Fun with Numbers!!

So I was super duper bored at work one day and wanted to see how many blogs have been posted. This is what I found out.

June 25, 2002 (the birth of this blog) - 190 days and 377 post.
2003 - 365 days and 662 post.
2004 - 366 days and 345 post.
2005 - 365 days and 397 post.
2006 - 365 days and 457 post.
2007 - 87 days and 136 post.

Notice in 2003 we posted 662 times. I'm not sure what was going on that year but man ... we were rolling. I think this might have been due to not having a comments section until later on.

In 2004, we died down but by 2006 we picked it up. It looks like if we average around 140 post in 90 days we will do 580 for this year. Anyways I just thought if anyone cared to see how many times we blogged. Please note there were also a LOT more people on this blog back in the day that I have kicked off so go figure.

TEXAS + Guns = R.I.P.

AUSTIN -- Criminals in Texas beware: if you threaten someone in their car or office, the citizens of this state where guns are ubiquitous have the right to shoot you dead.

Governor Rick Perry's office said on Tuesday that he had signed a new law that expands Texans' existing right to use deadly force to defend themselves "without retreat" in their homes, cars and workplaces.

(M) Alphaville [Criterion Collection]
Grade: B
What threatens the world in 1965? Communism, Socialism, Fascism. In this movie that is supposed to be Sci-Fi you see a detective sent from another galaxy to destroy the creator of a computer that is controlling what citizens are allowed to do, think, and know. It's a political commentary on society at the time and it is beyond odd. It is entertaining but... odd.

(TV) 24, Season 1 (2001)

Grade: A

This show is highly addicting. I finished the season in less than a week. My favorite characters: Jack(obviously), Teri Bauer(she rocks!), Tony, and David Palmer. I HATE SHERRY!!! I didn't give it an A+ because some parts of the writing was kind of cheesy, but overall, strong work for the cast and writers.

Season 2 here I come....

(M) Closely Watched Trains [Criterion Collection]
Grade: B+
This movie is awesome. It's very funny as well. A young boy gets a job at a train station during world war 2. It's a coming of age story of a boy obsessed with sex and becoming a man. However, he suffers from a sexual problem that he is more than willing to inform everyone of so he can fulfill his desire. It's very funny but the unique thing is it all takes place during his countries occupation by the Nazi's. The movie plays out in an excellent fashion and the B&W footage is fantastic. The movie also won best foreign film in 1967.




(M) Band Of Outsiders [Criterion Collection]
Grade: B+
This was an excellent foreign film about two men who both love the same woman and are trying to gain her assistance to steal money from her father-in-law. It's a classic film, it has great interaction among the characters and there's this little dance scene that is awesome.






(M) A Brief Encounter [Criterion Collection]
Grade: C
I have a feeling this movie carried MUCH more weight when it was made. It's the story of a married woman who by chance meets a married man and they spend a brief moment of theirs lives together falling in love. It's a theme you see a lot more these days, the idea of falling in love with somebody else after you get married. However, after watching it I thought of other movies where two people fall in love with each other and want to be with each other but can't, most specifically 'In The Mood For Love' which is far better than this movie in my opinion.

This is going to be a total nerd blog BUT tonight was the season finale for Battlestar Galactica and it was GREAT!! There has been a lot of discussion in the forums about this season ... some good, some bad but honestly TV is hardly this well written and acted anymore. Yea so I'm having a big nerd overload now ... I should calm down in a bit. Hee hee. One bum part is the show will not start its fourth season until 2008. We just started 2007 so yea it is going to be a LONG 2007 for me. :(

Sorry for this lame blog but this is all I could do on a Sunday.

(M) Boogie Nights. (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1997) Grade: B

Thoughts: Eddie Adams (Mark Wahlberg) goes from waiter at a club to Dirk Diggler, famous porn star with the help of Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds) and Amber Waves (Julianne Moore). The film was pretty good and filled with P.T. Anderson stars. It was a bit long but it was a good look into the porn industry and how the business has changed.

(M) Reno 911!: Miami. (Ben Garant, 2007) Grade: C+

Thoughts: A movie version of the TV show with more sex, violence and strong language. The Reno police dept. head to Miami for a police convention they were not really invited to. It was silly and funny and wrong with lots of random cameos like Danny DeVito, the Rock and Paul Reubens.

(M) Gwoemul (The Host). (Joon-ho Bong, 2006) Grade: B+

Thoughts: A Korean horror film similar to the Godzilla’s of Japan culture. A mutant emerges from the Han River and kidnaps a young girl whose family springs into action to save her. It was a funny, silly, scary, interesting and very, very, very Asian film. The movie did run longer than I would like considering most horror movies should only be like 90 to 100 mins AT MOST. The film did insanely well in Asia and is nominated for Best Asian film by the Hong Kong Film Awards.

(M) Ying Hung Boon Sik II (Better Tomorrow II). (John Woo, 1987) Grade: A-

Thoughts: Classic John Woo and Chow Yun Fat film. I could go on and on about this film but I won’t since no one will care. I will say no one does a gun battle shoot out better than Hong Kong films; some of the best work. Chow Yun Fat makes for a badass good guy and Leslie Cheung was such a wonderful actor. It will be 4 years since his suicide death come this April 1st. :(

Movie count: 27

I felt pretty lucky today. At work, I won the drawing to see the Anaheim Ducks play the Dallas Stars at the Honda Center. The only bum part was driving from LA to the OC. It was ONLY 39.09 miles in Friday traffic but yea. :(

In addition, they were giving away screening passes on KCRW to see the Namesake at the Arclight and I won!! I'm pretty happy cause I get a free movie with a Q and A with Kal Penn after and the book the movie was based upon along with the cd soundtrack. Good stuff and all free. Man I love free.

I was watching this Filipino news show with my mom and they were talking about medical tourism, specifically in Thailand. I've known about Filipino's going back to the Philippines to get plastic surgery and what not, but I never imagined American's and Europeans going on a "medical vacation." The news segment also showed what kind of rooms patients stay in after surgery and I've never even stayed at hotels that were this nice! I was also surprised to learn that people don't just travel for plastic surgery, they travel to get other surgeries such as open heart.

The reason I blog about this is because the Philippines is trying to get in on this industry, but they want it to be on a Thailand scale. At first I thought that this would be good for the country. Doctors would be motivated to stay in the Philippines instead of going to the US. (see my blog about this doctor drain) Good for all right? Wrong! Yeah, the doctors will stay and practice in the Philippines, but for TOURISTS. What about all the medically underserved in the rural areas? That's where most care is needed, but if this whole medical tourism thing blows up in the Philippines, every doctor graduating in the country will be pulled towards these hospital/hotels leaving the poor worse off than they were originally.

Hopefully next year I'll get to go on a medical mission to the Philippines in my moms province. I'm really looking forward to it.

Thoughts:

- An article about how as bad as bands like Hinder and Nickelback are people love them. It is kinda of funny.

- Offical album cover and tracklisting for new Tori Amos album in May.


- I thought I was a loser for all the movies I watch but this guy is trying to go to all the Starbucks!!?? I like all the HK and Spain ones.

- Why is Sanjaya still on American Idol?? It is pretty messed up because now he is just a joke but apparently some lady is straving herself until he gets voted off. Check out her MySpace page.


- I know no one cares but they picked up Battlestar Galactica for a fourth season wtih 22 eps and a two hour movie :) YAY!!

(M) An Affair Of Love (French)
Grade: B+/A

I JUST finished watching An Affair of Love and I LOVED it! I thought it was an excellent film and it's only like an hour and 18 minutes long. I like how they talked about how getting sex out of the way right up front allowed them to get to know each other rather than project some false image so you can get the person into bed. If you've already accomplished the goal of getting laid then you can move forward and it allowed them to skip the mundane what do you do for a living type of conversations.
Of course it also brings into play the power of sex and how they couldn't just let it be absolutely meaningless. I also like how they didn't tell you what the fantasy they wanted to act out was so you can let it be whatever you want. Their talk about how in the movies sex is either mind-blowing or horrible but never portrayed as in-between and that's what sex usually is was cool. I don't know, I could go on. I liked that the guy cried when she made her declaration of love and she made it without expecting reciprocation but just put it out there to let him know how she felt and how deeply those words can affect somebody. I liked how he felt he finally felt complete with her when he saw her grimace during orgasm and that there was finally no more holding back anything from him. The movie was a great exploration piece.

(G) The Bravery
Grade: B

My friend is BEYOND obsessed with The Bravery and she needs professional help. I went with her to this show last night and I had a good time but it was really entertaining to see how much she is obsessed with the bass player (Dirt) from this band. I had some yummy Pho before the show as well.

The most interesting thing about this show was that my friend and I sat at a table with two other girls, I'll call them Sara and Kelly. Sara just admitted to Kelly that she's in love with her. Sara and Kelly both have boyfriends. Kelly didn't know what to do because she likes Sara but is REALLY in love with her boyfriend also. What to do, what to do? I know. You do what Kelly did. You drink about 11 beers, get beyond hammered and spend the night rolling around on the floor and grinding on the girl who likes you in the seat and basically get as close to sex at the show as you can before probably going and having real sex later and then saying "I was so drunk, I don't remember a thing that happened last night." Which in reality may be true because she was sooooooo hammered. At the table next to us was a mom with what looked like her junior high son, I can't imagine what the mom and kid were thinking at these girls actions.

Blog....just to blog.

Booked my tickets to NY...sweet.

(O) Wicked (Pantages, 2007) Grade: A-

I really wish I hadn't read the book before the musical. Needless to say, the musical was very loosely based on the book. I don't want to ruin the plot for everyone, but there was really only one detail in the musical that left a bad taste in my mouth. This was a direct result for my having read the book and expecting things to happen that didn't. Despite that one detail, I thoroughly enjoyed this play.

We already know that I love the music, but watching the play in it's entirety added texture and even more feeling to the music. This musical was cleverly written and really funny. The cast was AMAZING. Eden Espinoza was a wonderful Elphaba, but the real treat about the Los Angeles production of "Wicked" was Megan Hilty(Glinda). Hilty played the saccharin, spoiled "good" witch, who befriends Elphaba. From listening to the CD, I expected to be annoyed, but Hilty's charm shines through and you just can't bring yourself to hate her.

"Will I see it again?" really isn't the question; it's "How many times are you going to see it?" For now, the answer is: 2(August 2007), but I'm predicting more. Let's not forget, I saw RENT 3 times in a year!

(B) Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Gregory MacGuire, 1995) Grade: C+

I read this a while back, after I listened to the Wicked musical soundtrack and before I watched the full play. Unfortunately, I began this novel thinking that I would get the full details of what would happen in the musical instead of going into it with a clean slate.

Pros:
The premise of the entire book is awesome. It takes a beloved and well known tale like "The Wizard of Oz" and presents it in a totally different perspective.

Cons:
The story was very slow in parts. The ending left me with this empty feeling and it really didn't seem like anything was resolved in the witch's life.

Honestly if I could mesh parts of the book and the musical together, I would be happy. I guess in the future I will try my damndest to treat musicals/movies and the books they are based on as separate entities to avoid any further heartache.

(M) A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints. (Dito Montiel, 2006) Grade: C

Thoughts: Based upon the memoirs of his real life - Dito Montiel, this coming of age story is about him growing up in Astoria, New York during the 80’s. The film could have been better if they focused more on Dito as an adult (Robert Downey Jr.) and less as an immature teen (Shia LaBeouf). At least, Dianne Wiest and Chazz Palminteri were great.

(M) Breach. (Billy Ray, 2007) Grade: B

Thoughts: The actual Robert Hanssen case is much more interesting than the film itself but it was still a good movie. Darth’s review is pretty complete so I’ll just add that Chris Cooper did a wonderful job and Ryan Phillipe wasn’t too bad but what was that big lump on his forehead.

(M) American History X. (Tony Kaye, 1998) Grade: B

Thoughts: Derek Vinyard (Edward Norton) is an ex neo-nazi skinhead just released from prison for killing three black men. Derek is trying to steer his younger brother Danny (Edward Furlong) from picking the same path he did. It was an interesting film but very frustrating because there is so much ignorance and racism out there. People like to think they are not racist, but in reality we all are and it just depends on what we do with the negative thoughts that matters. Trivia: Edward Norton gained 30 pounds of muscle for his role and the film uses the word "fuck" 205 times.

(M) Field of Dreams. (Phil Alden Robinson, 1989) Grade: B+

Thoughts: Ray Kinsella (Kevin Costner) and his wife Annie (Amy Madigan) live in Iowa raising their daughter Karin (Gaby Hoffmann). One day while in the corn field, Ray hears a voice and so begins a classic cult baseball film. I thought it was a really sweet movie with a good cast. I know most guys love the baseball / playing catch with your dad aspect but I like the family and desire to hold onto your dreams aspect more. Trivia - Then unknown, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are among the thousands of extras in the Fenway Park scene, and are uncredited and the studio built the baseball diamond on an actual farm in Dyersville, Iowa. After the filming was completed, the family owning the farm kept the field, and added a small hut where you could buy inexpensive souvenirs. As of 1990, visitors were free to come to the field and play baseball as they please.

Movie count: 23

WHAT THE F!!!!!



Ticketmaster is OUT OF THEIR MIND!!!!
Notice my ticket cost... $12, notice the service charge total: $14.25!!!!!!!!

Why did Tower have to close. I need a place to get my tickets at for cheaper!