Birthdays

as posted on wecomeofage

I’ve never celebrated birthdays like a normal person does. The cynic inside me tells me that nobody really likes me anyway; nobody will go to my party if I ever hold one. Except maybe my parents and my siblings. Which sucks, ‘cause although you need to be surrounding yourself with people who trust and love you, you get sick of them anyway.

Another part of me just wants to celebrate it by rewarding my body something it doesn’t normally get: long sleep. Maybe I’m too busy with work. Maybe I’m too busy with the Internet or television or the movies. Maybe I’m an undiagnosed insomniac. Who knows? I just couldn’t get sleep for more than six hours — even if I spend 12-14 hours in bed.

The wise person inside me never wants to celebrate it on any significant date. It says it doesn’t make sense. It says I don’t look that much different from myself exactly a year ago which means I really haven’t age. Unless of course you compare me to myself five years ago, which is stupid. What are you celebrating for? You’ve just gotten fatter. You want to eat on your birthday? It’ll just make you even fatter. Get some sense to yourself.

Wise person can really be cruel. But he tells the truth. He’s wise. Who am I to challenge his authority? He tells me the only way you could have aged is when you learn something new or different. Something that will make you a better person. Better human being.

I used to hate the rest of the world. As I’ve said earlier, I have this feeling that nobody really ever liked me which makes me not like them either. Everybody’s a jack-ass. Then, for some reason unbeknownst to me, I somehow learned (maybe through the internet, I’ll never be sure) that, yeah, including myself, everyone is going through something in their lives. Something probably makes them feel depressed — even the rich ones. And you’ll never know what will push them over the edge. Since then, I tried very hard not to snap at anybody, cause you’ll never know. You just won’t. Until you talk to them and maybe help them with it.

I am 26 now, I turn a year older every December and I still think most of the people I know don’t like me as much as I like them. But I learned not to care enough to confront them about it. In it’s stead, I just surround myself with people who like me enough to spend some time with me on the day I remind myself that only my body gets old, my thoughts are still childish.

For Laur'n

dreary grim black
sorrowful blue drab
drearisome uncomfortable wintry
austere dejected mopey
 
miserable woeful desolate
dolorous jarring disconsolate
in the dumps joyless dispiriting
melancholy oppressive dejecting
 
mournful gloomy dismal
woebegone funereal dull
sullen despondent comfortless
somber bleak depressed
 
sad
sad
sad
sad
sad.

The Morning Wood

the morning wood:
   comes out in the morning
     comes out to play
       is stiff and unbending
         is here to stay

the morning wood:
         likes the great outdoors
       likes building a tent
     likes baiting and fishing
   likes cleaning the vent

the morning wood:
   hates chores and vegetables
     hates noon and lunch
       hates people and meetings
         hates juice and punch

the morning wood:
         is high and fixated
       is too jack to call
     is boss and elated
   is too tall to fall

for Polin, my dear friend

Pauline, the Anti-Jet Set
Ice cream is part of her diet
She likes it when the ice cream is wet
You can even smell aroma on her breath

Her favorite flavors are lemon and maple syrup
She won't notice you no matter what stir-up
As long as she's eating her ice cream
She'll only spot you in a dream

Pauline, the Anti-Jet Set
I'm so sorry you don't know her yet.
Pauline, the Anti-Jet Set
The day will come, when you will have met.

I Feel You, Andy. I Feel You.

WHY?

This is The Office's Andy. I make the same forlorn, dejected face whenever I feel like I lost something that I'm emotional about. That exact same face. Looking down. Almost smiling, but never really. Hints of getting ready to scream and cry "WHY?" out loud.

I really felt Andy in the latest Office episode. It has happened to me a million times, and I don't think things will ever get tired of doing it to me. I sometimes think that it's just the way it's supposed to be. Melancholy and infinite sadness, referencing the ever morose Billy Corgan.

To make matters worse, they end the episode with Andy singing the Macy Gray song, I Try. Truly one of the saddest lyrics ever.




Here is my confession
May I be your possession
Boy, I need your touch
Your love, kisses and such
With all my might I try
But this I can't deny
Deny
I play it off, but I'm dreaming of you
(but I'm dreaming of you babe)
And I'll keep my cool, but I'm feenin'
I try to say goodbye and I choke (yeah)
Try to walk away and I stumble
Though I try to hide, it's clear
My world crumbles when you are not near
(when you are not near aahh)
Goodbye and I choke (yeah, yeah, yeah)
I try to walk away and I stumble (hey, hey, hey)
Though I try to hide it, it's clear (say it Lord)
My world crumbles when you are not here
Goodbye and I choke (I'm choking)
I try to walk away and I stumbe
Though I try to hide it, it's clear
My world crumbles when you are not near
(when you are not near, yeah, yeah yeah)
Yeah, yeah..
Anyway, I'm a bit teary-eyed right now and felt like writing this down real quick. Just to let everybody know at at exactly 2:58PM on a rainy Saturday afternoon, Charles is as sad as Andy.

Captain Planet and the Planeteers

Go get your rings ready, it's time to combine our powers and shout "GO PLANET!"

*Queue in Captain Planet's theme song

I think one of my fondest memories as a child was watching the first Captain Planet series (not the lame one by Hanna-Barbera) anchored by a mullet-wearing green-colored super-man named Captain Planet. Friday nights, 7pm. My full attention shifts to watching 5 randomly cool teenagers from all over the world with extra cool powers with even cooler rings.

You can totally trust the mullet guy. I mean, he's flying.

The 5 teenagers, or planeteers, have these powers to control an element of nature given to themby Gaia, spirit of the Earth. The 5 are Kwame (from Africa, controlling Earth), Wheeler (from North America, controlling Fire), Linka (from the Russian Federation, controlling Wind), Gi (from Asia, controlling Water), and Ma-Ti (from South America, controlling the extra element of Heart). I would describe these characters more but I'm too tired to type. They're on Wikipedia anyway. What I know that's not in their wikipage is that I always wanted Wheeler and Linka to be together.

Anyway, there's been a villain lurking our planet right now called Global Warming. It's up to us prevent it using our own magical rings. Our element being heart.

Heart? You mean we can talk to animals and be almost telephatics? No. Of course not. That one's taken already. When I say heart, I mean, won't your prying heart be a little bit concerned about what's going on with our ridiculous weather? Aren't you feeling sympathetic for our bare-treed forests? Aren't you sick of the horrible humidity? Listen real close, 'cause your heart is telling you something.

Do something.

Join me, and a few thousand people, and take part in UNTV's Isang Araw Para sa Kalikasan campaign through different critical watersheds nationwide. We're planting around 50,000 seedlings and will take care of it for at least 3 years (so you know I'm not kidding around). The cause will be held on October 10, 2010 while celebrating Ang Dating Daan's 30th anniversary on the air.

10.10.10. How cool is that? Do something historic on a historic date.

What, your fat-surrounded heart is too lazy to move on a sluggish Sunday morning? You can do other stuff of course. Click through this link and see. Most of them, you can do in the comfort of your own room.

Listen to what your heart says. It's the purest of all the elements. It's been planted with the seeds of love, caring, and compassion. Unless you're Duke Nukem of course.

Duke Nukem was an environmental douche. You don't want that label, yes?

How I Got to Know About Terry Fox Through Bill Simmons

As most of you don't know, I'm a big fan of Bill Simmons. I've been following him since the 2006 NBA Finals when I read a Mark Cuban blog post where he claimed that Simmons has become his new favorite sports writer.

I couldn't blame Cubes. He wrote masterfully with a lot of pop culture reference and most importantly, made me laugh (aside from the fact that he rooted against the Heat because of poor officiating. Finally, I favorite writer of my own.

I followed him since then, listened to 25% of his podcasts, bought both his books, RSSed his Twitter account, and even watched the TV shows he watched. I'm such a big fan of his. So just like Cuban, you can't really blame me if I watch the TV show he produces, 30 for 30. I'd totally go Senor Chang to be one of his friends.

One time, he tweeted about a 30 for 30 episode that everybody needed to watch. I didn't know anything about what the document was about, all I knew was Bill Simmons told me to watch it.

A few seconds into the program, they showed Steve Nash which I thought was favorable to me cause it was about basketball (I admit, the only 30 for 30 episodes I ever saw was anything that had to do with basketball and/or the NBA). Then Steve Nash starts talking about when he was just 6 years old back in 1980 when a young man who was running across Canada on one leg became one of Canada's national heroes.

Here's the summary from ESPN.com

In 1980, Terry Fox continued his fight against bone cancer with the pursuit of a singular, motivating vision: to run across Canada. Three years after having his right leg amputated six inches above the knee after being diagnosed with osteosarcoma, Fox set out to cover more than a marathon’s distance each day until he reached the shores of Victoria, British Columbia. Anonymous at the start of his journey, Fox steadily captured the heart of a nation with his Marathon of Hope.  However the 21-year old BC native's goal was not fame, but to spread awareness and raise funds for cancer research. After 143 days and two-thirds of the way across Canada, with the eyes of a country watching, Fox’s journey came to an abrupt end when newly discovered tumors took over his body. Two-time NBA MVP, proud Canadian, and first-time filmmaker Steve Nash will share Fox’s incredible story of perseverance and hope.

I won't dig into it any further; all I'm gonna say is go watch it. It's very inspiring and tear-jerky. I'm telling you. You need to see it. It'll make you realize how everyone is going through something in their lives but the real problem is: how you're going to face it. How are you going to handle every single hardship that comes your way. Terry Fox, needless to say, handled it like a hero.