May 2004 Archives

So Anil and Alaina are moving to San Francisco soon.

I hate to be all me me me right now, when I know it was a hard decision for them to make, but screw that, my New York mom and dad will be lost to the hated Left Coast before the summer is over, and so I will throw a hissyfit and selfishly stamp my feet on the floor like I did when I was four. Who will prod me out of my lazy, antisocial shell on Sunday afternoons? Who will order tasty family-style feasts to fill my belly in Chinatown? Who will patiently listen to me whine about my dumb little issues or complain about stupid governments and how much I hate people and tell me everything will be okay and make me believe it?

It's the end of an era and New York will miss you both lots, but not as much as I will.

My idol galiwaw herself on what is potentially a scary new force in Philippine politics:

While everyone was worrying about who would win for President, Bong Revilla managed to make himself second in the senatorial race. What's worse, Lito Lapid is 9th! AND The kicker is that Jinggoy is 11th. PUTANGINA. This scares me. Can you see where this is going? I don't even want to think about it.

Our Senate will be filled with megalomaniac fools with greasy hair and bigote!!!

I would be more appalled only I'm too busy being shocked that Miriam Defensor-Santiago is currently in sixth place. Sixth! Mga kababayan, ano ba naman yan? Last time around I found myself unable to vote for Ralph Recto on the administration's slate, but it was a decision I had to sit on for a while. But Miriam? Blank space na lang, noh.

I've been meaning to write a post about this for quite some time, but hey presto, my friend Diane went and got the party started for me:

and to the filipinos in america who feel they have an obligation to support a fellow countrywoman, i hate to to say this, but [Jasmine Trias] is not filipino. she does not claim to be filipino. she does not even claim to be filipino-american. she has never set foot on philippine soil and i doubt she ever will. she is *hawaiian*. when asked why she joined american idol, she didn't say "i want to put the philippines on the map." instead, she said, "i want to put hawaii on the map."

(we know where hawaii is! we watched pearl harbor!)

i feel that people voted on the basis of racial loyalty and not on the merits of the women's singing. but she doesn't deserve this asian loyalty. not once did she mention she's asian.

more than that, she doesn't deserve this loyalty because she is not as talented as la toya or fantasia or diana de garmo.

On a good day, the racially loyal freak me out. I get creeped out when people send me emails saying "hey, I linked to your site, check my blog out" and I do and they are asians or asian-americans whose blogroll consists entirely of other asians or asian-americans. Like, what the fuck? Do you really not have any interests outside being asian? How goddamn boring are you to be around?

And then you have the people who send messages me saying "hey, I am filipino" (even when, you know, they're actually fil-ams) and then expect us to be instant friends. You know, because if you eat enough chicken adobo it imparts a strange magical quality to the blood running through your veins that means you will get along perfectly with everyone else who has the same thing going. Hello, do the 80 million people on my 7,100 islands get along? No? Then what makes you think we will?

On a bad day, the racially loyal piss me off. The next person who tells me I should read this book or watch that movie or vote for this contestant just because he immigrated to the US as a teenager or he is hapa and casts people of color or her parents are Filipino immigrants, will get my tsinelas-clad foot up their ass. The book was bad (and he complains why people won't shut up about Ninotchka Rosca?), the movie was middling at best, and don't doubt that it will be a travesty if she gets the prize that clearly belongs to someone else.

Stop trying to get me to support people who don't deserve my support! If they aren't worthy of being mentioned in the same sentence as Margaret Cho or Ernie or Anil, you will be wasting both your time and mine. Move on to someone who is willing to support crap, you know, just because.

Salon's Tom Bissell, while reviewing Champions of Norrath:

I associate D&D with too many unpleasant things: acne, chronic masturbation, Renaissance fairs, the lute. You know I once had a woman almost not sleep with me because I admitted I dabbled some in Dungeons & Dragons when I was a kid?

Perhaps he should be grateful it was just the one woman? Things would be far bleaker if he'd grown up playing GURPS instead.

From Laura Parker's "The ordeal of Chaplain Yee" (from, of all papers, USA Today):

The crux of the case was the charges that Yee had mishandled classified information. But prosecutors did not show the defense any evidence that Yee had such materials. A hearing to determine whether he should be court-martialed was delayed over the issue.

"The government has never produced the evidence that it believes was classified, so I am somewhat at a loss," Fidell says. "We were playing Hamlet without Hamlet here."

When the hearing began Dec. 8 at Fort Benning, Ga., prosecutors led off not with their most serious charges, but with adultery. As Yee's parents, wife and 4-year-old daughter watched, Navy Lt. Karyn Wallace testified under immunity about her affair with Yee.

Under military rules, adultery rarely is prosecuted. It is a crime only if it is "prejudicial to good order and discipline," meaning that it has to be disruptive or be so widely known that it damages the service. Yee's affair apparently had been secret. "It is arguable that there was no crime," Barry says.

On the second day of the hearing, prosecutors asked for a 41-day delay to examine the classified issues. The hearing never resumed. The criminal charges were dropped on March 19.

His career ruined and name tainted, you'd think the indignity would end there, right? Nope:

Yee, meanwhile, is under a new Army order not to talk about his ordeal in any way that might be seen as critical of the military. If he does, he could face further prosecution or discipline.

Land of the what? Home of the what?

[ via angry asian man ]

From "Real Men Don't Play GURPS":

The easiest way to tell a Real Man from the rest of the roleplaying crowd is by the game he plays. Real Men play Dungeons and Dragons. Quiche Eaters play GURPS and Storyteller. Mark Rein·Hagen, the designer of Storyteller, was once asked, "How do you pronounce the dot in your name?" He replied, "It's unpronounceable, and symbolises how meaningless are the labels that we attach to ourselves." One can tell immediately from this comment that Mark Rein·Hagen is a Quiche Eater. Real Men don't need the abstract concepts introduced by Quiche-Eating games — like characterisation, immersiveness or realism — to get their jobs done. They are perfectly happy with a sword, a spellbook, and a beer.

• Real Men use swords to kill monsters.
• Real Men use swords to tame the wilderness.
• Real Men use swords to negotiate peace treaties.
• Real Men use swords to romance the opposite sex.

If you can't do it with a sword, do it with a fireball. If you can't do it with a fireball, it isn't worth doing.

[ via infraredherring.com ]

Student drinks lab chemical on a dare:

"We need to find out what it was from the toxicologist," Assistant Principal Ray Lascano said. "All of those materials belonged to one of the chemistry labs."

The student was found last Wednesday in a school hallway, bleeding from the nose and mouth. [bolding mine]

I wonder if his parents are going to sue the school for storing dangerous chemicals their idiot son might drink?

The Vatican warned Catholic women on Friday to think hard before marrying a Muslim and urged Muslims to show more respect for human rights, gender equality and democracy.

Let's go through that one more time, shall we? The Vatican is telling other people to show respect for human rights, gender equality and democracy.

So funny it goes straight past into the realm of unfunny and right back through to being funny again.

I'm tempted to form an NYC chapter of The Race-ists Club, only I'd have to ban half of the Nintendo Sunday Club outright because they're frigging regular marathon-running types.

Meanwhile I get horribly winded climbing the four flights of stairs at work. Arrrgh! Anyone want to join me? The pathway around the Museum of Natural History's block would make an excellent circuit.

After years of wanting to go after I'd first heard about it and an entire year of planning (which almost came undone by me falling asleep and not waking up until a full hour after I was supposed to be at Chris' apartment in Brooklyn), I went to Night of a Thousand Stevies 14 last Friday. The Knitting Factory's a hard place to take pictures, especially if you hate using the flash, and anyway I forgot to charge my camera battery so I had to use it sparingly but here are the least crappy of my photos:

Legendary NYC night club impresario and NOTS founder Chi Chi Valenti rocking it out. The crowd cracked up when she picked up a tambourine with a crow attached halfway through her act. She had the most gorgeous dark red shantung gown on plus a top hat with a gigantic feather for the rest of the night; I don't know how she managed to not die of dehydration because the Knitting Factory was boiling hot but she looked good and was a great host.

Billy O singing Beautiful Child (from Tusk). Later on in the night he did Everybody Finds Out (from Say You Will), which I was hoping someone would do. I was very glad he was the one to do it! You can see two short clips here: 1, 2.

Chris is a perfectionist and don't let anyone ever tell you any different. I guarantee she was the only Stevie in the place with faux cocaine smeared around her nostrils. Really, the only way she could've been more accurate is if she'd had a deviated septum created specially for the occasion.

Well, okay, maybe not that much of a perfectionist. After all, she did take this photo of me without including the least bit of what I was wearing. Um.

(I went for the mid-70's Stevie look: a black ballet top and blue peasant skirt over knee-high black boots with four inch heels and a white knit shawl.)

And now, for no real reason other than they came out okay, here are four photos of the crowd:

I bet you're thinking, wow, are all those men gay?

Well, duh.

The highlight of the night was easily master puppeteer Basil Twist's recreation of the Gypsy video complete with Stevie twirling from age to age. I managed to get a short clip of the fantasy land twirls at the end.

Mssr Twist and his friend (who had matching homemade Stevie barbies in white and black outfits!) were sweet enough to come up to me after the show and say they thought I was pretty and were glad I hadn't put on a wig because I stood out as a brunette in a sea of blondes. Little did they know my wiglessness had more to do with me being crap at fixing hair both real and fake rather than wanting to stay as I am, but I thank them kindly for the compliment.

Johnny Tingle & Max. Right now I am blanking on which song they did but remember that it was excellent.

Yes, that is Boy George. The Boy George himself. He did a reggae version of Go Your Own Way (from Rumours), so kickass I can easily forgive him for it being, you know, a Lindsey Buckingham song.

And last but not least here's a picture of Mike Albo's ass in skivvies from when he joined the Ho-Ho's as they performed a mashup of Stand Back and the song it was inspired by, Prince's Little Red Corvette. My world and Anil's collided for a few brief but shining minutes.

Other performers of note: BellaDonna wasn't quite the prettiest of Stevies but her love shines through—as Chris said to me, you know she's a serious fan when her drag name is a Stevie album. Her Running Through the Garden (from Say You Will) was great fun, especially the giant pink flower with the picture of Lindsey in the middle! The Stevie Nicks Experience gets extra points from me for doing the Stand Back disco version instead of the original, because we all know it rocks so much harder. Lisa Jackson and Steve Gib did a beautiful cover of Leather & Lace and the super hot Jessica Rabbit Domination sang Gold Dust Woman, Courtney Love-style (i.e. frequently off-key but still good) to close out the show. Too bad Justin Bond and Kenny Mellman couldn't make it, I'd sacrifice small goats to see what they'dve done. Oh well, there's always next year!

Check out Chris's account of the night. And then, of course, there's the inadvertent hilarity of a not-so-sharp kid whinging about how badly the show sucked, when in fact she left well before the show even started. Oopsie.

Say what you will about Michael Moore, but I happen to think he's doing the right thing taking Disney head on over Farenheit 9/11. From his rebuttal to Disney's recent p.r. offensive:

"Michael Moore has known for a year that we will not distribute this movie, so this is not news." Yes, that is what I thought, too, except Disney kept sending us all that money to make the movie. Miramax said there was no problem. I got the idea that everything was fine.

"It is not in the best interests of our company to distribute a partisan political film that may offend some of our customers." Hmmm. Disney doesn't distribute work that has partisan politics? Disney distributes and syndicates the Sean Hannity radio show every day? I get to listen to Rush Limbaugh every day on Disney-owned WABC. I also seem to remember that Disney distributed a very partisan political movie during a Congressional election year, 1998—a film called The Big One… by, um… ME!

"Fahrenheit 9/11 is not the Disney brand; we put out family oriented films." So true. That's why the #1 Disney film in theaters right now is a film called, KILL BILL, VOL. 2. This excellent Miramax film, along with other classics like Pulp Fiction, have all been distributed by Disney. That's why Miramax exists—to provide an ALTERNATIVE to the usual Disney fare.

[ via Boing Boing ]

If you're voting in tomorrow's Philippine elections, please consider casting a vote for Akbayan as your party-list representative. They're fielding the excellent Risa Hontiveros-Baraquel, whom Jo-Ann Maglipon wrote about yesterday:

She's stumping all over the country, because she hasn't got TV. Akbayan has money for only eight 15-second spots, or a grand total of two minutes on TV! (The law allows for 120 minutes.)

She could have tapped into her old media connections very easily. But Risa's position is that there is something "unethical" about all this. She goes into how a media person, having inordinate influence on public opinion, should not be using such a position of trust to advance a political career. At the same time, she adds, an elected politician should not dabble in media work at all, as this turns his government service into a part-time job.

And so: just two minutes of air time!

There are very few politicians and would-be politicians I thoroughly respect and I'm very happy to say Hontiveros-Baraquel is one of them. She was the speaker at my high school graduation and makes our school's history of educating strong, socially-conscious women to serve the nation proud.

Dan Renzi's mugshot is so ridiculously good-looking, he could easily use it as a headshot—and I hope he does.

The charge is total bullshit, of course. That said, I would happily get busted for indecent conduct myself if I could be sure my photo would come out as well as his did!

Spotted by Ranjit!

Jennifer Barrett's short interview with Margaret Cho is so great, it's a shame Newsweek is only publishing it online and not on dead tree. Cho on having been invited to visit the White House:

Are you kidding?
No, several times, by Dick Cheney. He was always sending me things to this party or that one.

Have you ever taken him up on an invitation?
No, I don’t even RSVP. If there was a box that said “As If,” I would check that.

Draw one on, check it and send that fucker back, is what I say.

Her "Revolution" show premieres on Sundance June 19th. If you live in NYC, don't have cable and aren't a creep and I'm not too lazy to throw a viewing party, you might be invited to come watch it here. Can't wait that long for your Cho fix? You can buy her previous shows on dvd to tide your over, I'm The One That I Want and Notorious C.H.O.

Oh, and for those of you new to these parts, here's a photo of me in my Cho Revolution shirt, purchased when I saw her at The Beacon last year. I'd like to also point out I'm probably the first person to ever get their picture in the NY Post with her face on their chest.

My friend Allan explains what he considers to be the four Chinoy subcultures:

The Filipino-Chinese have managed to survive and adjust through the times, but to generalize the Filipino-Chinese as just one community is a horrible mistake. There are several subgroups of Chinese living in the Philippines and each group has survived in their own peculiar way. Some of these groups have embraced Filipino values while others are still holding on to the old tradition.

It's a short post but fascinating reading especially if, like me, you aren't Chinese but like to consider how they situate themselves in Philippine culture and society.

You can read more about Chinoys at the always informative Tsinoy.com, one of the best (if not the best) community sites in the Philippines.

rests in this man's hands.

Congratulations also to Alison and Maude Lebowski for finding each other!

A few days ago me and Jarvis celebrated our eighth anniversary. When I first got him, he was a surly little puppy who could stand in my two hands. Eight years later and he's my number one boy, and still my little puppy dog.

Congratulations to Jennifer Rosales for winning Sunday's Chick-fil-A Charity Championship, her first career title after five years in the LPGA. She won by a stroke in a field that included Annika Sorenstam, Se Ri Pak and Grace Pak.

Most of you have probably seen this already as it made the rounds about the same time as Qveere Eye for thye Medieval Man, but it still cracks me up:

[ via djswifty ]

Previously, Kelis talking about "I hate you right now".

Jiang Zemin is clearly made of hardier stuff than I—if Kim Jong-Il toddled over and tried to make out with me I would run away screaming like a little girl.

He's more frightening than zombies.

[ via little. yellow. different. ]