Grill-a-thon

Barbecue party will be the theme for this year's company Christmas shindig. And no, the title isn't the name for the theme. But then I thought, why didn't I thought of that when we (I'm part of this year's committee) we're brainstorming for the perfect words to print on that tarp they're planning to have. Christmas Party Invitations will be printed and be sent out in the coming days and a teaser video will be launched too. This year’s party is not as big as our previous parties though. It’ll be a more low-key. We won’t be wearing costumes or any formal dress. All we need is our most comfortable clothes and have fun.

Gus Van Sant's Restless

Apologies for the mostly non-sense posts on this blog. This post would be another one of those useless ones. I know someone who would say this is another one of those self-centered moments I have. But then again, this is my blog and I would write whatever it is that I want here. Whoever gets the number of times I will use the word 'I' on this post gets a price.

FirstShowing. net have a handful of new trailers released these past few weeks. I only visit the site ones or twice a month to get fresh news about the commercial and not-so-commercial (read: indie) films, directors, writers, marketing ploys and who’s artists are in or out of a movie production, etcetera. Of all the new previews posted on the site, Gus Van Sant’s Restless is the one I am most excited about.

Here's the trailer of the film, set to premiere in January 2011 (yes, that far!):

The film stars Mia Wasikowska (Alice In Wonderland) and Henry Hopper. IMDB describes the film's plot as:

The story of a terminally ill teenage girl who falls for a boy who likes to attend funerals and their encounters with the ghost of a Japanese kamikaze pilot from WWII.

When I saw the trailer of Restless for the first time, I thought of A Walk To Remember instantly. But when I watched the trailer for the second, third and the fourth time, I realized that their only similarity was the ‘terminally ill girl’ part. Gus Van Sant’s film has a lot of depth to it. A lot of mystery, especially on Enoch’s (Hopper) character. How is he related to the ghost of the Japanese kamikaze pilot, and why does he gate-crash funerals? Is he ill too, like Anne?

The film’s tag line is “Who do you live for?”.

Dekada Primera

Pretty gowns: check. Styled hair: check. Dainty accessories: check. Clear skin, free of chin acne: check.

The game plan? have tons of FUN and celebrate Teloworks 10th Anniversary party in Blue Leaf, The Fort.

After all the Terno-hunting, intensive program planning and two weeks of hard work and practice for the musical, everyone who’s part of Teloworks Philippines Inc. were all smiles after the successful celebration last 15 October 2010.

Sharpie

Diana Agron released an official statement via her Tumblr blog about hers and Lea Michelle’s and Cory Monteith’s racy photos on the latest issue of GQ Magazine.

When I first saw this picture, I was surprised but was not alarmed. I was researching about cabin beds when I first read about the three appearing on GQ. Then I saw a couple of photos from the actual shoot on Tumblr. Yes, it was provocative but I get GQ’s point when they said the stars are in their proper age to to this kind of task. Going back to Diana Agron’s statement regarding the photo shoot; her post implied that she regrets she did such a photo shoot. But throughout her statement, this part’s my favorite:

Baby Gifts

Princess is such a bundle of joy in our family. I want to give her something pretty this Christmas. Something that will make her mom happy too. I might buy half of the gifts on my Christmas list online. I type in ‘best baby gifts' on Google. I clicked a couple of links from the list of website related to my search query. Red Envelop is one of the website I spent more than 10 minutes browsing nice things posted on their site catalogue. These are the things I liked and I’m sure Princess would love these. Mouse-over the pictures for the prices:

Downloading Bo Sanchez's talks from YouTube and converting it to MP3 for my Mama. :D

She personally requested that she wanted to "read" talks given by Bo Sanchez. I went to his website but there we're no available audiobooks for download. But his organization, Kerygma, has an official YouTube page where they upload almost all his talks from conferences. I am using Firefox's add-ons where you can download videos from YouTube as MP3.

If budget permits, I am hoping I could buy her a new MP3 player for her audiobooks. :D

My mother's passion to learn despite her condition (she got blind last August) is really inspiring.

Online Casino Games

There are a lot of assignments coming in about online casino games these past couple of months. A lot of clients have been asking me to research and write about first-hand stories I can interview and dig from the people I know who’s into this time of leisure. But first, let me share with you how Wikipedia defined ‘Online Casino’ for you to understand how the process works.

Online casinos, also known as virtual casinos or Internet casinos, are online versions of traditional ("brick and mortar") casinos. Online casinos enable gamblers to play and wager on casino games through the Internet.

Online casinos generally offer odds and payback percentages that are comparable to land-based casinos. Some online casinos claim higher payback percentages for slot machine games, and some publish payout percentage audits on their websites. Assuming that the online casino is using an appropriately programmed random number generator, table games like blackjack have an established house edge.

The payout percentage for these games are established by the rules of the game. Reliability and trust issues are commonplace and often questioned. Many online casinos lease or purchase their software from well-known companies like Microgaming, Realtime Gaming, Playtech, and CryptoLogic Inc in an attempt to "piggyback" their reputation on the software manufacturer's credibility. These software companies either use or claim to use random number generators to ensure that the numbers, cards or dice appear randomly.

Online casinos can be divided into two groups based on their interface: web-based and download-only casinos. Some casinos offer both interfaces. Some casinos offer 'Live gaming', either exclusively, or as part of a wider online casino offering. In live online casinos, popular casino games such as roulette and blackjack are dealt by real dealers in casino studios, in an attempt to convey more of the atmosphere of a physical casino. Player actions (including chat) such as 'hit' in the game of blackjack may be transmitted to the dealer; in some online casinos more than one player may 'sit' at a particular 'seat' on the table, and in this case there is no interactivity between player and dealer, the question of which player(s) requested the extra card that the dealer dealt and which chose to 'stand' will be handled by the software. It is usual for players to be able to observe a video feed of the action, and equally common for players to opt to turn it off, if they lack the bandwidth - as the cards are read by OCR and other technology, the video feed is only ever a visual cue.

It’s a pretty simple process, but complicated at the same time. Internet casinos are becoming popular among enthusiasts these days. The convenience that it gives to the users is one of its best traits. The convenience of placing bets where ay computer and an Internet connection is the one thing that attracts enthusiast with it.

Pasalubong

So Olive just got back from her two-week Europe trip. We missed her and all of us are happy that she’s back. Been asking her a lot of questions about her trip this morning. I love listening to her stories on how she and her friend Desi conquered three countries in two weeks! She’s got pasalubong for everyone in our team. She got me not one, not two, not three, but FOUR presents from her trip! I am in love with those earrings made from Murano glass.

I remember her telling us that she will bring home the Eiffel Tower.

And she did. :D

Grazie, Olive! :)

Show Time

Our company is celebrating it's 10th founding anniversary this year. In line with the celebration, a couple of people (ehem, talented ones) we're asked to join and prepare a number for the said event. Them creative guys came up with the idea of staging a short musical about the company and its services and resources. You wouldn't believe how brilliant and funny the lyrics of the songs for this musical were. And the ones who'll be dancing wouldn't be needing a weight loss program since each of the number require dance routines; it’s like having gone to the gym in an hour or two.

Smoke and Mirrors

I passed by a bookstore the other day. I haven't been inside one for the longest time. Never had an urge to buy a book since a lot of my books lying around my room are yet to be read and finished. Neil Gaiman released a couple of books that compiles his short stories and poems. Fragile Things was the first collection I got. I specifically asked for it two Christmases ago. It's almost 2am and I better get on and buy the best acne treatment there is since they'd be bumps all over my face the minute I get out of bed. But I just had to write this before calling it a day; Smoke and Mirrors was the first collection of short stories Gaiman released. I had to note that I need to get my hands on a copy of that book.

The Social Network

I heard a couple of cinemas will be hosting an advanced screening of The Social Network. I remember being skeptical about this movie when I first read it in a movie blog. The author vaguely said the film will be about Facebook. I actually saw some Facebook mascot (they should think of having one) doing cartwheels, it's like reading a bunch of stories about glucomannan and weight loss that promises losing weight in just an hour. Seriously, I have a lot of these scenarios formed in my head on how the storytelling for this movie would go. Turned out, a lot of critics are raving about it. Most of them said the script was good, the actors we’re good and the film, as they predicted, would receive commendation from the Academy.

Deathly Hallows

Browsing books, especially best sellers is sometimes frustrating. I still have got to read and finish A LOT of titles and buying new ones is not the best thing to do. Well, I sort of formed this habit of rereading novels, especially my favorites and some that would be made into a film that’ll be opening soon, like Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows.

I read J.K. Rowling’s last installment to the saga that is Harry Potter a few years ago. It was a great read and was a bit sad that the series that I have been following has come to its end. I still remember bits of it but I want to refresh my memory and be able to identify the things that I want to see on the first part of the film.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows opens in the Philippines on November 18.

Habit

I have to really work on getting my one entry per day routine on this blog. Three years ago, I have been faithfully writing and sharing the interesting and most of the time not-so-interesting things about my life. I've concentrated a lot on working with clients like the one asking me to write about retail cigars a couple of weeks ago that I forgot I need to write more personal stuff here. Because it is, in the firs place, my personal blog. I decided to jot down the events and things I need to write on this blog. Hopefully, in the next few days I’ll be able to write about:

• John Mayer’s concert
• my mother
• things I need to prepare for Christmas (since it’s three months away)
• my bike trips with Macky
• books I am reading and I want to read
• latest music I am in to
• movies I am dying to see
• maybe a run-down of the TV series episodes I am watching every week