Mga Bobo sa Senado

My Senate is such a hive of idiots...

Hello?! Pay attention fools! Congress is trying to destroy you with Cha-cha, but you idiots are so busy fighting with each other, you haven't even noticed. By this time next year, you probably won't exist anymore.

***

I didn't realize that whole ethics committee investigation is trying to expel Villar from the Senate. Ganun? First you ass-kick him from the Senate presidency (and replace him with that corpse Enrile. And seriously, who are the fools repeatedly electing him and people like Gordon into office? Gawd.) Now you're trying to remove him completely from the Senate? This is clearly the work of threatened presidential aspirants.

Not that I'm a big Villar fan, mind, but I take any accusation of corruption against already-previously wealthy (as in prior to his entry into politics) senators, who stand a good chance of taking the presidency next year (and away from a horde of other salivating aspirants in the Upper House too) with a block of salt. Maybe he's guilty, maybe he isn't. But isn't this a question for the Ombudsman and Sandiganbayan to investigate? Him being investigated by his fellow senators, who make barely any attempts to disguise their rivalry with him, is suspect, to say the least.

***

And who filed this complaint? Jamby Madrigal? Sus! I've always had the impression that lady wasn't playing with a full deck of cards. Have you seen her talk? I have, and in person. And it was weird. And hello? What has she done ba in all her time in the Senate? If she wasn't ferociously contesting her dead aunt's will, she wouldn't be in the news at all.

***

Meanwhile, Congress has come up with (how many now? three? four?) new ways to railroad Cha-cha. Melo is talking about a possible no-election scenario. Lorelei Fajardo, one of President Bitch's six (count 'em: six!) spokespersons has said words to the effect of: Prime Minister Arroyo? Why not? She's been a good president (and that last bit I most definitely take issue with). Pay attention senators! If Cha-cha passes, there won't be an Upper House for you people to fight in anymore! And I highly doubt you fools will be able to get any seats in a Parliament if our government system goes there.

Mga tanga! Mga bobo! Get your acts together! Stop investigating shit! You're not the bloody courts. Kaya nga may judiciary e.

Rape me! Romantic naman daw e...

Ahem. Ano daw? Acquittal ba kamo? Truly? Siryusly? Nakaka-bad trip 'di ba?

If the law can't protect you from being taking advantage off by foreigners in your own country (in this case, from rape), then where are you safe?

Na-acquit nga si Daniel Smith, and take note, mga gehls po ang nag-acquit sa kanya. Yung mga inaasahan na makaka-simpatiya sa isang rape victim na babae pa ang naglahad ng mga super-archaic and bizarre na conclusions leading to an acquittal. Such as:

1. “No evidence was introduced to show force, threat and intimidation applied by the accused (Smith) upon Nicole, even as the prosecution vainly tried to highlight her supposed intoxication and alleged unconsciousness at the time of the sexual act.” Ganun? So wala nang saysay ang "no means no" and "you can say no at ANY time" na tinuturo natin sa mga gehls? Basta kung walang force, hindi na rape? So kung i-roofie ka sa bar, hindi ka makapalag kasi unconscious ka, at dalhin ka sa kung saan para gamitin ang katawan mo, edi hindi ka na-rape? Kasi walang force? WOW! Ang galing-galing talaga ng ating mga hurado! Why don't they return the previous classification of rape na rin, na crime against chastity, while they're at it.

2. “When a woman is drunk, she can hardly rise, much more stand up and dance, or she would just drop. This is a common experience among Filipino girls.” Avah! Nag-generalize ang mga hurado! Common experience pala ito sa mga Pinoy gehls! Any girls reading this, chime in if this is a "common experience" for you when you drink. I know I've danced with lots of girls while they were drunk/tipsy, and they were all excellent dancers.

3. "The curious thing is that she danced non-stop to the urgent beat of rock and hip-hop music in an inebriated state for 15 minutes without stumbling clumsily on the floor.” Ito, maliban sa lame argument, funny lang na statement. I'm imagining three old ladies sitting around a table talking about the (ahem) "urgent" beat of rock and hip-hop... Hahaha! Anyway, THIS is their evidence she wasn't raped? She was dancing, ergo, she wasn't drunk, ergo, she couldn't have not consented? Jesus H. Christ! Clearly, these old biddies have never been on a bender. I've managed to get home stone-cold drunk without knowing how. Apparently, I was able to give the taxi driver directions on how to navigate the complicated route through our subdivision to our house. And our house is WAY inside the subdivision, so you're not just going to happen upon it basta-basta. But I'd be hard-pressed to explain how, seeing as the next thing I remember after leaving the club is being in the taxi pulling up at our gate. Lots of us are perfectly capable of remote-controlling ourselves through certain situations while drunk, even if we're not totally conscious how.

4. Ay, but the worst: The court concluded that Nicole’s portrayal of herself as a “demure provinciana lass going on a first-time vacation to Subic” as mere “deceptive posturing.” Attack the victim! Man, ano sila, defense ni Smith? So kung hindi ka "demure," edi hindi ka p'wedeng ma-rape! Anything that happens to you is surely consensual, anyway, slutty ka naman! Delightful!

I don't know where these judges read up on rape (and surely they have extensively, they're CA justices for god's sake), but I was always told that a girl has the right to say no at ANY time, even if she's just about to have sex with a guy. If, at this time, she changes her mind, it's her right, and the guy must stop. None of that she's-leading-me-on bullshit. And if you're drunk and unconscious/semi-conscious, can you really give consent? I thought the Makati RTC judge had conclusively stated you cannot. Rape is rape, whether the woman clawed and bit at the rapist to fight him off, or lay there because she was frozen in fear or drunk. If she didn't say YES, then it's not consensual. Simple.

Maybe forty years was a bit much, but Smith did rape and he should have been punished. And now, after getting fat in "detention" at the US Embassy (Have you seen the pics? Magpakulong na rin kaya ako sa US Embassy, mukhang mabubusog ako...), he's off and free? Gawd, this is the country I have sisters in? Where female judges will let men get away with rape? Holy shit.

Spontaneous romantic encounter lang daw? Kelan pa naging romantic ang rape? Aba, kung gan'un, magpa-rape na tayong lahat next Valentine's. Tutal malaya na rin naman si Smith, I'm sure he'll be willing to help.

Ang dami talagang hayop sa Pilipinas tsk tsk. I lab my gobyerno talaga...

Haha! Anthem ng buhay ko!

I heard this song, it's like every drunk night out I've ever had hahaha! Look up the lyrics!

Of course, you can't embed the original video... I did find this funny mash-up though:

Morning Surprise!

Don't you just love weekend benders? Palaging may surprise awaiting you in the morning.

Like: looking for your watch the next day and hoping you didn't leave it somewhere.

Like: wondering how the hell you managed to get home when you can't really remember how you left the club, or what happened to the people hitting on you.

Like: finding strange numbers saved on your phone, of people you have decidedly unreliable recollections of.

Like: finding receipts for drinks you don't remember paying for when you open your wallet to buy lunch workday Monday. And you realize YOU were buying the drinks that night, not the honeys hitting on you. Tsk. Poor form.

Like: hurriedly checking your bank account to see how much you have left after the bender. And being a bit horrified.

Like: finding a condom in your coin purse when you pull it out to pay Manong Tricycle Driver at 7:30 in the morning workday Monday, and having to hurriedly stuff it back, wondering how the hell it got in there. Don't worry prudes, pro-lifers, parents and friends of parents. I didn't shag anyone last Sabado. I have no idea how that bit got in my wallet.

I solemnly swear to leave all my cards home and go out with just a set amount of cash on my next booze trip. That way I don't find myself financially fucked over the next week.

Oh and P.S., why the hell is there such a buzz over Jagermeister? It tastes like blinking mouthwash with a bit of booze swished in.

What I Hate on Planes

I hate noise. So a little kid singing "'Di Ko Kayang Tanggapin" or whatever the hell April Boy song that was at the top of her lungs the whole flight long while her parents blithely ignore her will piss me off.

I hate people who don't follow safety rules. They're there for a reason jackasses! So people who refuse to shut their phones off until the plane is bloody taxiing already, and dive for them to turn them on literally as the plane hits the ground landing will also piss me off. Of course, people who don't shut their phones off because they're (good god) taking bloody pictures of themselves on the plane will piss me off even more. God, we're so pathetic sometimes; people will use any excuse to show off their stupid 3G phones. Nobody cares asswipes! We ALL have 3G phones!

Waiting in line not knowing what's going on where at a small airport will also piss me off. Note to PAL ground staff: if something went wrong earlier with your check-in computers, and you have some weird emergency check-in procedure going on as a result, please, explain to the people who arrived AFTER the fuck-up eh? Me standing in line while you ignore me, call the names of people who AREN"T in line, and don't explain anything until I snap at one of you helps not my mood. Or my headache.

I love how my job allows me to go around the Pinas. However, the bozo moments I seem to be getting in spades on domestic flights does take something away from the experience.

Oh and P.S., people asking for fragile stickers in fake American accents will also piss me off. Or asking their sister in said accent, "Was that you singing?" Yes, that was her. The whole bloody plane knows it was her. And she was singing a bloody April Boy Regino song so stop trying to pass yourself off as some konyo, moron.

Though, in fairness to planes, fake American accents piss me off in the air and on the ground.

Batman is Stalking Me

He is.

I'm quite enjoying it though. I love Batman.

The concept of him is superb. He has no powers. He just trains like hell and plans for any eventuality. And he didn't come from another planet or magically gain abilities. His parents were gunned down in front of him. So he decided to do something about it.

In the hands of a good writer, Batman has unbelievable story-telling power.

Which is not always the case. Fortunately for me, my recent exposures to him have been of the good kind.

First off, the Batman RIP story-arc running through his main comic, written by my favorite scribe Grant Morrison. Grant is a mad Scottish guy who's like the indie film-maker of the comic world. He can take any old, cheesy comic character and thrust him into a real world setting, psychologically deconstruct him, and entertain the holy hell out of the reader, all at the same time. Those who scoff at the comic book medium have obviously never read anything he's written. Grant Morrison is comic books on crack. I quite love his work.

And he's a bit of a comic book character himself, practicing chaos magick or some such thing. Whatever, if it keeps him pumping out stellar renditions of the Joker and stories about occult terrorists and cyborg house pets, I'll still be here.

But I digress. Back to the Bat. So yeah, Batman RIP sort of kills the character, but not like you think. First, his entire history was compressed throughout Grant Morrison's run, so one can make sense of why we had Angry Batman, Campy Batman, Grim-and-Gritty Batman, all the various renditions of him throughout the years that didn't really make sense toegther. Grant shows how it is possible for one person to be all this. Then he shows how this can totally fuck up someone's head. And we see Batman pushed to the limit by the only baddies who can take him on: baddies who attack him in the way he thinks. Baddies as smart as him. That's what "kills" him.

Cryptic much? But why should I spoil a good story here for lazy bastards. Go read it.

Of course, once I was done with that, the Bat started turning up everywhere. First HBO has been showing my favorite Batman movie on a loop, Batman Returns. You gotta love Tim Burton; his scenes may be unbelievably camp, but they manage to be unbelievably goth and crazy at the same time. I love his anarchic, fucked-up villains. None of them want to steal or take over the world or such shit. They just want to Blow Things Up Real Good. Danny DeVito's eloquent monster of a Penguin was super-entertaining. And until Heath Ledger's Joker, Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman was my hands-down favorite, and I still like her just as much as Heath's Joker. Come on, she was off the scale! She managed to be sexy, funny and dangerous, all while her head was out to lunch. I loved the part where she becomes Catwoman and makes her suit. So disturbing. It kills me that people will remember the super-shit Halle Berry Catwoman and not this one.

This movie shows you why the Bat-baddies are so dangerous. Not because they have powers (most of them don't), or because they have cool tech. It's because they're fried. And the only way Batman can keep up with them is if he's fried a little too.

And how do you follow that up? Why with Batman graphic novels of course!

My dad didn't want to buy me Christmas gifts he wasn't sure I'd like. So he took me to Fully Booked to pick my own out. Now I'm not really much for sappy Christmas gestures. I like to think I'm pragmatic and efficient. So this gift-buying technique appeals to me.

Anyway, I was wondering what to get when they suddenly glowed at me, calling to me: The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller (he of Sin City and 300), and Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth (by Grant Morrison, of course). Both written in the '80s, both highly acclaimed. The Dark Knight Returns was what returned credibility to the Bat-books in the '80s and started the movie franchise (and by extension, all other superhero movies of the '90s and the 2000s.) Of course, the god-awful Batman and Robin killed the franchise, but then I suppose we wouldn't have gotten Christopher Nolan's stellar opuses if that first franchise hadn't died. I haven't started it yet; I went for Grant's book first.

Arkham Asylum was written in 1989 and is the best-selling American graphic novel of all time (and written by a Scottish writer at that). It follows Batman having to enter Arkham after all the prisoners have escaped and rioted, in exchange for them releasing their hostages. This isn't some ass-kicking, gadget-throwing she-bang. This is Batman being taken apart by a psychiatrist, running through mazes, crazy stuff. My favorite line so far? One inmate demands that they take Batman's mask off. "I want to see his real face," he declares. "That is his real face!" declares the Joker, "And I want to go so much deeper than than!"

And that's the thing about Batman. His enemies and him have a special relationship. Even they understand him. He kind of is the mask, the bat. And that's his appeal. We all go to a place where we're strong, where we can do things, help people. We project masks and capes that let us move around and give us strength.

But we're never sure if its healthy. If we're normal. We could be just as mad as all the other people around us.

Alcohol-free

Not.

I don't know what to do with people who don't drink. It's like meeting a kid who doesn't like chocolates or video games or cartoons.

What do they do for fun? Oh I'm sure there's a whole list of fun, wholesome things to do like doing math and going to mass, but alcohol is FUN. Like fun-fun, real-fun. And it makes you fun. Even if you're the most uptight, repressed character around, beer loosens the tongue (and body) and pretty soon, you're dancing on a table or stroking someone's thigh inappropriately or something.

I met someone some time back who told me he didn't drink or go out on gimiks. So what am I expected to do with such people? Suffice it to say our interaction since hasn't been substantial.

Booze, I find, is a universal thing. No matter how different the people I meet are, once I find out they're boozehounds too, we get along fine. Many of my longest friendships have been forged in the furnace that is the hours-long drinking session.

I started crazily, of course, like any newbie teenage drinker. There were the gimiks where I went nuts and ordered lots of different drinks, and ended up laughing at my reflection in the bathroom, or talking loudly at scared bartenders, or passing out, or spewing chunks. Eventually, as I approached my current age, I settled on beer. Tequila and vodka are fine, gin a big no-no (hate the peppery taste), cocktails are alright, I suppose, when clubbing. But beer... ah. Beer's the drink that settles on you like a warm haze and tells you that everything's going to be alright. And even when you feel like throwing up, it's still telling you that. Gotta love something that lies to you so well.

And my love for beer has increased over the past few months. Before, I just had Red Horse. Then my dear, dear GX friends introduced me to the wonders of Carling and Fosters (and cider, but that's a whole other hangover). And since I got back, my dad's showed me the awesomeness that comes from a can of German beer. My faves right now are Kapuziner and Oettinger.

'Course now, I seem to have less opportunities for drink, which makes my liver sad. Everyone's off doing their own thing, and getting all my friends together in one place needs committee-level planning nowadays. 'Tis not good for me, coming off a volunteering experience where I was boozed up and clubbing with some awesome people half the time.

So if you don't drink, don't tell me about it. And if you do, let's get me good and wasted! Me needs a good pub crawl soon.