i had myself a very full weekend.. let's go backwards..

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sunday. after lunch, it was a pretty uneventful day until i get a call from jaysarmie with an invite to watch the game at her place along with cesar andrew and shelly. i get there a little late, at the end of first quarter when lakers were losing, but once i sat down and started watching they started picking up with the lead that carried them throughout the rest of the game. it was a good win for the lakers, but i wish it had that edge-of-your-seat suspense like it did at game 4. chips, beer, limoncho, and churros kept us all company for the game. we all headed our separate ways shortly after. right when i get home, my mom's packing stuff in the car get ready to leave for my sister's place in chino hills. perfect timing. i tag along. we get to my sister's and check out her new couch that kobe loves to sleep on. watch happy feet in hd, have some pizza, then head home. a relaxing sunday!

saturday. come to think of it, i think i just bummed it out at home..


friday. my first murder mystery dinner experience! for jean and rommel's birthdays. it was held at the El Cid restaurant in Los Angeles / Silverlake. Rommel, Kyleen, and I were the first ones there out of our group, so we started mingling with the other dinner-goers. the first person we met was Mandy, some girl from Louisiana.. we then got to meet and talk to a bunch of interesting people. this is already when the murder-mystery started as we are meeting with fellow dinner-goers.. but we're not entirely sure if they are really just there for the dinner or if they're actors in the program. but it started getting pretty obvious since some of the people we were meeting were a bit more animated than the average person eating at a dinner. except for "Steve," who was an actor, but acted in a way that was so low-key that he could have been just another person like all of us. but he was extra creepy.. had that serial killer look/attitude and loved disneyland of all things. anyway, the security guard was the first to die, followed by our friend steve, then mandy was poisoned. the experience wasn't as interactive as we'd have liked, but it was still a great show to watch, not to mention hilarious. the magician/host was a crazy comic who learned just about everyone's names (there were almost 100 people there) and made jokes just about anyone in the room.


thursday. i made it a point to hang out with alex tonight. it was his last day at the dorms and was going back home to san diego for the summer. after a bunch of planning mishaps, we finally settled that alex, jowena, and myself would go to wingstop in rancho cucamonga. i know a bunch of bmod was planning to go to level3 that night, but c'mon this is my little brother we're talking about. there was a huge backorder on wings because of the game so we had to sit at a table and wait for 40 minutes before we could order. so we just sat and talked for a bit. i knew alex was supposed to stay for half of the summer for classes and to look for a house to live in for the rest of the year. but with summer quarter cancelled by calpoly, i asked him what his plans were for the fall regarding housing. he then had a very flushed look on his face. that's when it hit me. he wasn't coming back to calpoly. housing and tuition are taking a big hit on the wallet, and with the lower quantity of classes offered for the rest of the year, his parents decided it would be best for alex to finish up school back home in sd. hiding my sadness with the situation, i proceeded to force myself to enjoy the rest of the night. wouldn't want to have alex leave on a sad note. after dinner and about an hour in the parking lot, jowena and alex gave their last goodbyes. i then took alex to cvs to get him his favorite beer, Blue Moon, and get back to the dorms, get our drink on, and help pack the rest of his stuff in his car. we drank, watched daft punk's interstella, and finally packed his car like a tetris puzzle. it was time for him to leave for riverside before he headed back to sd. we bid our last goodbyes.. and i headed home. i've never done well with goodbyes. and this was worse considering it had literally come out of nowhere. was not ready for that goodbye at all. after rk and elise, alex is the third of those i've come to call a 'best friend' move to or back to san diego. gonna miss my lil bro.

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even with this fairly full weekend, i've been getting this feeling of detachment. like i don't belong. or like i'm slowly drifting away. i think i know what it means..

yesterday, my mom and i bid farewell to two tenants that graced our home for the past 5 or 6 years. Henry and Bertha, two red-eared slider turtles that we raised from their littlest stages. you could literally fit the both of them in the palm of your hand. and up to yesterday, 5 years later, they were each about A FOOT in length!

we noticed that with their drastic growth in size, the more they needed to eat. while the price of their food didn't change (about $12 a bottle), the rate at which they finished a bottle skyrocketed. it was getting WAY too expensive. the frequent changes of their water was also getting troublesome. with the size of the turtles, the more water needed changing. and it wasn't as easy as back then when they were small -- we'd just have to pour a couple pitchers of water in to keep them happy. now, we had to siphon the water out into the backyard, then bring in a hose to refill their space. we also knew that they would start to outgrow their space in no time. sadly, it was time to let them go.

my mom called the local pet store inquiring about what to do. they said they'd be happy to take our turtles and try to re-sell them to a new home. upon bringing the turtles into the pet store, they were all amazed at how large the turtles were. normally, home-owned sliders would die before they got to the size of ours because their owners wouldn't be able to keep up. and unfortunately, they were not able to take the turtles from us. they were under the impression that we were bringing in baby turtles. we did learn, to our surprise, that both of our turtles were FEMALE! poor Henry, she had a boy's name, haha.

they then forwarded us to another local pet store, who focused mainly on fish and other water-related pets. the owner knows of a place who was taking in turtles for their pond, and to my surprise, it was the Pomona Fairplex. so he took the turtles from us and ensured that they'd have a happy new home at the Fairplex. i'm glad knowing that they'll be in a natural-esque and well-maintained habitat that is larger than what we could provide.

so with Kobe moving out with my sister, and the turtles gone -- my house is entirely pet-less... sad to say. those little animals really filled a void that i did not know was even there.

i had a strange experience the other day.. i was home alone on my laptop minding my own business, then all of a sudden i just feel weird, almost claustrophic.. like something was closing in on me. then i smell a scent of a cologne.. as if someone had walked passed me. i recognized the smell.. but couldn't put my finger on who it reminded me of.. i was spooked for a bit afterwards. usually when someone experiences that sort of thing, it's usually a scent of someone who had recently passed, like an old relative or something.. but the scent i smelled was familiar, like of someone i know currently. but then i brushed it off and got ready to go to Lust..

really liked the crowd at Lust this past Saturday! loved how it was a very mixed crowd, and a lot of girls.. making it easier for me to take pictures. i hate when the crowd is a bunch of guys who are "too cool" for the camera. a good handful of bmod was also there making the night interesting as always. all-in-all a very good night and turnout. headed to denny's afterwards and ended the night shortly after.

then the next day i woke up sick.. yayyyy boo...

random movie review: BOLT. i thoroughly enjoyed this film. i was kindof afraid of watching it because it wasn't a pixar film. and compared to disney's previous attempts at computer animation films i was not expecting much. i thought Chicken Little was horrible. i felt Meet the Robinsons was trying way to hard and it was just too busy. but disney got level-headed with Bolt. they went back to their storytelling roots and took some smarts from Pixar. and while i wouldn't put it up there right next to a pixar movie, it's pretty close. a little dog who thinks he's a superhero; that makes for a pretty enjoyable movie.

actually kinda made me miss kobe. it's been a little different not having the little guy walking around lightening the mood. i mean, as a pet, he just walks around without a care in the world.. and he was always a reminder to me especially when i was stressed out, to lighten up a bit. but i visited jamie's for lunch on tuesday, and was surprised to see that she leaves the balcony doors open for kobe to freely walk in and out. so he now has his first taste of being outside, ahha

kobe had a visit to the vet on monday. he has been pretty sick for the past few weeks. he developed skin rashes around his body which results in more scratching and licking which results in more coughing up hairballs. and he's also noticeably depressed. literally just sitting up and staring at a blank wall no more than a foot away from his face. the doctor diagnosed him with flea allergy dermatitis. which is easily treatable. but the thing is, kobe does not have fleas. upon further research, i found that the allergic reaction can be started by just a single flea bite, who decided to bite him and leave. his depression/anxiety is caused by a sudden change in the household (moving to a new place, or someone moving out), and with my sister moving out, i'm guessing that's the case. but either way, he now has meds that is keeping him both not itchy and happy.

in music news, common's new album "universal mind control" leaked! this has been a very anticipated album for me. a little weird that it only has 10 tracks.. but 7 of them are neptunes produced. all of you know that i'm a sucker for the neps.. and while i do enjoy listening to this album, i must admit that i miss common's usual jazz/soul influenced sound. production-wise, i love it. the neptunes sound great.. which is saying a lot considering i haven't been liking TOO much of their recent stuff. common on the other hand.. hmm.. i have to mention that he has fallen down lyrically. his words just lack the substance that he had for such albums like resurrection or like water for chocolate.. for die-hard common fans, this album is going to be a definite flop much like electric circus (man, that album was.. interesting..). but anyways, while i know this album is going to be a disappointment to many, it's still a handful of rich-layered and top-notch neptunes sounds. my top tracks are: universal mind control, gladiator, and inhale (i hear chad shining like crazy on this track).

did the photoshoot for some of the bmod newbies today. too bad it was hot and humid out.. there were even a couple raindrops. but it was fun.. photoshoots are always fun, but all the crap i have to do after; resizing, uploading, emailing, touching up, re-emailing, updating the website.. quite tedious.. but in the end it's still fun.


the four newbies that got their pictures taken today..
and if anyone remembers Alvin from barkada a few years ago..
that's his little sister on the left.

went to red robin again to take advantage of my mom's free birthday burger. i tried their raspberry limeade.. it was alright; just tasted like sprite with raspberry syrup.. and for the same price as their famous strawberry lemonade; i'd rather have the strawberry lemonade.. i did see, though, that they have a new drink: the blueberry pomegranate limeade.. made with pomegranate syrup and real blueberries.. sounds like i might like it.. that's for next time..

last night after practice, me vince kj gigz arvin leah mark jasmine and jean ate at the new guppy [tea] house in hacienda heights right off the 60fwy. as far as food and the quality, its the same as the other guppys' (awesome!!), but this just makes it soooo much better because now we dont have to drive all the way to cerritos to get our guppy's fix!! much excite!

and here's another cat story. so.. around 5am (give or take 15 minutes) EVERY DAY, kobe starts scratching at our bedroom doors, never mine though; because my door is always open so he can freely walk in and out at night. but for my mom and sister, he just continuously scratches at their doors. while the majority of his reasoning is that he's hungry, it just seems interesting to me that he does it at around the same time every day. but sometimes, he's just weird and it seems like he's just checking that whoever is in the room is ok. for example, he'd scratch at my sister's door for 15 to 30 minutes.. when my sister finally cant take it and gets out of bed, she opens the door and just looks at him sitting there, and he looks up as if to say, "hello..". she closes the door and goes back to sleep, and kobe wont bother her anymore for the rest of the morning.

i've found myself going back into country music mode and listening to rascal flatts and ms. underwood a lot recently.. dont hate!

last weekend's rooted movement 2 year anniversary party at highlands in hollywood was all kinds of awesome.. and the aftermath was all kinds of not.

bmod's beach outing on saturday was fun as well; even though kj and i made a death defying walk with a bunch of beach stuff. our grill and ice chest failed.. so bad that our neighboring beach-goers decided to sell us their grill!

my sister's and mom's birthdays were on the 4th and the 6th; while not hugely celebrated, they were still celebrated nonetheless. but i do miss those days when your birthday was THE thing to look forward to.. that, and Christmas..

we've been feeding kobe less because he's starting to gain a lot of weight. and yesterday, when me arvin vince and bert went to fry's on our nerd trip, i bought some batteries for my red laser (not the green one, that would kill my cat), so that kobe has something to chase around. threw the batteries in; and then his fun started.. but it only lasted about 3 minutes before he got bored of the laser.. whomp!

did quite some movie downloading/watching... highly recommended: wanted, hot rod. recommended: hancock. avoid at all costs: poseidon, premonition, the happening. yet to watch: the wackness.

the world is currently all blah right now; but im doing my part to attempt to maintain balance. because the only thing worse than blah is a chaotic blah.

strongest quake to hit the LA area in over a decade..

my experience: just laying there, awake. then i felt the initial jolt. took me less than two seconds to realize it was an earthquake. im on a steel loft bed, so it was dumbing down the violent shaking and smoothing it out for me haha. a few seconds later, my mom comes running into my doorway screaming my name in franticness. then she started saying some prayer. when it transitioned from violent shaking to that slow rumbling that makes you feel like you're on a boat or drunk or something, i reassured her to calm down and that it was almost over. but she said she could still feel shaking, which i found out later it was a longer quake than i realized because my bed had absorbed a lot of the small shakes towards the end.

went on our normal day shortly after while watching the news coverage on the event. the entire time my i noticed my cat wasn't popping his head around while we ate.. hmm.. went looking for him, poor thing, totally forgot about his well-being because of the quake and picking up random things that fell. found him cowering in the corner behind a couch.. got him out and he was on permanent alert mode. ears perked. eyes dilated. constantly looking around. found his way behind our tv and hid there for about an hour.. had to pull him out myself and take him to my room where he found yet another small covering to hide in the shelves.. it wasn't until about 7pm where he was finally able to walk around the house by himself, with extreme caution of course, but at least he was able to wander.. poor guy hah..


kobe scared to come out from
behind the tv after the quake

anyways, with this 5.4 quake; there is a 5% chance that within 24hrs, it is a prelude to a bigger quake.. but after around noon tomorrow, the chance goes down to 1%.. so let's hope that doesn't happen.. earthquakes are fun when there's not damage, so anything stronger than today's will be too much to handle..

and man.. within ten minutes of starting this entry, i heard some news.. felt like i was slapped in the face, kicked in the groin, stabbed in the back, and had my heart torn out.. some people can just throw something good away so easily..

holy geez it's 5am..

i just got home from a chillout at rooted and a nintendo ds party at denny's with mark alex jean and bert.. and we bumped into pat and froi while there.

anyways, this is a story about a heroic cat named kobe. as some of you may know, we have a very large tank that houses two red-eared slider turtles. and when they get hungry, they tend to move around a lot when someone walks by. well, yesterday, they were moving around more than normal. and my cat was sitting there watching them. my sister and i wondered why they were moving so much, but we just assumed they were just restless. but all of a sudden, kobe starts to freak out as if he's terrified of the tank, when he would normally just sit right next to it as if the turtles weren't there.

it brings my (and my sister's) attention to the turtles.. we notice that our glass heater that we use to heat up the water was giving off a weird blue spark within itself. *!!!* i know that isn't right, so we get the electric glass heater out of the water. upon inspection, we found a very small crack in the glass! the heater was broken and was probably putting an electrical current into the water! i'm sure it was a very small current, but enough for the turtles to feel.. had the crack in the glass been a bit bigger, i'm sure the turtles would have been electrocuted and fried!!

i dont know how my cat was able to sense that and show it.. perhaps the turtles were giving out some kind of distress call that only animals understand? i have no idea..

i hate heat. heat needs to die. the sun needs to turn off. and it needs to start snowing again.

apparently, i'm not the only one who cant stand it.. i was looking for kobe all over the house to find him in the most unexpected place ever:


cool cat
talk about smart huh? if i could find a large ceramic thing to just sit in i would do it too.. our guest bathtub is currently being used as extra storage.. heh..

all the super smash bros brawl bulletins about friend codes are making me envious.. boo..

grillz candy update.. not wanting my sisters three dollars to go to waste.. i ate it. with my teef blingin', i was expecting some money to start raining down, and a hummer limo to pull up and empty a bunch of ho's into my yard.. but none of that happened. my I.Q. lowered, i looked like an idiot, and the candy tasted just as bad. other than its hilarious novelty keeping it from failing miserably, i give it a D-

i went to elephant bar last night with bert vince carissa and marco. and i didn't order the chicken tender platter. whoa? yep, i got the shrimp adventure platter. very good.. but pricey; and i'd rather save 6 bucks and go back to my regular meal with the best honey mustard sauce ever. but this once was a nice deviation.

random; my cat seems to have developed a sense of protectiveness over all of us here at home. all cats fear water. when the shower is running, he would look into it cautiously.. and just as any of us are about to step in, kobe would reach out and grab your foot as if saying "no! dont go in there!!" other randomness: he can also catch foil balls made from candy wrappers. and if he misses a catch, he'll pick it up with his mouth and bring it back.

i went to the essence workshops/auditions tonight with hannah froi mark and james. loved the choreo. it wasn't "girl specific" either so i wanted to learn it. but didnt. just watched. and when i got home, i noticed my laptop wasn't closed.. great, that means kobe walked all over the keyboard while i was gone. i get out of the screensaver and find this in an IM to chad (not sent though..)

cxhjmdffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffhyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy=[-pppppppwqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqRKJ ,M=[-PPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP-WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

so that's the result of a cat and a keyboard.

<nerd> trying out apple's "safari" browser for windows. back when mac-biting was the cool thing to do on windows machines, i'd be all over it.. but after using it.. i dunno, yeah it renders pages crazy fast. and i'd actually prefer it to internet explorer.. but something about it makes me keep going back to firefox. it might be the fact that it keeps the apple aqua theme in tact so it actually looks the same that it would on a mac machine. the font smoothing makes text look different than any other application, and the aqua buttons and that gray itunes color just make it feel tacky when using it on vista. plus i've gotten spoiled by all the extensions and add-ons i've added to firefox (i'm using the nightly beta build 3.0b3). </nerd>

bmod gets to meet some of their biggest fans from pomona high school later on today when they perform for the teachers vs seniors basketball game. that should be fun and interesting..

( and a survey... )