Desktop Monster

This video, forwarded to me by a friend, is weirdly hilarious. While I love trying out new applications and pimping out my desktop, I wouldn't want this guest on my PC. In the end though, it might actually prove to be useful.

Shangri-La

Photos taken from me and my parents' Mindanao trip. I originally wanted to visit Camiguin and Siargao (places everyone I know has been to and hyped up), but the trip became some sort of a homecoming for the Quina clan - many of whom flew in from abroad that week. So I decided to scrap my itinerary and tag along with my relatives.

These photos were taken from and on our way to visit Tinago Falls along the border of Marawi and Iligan City. It was literally "tinago" as one could imagine - we had to go off-road and use dirt tracks to reach the descent point, and we had to go down 300+ steep and jagged steps to reach the base of the falls. The older folks were complaining, but realized it was worth every joint pain upon seeing the falls in its pristine glory. In contrast to the Maria Cristina falls which we also visited, Tinago was not as crowded and not as developed; there was only another group when we visited, of about 5 people.

Visit my Multipy site for more pictures.

Original sin

My issue with Joss Whedon is that he's beginning to be too much of a fanboy himself.

For those who aren't in the mix, Joss (yes, we're on a first name basis) continues the eight season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer in comicbook form. The storyline quite literally follows where the show we religiously, obsessively followed for 7 years left off, except now budget constraints are no longer an issue. Now he can make Buffy flykick and do midair roundhouse even while falling from a glass roof, without having to concern himself with its choreographic or logistic (im)possibility (or deal with Gellar's tantrums). In fact, the darkly cute Willow and Amy - her former pet (literally) and witch-bitch - can be seen engaging in a spectacular magical fight that can rival Dumbledore's and Voldemort's in issue 4. Hmm, I would like to test that theory. ;-)

But Joss heavily invests on how the slayerverse played out in the last two seasons of the show, which is understandable, but can be quite disappointing for the fans. Yes, I do love dikey Willow, and I have no problems with one-eyed Xander. I must admit though that activating slayers the world over spoiled the whole drama. It was a resolution that fans knew was coming, but fervently hoped Whedon wouldn't allow because admit it or not, the drama ergo the story is all about the one girl in all the world who will stand against vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness. In walks Faith in season 3, and I wanted post-Buffy slayerville to be about her, standing against vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness, alone. It also helped that Joss' writing of Faith is just too interesting and the casting, hot.

SPOILER

Joss however refused to fail popular expectations, and decided to end Buffy's TV run with an army of slayers that the now uber-powerful Willow activated. So we see that Buffy is given a chance to lay her arms down. And then we are told that he spent his post-Buffy break writing The Astonishing X-Men.

Being a big fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, as well as being impressed with Firefly and his turn in Stan Lee's iconic mutant characters, it is no question to me that Joss is a genius of the sci-fi/fantasy genre. But working on multiple storylines must have taken its toll, and it appears that he is now jumbling everything up. With thousands of slayers running around, the latest season shows the government and some demonic order conspiring to destroy the slayer population out of fear that they might eventually take over the world given their inhuman abilities. In fact, as of issue 5, it appears to be about slayer-discrimination/fear, the same way X-Men was about mutants and mutant hate/fear.

I hope season 8 doesn't turn out to be that derivative. It's too early to judge anyway. And I will love slayerverse, bad or good season notwithstanding.

Hardwork

Last night my colleague forwarded to me what she claimed was a leaked copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I asked her to send me a copy after she casually mentions that she had already read it, a revelation which caused me shock and awe beyond Bush's firepower. While I know how badly every literate people the world over want to get their hands on the series' finale first, it is this same realization that tells me there's no way in the world that the publishers would be too careless to leak a copy of its manuscript prior to the release date. That and of course, capitalist motivations.

So I opened the file and began reading the first sentence. The thing with the leaked version is that anyone who took at least introductory college lit will know the first sentence alone is not publishing-worthy. I am amazed at those who actually took the time to read it for having the tenacity to go through almost 700 pages of bad writing. But I feel more sorry for the admirably dedicated HP fan - possibly an avid fanfiction writer - who wrote it and who will never be acknowledged for his/her work, which will forever be known as piffle and which will be subjected to endless ridicule by his/her fellow HP fans.

So JKR would begin what could be the most anticipated piece of literature in modern history with "Harry slowly raised his head and stared morosely at the familiar visage of number four, Privet Drive"?

Yeah. Right.

Hot air

I must admit, never have I been so terrified of going into a class as I am now with my Ph.D. course. Yesterday my professor asked each one of us our problematique for our dissertation and it felt like all the joy was sucked out of me because truth is, I don't have any problem, so to speak, to work on. While I do genuinely enjoy discussing the many critics and writers we read, I forgot that the professor operates on the assumption that everyone of us there is working on a dissertation. I do remember telling her that even as a graduate student I can handle the pressure of a Ph.D. class, and that I can work on that level without any special treatment. But that was when I foolishly blinded myself with the thought that Ph.D. classes will simply be about further (not necessarily deeper) discussions of different writers and critics and their works, which as it happens it also is. But the prospect excited me too much that I forgot postgraduate students are also supposed to be working on their dissertation.

Now I am in the same boat as the doctoral students are in. The difference is, they have a master's degree under their belt while I don't. But when I come to think of it, what really brought me to enroll in Comparative Lit are all the literary theories and the critics. I don't actually read much "literature" but rather more of the reactions to it. Talk about ambition. And taking the easy way in.

Now I find out that what I have to do really, if I plan to be literary scholar, is to find a writer or a bunch of similar ones, and devote my life to him or them. I'm thinking of becoming the preeminent Filipino Barthes or Habermas scholar, just to dodge accusations that I am merely mimicking Steve Carell's character in Little Miss Sunshine (who was a Proustian scholar) for lack of any real interest on any one writer. Barthes and Habermas because, well, they're quite celebrity intellectuals, and more people - I think - will know who I am working on compared to, say, Baudrillard and Sontag.

And if my analytical abilities can't cope up with my ambition, maybe I can just have T.F. Sering.

The problem with words

I wish I have it easy the way some people do when they sit in front of their PCs, or hold their pens over some paper. To them it comes naturally; thoughts flow easily into words effortlessly the way ice melts to water when heated (bad metaphor). And it's not simple communication, because these people can make crap smell like your mother's own version of adobo when they write about it. God they can even make it taste like one.

I wish I was like them.