Babbling Point

+ HAPPY BLOODY DAY TO ALL YOU YOUNG LOVERS OUT THERE Recylcing rejected ads... pieced together by me and Brandie... for two friends who are about to spend the first Valentine's apart.

- HOLY PANTY RAID, BATMAN! Robin is now a girl! Well, I've always liked Damion Scott's work, ever since I first saw his art in BATMAN. So, I'll definitely check out this book. Besides, it's being written by Bill Willingham, who also did a good job in FABLES.

I almost cried when Ian emailed me this pin-up / cover. Ian Sta. Maria is one of the art directors of the Globe Team. (He's also the inker of Batch72 and former vocalist of the rock band Chocolate Beef.) Despite the fact he's working on a tri-media campaign, as well as several other print ads, he managed to do this art work along with three other pin-ups. Turns out he and Bow started talking about the good old days of COMICS 101 and the Flying Phantom. So Bow brought along some old sketches and character designs and gave them to Ian and the next thing we knew... SHAZAM! Ahem... I mean, FLY PHANTOM! FLY! (Well, that's not really his battle cry. He has none.) Is this a sign from the comic book gods that the Phantom must fly again?! mwahhahahahah!!! Let's see if something takes flight before the year ends. :)

+ CUT-AND-PASTED FROM JOEL'S BLOG Episode: The Eighth Endless A tribute to Neil Gaiman's The Sandman series. For the fans, enjoy. For the non-fans, try to enjoy. And then there is Death. But there is still one more sibling, an eighth Endless who remains a mystery. His name is Dedma. Nobody remembers when he was born. That detail is written in Destiny’s Book, but not even the Eldest of the Endless remembers which page it is on. Dedma has not attended any Family gathering since the beginning, and he barely responds when called upon, if at all. Then again, his brothers and sisters never consciously seek him out anyway. Of all the siblings, it is Desire who fears him the most—so much so that if his name is mentioned, Desire will not even recognize it. His sigil is an expressionless mask, which he wears on his neck. He acts not out of responsibility but out of choice. If you should bump into him, do not pay him any attention. He won’t mind you either. ...

:) L'cOh mio! Sono vagante in italiano! Couple of years ago (around 96 or 97), an Italian professor read my short story in the short-lived anthology “Chimera” and asked if he could include it in an anthology he was compiling. He said it was going to translated into Italian and published in Italy (of course). I said yes to his request. Years later, he sent me a copy of the book, but it was delivered at a friend’s office, which shut down before I could get it. I forgot all about it and thought, why would I need an Italian version of my story anyway. Last night, I Googled myself and found my name in this Italian site. http://www.iccalcinate.it/interc/bibliot_all12.html Turns out, my story got include in the book (for a college course?): “Writings and Languages of the World. Stories for intercultural education. An anthology dedicated to the literature of the South of the world. Every reading is accompanied from integrating proposals of activity and distance...

CURRENTLY MY GUILTY PLEASURE. When I first heard "Toxic", I didn't even know it was sung by Britney. I thought it was from some new manufactured all-girl group. I kept hearing it on the radio for a week, but always missed the DJ's intro to the song, so I only found when I finally saw it on MTV. Damn! She got me there. I like the song. Guilty as charged. The video's not that bad, has that ALIAS / JAMES BOND feel to it. Actually, the song does remind me of a James Bong theme song, especially that part where the guitar comes in. Must. Stop. Self. From. Buying. CD.

WE HAVE ZUCH ZITES TO ZHOW YOUZ Hey kids! Look! Zsazsa Zaturnnah has a new web site! Click click and check out an exclusive interview with Carl Vergara and the answer to the very importnat question, "Will Zsazsa run for President?" Or maybe, she should run for Congress! hehehe You can also download three zuper pretty Zsazsa Zaturnnah wallpaper . So, go! Go! Click! Click! ZATURNNAH!!!! And anyone around the world can now get their hands on the magical story of ZSAZSA, because she's now available in DIVISORIA.COM .

+ Just got SPAM about the 1st Metaphysical Convention , to be held in Las Vegas. Which begs the question, if you can't go to Vegas, can you attend the convention in spirit? (Rim shot please) It would also make for an interesting episode of CSI! (Starts next week! Yey!)

I AM SQUIRREL Saw this in Hai's site and couldn't help but laugh. That's what I'm like in the office. I am a squirrel... hear me roar.

:) The blog entry is brought to you by the letter F. Astig! This month, Brandie starts his job as a faculty member in the Academy of Arts in San Francisco. He'll be teaching advertising to undergrads and will also serve as thesis advisor to senior students. Please do say hello and congratulate him by going to his phlog .

FANTASTIC CON! Hey Gerry ! Thanks for inviting us to join the KOMIKERO booth at The 2nd Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention. It was fun! Fun! Fun! Sweaty and hot, but fun. :) It was also great to finally meet the Komikeros! Happy-perky-hyper-Ryan was the first to greet me, say hello, and try to sell me their comic books. He also took all my coins and spare change... hehehe... Finally got to meet Jonas Diego after all those years of snail mail and email. Hey Jonas! Yup, we must work on something soon! Geoffrey was there to give away preview copies of his comic book debut SERVANT. Hello na rin kay Jac , Johnny, Jerald, and Mylene, their newbie Komikero. :) And finally got to EB with Tobie! (Sorry... still can't find the script!) Ryan Orosco passed-by and gave Gerry a CULTURE CRASH calendar. heheheh Philip Tan came by stayed for awhile and was able to do a sketch or two. On the Alamat side of the booth, it was just me and Carl and his sold-ou...

THESIS STATEMENTS A year will not pass without us being interviewed by a student for his report of thesis. It started early this year as I was interviewed by a student from AIM who was making a business case about local comic book publishing. More specifically, his thesis was about studying the current comic book market and determine what kind of comic book is the market looking for and to create a comic book to cater to that market. To which I asked, “Isn’t that called, SELLING OUT?” He smiled and said, “Well, I hope to be able to synthesize everything I find out and still come up something that doesn’t look like a sell out comic book.” Like with every interview for a report or thesis, they would usually ask, How’d you start? What are you influences? What were the problems you encountered when you started your business? And so it becomes another episode of THIS IS YOUR LIFE and you are forced to remember the mistakes of the past, while trying to force yourself to smi...

+ "You bleed onto the page. This is your lifeblood. Minutes and hours and days and years of your life, transmuted into letters and words and sentences. A scattering of drops, globules of plasma. Punctuation. Period. Umlaut. "In the end, perhaps this is all you have to show for yourself. Your whole, messy life, smeared across the white pages that stop you from hemorrhaging." from David Hontiveros' PUSOD HA RAGAT Feels like he was also talking about making ads. In the end, what do you have to show? A couple of tearsheets, some commercials which some people considered cool for 30 seconds. There must be something more to all of this.

A funny thing happened on the way to Endor.... or, that's what happens when you smoke that Ewok weed. Wow... never knew this issue came out. I think Jobert told me about this site but never got to check it out. You can even buy Leia's metal bikini if you want to. Wonder if anyone will dress up in this at the SCI FI CON this weekend. :)

Got to watch half of THE GATHERING last night. During the first half of the movie, I was running around the mall trying to look for my lost car park card. I never found the card and had to pay P230 to get out of the mall. So, by the time I got in the movie, I missed most of the set-up, which was okay since Dang and Doris told us about the premise of the movie, which was the main reason we watched that instead of ROTK. (Well, we watched ROTK Saturday night anyway.) THE GATHERING felt like a extra-long episode of THE TWLIGHT ZONE. Well, it was more like that episode of RAY BRADBURY MYTSERY THEATER called THE CROWD, where a mysterious crowd would always appeared whenever there was a car accident. Turns out "the crowd" was composed of people who had died in other accidents and were "acquiring" more members by making sure that people in other auto accidents die. In THE GATHERING, that concept is taken to a Biblical scale, where a "crowd" gathers at ...

+ Ilang tulog na lang... dadating na siya! You're 12 years old and you discover you have super-powers! Are you a mutant? A strange visitor from another planet? Nope... turns out, you're God. Chosen #1 is tentatively scheduled to hit stores on January 21st.

PHLOG PHLESH The Ombundsman of Tech has once again discovered another interesting mobile blogging site. Jason was the first one to tell me about PHLOG.NET . And now, the wild side of moblogging... www.phonebin.com!!! Actually, it's quite funny. Wondering when the first Pinoy (or Pinay) will make a post there. Click here to see the strip show . Meanwhile, back in blogland... You can read the diary of a London callgirl , a porn star's journal , or, if you wish True Porn Clerk Stories . Take your pick and click. Looking at these sites, it would make for an interesting marketing tool if all of the Viva Hot Babes kept a blog/phlog. Just to make sure they're all okay and doing well. :)

00:00 DAY ONE In 15 minutes, Jan1 will become Jan2. Here we go... Spent most of the day in bed, then went to mass, then the mall, then back home. Deliver some gifts and went around Greenhills and Makati looking for an internet cafe that's open on New Year's Day. Found that old reliable Station 168 is open, but ended up in using a keyboard that had Korean keys. So, I blame the keyboard for any typos. Got to spend the second to the last day of the year with old friends. We ended up at 90 PROOF , where we talked about... oh... work... and girls... and life in general. Parted ways around 4am. Wow... 4am... been awhile seen we did any of that. Usually, when I'm going home at 4am, it's because I'm coming from work (and would usually have an 8am meeting to deal with.) Was supposed to meet up with the guys again early this morning, after all the fireworks had been spent and as the smoke and smog would blanket the city, but they all texted that they were too t...

+ READY, AIM, FIRE! Joey is Maricel's seven year old kid. One night, after playing MECH WARRIOR, Joey went up to his mom and asked her... JOEY: Mama, what mech warrior do you want to be? MAMA: I don't want to be a mech warrior. I only want to make love, not war. JOEY: Then you can be a LOVE MECH! We can set the mech for love. And you can be armed with torpedos of peace. More of Joey's crazy ideas at: http://joeyworld.blogspot.com/

:( ON A BLUE NOTE Got to watch the Blue Rats Friday night. As I listened to them sing about lost love, rant about life, and occassionally yell out their frustrations, I realized that I could've been a blues singer. And with those same prerequisites, I could also find work as a death metal vocalist. Maybe... in an alternate universe. And in that parallel existence, I'd end up with a legion of fangirls who'd love me and cry for my songs. But they'd never ever want to hear me sing happy songs. So I'd have to remain blue for all eternity, until I get sick of all the success and decide to become a popstar, by which time I'd be too old to join a boy band and end up writing about my failed career which becomes the number of song in the charts overnight. Yeah :)