At this year’s Christmas celebration, we had a special guest in the person of Inang’s sister, Lola Bebe. She had been sick for quite some time already and had been visiting her sister quite often lately and expressed happiness at the thought of spending Christmas here with us and so on the day of Christmas eve, she came to our place early and busied herself just looking at the preparations and the kids dancing. We had our usual simple fare of spaghetti, grilled hotdogs, fried chicken, fruit salad, biko, potato salad, ham n cheese cordon bleu, choco fountain and a newbie – grilled tuna panga. Well, once again despite the small space everyone that mattered was present. Everyone had fun and enjoyed a noisy but still blessed Christmas!
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Saturday, December 24, 2011
FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS - Movie review
The movie starts with Justin Timberlake (Dylan) presiding over a creative meeting with his staff then he runs off to meet with his ‘supposed girlfriend’ who initially I thought was Mila Kunis (Jamie) since she was the one talking on the phone but apparently the two are with different partners – Justin with Emma Stone and Mila with a guy I don’t really recognize. Both of them got dumped by their partners on that same night and so they both decided against having any future complicated relationships.
Jamie meets Dylan, for the first time when she picks him up at the airport. She apparently works for a recruitment agency and is hoping to convince Dylan to work for GQ magazine. Dylan is hesitant at first since he does not want to uproot his entire life in L.A. for a new job. So Jamie takes Dylan on a fun night tour of the city to convince him to move to New York which includes having drink in a bar, going street dancing (with a flash mob) and gazing at the stars and New York’s beautiful skyline from the top of a building.
Dylan finally agrees to take the job and at his first day at the GQ office, he meets Woody Harrelson (Tommy), the sports editor who thought he was gay. Jamie arrives at his office and presents him with the contract which he must honor for a year otherwise she will not get a bonus. Since she is his only friend in New York, he has lunch with her and while eating discover that they have both been emotionally damaged and vowed to shun having complicated relationships altogether. Jamie invites Dylan to a party at her place so she can introduce her around to different people. They hang out a few more times together until one night while watching a romantic comedy they started talking about sex and relationships. They end up deciding that they can have sex without any strings/emotions attached.
The next day, Jamie visits Dylan at the office and both of them decide that last night was a mistake and they should both stay as friends but that same afternoon they ended up having sex again and many more times after that. After awhile, Jamie realizes that she wants to start dating and they decide to stop having casual sex. They take a walk at a park and they take turns getting to know other people and she ends up meeting Parker and they start dating while the woman Dylan approached ended up going off to meet with her husband.
Jamie continues to date Parker and on the fifth date, they go to bed. Dylan meanwhile accepts Tommy’s invitation to go to a bar and hooks up with some lady who was too forward/aggressive for his taste. Jamie, meanwhile, separated with new guy Parker who tried to sneak out on her after the fifth date, saying he was not meant to be her Prince Charming. Dylan helped her get over the pain of being dumped by Parker and gifted her with a street art painting that she totally loved. Then, when she got home she found that her mom bailed out on their supposed weekend trip so Dylan invited her to go to LA with him to visit with his family for the 4th of July holidays.
They fly to California where she meets Dylan’s older sister, Annie, nephew Sammy and his dad who now has Alzheimer’s. Dylan’s family had a pretty house on the beach and that night while the two hang out together talking about Dylan’s childhood they get emotionally close and spend the night together. Jamie sees how difficult it was for Dylan to see his dad getting worse with Alzheimer’s. Then, when he takes her up to the mountain to have a close look at the famous Hollywood sign, she asks him why he never talked about this mom leaving. Dylan says he doesn’t want people to pity him and Jamie tells him that what he needs to do is to act towards his dad like nothing has changed. But Dylan refused to talk about it and so they leave it at that.
Then, Jamie overhears Annie and Dylan talking about ‘their relationship’ and Dylan quickly denies that anything is going on between them, that they are just ‘friends’ though she did see him creeping out of her room the other night. Annie tried to convince him that they are perfect for each other but to no avail. So that same night, Jamie decided to leave telling some lame excuse about work. She ignores his texts and calls, still hurting from his comments to her sister. He finally found her at the top of the building, at her ‘thinking spot’ and asks her why she had been avoiding him. She ended up telling him that she overheard their ‘talk’ and he admits he only said it to get his sister off his back. Jaime countered that she thought they were friends and that friends weren’t supposed to say those things against each other. So she doesn’t want to be his friend.
They go on with their lives until Jamie discovers that Dylan may be leaving GQ for another company which would affect her commission so she confronts him and this leads to another argument. Jamie and his mom have a talk about love and she advised her not to repeat the same mistake she did – not to run after a fairy tale Prince Charming, find someone to take on the world with. Dylan, on the other hand, meets his dad at the airport and over lunch his father thought he saw a girl he once knew. He tells her about a girl named Diddy, the love of his life that he met while at the Navy. It seems he never really got over her and maybe it was partly why his wife left him. He was too proud to tell her how he really felt, he just let her go and now he lives with that regret for the rest of his life. His dad told him that life is short and he should not waste any minute of it. Dylan finally admitted to his dad that he feels he messed up with Jaime and so his dad told him to fix it.
Dylan asks Jaime’s mother’s help to make her go to the Grand Central Station and he arranges a flash mob scene. He admits to Jaime that he missed her, he is all he thinks about, and wants them to be best friends again. He says he wants his best friend back because he is in love with her. They kiss and Dylan then suggests that they go on their first date, at a cafe across the street. The film ends with them stopping pretensions on their ‘date’ and passionately kissing inside the cafe. The movie is in fact pretty good! I like the palpable chemistry between Mila and Justin and their characters are just so relatable particularly by this generation of commitment-phobic millennials. They try their damnedest to act cool about sex when in fact they are still both romantics at heart. The movie is very funny and the acting so natural. Furthermore, even though the plot was quite predictable, it was still pretty much quite enjoyable to watch. But definitely this is not a movie I can watch with my daughter since some of the scenes were quite explicit. Maybe when she is a bit older and more mature, I would recommend that she watch this movie someday.
[photo grabbed from IMDB]
Jamie meets Dylan, for the first time when she picks him up at the airport. She apparently works for a recruitment agency and is hoping to convince Dylan to work for GQ magazine. Dylan is hesitant at first since he does not want to uproot his entire life in L.A. for a new job. So Jamie takes Dylan on a fun night tour of the city to convince him to move to New York which includes having drink in a bar, going street dancing (with a flash mob) and gazing at the stars and New York’s beautiful skyline from the top of a building.
Dylan finally agrees to take the job and at his first day at the GQ office, he meets Woody Harrelson (Tommy), the sports editor who thought he was gay. Jamie arrives at his office and presents him with the contract which he must honor for a year otherwise she will not get a bonus. Since she is his only friend in New York, he has lunch with her and while eating discover that they have both been emotionally damaged and vowed to shun having complicated relationships altogether. Jamie invites Dylan to a party at her place so she can introduce her around to different people. They hang out a few more times together until one night while watching a romantic comedy they started talking about sex and relationships. They end up deciding that they can have sex without any strings/emotions attached.
The next day, Jamie visits Dylan at the office and both of them decide that last night was a mistake and they should both stay as friends but that same afternoon they ended up having sex again and many more times after that. After awhile, Jamie realizes that she wants to start dating and they decide to stop having casual sex. They take a walk at a park and they take turns getting to know other people and she ends up meeting Parker and they start dating while the woman Dylan approached ended up going off to meet with her husband.
Jamie continues to date Parker and on the fifth date, they go to bed. Dylan meanwhile accepts Tommy’s invitation to go to a bar and hooks up with some lady who was too forward/aggressive for his taste. Jamie, meanwhile, separated with new guy Parker who tried to sneak out on her after the fifth date, saying he was not meant to be her Prince Charming. Dylan helped her get over the pain of being dumped by Parker and gifted her with a street art painting that she totally loved. Then, when she got home she found that her mom bailed out on their supposed weekend trip so Dylan invited her to go to LA with him to visit with his family for the 4th of July holidays.
They fly to California where she meets Dylan’s older sister, Annie, nephew Sammy and his dad who now has Alzheimer’s. Dylan’s family had a pretty house on the beach and that night while the two hang out together talking about Dylan’s childhood they get emotionally close and spend the night together. Jamie sees how difficult it was for Dylan to see his dad getting worse with Alzheimer’s. Then, when he takes her up to the mountain to have a close look at the famous Hollywood sign, she asks him why he never talked about this mom leaving. Dylan says he doesn’t want people to pity him and Jamie tells him that what he needs to do is to act towards his dad like nothing has changed. But Dylan refused to talk about it and so they leave it at that.
Then, Jamie overhears Annie and Dylan talking about ‘their relationship’ and Dylan quickly denies that anything is going on between them, that they are just ‘friends’ though she did see him creeping out of her room the other night. Annie tried to convince him that they are perfect for each other but to no avail. So that same night, Jamie decided to leave telling some lame excuse about work. She ignores his texts and calls, still hurting from his comments to her sister. He finally found her at the top of the building, at her ‘thinking spot’ and asks her why she had been avoiding him. She ended up telling him that she overheard their ‘talk’ and he admits he only said it to get his sister off his back. Jaime countered that she thought they were friends and that friends weren’t supposed to say those things against each other. So she doesn’t want to be his friend.
They go on with their lives until Jamie discovers that Dylan may be leaving GQ for another company which would affect her commission so she confronts him and this leads to another argument. Jamie and his mom have a talk about love and she advised her not to repeat the same mistake she did – not to run after a fairy tale Prince Charming, find someone to take on the world with. Dylan, on the other hand, meets his dad at the airport and over lunch his father thought he saw a girl he once knew. He tells her about a girl named Diddy, the love of his life that he met while at the Navy. It seems he never really got over her and maybe it was partly why his wife left him. He was too proud to tell her how he really felt, he just let her go and now he lives with that regret for the rest of his life. His dad told him that life is short and he should not waste any minute of it. Dylan finally admitted to his dad that he feels he messed up with Jaime and so his dad told him to fix it.
Dylan asks Jaime’s mother’s help to make her go to the Grand Central Station and he arranges a flash mob scene. He admits to Jaime that he missed her, he is all he thinks about, and wants them to be best friends again. He says he wants his best friend back because he is in love with her. They kiss and Dylan then suggests that they go on their first date, at a cafe across the street. The film ends with them stopping pretensions on their ‘date’ and passionately kissing inside the cafe. The movie is in fact pretty good! I like the palpable chemistry between Mila and Justin and their characters are just so relatable particularly by this generation of commitment-phobic millennials. They try their damnedest to act cool about sex when in fact they are still both romantics at heart. The movie is very funny and the acting so natural. Furthermore, even though the plot was quite predictable, it was still pretty much quite enjoyable to watch. But definitely this is not a movie I can watch with my daughter since some of the scenes were quite explicit. Maybe when she is a bit older and more mature, I would recommend that she watch this movie someday.
[photo grabbed from IMDB]
Thursday, December 22, 2011
WAIVED GLOBE BILL...FINALLY!
Finally! After so many attempts/calls made, I was finally able to get my first globe bill waived. Imagine my surprise since I was expecting a bill of PhP500 for my first monthly payment and getting a humongous bill amounting to almost 2K! Because of data that I did not know I was unknowingly using! WTF!@#$%??!! But it seems I was not the only one, since I soon heard/read about some people complaining to Globe about the exact same thing – data charges suddenly shooting up their monthly bills for no reason! When I was able to talk to a Globe customer service officer, she willingly agreed to waive the data charges and advised me how to turn off the data function of my phone so that I would not anymore incur additional charges. I would just need to turn them back on whenever I need to go online...whew! Thank God for small favors like these. Next time though, Globe told me I would have to pay the bill accordingly since they have already told me how to use the phone properly and so it would be my and my fault alone if ever my data charges still remain high.
Monday, December 12, 2011
VMS SPORTSFEST
It’s my daughter's school sportsfest today and though I do not usually watch their sports competitions, I opted to watch today since it will be her first performance as a member of the drum and lyre band. Here are some of her pictures when they practiced before the actual sportsfest since I wasn’t able to get close when they actually performed.
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