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big if

big ifMark Costello’s novel Big If is populated with some of the most interesting, most contemporary, characters. Walter is a moderate Republican atheist working in insurance. He has the habit of crossing out GOD in his dollar bills so that the statement reads IN US WE TRUST. He has two children: Jens, who has grown up as a software programmer, writing code for and pondering the morality (or immorality, or amorality) of the monster game he has developed; Violet has grown up to work in the Secret Service. Vi is assigned to the VP, who is running for president and will have to go to the Democratic primary in New Hampshire to jog (surrounded by security), eat at a McDonald’s (surrounded by media), and shake hands with the common people to get their vote. Jens’s wife, Peta, is a realtor assigned to manage a supposedly boring building now being attacked by a group of violent right-to-lifers. Gretchen, Vi’s superior, has separated from his douchebag boyfriend, but his son has found the boyfriend’s address by Googling himself, and now wants to spend time with his father. Before Lydia married Secret Service agent Lloyd Felker, her talent agent said, You’re not supposed to marry your own agent. And I’m your agent! He’s not that kind of agent, Lydia said, and her talent agent said, Oh my god, is he a literary agent? How will you be able to feed yourself?

Big If, published in 2002, was a finalist for the National Book Award. I wonder what novel it came up against. Costello’s novel was funny and touching and relevant enough to have won.

And the back cover has a blurb from Jonathan Franzen, saying the book is filled with “inside dope”. I mean, come on.

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Next: probably Eden Express. I’m still reading The Blind Assassin, but it’s too rich, I can’t devour it all at once.

I’m also interested in this book:

random

The last good non-fiction book I’ve read was Watching the English by Kate Fox. Pop sociology for the win.

english

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In other news, a story of mine is being considered for a fantasy anthology, but the editors are asking for a major edit. I’ve already edited it, re-sent it. Hope the new version does the trick. We’ll see. ;)

Congrats to Paolo for receiving that acceptance letter. Hooray!

new poem

In the (e)mail:

Eliza, thank you for your recent submission to THLR [The Houston Literary Review].  I’ll take “News About the End of the World” for [the] September Issue.


Yay. :D

I’ll link once the issue goes live.

oldie

The guy at the computer shop played “Closing Time” to check my new purchase’s sound quality. This is my favorite song, he said. I said, Yeah, that’s a good song.

He said, You know this song?

Uh, yes.

Weh?

Uh –

I must have been in high school when this song came out.

* * *

I’m puzzled. Well, look, it’s highly probable that I was also in high school when Semisonic released this song, because we’re probably in the same age bracket. Why the hell do you look so surprised?

Do I look like I belong to the Miley Cyrus generation?

I’m offended.

* * *

Anyway. So this netbook thing. Pretty cool. I got the Lenovo S10-2, and it’s quite affordable. I was offered a free upgrade to 2 G for my RAM. I didn’t even ask. And I spent my lunch hour trying to think up ways of seducing Lenovo’s salespeople to give me something extra. (It probably wouldn’t work anyway.)

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And I am officially broke in 3, 2, –

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At least now I can safely retire my trusty Toshiba that has served me for more than five years. It’s still working, but there’s gunk on the screen and it emits this weird smell when I open it (hopelessness, probably, the smell of old technology). Also, it only has 30 G as hard disk memory. And only one USB port.

But at least it has a floppy disk drive.

* * *

See, if you remember goddamn floppy disks, you’d know “Closing Time” and Walkmans and Discmans and buying cassette tapes at the record store because they’re cheaper than the CDs and listening to the Top 40 on the FM radio every morning and not really understanding what Wi-Fi is. Internet access with no cables? What? Get out a here.

Unlike this idiot.

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It gets kinda scary when some people don’t know the things you know. People who don’t know what floppy disks are are being born every day. It’s a damn invasion. Now I know what my father felt when somebody said “Brooke Shields” and he said “Blue Lagoon” or whatever the heck film that was, and I said “Suddenly Susan”. We were mystified and scared by the things we didn’t know.

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I suddenly realized how sucky our office internet connection really was when I tried the Wi-Fi in the condo, and it allowed me to Tweet faster. I mean, it’s Wi-Fi, it’s not even WiMAX.

Don’t tell me you don’t know what WiMAX is. Google it. You’ll have a nerdgasm.

rip, michael

I remember watching my first Michael Jackson concert on TV (we couldn’t afford watching it live, and I wouldn’t be allowed inside anyway, small as I was back then) with my parents years and years ago. I remember marveling over the fact that fans actually fainted at the mere sight of him. So strange, the craziness of it, that level of worship. My parents said, in Michael Jackson’s concerts, that kind of reaction was normal.

It must have been terrifying, I thought.

I found out about his death early in the morning on Friday, when CNN was still saying that the reports were unconfirmed but flashed the news anyway: MICHAEL JACKSON IS DEAD. Before the news was confirmed I just remember finding it so surreal that CNN had a correspondent from TMZ. Look, that CNN anchor’s actually listening to the guy! She’s taking him seriously!

Then a call from the LA coroner, and it was official. Here are two articles about Michael Jackson:

“Between Ninoy’s killing, EDSA, was ‘Thriller’”

“Like Orpheus, Michael Jackson was destroyed by his fans”

This is one of my favorite Michael Jackson songs/videos. MJ having goofy fun with his sister – as good a memory as any.

transformers 2: revenge of the whatchamacallit

The first film was fun, just the right amount of comedy and action and I think just a couple of shots of robots being torn apart (literally, the one with that Decepticon on top of the building; metaphorically, the one involving Bumblebee). This sequel, however, felt like Michael Bay charged at me at full speed and hit me across the face with a folding chair. And I didn’t even watch this at IMAX.

The quiet parts were either cheesy (Megan and Shia kissing at sunset, the sunlight bursting through their lips), or corny (Shia’s mom eating happy brownies and tackling a college boy). Gah.

If you’re planning to watch it, here’s a sneak preview –

transformers-2-image5

– and by “sneak preview” I mean “the entire film.” Just turn the sand to pavement, add some robots, some explosions, and put Megan Fox on a motorcycle for no other reason than to see her on a motorcycle.

Rainn Wilson’s in it but his character just came across as obnoxious and idiotic, or am I just being a girl? No. John Turturro’s character entered the film (and showed his butt) too late.

Photo from screenrant.com.

Roger Ebert gives the film one out of four stars. Quote: “The plot is incomprehensible. The dialog of the Autobots®, Decepticons® and Otherbots® is meaningless word flap. Their accents are Brooklyese, British and hip-hop, as befits a race from the distant stars.”

Here‘s a fun review by Jessica Zafra. Quote: “Basically this movie was directed by a dick.”

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In other news, I found out that walking aimlessly inside a BookSale branch is a fun activity. I didn’t even plan on buying a book but I saw this and I just grabbed it:

eden

Mark Vonnegut is Kurt Vonnegut’s son.

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Favorite things: food, books, good movies, 30 Rock and The Office.

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When my sister and I were handed our bus tickets this morning, we noticed that the punched prices seemed lower. My sister thought there was a rollback, while I thought my sister probably told the conductor the wrong stop. Then the conductor came over and said, Isn’t that your father, the one who dropped you off?

Apparently my father is one friendly discount coupon.

the big thank you

Back home: My sister, who graduated in April and has been, um, let’s say, restless (like most recent graduates – it’s a syndrome; I’ve suffered from this, can be quite debilitating, reduced me to tears at one point), sent me a text message, asking me to take a look at her CV. A good start, I think. (She also asked me to bring home copies of the soundtracks of Phantom of the Opera and Slumdog Millionaire, and don’t I dare forget it. I’m almost afraid to ask what for.)

AND. It’s my mother’s birthday today! *dance*

Last night: I can’t remember now when I had the idea for this particular story, but I’ve been taking notes, the characters just suddenly piping up while I’m busy with laundry or the dishes or while I’m eating (which can be very annoying). Anyway, I took notes. (If you write fiction or whatever and take notes in a little, battered notebook, lord help you if you get involved in a crime and the cops take a peek into this – they’ll think you’re a nutjob. Maybe I should put a sign on my little notebook: JUST STORY NOTES DON’T PANIC.) Snippets of dialogue, plot comments, character quirks. And I ended up with what? A jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces. Oh, what fun. But I sat down and began writing anyway, coughed up five pages without tripping once, and was pleasantly surprised. The beauty of a half-baked idea: you work on it long enough and before long the characters are practically dragging you to the next plot turn. It’s freaky and exciting and I hope I won’t hit a wall. I hope I’ll finish telling the story.

I’m grateful. It’s not a bad emotion to feel every once in a while, right. ;)

this close

From the (e)mail:

Your poem made it into the final rounds of consideration, but having accepted another poem about <subject matter>, I felt that it might be too much in one issue.

I’m in love with the tone of this letter but I still went ACK!

Muntik na!

*snaps fingers*