutely disown you, for sure.
Heh, just kidding!
You know I love you and I always will. =)

Enough is enough!
After suffering 4 days and 3 nights of darkness, heat and mental strain, my sister and I have had enough. So here we are with parents in tow, nicely ensconced in the Linden Suites for 2 nights. We checked in today, Sunday at around 3:30 pm. Our parents aren't that young anymore and I wasn't sure they nor I could take another night sleeping in the dark with mosquitoes buzzing in our ears, sweating like pigs in our cramped little space.

Besides tomorrow is my sister dearest's birthday and I didn't want her to welcome her 3X year in such deplorable conditions. We still don't have electricity in our place but we do have constant supply of water. The elevators work every other hour, the place is pitch dark and our 12th floor unit feels like a sauna. Without TV, the Internet or even something like a hair dryer, it was really like living in the Dark Ages.

So yes I intend to fully enjoy myself, get enough sleep, soak in the aircon and more importantly I can check my emails, blog hop and just feel 'normal' yet again.

Anyways this post doesn't really seem coherent, I'm tired beyond comprehension.

Quotable Quotes
Somebody's boring me.
I think it's me. (Dylan Thomas )


Bwahahahaha.
How appropriately true in my case. =)
But at least I can still grin and bear it.
So it isn't so bad, after all.

My Sunday fix

Sunday family brunch/lunch with my parents. At the mall or their house or here in my loft. Great bonding moments!

Eavesdropping on other people's secrets on this website.

Listening to the radio on my cellphone all day. Oldies, 70s songs, 80s fare. Songs from Tom Jones, The Cascades, Bobby Darrin, Brenda Lee, The Beatles, Andy Gibbs, The Eagles, Kenny Loggins, John Waits, Tom Petty, Rod Stewart, Bryan Adams etc. Tunes I grew up listening to so nostalgic sentiments wash up all over me.

Filling up the countless raffle coupons from the different supermarkets which my mother forces me to do. She is somehow convinced I'm lucky although I haven't really won anything major like a plasma TV or a brand new car. Ugh!

I end this post with a few lines from one of my favorite songs of all time:

I beg your pardon
I never promised you a rose garden
Along with the sunshine there's gotta
be a little rain sometime
When you take you gotta give
so live and let live and let go
oh oh oh oh
I beg your pardon
I never promised you a rose garden