There’s a big world out there, and it’s for sale. All of it.

The interviewer offers me these standard questions:

What are your strengths and weaknesses?

What can you contribute to the company?

How do you see yourself five years from now?

These are usual questions. There’s a whole list of others, but these three, you won’t walk away from a job interview without having to answer them. They’re designed supposedly to allow the interviewer determine if you’re fit for the job. They also make interviews full of shit.

I’m not really looking for a job. I work at home. I have a steady income from my online projects. I own goats, pigs, chickens, guinea pigs, and some other fierce animals whose ownership indicates overlord status. Which means I’m an actual overlord. I also own an ukay-ukay-bought bald-headed albino slave who entertains me by popping out of nowhere in a pink tutu dancing to the first few waltzes of The Nutcracker (when available). Clearly, I have everything. But I was browsing the interwebs the other day and found this opening for a copywriter.

For those who don’t know, the copywriter is the writer version of a prostitute. In the advertising industry, the copywriter supplies the words. In a more general corporate sense, depending on the company and the overpaid weasel who manages it, a copywriter may be asked to write speeches, annual reports, letters to the editor of some annoying but important broadsheet, the English essay assignment of the CEO’s seven-year-old daughter.

[Continue reading]

The Spinal Tap

The Spinal Tap is currently the internet’s most awesome website.

It’s my personal/impersonal/okay-I’m-lying blog.

The Dude

My sister owned a single morbidly obese female guinea pig (which I mentioned some years ago).
It remained that way until one of the neighbors (who also happened to
own a bunch of guinea pigs and had a guinea pig population boom
problem) saw our single morbidly obese female guinea pig and kindly
offered to donate one more. And because we’ve always been kind to
neighbors with a guinea pig population boom problem we said, Sure,
okay, that’s fine, what’s another useless mouth to feed, eh?

Now
we have two small mammals, both fat females, who prowl the small yard
in front of our house like two fur balls gnawing at whatever wooden
thing there was. They live in this neat little cage whose door was
always kept open so they can go in and out of it as they please. The
cage also has a little handle, which might come in handy just in case a
nuclear war breaks out and there arises a sudden need to quickly
transport the guinea pigs to a safe, bomb-proof place.

All was
well. The two matrons of our yard lived a nice, well-fed, protected
straight-out-of-Disney existence. They sometimes threw sarcastic
remarks our way whenever we tried to feed them my smelly fingernail
clippings. But overall, life was good. At least, until the puppy came.

Well,
the puppy, let’s call him Dude for convenience, was a little
mischievous fellow whose sole purpose in life was to be an
ultra-efficient poop-and-piss processor – place anything in its mouth
and the puppy, a marvel of nature, quickly turned it into either (a)
poop that stank; (b) pee that stained. Based on this alone, we
suspected the puppy was probably a Filipino politician in his past life.

Suffice
it to say that Dude, we had decided, needed a little strategic
housebreaking. And this being the modern day of the internet, we used,
in the wise words of George Bush himself, “The Google.”

However,
as it turned out, trying to find accurate information on what we really
wanted to accomplish was no easy feat. The following were the exact
search words we used – all in the order of increasing desperation.

“How to housebreak a dog.”

“How to patiently train a dog to shit in designated places.”

“How to FORCE the dog to shit in designated places.”

“How to strike fear in the heart of dog, so he shits ONLY in designated places.”

“How to COMPLETELY STOP dog from shitting.”

“How to turn goddamn dog into fine paste using only household utensils.”

“How to instantly vaporize goddamn dog using laser built from readily available computer components.”

I
don’t have to tell you that for some reason, nothing worked. So at this
point, to protect our house from further poop-trefaction, it had become
a cardinal rule to closely watch the puppy for the tell-tale signs of
it answering the call of nature. If and when one of us humans witnesses
any of the said tell-tale signs, it was our responsibility to swiftly
rise to the occasion, leap into action, and whisk the Dude to a more
poop-receptive place — hopefully right in the nick of time.

One
morning, as I worked furiously on my PC chasing a deadline, Dude came
out of nowhere walking with that strange gait — and the thought
flashed in my head: the puppy…oh, shit! My knee-jerk reaction was to
dash for it. However, somehow I tripped on something, and I fell down
in dramatic slo-mo like some doomed redwood tree, my left knee hitting
the concrete floor hard. I swear I heard a bone crack.

The dog came galloping up to my face and nervously stuck out his tongue, panting like crazy.

Dude: Now, I’m gonna tell all my friends what an idiot you are!

Me: Dude, you have no friends.

Dude: Well, let’s see about that when I grow up and finally become a hot bitch!

Me: Dude, you’re a male dog.

Dude: Nevertheless!!!

Of
course, this meaningful exchange didn’t actually take place. What
really happened was that the dog yawped and barked and heartlessly
tried to eat my hair as I lay there writhing in mind-numbing pain.

My
left knee would swell and bruise and blacken and I would spend the next
few days glaring at the dog. Meanwhile, there was work and more work
and there was less and less time to leap into poop-related action.

Later
on, Dude found a new way to amuse himself: by sexually harassing the
two female, morbidly obese guinea pigs in our front yard.

Somehow,
it was a tragedy waiting to happen. The universe actually aligned
itself for this unspeakable development to find fruition.

First,
there was my sister’s stuffed toy, which looked like a little monkey
with the same body size as Dude, but for some reason Dude thought it
was another dog he could actually have sex with.

Second was that
the “poop-receptive place” I mentioned several paragraphs ago was
actually the front yard, and the front yard, as everyone at this point
realizes, was where the two fat furry garden matrons ruled and rooted.

And
so Dude meets the two guinea pigs, resembling the stuffed toy he had
been humping, and all hell breaks loose. Sometimes, deep in the night,
you could hear the guinea pigs screaming the hopeless, painful screams
of the royally fucked. We humans tried to prevent it whenever we could,
but whenever we let the Dude out to answer the call of nature, he would
chase the screaming guinea pigs as soon as the last piece of turd
squeezed out of his asshole. And to add insult to injury, the puppy
began to really, really fancy the guinea pigs’ own droppings. Look at what
we have here: Dude trying to rape the guinea pigs and literally eat
their shit, too. Ain’t he a sweetheart!

I haven’t written a
single piece of fiction in the past several months, and I feel guilty
about breaking the dry spell by writing about the Dude. My left knee is
still swollen. And as I write this, the Dude has just begun trying to
eat my brother’s shoe. The house smells of shit. I turn on the TV, and
the news also stinks of crap.

Maybe later, I’d go out and visit
the two “rape victims” in the front yard, see if they still have the
same old, fiery sarcasm in them. Meanwhile, the Dude walks with that
strange “I’m gonna poop” gait again, but I’m wiser this time. I’m not
going to fall for that, you bastard. I now know when to recognize
genuine, true-to-the-core poop. But…

Oh, shit. You win.

“And they’re turning us into monsters”

“Wow! Ang galeng!”
   
– Steven Spielberg

“Amputs! Ayuz! Parang tutoo!”
   
– Spike Lee

“Sobrang ma-Force-y! Grabe!!!”
   
– George Lucas

“Asan ang b**bs?”
   
– Larry Flynt

My brother Marvin and I made this little video. Alright, it was Marvin who actually did most of the work, while I just reacted in my usual anal-retentive way over his shoulders. It’s our own take on the fun happenings currently changing lives and giving a 2010-boosting exposure to everyone concerned at the Philippine Senate.

Marvin did the editing using Swishmax and Sony Vegas version 5.0. Credit goes to all the unnamed sources of the images. The song is “Kids with guns” by Gorillaz. And when you think about it, it’s quite hilarious. Darkly hilarious.

‘And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.’ — Nietzsche

For those of you who wake up in the morning, access your blog, and think, "Hey, ain’t it awesome if I post the lyrics of my most favorite song in the world ever on the blog and wow my friends? Like, today? Haller?!"

And so you do. Over and over and over again (ooops! that’s a song’s line right there!). Well, I’m your patron saint. Not only I’m going to post the most truly awesome song lyrics ever made in the world, I’m also posting it while actually singing it aloud and dancing that Marian Rivera dance while wearing my favorite hot pink thong. Can you beat that?

Here it goes!

***

"Around the world" by Daft Punk:

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world

Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world
Around the world, around the world.

***

Hah! Now I feel better. There’s nothing more exhilarating and profound than posting song lyrics on my blog. I love it! And I’m sure you do, too! If I were gonna choose between peeing on my laptop and post song lyrics on the blog, I’ll always definitely choose the latter (despite the obvious tastefully edifying possibilities with the former).

In other news of the past two weeks: been very very busy. (check). Been burned out (check). Lost a chicken (check). did something evil in the past two weeks (check). watched No Country For Old Men, reaffirmed that the universe is fucked (film’s characters), and some people are very aware of that to the point of genius (Coen brothers) (check). read Amsterdam (Ian McEwan), reaffirmed that human beings are both heartless and infinitely stupid (the novel’s characters, many people in the planet, me) and incredibly brilliant (Ian McEwan, the author) (check).

Three weeks ago, I was standing on an aisle in a very huge bookstore. It was 10 am when it suddenly hit me. It began as a sensation in my chest, that crept up my spine and made me wanna pee. It took seconds to articulate the thought: life is utterly short. I can ignore others when they tell me, "Hey, man, life’s short." But this, not this. This is different. This has a feeling, a sense of foreboding that hasn’t gone away. A sense of painful urgency, like a deadly knife stab from somebody you thought was your friend. I was standing there with that trickle of early birds like myself hovering about those books, and I was thinking, "Look at all these that I’ll never ever read." The stories I’ll never know. The sensations I’ll never feel. Simply because human time is not enough. You’re already swamped with the sheer business of living. The little time that’s left after: (1) sleeping, (2) eating, (3) communicating with other humans and animals, (4) fornicating or attempting to fornicate, (5) making new enemies and friends, (6) earning a living, (7) eliminating all you’ve eaten, (8) pretending to be smart –  the little time that’s left after fulfilling all these necessary human activities means it’s not possible to consume all the good literature you can identify in one’s lifetime.

Later, at home, I surveyed all the books I’ve bought in the past year. I looked at them with the pity you feel when somebody’s going to die, and you know. So i picked some up — Dave Sedaris, Amelie Nothomb, Thomas Harris, Dave Eggers — and I stayed in my room just reading them. But after merely finishing Nothomb’s Fear and Trembling (which was easy) and halfway through Sedaris’ Dress Up Your Family In Corduroy And Jeans, I found it impossible to resist proceeding with: (1) sleeping, (2) eating, (3) communicating with other humans and
animals, (4) fornicating or attempting to fornicate, (5) making new
enemies and friends, (6) earning a living, (7) eliminating all you’ve
eaten, (8) pretending to be smart.

So by now, you know I’ve given up. And I’m sure, that’s how the rest of the world live: by just getting by. By taking whatever they can take. Enjoying the little morsels floating by them and shutting off that creeping awareness of those so many things forever out of your reach. Chuck Palahniuk has the word for us: "the all-dancing, all-singing crap of the world."

That’s you and I, man. Around the world. Around the world. Around the world.

“Susan and the Infinite Sadness”

I had been cleaning up my hard drive when I found an old story I had written several months ago. It’s called "Susan and the Infinite Sadness" and I sort of wrote it along the usual plot lines of the Maalaala Mo Kaya classic Tagalog drama. Except it’s written in English, a language I constantly use to subtly hide some vomit-friendly plot twists I tend to make.

Be forewarned, though: the story’s so sappy no print publication agreed to publish it. As the old-timers used to say, it’s not only corny, it’s cornichon! Today, however, I’m posting it online in celebration of the World Sappy Short Stories Day, an awesome global event I invented two minutes ago.

So for avid readers of incredible tearjerking pseudo-romance stories (cleverly sprinkled with gratuitous and entirely unnecessary sex scenes), you may read the full text of "Susan and the Infinite Sadness" here.

Great Moments In Government Employee Hotness

Dante’s Moustache and Beard Beauty Parlor featuring 2007 image model Comelec Spokesperson James Jimenez.

Testimonial:

"I’m very happy with Dante’s state-of-the-art  moustache-twirling service, beard rejuvenation and scrotum laser-resurfacing, now I have the drop-dead gorgeousness of my idol Dante Varona! Everytime I look in the mirror, I faint! Gosh, I’m that hot! No one will know I’m not actually an Earthling!"

                                            — James Jimenez, famous Filipino celebrity, teenage
                                                heartthrob,and incumbent Comelec spokesperson 

Skirmisher Dancers

Main Skirmisher blogger (that’s me) and some of the people who occasionally contribute to the blog are the stars in a new Heineken-inspired dance craze. I never thought we’d look this fuckin’ good. Far left is Pepe Alas, third from left (the dork in front) is me, while to my right is Dementia (Karen Ang). The black dude second from the left is supposed to be the blog’s mascot, but I couldn’t get a nice face-detectable image.

Overheard At The Supermarket #1

Supermarket somewhere in Manila. Two guys debating right by the shelves of fruit preserves and jars of processed honey.

Dude 1: alam mo, hindi nilalanggam ang honey.

Dude 2: nilalanggam rin iyan.

Dude 1: ang orig na honey, hindi nilalanggam. yung honey na may halong asukal, yun ang lalanggamin.

Dude
2: baka ang tinutukoy mo, nagki-crystallize. honey na may asukal,
nagki-crystallize, yung orig, hindi. liquid forever. kahit malamig.

Dude 1: pareho din yun. ang honey na orig, walang halo, hindi nilalapitan ng langgam, hindi nagki-crystallize.

Dude 2: [pause] ano ka ba. kung betlog nga nilalanggam, honey pa? e mas matamis yun.

Both
dudes leave. I grab one of the jars of honey and throw it into my cart.
I’m thinking, maybe I’ll smear some of this shit on my testicles and wait
for the ants, see who’s right. It’s okay. All for the sake of
science. Then I’ll post the findings of my randomized, double-blind experiment later, just to rid the world of debates like that one.

Koko Pimentel Removes Koko Krunch Off The Shelves; Pichay Blames Everybody Except His Mother

Disappointed that not even years of clever subliminal
advertising could win him a Senate seat, Koko Pimentel recently ordered
thousands of boxes of Koko Krunch breakfast cereals taken off supermarket
shelves. If not even the subtle resemblance of the breakfast cereal’s character to his own
face could endear him to the hearts of voters, Koko said during a press
conference, then screw this country.

"From now on, I will deny thousands of Filipinos who
actually can afford to eat breakfast the pleasure of eating Koko Krunch.”

When pressed about the future of Koko Krunch, Koko Pimentel
said they’re not completely killing the product. "We’re just considering
changing it into something more effective, like Koko’s Balls, because balls are so hot right
now.”

Meanwhile, Prospero Pichay is considering suing his
advertising agency for coming up with the stupid "Itanim sa Senado"
campaign. Pichay said that although "Pangarap ko, tuparin ang pangarap
mo" bullshit was brilliant, he thought his own creation, "Pichay, isaksak sa
baga ng Senado" would have given him a better chance of winning. Instead,
his not-thinking-out-of-the-box handlers insisted in adopting the ever-corny
"Itanim sa Senado" slogan. Hence, his tremendous loss.

 
"Anak ng puta, sinong gagong taga-syudad ang boboto sa
akin sa itanim, itanim na iyan. Sa mga magsasaka lang at marijuana planters
bumenta iyan e. Pati yung mga mascot na ginamit namin, hindi naman nakakatuwa yung mga yun e.
Kung si Doraemon ginamit namin, patok sana.
Tutal kamukha ko naman yun," Pichay fumed during a tete-a-tete with Amay
Bisaya at Cafe Lawton.

You may remember that Pichay’s "Pangarap ko, tuparin
ang pangarap mo" inspired tambays and common kriminals everywhere to come
up with their own versions, like the following:

 
Smelly kid: Pangarap ko, makakain ng hotcake. Kahit
one bite lang.

"Pagpag" hotcake street vendor: Pangarap ko,
tuparin ang pangarap mo!

Underpaid construction worker: Pangarap ko, makatagpo
ng mumurahing babaeng mayayari.

60-year-old Doroteo Jose prostitute: Pangarap ko, tuparin
ang pangarap mo!

Senior high school student: Pangarap ko, makabili ng isang
bloke ng jutes sa presyong abot ng allowance ko.

Marijuana dealer: Pangarap ko, tuparin ang pangarap mo!

Manileno: Pangarap ko, magdilim at maging grabeng boring at
corny ulit ang Maynila.

Alfredo Lim: Pangarap ko, tuparin ang pangarap mo!