June 29, 2004
I went and saw the much ballyhooed documentary "Fahrenheit 911" and I've got to say that it made my non-political @ss think. I've seen almost all of Micheal Moore's movies (dare I say documentaries) and I enjoy them for what they are. It's obvious that in every movie he's made, he skews the facts (sometimes stretching facts so much that they are unbelievable) to make his point of views valid and he does it in a comedic and cartoonish fashion. And although I don't agree with everything he promotes, it is entertaining and I just take it as that, entertainment. But what I like most about his movies is that he often tries to show a side of an argument that is rarely shown on the regular news and media and Fahreinheit 911 shows the side of our fight against terrorism that we don't see on the nightly news. One thing that this movie really shows is his contempt against our President.

The movie does start off in typical Michael Moore style, as he highlights a bunch of shots that shows President Bush acting as a bumbling idiot. He does try to stretch a few facts about oil companies and his ties to the Middle East and controversial election (there is a good scene showing the House of Reps vs. the Senate that deserves applause) and the whole time Michael Moore narrates it, while giving his thoughts on the whole thing to help sway the audience to his side of the argument. Some of it is valid, some of it is a bit much, but it's all done like his other movies, so it was expected.

Then in the middle of the movie, it all changes. The mood changes, the subject matter is no longer a laughing matter and the movie starts to turn into a documentary with minimal narration. The persuasions are now just a few remarks here and there and the audience comes to their own conclusions when shown memorable moments of the past few years. Scenes of 9/11 and the Iraq war basically speak for themselves. We see soldiers going to war and families coping with losses. We get to a personal level with several people and their opinions of the events. There are questions about Homeland Security, media coverage, halliburton, the patriot act.

I was surprised at the kind of emotion the movie had. Some of it was very hard to endure. I'll admit that there are several moments that choked me up while watching it. In fact, as the movie ended I didn't expect to see almost half of the audience in tears (and it was a surprisingly packed theatre, on a weekday afternoon). But that is what I applaud this film for, evoking emotions, from comedy to sadness, and making everyone see his side of things, albeit a different side that is usually seen in our patriotic society. And this should lead to conversations and debates between people who normally don't speak about politics. And that is a good thing. And it may lead to people actually voting in the upcoming election, one way or the other, or even becoming involved in some matters. This won't sway many Bush supporters to vote differently, it'll probably just anger the Republican Party severely. But in the demographic of people who are neutral, this movie will probably scare them away from a vote for Bush. And for what it is, Fahreinheit 911 is a good, important movie that I believe most everyone should see. Go with an open mind and come to your own conclusions.

June 25, 2004
Here are the Pictures I took from Gerry & Katrina's Wedding.
Click on "view all albums" on the header on top to view more pictures of the events involving the wedding. There is a lot of stuff I didn't take pictures of because I was probably busy doing stuff. I wish I had taken more pictures of the people at the wedding, but if you have pictures you want to share, feel free to upload them to these albums, it's fairly simple. I believe I've granted access to anyone who wants to add pictures... I don't know, it's the first time I've used DotPhoto, but if it asks for a password, try Katrina's new last name. I'll be showing these to the happy couple when they return from their honeymoon in Hawaii (if they aren't already lurking here now, and if you are I'm sure you can find something better to do than surf the internet in Hawaii) and it would be nice if they could see a conglamerate of pictures, and not just my pics.

And now I've got to go find a gift for another wedding tomorrow.

The NBA draft has become a joke. I used to get all excited and amped about it. I used to have my research done on all the prospective players and follow along as I watch all 4+ hours of it. Now I don't care about it. I predict that more than half of the first round selections in yesterday's draft will end up as busts. This is part of the reason as to why the NBA sucks now, and it's bringing the college game down with it. Dwight Howard, the first guy picked overall, is a monster though. But I would have went with Emeka Okafor instead. And I'm not even going to start about the direction the Lakers are headed... I hope Sasha Vujacic isn't another way of saying Slava Medvedenko.

June 24, 2004

the happy newlyweds

Well this past weekend was extremely exhausting for me, but now Gerry & Katrina are now Mr. and Mrs. Reyes and with the wedding stuff all done, I can now relax (that's why I've been post-less the past few days, I've been chillin'). I hope all of you that were there enjoyed it as there was a lot of work put into it (and a lot of behind the scenes stress that so few people will ever know of as it all came together at the end). Also, I hope you guy enjoyed my "revealing" performance (which had me nervous for days). And for those of you who weren't there and don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it. I'm working on getting pictures posted, they should all be up soon.

I've got wedding #2 this Saturday for Jason & Melanie. I can enjoy this one more as I'm just a guest without responsibilities. Those of you coming in from out of town for this one, I'll see you there. It's supposedly a big reception.

The Black Eyed Peas have recently released their latest single and video, "Let's Get it Started". Due to the fact that the ABC/ESPN decided to make it the theme to the NBA playoffs, I'm already sick of the song without having heard it once on the radio. The video is okay though. But what has got me excited is that concurrently they have also released "The Apl Song" as a single in the Philippines. Those of you who have heard the multi-platinum album know this as the song in tagalog. A pinoy-themed video has already been made and features several celebrity filipinos in it. Hopefully, we'll be able to see it here in the states (well, through an inside source of mine, it'll be all over the internet in July and MTV is thinking about picking it up.)

Apl de Ap (the pinoy of the group) is huge in the Philippines. Due to this popularity, the peas have decided to release the song to pay homage to the Philippines. Check out the Making of the video website from the director himself, Patricio Ginesla of Debut and Lumpia fame. You can check out lots of pictures from the set and a making-of video. good stuff...

June 16, 2004
The lakers...what can I say? What a let down. I'm upset. This should have been a dominant year, and although they made it to the finals, they should have won it all and convincingly too. With their lineup, they should have been destroying teams nightly all year long. But they played lackluster and, as evident during the playoffs, they squeaked their wins out and it showed at the end. Oh well... I'm over the NBA season, bring on football season (sorry baseball, I just don't care until the playoffs, and even then I only care if I have a favored team playing). Hopefully, the newly vamped Redskins don't let me down either, but the way this year is going, all of my teams have become disappointments.

I'm still a laker fan, always have been for as long as I can remember and probably always will be. I'm just a dissapointed fan right now. And with big changes to the roster in the offseason, it'll be a different team next year. It'll be a rebuilding year. At least my hopes won't be as high next year.

With my bigger Yahoo email storage, I need help filling it up. Feel free to send pictures, audio, etc. I used to hate that, but now I welcome it. I used to have to spread my emails within my 3 yahoo accounts (my 2 "sign up for junk" addresses - [email protected] and [email protected]), but now I don't have to. But that just means I've got 3 times the space now. I could still use an Gmail invite if anybody wants to send me one.

Today I've got some "preparing" to do for Gerry and Katrina's wedding this Saturday. Also, for those who will be attending (especially those of you from out of town), we've got a room for the night at the reception hotel if anybody wants to hang out all night or doesn't feel like going home. BYOB and bring some for me too. Let me know.

June 15, 2004
This week is dedicated to my good friends Gerry and Katrina as they will be wedded (did I just make up a word for married?) this Saturday. They've been working hard the past few months on getting this wedding ready, and with less than a week to go, things might start getting hectic. And I still need to buy them a gift. Good thing for them, I get paid tonight, otherwise I would have been getting "creative" with their gift. (creative - making a $10 gift look like a $50 gift)

Yahoo email users... did you all check your email accounts today. Today Yahoo starts their new program featuring free 100mb email accounts. If you haven't been upgraded yet, you should be soon. So I went from frantically deleting emails constantly to keep my 6mb account under 90% usage, to an account at under 5% usage. Big difference there. And no more cussing out those of you that don't understand how bandwidth works and like to send 5mb files. This is Yahoo's move to counter Google's popular and highly coveted 1Gigabyte Gmail account. (currently, gmail is invite only and it's so much in demand that people are auctioning off their invites on ebay.) I do have a tough time trying to locate that one old email that I'm looking for as I sift through my hundreds of old emails. Now, I may have to search through thousands.

June 10, 2004
I recently found out that someone that I used to hang out with at ODU, Brandon Vera (Brad to his friends), is now the #1 rated heavyweight (scroll to the second to last category) grappler in the United States. He's really into the sport of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) and it looks like he's making a pro career out of it. He's been training in San Diego for a few years now and has built up a worthy reputation. Last month he stepped up to UFC's Tank Abbott's challenge to any fighter in Tijuana, but the fight never occurred (here's a link to the video, but it comes with a few pop ups and it isn't the best quality). It's good to seem him doing so well. I can't believe I played tackle football with him. I also put him into some coconuts and had him dance the coconut dance. I'd post a picture of that, but he'd probably kill me if I did. And I know he can literally with his bare hands. Just look at what he's doing to this guy.

Here's some of his accomplishments:

BRANDON VERA

6x Grappler's Quest Champion
2004 Brasil vs USA Absolute Champion
2003 & 2004 Pan American Champion- Super Heavy Weight Champion
2003 Abu Dhabi World Championship competitor
1997-2000 Olympic Resident Athlete- Greco Roman Wrestling ( ranked 4th in the USA)

dude is BAADASSSSS!!

Football season coming up soon, and along with that is the slew of Football video games. The past few years has seen an ongoing battle for the king of football games between the Madden franchise and the ESPN 2K line. The games have been trying to out-do each other and the consumer comes out the winner as we get 2 quality games. But it looks like ESPN 2k5 may be doing the unthinkable this year. They may be releasing the game at $19.99. While this news is yet to be confirmed, both EBgames (use code "E3SHIP" for free 2 day shipping) and Gamestop (code OVR4GRND gives you an upgrade to overnight shipping for the price of regular ground shipping) have already posted pre-orders at this price. Shoot, for $20 I'd buy it even if I didn't play football games. Needless to say, I've already pre-ordered my copy and hopefully they will honor the price even if the retail price goes up. It's a steal if this is true. I can also cancel if it's not.

June 5, 2004
Memorial day started off this week, and that usually commemorates the start of the summer season. I'm sort of planning a busy few months including, a couple of weddings this month, a bunch of concerts, and a some road trips. I may end it with a trip to New York around labor day. The US Open Tennis tournament would be going on around that time, and I figure that it would be nice to go. Tickets to the event for the general public go on sale Monday, so i'll be mulling over that this weekend.

Hopefully this summer will also be filled with some Pinay Hotness. (pg-13 site, probably not work friendly)

Picnics and parties are also part of the summer agenda. That also includes lots of food. I can sure take on some hot dogs during the summer. So much I feel I can hang at Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest on June 12 at Macarthur Center in Norfolk. I'd try out but I'm supposed to be keeping slim for a wedding I'm part of the next weekend. You know how them asians have been lately with these hot dog eating contests. We're like vacuums.

June 1, 2004
It was an extremely exhausting Memorial Day weekend. Saturday was just non-stop for me. I was basically out all day from when I got off of an 8-hour shift at 8am until I got home at 2am. I was to get up at 5am so I could catch the bus to Atlantic city, so I figured the best thing was to not sleep and just sleep on the bus.

So I get on the bus full of uncles and aunties. No disrespect to them, but it was another world on the bus with them. My plans to sleep the whole way there was thwarted by about 20 loud rounds of bingo and a lot of really bad jokes that they were determined to tell by the bus intercom. I did get a few minutes of rest here and there that probably equalled about an hour and a half of sleep, and the bus seat itself isn't the most idea place to sleep. The bus driver did help by speeding the whole way there. The expected 6 hour trip was shortened into about 5 and a half hours, and this is after stopping several times, with one stop being over 1/2 an hour for lunch. Dude was flying.

Even with the discomfort, the value of the trip couldn't be passed up. It cost $50, but once you get off the bus in AC, they gave us $22 cash (why $22, I don't know) and they also give a voucher for a free dinner buffet, which costs $20 with free drinks and dessert. And this buffet was no joke. The food was 5-star restaurant quality. I would have been satisfied with it if I had paid the $20, but the fact it was free made it even better. So the bus ride itself was $8, and I think some of that even went to the coordinator of the event. The only thing I had to spend money on was the actual gambling. And did I spend.

I had a descent day gambling. I started off slow and spent a lot, but then after a while I found myself up $200 (and maybe more, I know it should have been $500, but I screwed up bet, but you don't need to know about that). Then that $200 started dwindling away slowly. I didn't gamble as much as I could have, but that may have kept me from just losing more. But at the end of the day, I was down $30. But $30 in Atlantic City is really nothing. And that doesn't include the $22 cash that they gave me for getting off of the bus. I had a good time though and I think it may have been in part that I wasn't in the mindset of making a lot of money, but winning some money would have made it even better. But I also noticed that gambling big to win big can lead to losing big. I guess that's why they call it gambling.

So the bus ride back wasn't as bad as most of the trip was spent with everyone sleeping. The bus driver, with less traffic to deal with, went even faster this time. The one rest stop we take at 3am, a lot of the uncles and aunties think it's a good idea to buy coffee, because it's morning time. This just keeps them awake and talking the rest of the way. I get a lot of sleep still, but it was a really rough bus ride and while my head is resting on the seat's head rest, the rough ride just constantly keeps my head bouncing most of the way. So while I get a few hours of sleep it didn't feel like much and I woke up with the biggest headache. Even still, an $8 bus ride is still worth it and I'll probably be doing it again.

We were supposed to get back at 7am, but the bus driver got us back a little before 6am (talk about cutting some time off). I get home with the big headache and start watching the morning news. I fell asleep and then woke up to the news again. I get up thinking that the noon news was on only to find out that it was the evening news, so I had just slept the whole day away. It felt good though to actually sleep after a few days.

And I was awake to see the lakers win their series. I didn't actually see the end of the game though, as it always ends around midnight, just while I'm heading into work. I doesn't matter what time it starts, it always ends while I'm in the car on the way to work.