My Favorite Things

I was watching The Sound of Music days ago and, of course, came across the song My Favorite Things. The movie made me pop The Phantom of the Opera and West Side Story into the player, the result of which was my treating myself to an afternoon of musical. While I was watching the Phantom, I tried so hard to convince myself that the lead actor played King Leonidas in 300. Maybe it was the mask and the fact that in 300, Gerard Butler sported a beard, that I found it difficult to see the similarity and gave up angling my head from side to side just to get the view I wanted and convince myself that, yeah, they look the same.

Anyway, my favorite things. There's none, really. Unless I take into account the fact that I'm a collector, although not in the strictest sense of the word. I mean, yes, I collect DVD's and Vcd's of my favorite movies or movies I think are worth immortalizing in my CD cases. I collect Cd's of my favorite music artists. I collect books written by my favorite authors or books which I consider to be good reads. It's not so much as collecting as buying, though. I would want to think that I'm simply buying these things because I want to watch the movies all over again, or listen to the songs one more time, or read the books yet again. I was not a collector to begin with. I just want to collect when I feel like collecting then give up after a few days. The end result: I haven't collected anything that's worthy to be called a collection. Except maybe the DVD's, Vcd's, Cd's, and books I got for myself.

I started buying or collecting DVDs/Vcd's when this guy from somewhere (not from the Philippines; another story for another day) gave me Vcd's as a form of pasalubong - tokens you give to someone when you've gone traveling or when you're from a place different from the recipient. Apparently, he's a DVD aficionado. And I sort of caught the bug. I started buying Vcd's for myself; then I progressed to DVDs. My limited financial resources affect my decision on whether to buy the DVD or just the Vcd of the movie though.

The music came with the former. But I don't buy Cd's as much as I buy DVD's/Vcd's, mainly because I hear the songs played repeatedly over the radio, plus I can download the music anytime. So the choice of Cd's are usually limited to the most favorite artists.

My mom's a bookworm. I don't know if you can inherit that but I've definitely been a bookworm for as long as I can remember, and I'm crediting my mom for it. As much I loved to read when I was younger, I didn't buy books for myself then. So the books I read were borrowed from friends and, of course, the books my mom let me read. Whenever my mom and I would pass a bookstore, she would persuade me to go find a book of my own but I'd always say that I'd just borrow hers when she was through. The collecting started when my cousin's guy friend lent me a John Grisham book. The next thing I knew, I would scour second-hand bookstores for quality titles. I also buy my books from those really pricey bookstores but not if I can help it.

I do plan to start collecting articles; what those articles are, I do not yet know. I'm thinking different Santa Claus images. I'm thinking snow globes. I'm thinking match box cars. Oh, I almost forgot: I got two movie posters, both gifts. I don't know if that'll count. And there's something else: I haven't got any space to put the articles on once I start to collect. The DVDs/Vcd's/Cd's are crammed in one corner of the room, neatly arranged in their cases. The books are stuffed in storage boxes as there's no space for a decent bookshelf. Maybe the reason why I haven't collected collectible articles yet is because I have no place to display them. Or maybe I'm just making excuses for not starting to collect. Or maybe I'm not really a collector collector.

Around The World

In the movie The Prince & Me, Julia Stiles' Paige Morgan had a world map on one side of her bedroom wall. She had color-coded pins tucked to the map - red (I don't really remember the colors), were for those places she had been to, and green were for those she wanted to visit. By the way, the movie is my most favorite in the romcom genre.

Anyway, I like to travel. The extent of my 'travels' though has been a tour of Hong Kong a month before the turnover ten years ago, and that has been the only instance when I went out of the country on a tour. The rest of my travels were local - the recent being a weekend getaway to Cebu and Bohol with my friends, the memorable trek to Sagada with my dad and my brother, visits during summer to cool Baguio, a boat ride to the Hundred Islands of Pangasinan, and a view of the Ilocos Region from the back of my dad's pick-up.

I want to see more of this country and definitely more of the world. I long for the time when I can just jump on the plane and let it whisk me off to some really cool place and I would document everything. I don't want to simply click around with my camera; I want to know something about the place. I want my travel scrapbook to be a travelogue.

Of course my desire to travel is just simply that, a desire. I can't afford to travel. Not yet. But when I do land the job I applied for, I'll be saving a portion of my salary for travel expenses. In fact, the very first thing I'm going to buy with my salary is a digital camera. What's the use of a travelogue without one?

Another idea that fascinates me is to live in another country, alone. Not permanently, though. I know The Philippines will always be home. It'll just be cool to live anywhere but here for a while.

Afraid Of The Dark

I don't how or when it happened; it just did. I am a self-proclaimed night blind person. One day, I was pretty confident walking around in extremely dark places. The next day, I'm afraid of entering a dark room, even with a dim light on.

It makes it quite difficult for me to drive at night even with my high beam on. I couldn't go to the cinemas alone, not that I would want to go alone, takes out all the fun. The point is, in the cinemas, there are lights just bright enough to guide the viewer to his seat. In my case, I can't see a thing. I stoop really low so I could see the stairs, or I have to have someone guide me through the steps.

I share a room with my cousin, so even if the lights are turned off, I could get some sleep. But when I spend the night alone, I leave the lights open, or I have a night light on. Since my cousin is on vacation, I had the lights turned on full blast since Sunday. And to assure myself of a good night's sleep, I watch movies or read books. So far, so good.

Skeleton In My Closet

Several, if not all people, have skeletons in their closets. I know I have one rotting away in mine. I want to get rid of it -yank it from my closet and bury it deep, deep in the ground.

I know of a woman who has more than once posed as a guy over at a chat room. She created this smart, aloof chat guy and soon women were flocking. A few seriously wanted to have more than a chat relationship with this cyber guy, but she was able to hold them all off. Except for this most recent victim. Their relationship transcended the borders of chat rooms. She was able to talk to her, and how the latter manages to sound like a guy I could barely fathom. But they talk. And the talks led to something else, something sexually else.

It's not normal, at least in my standards. Questions abound, the first and probably most pressing is: Should she tell the other woman that she's a, well, woman herself? Or cut communication altogether and live by the adage that what the other woman doesn't know won't hurt her? Naturally, the woman created a whole new universe for this cyber guy she created and she fed it all to her victim, who was gullible enough to believe everything. The victim has even gone too far as to fall in love with the cyber guy.

Another question: Why pose as a guy in the first place? And why take it this far? She should have stopped when things got a bit steamy. I mean, how could one possibly be aroused by the fact that the person on the other end of the line is of the same gender as herself? If you belong to the third sex maybe, then yes, but this woman is straight - likes men and men alone. It's a bit sick, really. No, let me take that back. It's major sick. I don't ignore the possibility that she could be a lesbian, or have the tendency to be, but I know her through and through. My knowledge of her personality makes me confident enough to say that she is straight.

She should kill the cyber guy and erase his universe from her thoughts. She should live her life in the real world and not hide behind these imaginary people her creative mind conjures. Maybe she needs psychiatric help.

I've put this into writing in the hopes that should she feel the urge, she just has to check this blog and fight that urge. I'm burying the skeleton. I hope she doesn't undig its grave.

Home Sweet Home

I'm a homebody. My idea of fun is reading a good book within the confines of my home. Or watching a decent movie in the comforts of my room. Or surfing the net in the safety of my abode. Sure I go out once, maybe twice, a week. And the extent of my going out is visiting the mall located in front of my house, or the one located in the heart of where all the traffic is - a good 20-minute drive from my place. Not to give the impression that I'm a bore, because I'm not, I also have fun with friends. And 'fun with friends' is an occasional lunch or dinner during the weekends, when we can squeeze it in our schedules. But given the choice of hanging out or just staying home, I'd choose the latter, hands down.

I had my share of wild days. Back when I was in college, the hardest liquor I drank was tequila and the wildest adventure I had was the gay bar. My friends and I would go to karaokes located all over the Metro and order hard drinks. Gone are those days. I guess when you age, your interests change. And what was then the ultimate fun is now the ultimate bore. My friends and I prefer a tranquil lunch or dinner in a decent restaurant, then maybe grab a Starbucks coffee later to catch up on gossip.

Anyway, yesterday was spent watching all three installments of The Lord of the Rings in my room. I really love this movie. Hard to believe it has been 4 years since the last installment. Today will probably be another marathon of...Harry Potter perhaps.