EPIC

As many of you know, I have been studying (not so) diligently for my DATs. I have been known to study at various places around Milpitas, such as a local Starbucks or Peet's Coffee.

Today, however, I decided to go with my friend Christian to the Milpitas Library, which is relatively new. It boasts state-of-the-art facilities and utilities, such as a computer monitor that allows private internet viewing for people so others can't watch at odd angles. However, for those looking directly into the monitor, the screen is in full view.

Christian and I are sitting next to an island where the public computers are. Next to us are two seemingly innocuous public library users maximizing their opportunity. On one side is a 50ish-year-old Chinese man. To his left is a young black middle school boy, supposedly studying. Behind the boy is a woman sitting who seems to be watching him, making sure he works.

Christian and I are behind them.

The old woman falls asleep, so naturally, as any of us would do, the boy starts to fool around.

But things get out of hand...


The old man has been watching graphic Chinese pornography this whole time, and Christian and I can see this. It's surreal, the porn and the fact that he's watching it.

Furthermore, the black kid's babysitter is dozing off so he's sneaking glances every so often.

AND THE OLD CHINESE MAN WON'T STOP!

Pic or no proof?

From left to right: The sleeping babysitter, the black preteenager, the perverted old man.
Christian clarifies in case you couldn't tell which one was looking at the porn.

Facebook Notes

I logged onto my Facebook the other day as I do every so often (hourly, really), and I was somewhat surprised to see that I had been tagged in a note. Now, I knew that I hadn't recently hacked onto Sean's account recently or anything, so I knew it wasn't some grotesque note about Sean's sexual tendencies (I do love those notes. You guys should check them out). Also, I knew it wasn't one of the Andrew-Writing-As-Sean notes because I had tried to write one a few weeks previously only to find that the moron had changed his password.

Jerk.

So it was to my somewhat pleasant surprise that Christian Deguzman tagged me in a random survey about random facts, entitled "16 Candles". Now, in the old days of MySpace notes and Xanga subscriptions, to which I'm sure many of you still follow, surveys were plentiful and manifold. They were generally pointless ramblings, asking about specific questions regarding the surveyed. And normally, other people were chosen to continue and spread the survey love. They consisted of lame questions on random things, about which I knew few people really cared. In short, I generally despised them, seeing them as a cheap, easy way to fill up space and time.

Regardless of my blatant disrespect, however, I filled a few out, contributing to the insignificant myriad of words to waste time. We all have done things about which we may not necessarily be too proud...especially in boredom.

Anyways, the purpose of this rant is not to condemn surveys, even though I must add that they are worthless and pointless. The point of this rant is to fill out another one. Mr. Deguzman was not the first to tag me in such a survey. Helen Nguyen and Tiffanie Lee have also graced me with mention. Thus, I am triply obligated to fill out this crap myself.

I particularly enjoy this one because while most surveys ask random things, this one simply asks to write anything. That freedom itself makes it appealing. That, and the fact that a 2 hour lecture at 8 in the morning cannot possibly sustain its excitement in the allotted time.

Oh, and my last note was a result of a tag from Francesca Lomotan. Thanks, Franny =)

"The brief: "Once you’ve been tagged, you have (can if you want) to write a note with 16 random things, shortcomings, facts, habits or goals about you. At the end choose 16 people to be tagged, listing their names and why you chose them. You have to tag the person who tagged you."" -Xtian

1. I'm a huge fan of Disney films, mostly musical films made after The Little Mermaid in 1988, which was technically the beginning of what is now known as the Disney Renaissance...

2. I once wrote a lengthy research paper on Disney and the Little Mermaid.

3. I've seen close to 800 films, and my favorite three are Beauty and the Beast, Pride and Prejudice and Lost in Translation.

4. I love my friends more than anything. I value interpersonal relationships above all else, and my religious views stem from this (See previous entries).

5. I usually don't do things in moderation. I'll eat a meal or two a day, but they'll be meals large enough for two healthy people. If I work out, I'll go as hard as my body can humanly handle (or if I cramp...), but I seldom work out. I either pull all-nighters or sleep in excess of 12 hours at a time. I am a child of extremes, but I'm trying to change it.

6. I was born in Worcester, Massachusetts and moved to the Bay at an early age. This justifies my being a fan of the Celtics, Patriots or Red Sox. I'm not a fan of any of the three, but I could justifiably be one! (PS Go Warriors and 49ers!)

7. Before my current permanent residence (what some call home), my immediate family had never lived at one address for longer than two years. My former addresses include 609 San Miguel Ave. Santa Clara, CA, 95050; 1454 Don Ave. Santa Clara, CA, 95050; 244 Smithwood St. Milpitas, CA, 95035; and my current address. I lived in two places prior to the San Miguel house, but I was too young to remember the addresses.

8. When I was young, living in a duplex before we moved into the San Miguel house, I was once woken up by the sound of a police interrogation in the middle of the night. For some reason, I was sleeping in the living room that night. As it turns out, the Mexican family to whom we let out the other side was in the middle of a feud. That night, the husband stabbed his wife and killed her outside our place. It was all over the news, and our house was on TV and everything. I wasn't scared because I knew it was over, and the guy was caught. They were survived by at least two daughters near my age, who were then raised by grandma. The mom was buried out front. Her name was Charlotte.

9. When my brother and I were younger we both had our own favorite bedsheets/blankets. His was Barney and mine was the original Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. While Matt's Barney blanket was soft on one side, mine had the Power Rangers on it. A fair trade off in my opinion.

10. Though I'm an Eagle Scout now, my first Scouting experience was as a Cub Scout in Lien Doan Ra Khoi, or Troop 285, in San Jose. My first camping trip was horrible. I think I cried and missed my mom. I remember doing push-ups for doing something wrong. Looking back, it wasn't so bad, but I was new to it, and probably whiny to begin with. I was then a Boy Scout in Troop 74 until my parents moved us to Milpitas, where I joined 101 Lac Hong, which later split into 101 and 111, Lien Doan Hoa Lu. It was with 111 that I earned Eagle Scout. I know this doesn't make sense to lots of you, but I hope it was random enough.

11. I played the flute for a year in 4th or 5th grade. Manly, I know.

12. In second grade, I pretty much thought I was a badass, flipping off all my friends and whatnot. Then I transferred to St. Justin's in third grade. I suddenly became the only Vietnamese boy, and one of like 5 Asian kids. It was weird, and I was quiet and shy around these people until I left them in 8th grade. I mention this because I got in trouble my first few weeks for pretending to flip someone off. The jerk told on me. I learned.

13. If I ever come off as someone who is very aware of his grammar, I attribute all such awareness and grammatical knowledge to my middle school English teacher, Mrs. Wayne. She had us write often in our headings, "English is my favorite subject in the world!" and had us analyze and diagram sentences. *Shudder*

14. I secretly love and enjoy analyzing and diagramming sentences.

15. I used to play with Barbies with my cousin Phuong, Chị Bé, when I was much younger, but it wasn't like dress-up or hair-combing play normally found in young female circles. It was more like I-have-control-over-someone's-fate play where I enjoyed controlling or living vicariously through the dolls. In my defense, GI Joe dolls are played similarly, but yes, it's still feminine because they're Barbies. And lastly, for some reason I can't seem to understand,

16. I'm still single. I'm picky too, so that may have something to do with it. But I'm sure the Barbie thing doesn't help much.

Time on Red Bull

It's 4:15AM, and I'm still awake. This post will probably the one An Vy reads first, since she will have probably caught her eye on her name at the top. So I guess I should make this one good? ;)

So it's 4:15AM, and I find myself idly refreshing Facebook. I'm adding new friends from the right module on the Newsfeed page. You know, the one under the "People You May Know" headline.

That's how lame I am. I want to sleep so badly, but my schedule's all messed up now. I watched a movie yesterday night (morning) and it kept me awake until half past 5 in the morning. It was well worth it though, considering how much I had wanted to see it in theaters last year, but never got around to it.

It was Dan in Real Life with Steve Carrell and Juliet Binoche (and Dane Cook too, but I'll comment on that in a second.) I loved the movie. It seemed like it could have been made 30 years ago and been considered a classic, but alas, it was made in this day and age. So, to a lot of people, it'll seem cliche and contrived. It will also seem fake and unrealistic, like a typical Hollywood film. But this movie was very down-to-earth, very low-key.

There were lots of flaws though, like the lack of depth of the family members (probably due to the short running time of the film). Also, the music was a bit unnecessary, though extremely well-written on their own. Sondre Lerche is an amazing musician. Moreover, the film was very contrived in its plot elements, the way the story unraveled. The writing must have been edited by a producer looking to make money, since the script obviously tried diligently to appeal to a large audience. This sacrifice was overall detracting in the direction of the film's story, but it was not as noticeable as some critics made it seem. Plus, the acting was wonderful, the chemistry between Carrel and Binoche surprisingly smooth, like chocolat (sorry, I had to...). As for the supporting cast, Dane Cook is a surprisingly not bad actor and is funnier when he's not cursing or making vulgar jokes like his stand-up. He's not a very good stand-up comedian, his jokes being stale at best, but his presence was welcoming, sharing the screen well with Carrell. The rest of his family could probably be considered one character for all the use they have in the plot's progression. They did, however, work well to show the amount of love in the family. The large size of the immediate family really was impressive in its goal to emphasize the ensemble nature of family love. Simply seeing them do things as a whole unit was heart-warming, if a bit unrealistic.


Overall though, the film's general tone was so warm that it easily balanced out all the obvious flaws. Had those flaws not existed, the film would rank among my all-time favorites. Yet, even as it is, Dan in Real Life makes my list for 2007.

Speaking of which, my Top 10 List of 2007 has been deleted from Yahoo. I mean, it's another one of those things that no one reads (not unlike the words you're reading right now), but the fact that I spent time on it just to have it deleted really annoys me. I have to do it all over again...

Now, on to the petty details of my day: I woke up this afternoon and did nothing worth noting...

Then, after a blissful conversation, I proceeded to go on Facebook. Much to my chagrin, I found that my dear friend Christian DeGuzman had bought two-thirds of my friends on the Friends for Sale application. I then engaged in a short FFS skirmish, buying back all my friends multiple times. Christian was a formidable opponent, and like any other formidable opponent, he agreed to a truce with me. We decided to split the "pets," as they are so dubbed. He kept a few, while I kept others. Then we agreed never to buy from each other again, so as to maintain a certain level of civility between two obviously upstanding members of the FFS community.

However, less than 5 minutes after the truce, I refresh my main page on FFS and find that someone else was buy friends from me. I found myself first embroiled in indignation, and then humor at my indignation. This humor quickly receded into determination to buy my friends back. This person was none other than Peterson Rooster Lim, Christian's roommate. How dare he? They were MY property, and he had no right buying them from me.

I quickly checked the cash amounts both of us had, and it looked like he and I were to battle until I ran out of money. And so, the epic war raged on.

After 15 minutes or so of buying back our mutual friends, I complained to Christian, who was happily building up his own collection without me as a hindrance. He first laughed it off, probably thinking I deserved as much for being greedy, but then, he came up with the perfect idea.

He told me to buy Kate Salazar, Peterson's girlfriend whom I was sure he coveted. At first, I was skeptical, worried that Peterson would buy my own girlfriend, but Christian quickly doused the flames of my doubt. Christian, being the good friend he was, had already tried to buy my girlfriend in order to stop me from starting a war with him, but, much to his surprise, he was unable to buy her because she was not his friend on Facebook. So, Christian told me, buying Kate would not bear any financial risk on my part.

So I bought her. Every time you buy a person on FFS, his or her value increases, so that the next time, the cost of buying the person is larger, sometimes significantly so for more expensive pets. The extra money goes as a profit to the owner of the pet. For example, say I buy Peterson for $560. If Christian wants him, he has to pay $580, with the extra $20 going to me as a profit. If I want to buy Peterson back, I have to pay $610, with Christian receiving $580 (the price he bought Peterson) plus a $30 profit.

After a while, Kate was the only one Peterson and I were vying for, since I just wanted her to profit from all his money and buy Christian and Sean back. Since I had bought a few more pets earlier that day, Peterson had the upper hand, eventually buying out Kate for more than I could buy back. I didn't mind that much, since I could now buy Sean. However, I forgot to buy Christian, and Christian was terribly angry with me. "You have to buy me back!" he told me aggressively online. "She's worth more than me!"

So after everyone signed off, I got more money (via a secret method I shall not reveal here, just in case). I then bought Kate, Christian and Sean. By this time, I had accumulated so much money I was able to by Wanda Lam and Tracey Tran, for $21k and $14k, respectively.

I don't want to keep them. I just want some people to buy them so I can make a few thousand dollars profit.

And now I'm blogging about it.