I just watched episode 8 of atashinchi no danshi and i think it's the best one so far. made me laugh, made me cry, made me all warm and fuzzy inside. here are some spoilerish scenes i couldn't resist but capture. ( continue on... )

how many hours of drama watching have you clocked in?

( here's mine )

happy new year! my first post for the year and hopefully i can get off my lazy ass and update more often than i had in the past year. (yeah, yeah, i know new year's resolutions more often gets broken rather than fulfilled, but one can still aspire to do it, right?! XP)






caught tenchijin (NHK taiga drama) last night, well, morning actually. seems really interesting. apparently oguri shun, masami, fukakyon, shirota yuu, aibu saki, and a lot of well known actors are in it... and of course tsumabuki satoshi top bills the series.
these dramas usually starts out from the very beginning, as the protagonist was growing up and all that, but there was a sort of a preview before the whole story unfolded and tsumabuki, playing the lead character naoe kanetsugu, looked really cute in period costume, he was all smiles ^_^. shun, on the other hand, playing a samurai who was probably a sengoku commander looked serious and pensive.
anyway, after that preview, the drama started out, true enough, with satoshi's character as a little boy of about 7 or so. he was awestruck and amazed when he saw the imposing uesugi kenshin in action. abe hiroshi who plays kenshin looked the part, oozing with the coolness of his character. i think i've never watched abe onscreen before without breaking into a grin or a laugh since i always see him as the funny boke character. this time his character is about as serious as they can get and instead of smiling, i had a thought balloon that had "eeeh?! kakkoii!" written all over it. the young naoe even took home the arrow that kenshin's blade had deflected in a previous scene.
as taiga dramas go .. it looked as if it's going to be really long and i was getting sleepy so i left it hanging hoping to catch the reruns sometime later in the week.
so anyway... yes, it looks promising and i hope some group takes this up and release subs.

kaze no mukou e
(beyond the wind)

the song opens up with guitar strumming and drums then nino started singing and the rest of the guys joined in. the guitar beat, strangely enough, reminds me of a faster version of vertical horizon's intro in "send it up".

it's such an upbeat and fun song, a certified picker-upper. like most of my fave arashi songs i think this would get a lot of air time on my ipod when i'm feeling kind of out of it or having a gloomy day. i mean who can stay down when the guys are singing ("kaze no mukou e, tabi wa tsuzuite yuku...")?


( more... )

federer vs nadal in wimbledon: it was worth staying up for. it was history unfolding.
i think they both grew beards during the match. it was that long! with two rain delays and one set taking up as much as an hour it was a long road for the victor. nadal had to work for every point but so did federer (which was unusual for him). the two men used up their challenges to make sure none of the shots were wasted, more so during tie-breaks. the weather added to the level of difficulty that the players had to face. nadal had at least two good shots that went out, the ball making a detour because of the strong wind. i guess both the players were troubled with the weather.




( Read more... )

i'm putting up pics of my favorite 47 DVD behind the scenes moment here just so i'd have it up somewhere (part 2 of the last half) :



( find out what made subaru smile )

i'm putting in pics of my favorite 47 DVD behind the scenes moment here just so i'd have it up somewhere (and i'll be starting with the last half) :

( choose your OTP )

so i've been reviewing the 47 making videos and i heard the ending collage song - itsuka mata, different from the one i've heard before (the acoustic one from the Gachinko Session) it was so pretty, i love it! the first part really showcased maru's voice .. and yes it was beautiful.. and so were the rest.
anyway it prompted me to attempt another translation. i find that i can remember the lyrics better that way and it's good practice  -_^

( Read more... )

the little girl next door (who's cute and shy but has a really loud voice and often surprisingly thinks like a grown up) keeps on repeating: "wag muna kayo matulog!" [don't sleep yet!] like a mantra.
a bit annoying but i can't help but rememember when i was a kid, i'd do that too. everytime my parents and brother would take a siesta [mid afternoon nap] i also asked them not to. i couldn't sleep at such an odd hour and i always feel like they're leaving me when they go to sleep.

at last! i'm posting my translation of heavenly psycho i hope i don't get bricked for this hee hee.

( douzo )

ok. so when i watched 11.28.07's janiben (comedienne, nishioka sumiko as guest)i had a lot of questions like:
( Read more... )

i'm still crazy and i'm still addicted, so last sunday i took a break from doing stuff and sat down to watch TV. i took my chances and watched Shounen Club and surprise! Yokoyama You was their guest (in all his sparkling red sequined glory). the topic for that day had something to do with one's most treasured thing and as per usual everyone was asked. one that was interesting (and expected) was chinen's answer - ohno kun goods :-), any merchandise that has ohno, he's on it, he even mentioned keeping a telephone card that featured shachou (ohno). hahaha! chinen! always the fanboy. yokocho's answer? kanjani 8 members, awwww he's such a sweetie.

just before he went to do his solo song he mentioned that normally it was always subaru and ryo getting the limelight, with cameras always on them in songs sang by the whole group. he proved to everyone that he was worth every shot in his solo number though. he sang "confusion", an angsty, intense sort of song. i love yoko singing... he should sing more "serious" solos. and his dancing here was also great. not like the graceful and almost flying type of dancing that hina and shota does nor the sexy moves that ryo specializes in, yoko's was ... well rough and powerful. he tends to have his head lowered when he dances, only glancing up in certain moments when he emphasizes a line, i think that added to the intensity. there was also a shirt-ripping moment (but relax, he had a white undershirt on XP) and then shortly the song ended. i didn't even notice there were back dancers, hehe. yoko really delivered!

mmmm what else happened.. he was judge in the quiz (guess the kanjani 8 song from the first few notes) and in the "yoko chance~" portion he guessed the song himself and got a bit stuck with "sukiyanen, osaka" where he had to sing the first few lines before finally getting the title.

SC ended with him singing "mugendai" with the rest of humanity .. er,i mean the rest of the juniors, and then credits...

...and all that's left in my short term memory is the image of yoko dancing... in his sparkling red sequined glory.

screen caps and DL links from za_riel's site

de venecia's voice is blaring from the office TV's speakers. i put my mp3 player on loud mode. i so don't want to hear a politican's impassioned speech right now. especially when all he's being passionate about anyway is his desire to keep his position.

got an invite on my email yesterday for Instituto Cervantes de Manila's The Ternateños and Bahra book launch.
aaargh! why did they schedule it on a friday and at 4pm?! i want to go but there's work of course. colette and i have had discussions in the past about the Ternateños and how their Chabacano is different from the one used in Zamboanga, and we were wondering how that came to be. i bet there would be interesting talk as ambeth ocampo would be there. sucks that i can't go :(

it was windy this morning. while i was walking, the strong wind swept the small leaves on the ground forward: a solid stream flowing at my feet.
i love windy days.

from goofy to gorgeous: the evolution of maru

maru has always been my least noticed eito. how'd he suddenly become mecha kakkoii while i wasn't looking?



( see the pics and judge for yourself )

my top ten kanjani 8 songs as of jan2008 -- not in chronological order since i like them equally. well maybe some more than others but i don't want to arrange them since it goes up or down depending on what i'm looping in my player at the moment. before it was watashi kagami, weeks ago it was eden, heheh, and recently i've been overloading on osaka romanesque.



yasu during their SCP Eden performance

( onto the song list )

ok, so my day is complete. i just watched maru, yasu and baru guest on NHK'S shounen club (SC). they performed a medley: each sang his solo and all of them finished off with "zukkoke otoko michi". the solo songs were shorter than i preferred but at least i finally saw yasu do his thing on the guitar for "watashi kagami" (uncontrollable squeee here). but i miss the other guys in the zukkoke otoko song. it's just not complete without them.... i mean..the gang didn't get to point at yasu in the "jagaimo mitai" part, what's up with that?! and the whole crazy dance is missing.
they were in another segment: the games part (just like last week's). i think baru is still being mean to yasu and didn't pick him to win in any of the questions/challenges. it's bullying i tell you!. how could he not pick yasu when he did his "sabishii pose"? [made me doki doki], baru said it himself, yasu's an expert in this, ne? and also when they were asked to confess to a girl in kansai-ben. yasu tried to impress with his pa-cool voice. maru spoke so fast, i think it was gibberish! he and baru got in a passionate battle afterwards (all still in gibberish i think) and that was really funny so i sort of forgave baru for his bullying (that and because he looked bizarrely cute in the white goat with stars head gear thingie that you've gotta see to believe).

#50. the dark is rising by susan cooper
- though this is the next book after it, it definitely does not take up where "over sea and under stone" left off. i met only one familiar character - Gumerry but here known as the mysterious Merryman Lyon. Early on in the book i got introduced to this new family, a large one, where will, the youngest of the brood, gets the spotlight. and i got to discover how everything changed for him after his 11th birthday.

characters i found really interesting: there's a lot to choose from but the one who intrigued me most was herne the hunter (first time i heard about him and the wild hunt). the chapter where he appeared in was both terrible and beautiful. and here i get to appreciate cooper's magic on weaving words.

another interesting thing was this sad bit about the walker's back story.
( my random comments on the rest of the list... )

#15. time traveler's wife by audrey niffenegger
i kept seeing this in other people's lists so i decided to try it as well. it was engaging. i read it at night before sleeping and tell myself i'm going to stop at a certain chapter but couldn't, since i kept wanting to know what happens next to henry and clare.
it was a good read... but not really up there in my most favorite reads list... probably somewhere down the middle.


#16. possession by a.s. byatt
i love this! it took me a while to get through everything but i must say byatt is a master at her craft. but of course the book was not without any er-what-was-she-thinking-when-she-wrote-this-scene moments. it doesn't make a great whodunit book but i think it's a wonderful piece of literature. somewhat akin to the way dickens, austen and the bronte sisters described scenes and expounded on thoughts and ideas so it has that victorian book feel to it. the story wove in and out of the past and both the characters from the past wrote heavily on norse mythology, and am starting to get interested in that as well. i thank the high heavens for stumbling upon the movie on cable and being intrigued enough to hunt for the book version ...which is infinitely better.


#17. the ivory and the horn by charles de lint
de lint presents different stories in an urban setting but as rife with mythology and mystery as any folk or fairy tale i've read in the past, with some characters reappearing throughout that at the end they were familiar to me as neighbors and friends, and like them, some were more interesting than others. my faves are: "coyote stories" (i so wanna see coyote!), mr. truepenny's book emporium and gallery", and the "deadman's shoes" which has a twilight zone feel to it.


#18. amrita by banana yoshimoto. ok, this is definitely weirdsville. too many characters that are just too bizaare for my taste (i never got to like yoshio nor his friends). but i finished the whole thing and still enjoyed and savored the quiet, almost meditative way that she writes as in her other books. i still love kitchen best but i'm glad i picked up this one too.

#19. artemis fowl files
one word, fun! juvenile but fun... (ok ...three words)


#20. where only the moon rages by christina pantoja hidalgo
fairy tales but not really. it has the eeriness of stories you've heard from your lola (grandma), or from the upper classmen at school during late nights of puyatan (all-nighters), with enough flavor of truth in it for you to ponder in your head whether those things really did happen in the past or not. i read it all in one weekend night when i was at my parent's house in the province and i thought, how utterly appropriate!
hidalgo's writing actually reminds me of another pinoy writer: gilda cordero fernando in the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker.


#21. the brief history of time by stephen hawking
if only there is such a thing as a unified theory that covers everything, i wonder how the world would work and how people would think and decide on everyday things.
i wouldn't pretend to understand everything he said here even he tried hard to make it as "layman" as possible, but reading the book kind of made me want to read more of history and science and works of scientists that don't usually get the spotlight.

#23. nodame cantabile vols 2-4 (translated)
as ever, hilarous and side-splitting funny. vols 2-3 are not mine but i bought the fourth copy for myself and sadly that one is the most unfunny of the lot. nodame gets a bit serious and masumi who never fails to make me laugh to the point of tears just barely made me snicker in the boat scene. oh i wish the rest would be better than this.

#24. airu vol 12 (strong will) by hiroyuki asada
still love akabane in this (bonus: one pager chibi version of him). and an interesting character probe into rival team's takumi and tetsuro.

#25. the drawing of the dark by tim powers
my first tim powers book and after reading this, i think not the last. i still prefer his buddy's series (blaylock's elfin ship, etc.) but i did like powers' take on norse mythology and arthurian legend. although the two main characters were memorable and i enjoyed their banters and adventures together, the only main woman character was pathetic and was pretty much frustrating throughout.

#26. artemis fowl, the opal deception by eoin colfer
not my favorite one in the series but it was pretty good (except for that one part where... oh no, i can't give the spoiler away). i sort of feel that foaly didn't get much exposure on this one and i missed him.