alright, time to rundown some quick CD reviews...

	U2 - All That You Can't Leave Behind I've got to admit, this album could have been a lot better than the singles would make you perceive.  The first half are pretty much the singles, and the second half really feels like filler material; B-sides. I mean, filler U2 material are still pretty good considering, but not spectacular. 1) Beautiful Day - 2) Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of 3) Elevation - 4) Walk On - 5) Kite   --------------------------------------------------
	Velvet Revolver - Contraband The first thing you think of going into this album is whether it's going to be more like Guns N Roses or Stone Temple Pilots.  The result is really a band that has it's own sound.  This has more or less a hard rock sound, plus it's power ballads.  This sound can get a little repetitive though, but it's not bad for a debut album. I have to say that the first half doesn't really grab me as much as the second half. 6) Fall To Pieces - 10) You Got No Right - 11) Slither   12) Dirty Little Thing - 13) Loving The Alien   --------------------------------------------------
	Nevermore - Dreaming Neon Black Nevermore's got themselves a nice dark moody heavy metal album, with some emotion too. That's pretty much what this sounds, but it can be pretty generic though to this genre.  It's got some stellar hooks and grooves, but overall it doesn't grab me as much as I wish it did. 2) Beyond Within - 4) I Am The Dog - 5) Dreaming Neon Black 9) Poison Godmachine - 12) No More Will   --------------------------------------------------
	Nevermore - Dead Heart, In A Dead World This is for all intent and purposes an extension to "Dreaming Neon Black." The sound is more or less the same, but the guitars sound a little bit harder and more "crunchy" in this one. It's got a nice metal version of Simon & Garfunkel's song "sound of silence" too. 1) Narcosynthesis - 6) Heart Collector - 8) Sound Of Silence 10) Believe In Nothing - 11) Dead Heart, In A Dead World   --------------------------------------------------
	In Flames - Jester Race / Black-Ash Inheritance This is another melody heavy metal album with a lot of growling vocals.  I've mentioned that I'm not really that big on growling vocals and this one is no exception.  I would listen to this for the acoustic guitars mixed with your metal infused electric guitars though, as they are pretty good.  Not really an album that could be considered a favorite of mine, but if you're into this type of metal, check it out. 1) Moonshield - 3) Artifacts Of The Black Rain - 8) December Flower 9) Wayfaerer - 11) Goliaths Disarm Their Davids   --------------------------------------------------
	Scorpions - Crazy World In this corner we got a metal band with lots of rock anthem moments.  This is not a heavy metal album but a lot more light, yet fun; almost like hair metal bands. We've got a lot of songs here that demand to be sang out loud, and I was glad to do so. The songs while sounding somewhat generic at first, will hit you with a great chorus that will stick with you all the way through. 1) Tease Me, Please Me - 3) To Be With You In Heaven 4) Wind Of Change - 6) Lust Or Love - 11) Send Me An Angel   --------------------------------------------------
	Pulley (self-titled) This is your typical melodic punk album, but it's a good one.  You've got the catchy songs that gets you to sing along and thrash along too. Pulley may not have their own image that they can call their own, but at least they aren't a band melodic punk band.  Worth a listen. 1) Working Class Whore - 2) Soberbeah 3) Pie - 4) Gone - 5) Over It   --------------------------------------------------
	Sarah Brightman - DIVE This is a very dreamy album, and true to it's album name "DIVE," the sound gives off a very aquatic feel to it all. The singing, the ambient sounds, the moody music, the pop sensations, and the new age-ness of the whole thing is quite stellar. Excellent all the way through, and one of the best of it's type of music. 2) Captain Nemo - 3) Second Element 5) Once In A Lifetime - 7) Salty Dog - 9) Seven Seas   --------------------------------------------------

 

She Has No Random Timer

the latest and best Batman Begins trailer yet (video)

pikashoes (link)

no skateboard? no problem (video)

most expensive ZIP codes 2005 (link)

bad jump (video)

acurabot (pics)

manakim moonwalk (video)

e-mail destroys IQ (link)

cat drumming on baby (video)

cartoon fridge - your source for toons (link)

banana moron (video)

miniclip rally (flash game)

those singing horses (flash)

violent, chaos, mayhem (flash)

so, some random things that's happened to me...

I was driving down a 50mi/hr road at about 6AM, when all of a sudden I
hear this loud THOOMPH!! I glance towards the right passenger window
and I see this huge orange dumbell that construction people use on
roads flying in the air towards me.  Since I was going at a decent
speed, the thing didn't hit me at all.  It looks like the car next
to me must have accidentally hit it,
although oddly enough, I didn't even notice it on the road in the first
place. I looked at my rear view mirror and see all these cars behind me
scrrreeeecccchhhhh to a halt, while I'm the lone car that's driving
away.

Me and my mom went to this Pilipino restaurant where she knows several
of the people there.  They got around to talking and me being the
youngest of three sons was brought up on the conversation.  One
older guy says that he has three daughters and asks if any of us are
married.  My mom responded that the two oldest already are, and
the guy says "me too."  Before things get out of hand, I say that
I already have a girlfriend, and he says that his youngest already has
a boyfriend.  Then they add the side comment, that we're still not
married people though, so there's always a chance. Asian parents, I swear.

I went to go see a movie. When it was over, I was walking out of the side
exit doors, and there were these two teens standing there.  As soon as I
left the theater, they quickly entered the door that was still ajar, and went inside. The
things people do for a free movie. Sneaky sneaky.

I'm happy to say that I am not completely desensitized to violence yet. I was watching my DVDs of Happy Tree Friends, and going over one hour of that is pretty wacked! Many a times I had to look away from the gross factor of it all. bleagh.

Rain hits southern California again.  It was so hard that when I
was running through it, the rain looked like thick pencil lines that
you find in comic books like Sin City.
It was so hard that when I turned off my windshield wipers and let my
car sit there, it would literally look like I was in a car wash getting
drenched with water.

Driving on the roads when it's raining reminds me of another reason why
I tend to hate trucks and SUVs. While everybody on the road is driving
slower and more carefully to avoid any possible accidents, here comes
these stupid drivers in their big pick-up trucks or SUVs ignoring the
flow of traffic, weaving in and out cutting people off.  Stupid
stupid I tell you.

So, I haven't checked my e-mail since Saturday 4/23, and I now have 87 new mail to go through.

Lately, there's been a lot of psychological pressure that's getting
piled up in my head.  The pressure being that of somebody who
feels lost in his place in the world.  I mean, this feeling has
been going on with me for years now, and I can even say that it started
in the summer of 2003. Before then, I thought I had my life pretty much
mapped out, but now, I don't know anymore.  It's as if the closer
I get to 30, the more I feel trapped in my existence. In fact, I just
want to lash out at the world and people. But all I do is confide with
the world's guilty pleasures and the immediate comfort from the people
I care about.

Lately there's been many many things that are reflecting my state of
being. Firstly is the moody nature that I've been going through, which
I'm successful so far in hiding. Ironically enough, I know people who
are feeling frustrated and irritable, which is exactly how I pretty
much feel but don't show.

I've also recently found out the state of how soon I could buy my own
house, which isn't anytime soon. To go with that, the pressure of
getting married is finally looming over my head too. Going further into
the future, I don't even know if I'm properly prepared for retirement.
Then there's also the fact that this year is the 10 year anniversary of
my graduating High School.

Also, there's that "What is your life path number" quiz that really hit home a lot more than it probably should have. The main character of "Wonderfalls"
is also going through these feelings that I have right now, and that's
a series I coincidentally watched recently.  Not only that, but
I've finally just seen the movie "Big Fish," which talks about a person's achievement in the world. It's like signs that are pointing towards me.

I know there are many things I need to do and change in myself to fix
my problems. Because I do care about my state of being.  But at
the same time I don't. A bit of a conundrum ey?

You Will Die at Age 61

61  You're pretty average when it comes to how you live...And how you'll die as well.

In a previous blog,
I mentioned how Firefly got the shaft because of the lack of interest
when it first aired, but then turned into a love of the series after
the DVD release.  I remember chastising them for not supporting it
in the first place. weellll.... now I'm at the other end of those angry
words.  To be fair, they showed even less episodes of this show
than they did Firefly before they cancelled it.  But then, I also
admit that I consciously did not want to see it, because I feared that
it would be yet another show that I will have to follow.  Boy, was
I right.

I recently watched all 13 episodes of a cancelled TV show called Wonderfalls,
and I've got to admit that I immediately fell in love with it. 
It's a show about a mid-20's woman who feels like she hasn't done
anything worthwhile in the world, but is put upon a crazy situation
where she becomes the catalyst of destiny and fate. She goes through
that motion because she hears inanimate objects with animal heads that
talk her into doing certain actions, that causes a chain of events that
lead into something worthwhile.

Firstly, my girlfriend knows I love making stuff animals "talk," so the
fact that this show has that aspect amuses the hell out of me.  It
also has a nice romantic arc between two of the main characters, and
ofcourse I'm just a sucker to that. The other thing that caught my
attention of this show is the ensemble cast of characters, which really
works well together and really grew on me immediately. Ofcourse,
there's the main character of Jaye Tyler; played by Caroline Dhavernas, who is a delight to watch her in a very captivating performance.

The way the stories are done too is ingenious, because I'll try and
follow along the way in figuring out what the talking cow meant by
saying the cryptic "bring her home."  Jaye simply has to figure
out what they are trying to get her to do, in fact as a viewer I too
get confused as to what the talking object wants, and why it is saying it. But in doing the
orders given to her, Jaye get's put in hilarious situations that
eventually lead to it's inevitable conclusion. 

Wonderfalls really is a great series, and is easily one of my current
favorites.  It's too bad that it is yet another quality show that
got axed by the Fox network. If you get a chance please please please
support the series by watching / buying the DVD box set.

Your Random Eyes Open

Star Wars Revelations (video)

bar bell funny (video)

darth vader has a blog (link)

flying dog (video)

Hollywood embracing BitTorrent? (link)

owned clips (video)

play 20 questions (link)

drift racing (flash game)

voicemail of a car accident (sound)

fire, using coke and chocolate (link)

open hand invitational (video)

what will you look like in 40 years? (link)

bonfire blows up (video)

jungle escape (flash game)

Kung Fu Hustle (Gong Fu) is a very entertaining movie.  Stephen Chow, straight off the heels of Shaolin Soccer, does a great homage to the many Kung Fu films in the world, adds his blend of humor, and to Bruce Lee
(just look at the heroic pose he does towards the end of the film).
There are many things that makes this movie good, memorable characters,
great ecentric humor, and the excellent fight sequences that uses some
great special effects for a Hong Kong film.  The characters have
some incredible abilities in the movie that verge on the fantastical,
the humor has sequences that is straight out of a cartoon, and the
martial arts scenes just leaves a nice grin on your face. I believe movie critic Roger Ebert
described this film like a mix of Bugs Bunny, Buster Keaton, Bruce Lee,
and the Matrix.  Honestly, that is a great description for the
movie. Awesome movie, one of the greats out right now, and deserves an
A-.

---------------

The Thirteenth Floor was a nice pleasant surprise. It came out around the same time that the first Matrix
was out, and was clearly overshadowed by it. Which is unfortunate,
because while the plot concept is similar to the Matrix, this one is
treated more like a sci-fi mystery more than an epic saga. The concept
of a virtual world is an interesting one, and this one adds a nice
addition to the theory.  The story itself is nicely done and works
well, but the characters are more or less generic to a sci-fi movie.
This movie is definitely worth watching though, even though it looks
like it isn't. B+

----------------


In The Company Of Men is one of those movies that generate a lot of
discussions among people. The subject matter is pretty harsh, yet very
much realistic and totally relatable to most anyone; especially men.
This is a very low budget film and it really really shows.  The
music and camera work is almost non existent, which gives us a lot of
scenes where we see two characters talking in one static shot for a
minute or two.  That can make the movie drag a little more than it
should, but it's the dialouge that will keep a person engrossed. 
Definitely not a movie you want to see with a woman and for that
matter, some men may not like it either. B-

so.... yeah... this weekend has been pretty good in the lounging
department.  I've always complained about always being busy on my
days off, but so far... sleep, eat, watch tv, watch movie, eat, sleep,
then computer stuff. 

Okay, the PC stuff took a good chunk of hours from my weekend. I'm
still playing around with prospects of capturing analog video/audio
from a VCR to my computer, to try and convert it to a compressed
smaller sized video format.  I need it compatible to my pocket
pc, as well as just getting a smaller sized video for future play on my
PC. I would also like to get them burned to a DVD to be
viewed on a DVD player as well.

yup, relaxed... but busy too this weekend. kinda.

Everybody's Changing Random

gallery of bootleg toys (link)

Harrison Ford's finger acting (pics)

motorcross stunt game (shockwave game)

the land walker (link)

the mouse band (flash)

traffic control (flash game)

bizarre place names (link)

N.W.A. explicit content only version (sound)

choose your urinal (flash)

the ultimate beer bong (link)

the keyboard car (pics)

kung-fu statesman (flash game)

sue the bad dive buddy (link)

game system battle saga (flash)

Who can read this with no problem?
 
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg.
The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid. Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at
Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a
wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be
in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed
it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed
ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and
I awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt!