I’m not an American citizen so my opinion doesn’t really count. I’m quite happy with the end result, though. Peace.

Some sort of school project, I believe. Not bad.

The ensemble cast, however, made it worthwhile. I thought the acting was first class. The main and supporting characters were greatly realized. De Niro and Pacino, as always, were amazing. They just have this raw realism about them. Carla Gugino’s Karen Corelli wasn’t bad either. The amount of freakiness she brought to the character made her just, I don’t know, perfectly twisted.

This film isn’t nearly as great as the two geniuses’ previous collaboration (Heat) but it’s still very much worthy of any film buff’s time. I don’t want to get into too much detail so I’ll stop there. Go watch.

Funny, eh? Admit it, pervert.

So off I went to the nearest Land Transportation Office. The process is a complete blur to me now but I do seem to remember getting a student’s permit that day. The official license came after a month or so.

Now here’s the predicament. Back in 2005, when I was still residing in Las Vegas, I had developed a bit of an unhealthy addiction to beverages. Alcoholic beverages to be exact. Intoxication happened on a daily basis. One night, as I was patiently sitting in a bus on the way home, I accidentally fell into a deep beer-induced slumber. Only God knows how long I was out but I’m guessing it was for around a half an hour. The driver had to physically leave his seat and wake me up to inform me that we are on the last stop. Luckily, it was exactly where I was supposed to get off. So I hurriedly stood up, thanked the driver and went on my way.

As I was walking towards my place, I decided to do what I usually do before I get off public transit. I checked my pockets. My mobile phone? Good. My money? Good. Something is amiss, though. Shit. I lost my wallet. With it came my health card and my precious, albeit expired, Philippine driver’s license. Health cards are pretty easy to obtain and I really couldn’t think of an instance where my Philippine-issued license would be of any use. So I just shrugged it off thinking I could always get new ones.

Fast forward to 2008. I decided to come back to the hustle and bustle of Manila. It turns out that not only do I need an affidavit of some sort to replace a lost license, I also need to have connections if I want the process to be expedited. The other option is to just start from the beginning. Apparently, the best way to get a replacement license is to go back to the dreaded student’s permit. Meaning I need to retake all the tests or repay all the fixers. Crazy. Just to be clear, these information didn’t come from the Land Transportation Office. So it’s basically pure hearsay. But knowing how government offices in Manila work, I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be accurate.

It’s like having a dog that slowly learns how to talk.

That’s how Dr. Cox (from Scrubs) puts it. How cool is that? Arrf!

I mean think about it. Instead of shelling out a couple of hundred dollars for an impersonal hotel room, you can immerse yourself into a totally different culture by spending a few days with a local. Of course there’s always the risk of encountering organ-harvesters (an urban legend that has never been documented, by the way) or your typical run-of-the-mill crazies (think Hostel). Not impossible but highly unlikely.

I’ve been thinking of visiting Japan and Singapore for the longest time. If ever I do get the chance, I would definitely give this a shot. I hope they only take one kidney, though.

Lately, I’ve been browsing the internet more than usual. Everyone seems to be authoring their own journals so I thought I’d give it a shot. Up until a few hours ago, this site’s sole purpose was to serve as my online portfolio. It’s where I direct potential clients to whenever they want to check samples of my work. Well, not anymore. I’m going to conform. I’m joining the herd. That is something I don’t usually do.

It’s been a couple of days since I started coding and building this site. I wanted to keep it clean. Now I’m happy. I like the way it looks and I’m ready to go live. I’m certain that only a handful of people will read this post. If you are one of them, I apologize. Think of it as practice.

The next couple of entries will most probably be consisted of fragmented sentences and all sorts of stupidity. I’m looking to improve as I go on, though. With all that said, I’m going end this like I would a face-to-face conversation. Ingat.