i'm so tired... by Lauv and Troye Sivan (Stripped Version)

Despite this song being released more than 2 years ago, I only discovered i'm so tired... by Lauv and Troye Sivan recently and I immediately loved it. While playing it on youtube, I saw this stripped performance in the related videos and I decided to play it. As much as I love the original, I found myself connecting more deeply to and being more moved by this version. Listen to it here:

  

video uploaded in youtube by Lauv

Thankfully, this stripped in LA version is also available on Spotify. Needless to say, I've been listening to it a lot.

Friends Reunion, WW84, and HBO Go

When I subscribed to HBO Go Asia last March to watch Zack Snyder's Justice League, I intended to terminate my subscription after a month. As it turn out, I ended up extending my subscription in April so I could watch Wonder Woman 84 which became available on HBO Go on April 21 and I extended my subscription again in May to watch the Friends: The Reunion.

Friends: The Reunion

I was one of the many millions of people who tuned in regularly to watch Friends across all its seasons so I definitely had to watch this. But rather than this reunion being a show that told us how Chandler, Joey, Monica, Phoebe, Rachel, and Ross were now, it was a nostalgic walk down memory lane with Courteney, David, Jennifer, Lisa, Matt, and Matthew, along with other cast members and creators of the show. Lisa was asked towards the end of the reunion whether they've talked about making another episode or another movie and she said that the writers David Crane and Mrta Kauffman said that "they ended the show very nicely and they would have to unravel all those good things in order for their to be stories." I actually liked the format, which involved the cast talking to each other and reading scripts, showing clips from the show, and even having all of them interviewed in front of a live audience. It was so nostalgic seeing Matt and Matthew sit on Joey and Chandler's reclining chairs, seeing Matt put on all of Chandler's clothes again, hearing Lisa, Rachel, and David reenact the time when Phoebe found out about Chandler and Monica, listening to Lisa sing Smelly Cat again, and even seeing Maggie Wheeler who played Janice (Oh... My... God...) and James Michael Tyler who played Gunther make special appearances.

It was mentioned during the reunion that the one sentence pitch is for the show was "it's about that time in your life when your friends are your family" and seeing the cast together and talk about how important they all are to each other really tugs at your heart. Oh and to anyone who might not know, I believe it was Friends that coined the term "Friendzone". Check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugYEJfwUdcA. 

Wonder Woman 1984

The first Wonder Woman film is one of my favorite superhero movies so I wanted to see this sequel. It was entertaining and enjoyable to watch, but it wasn't as good as the first one. It was an interesting story, which I won't spoil, but as we all knew that Chris Pine would reprise his role as Steve Trevor who died in the first movie, I wanted to see how that would happen. I was also curious to see Cheetah's origin story and understand how her powers would be at a level that would enable her to match up against Wonder Woman. (When this is revealed in the movie, I thought it made perfect sense.) SPOILER ALERT: One of the cool things in this movie is that we got to see Lynda Carter, who portrayed Wonder Woman in the TV series that aired in the 1970s.

*****

Since I'm already subscribed to HBO Go, I tried to maximize it by watching as many movies as I can. I normally play a movie while I'm doing other things at home (for instance, doing chores) so I tend to watch films that I've already seen  before. In the last couple of months since I subscribed, I've re-watched 23 movies. These are: Spider-Man: Far From Home, Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse, Wonder Woman, Red Eye, Four Weddings and a Funeral (I've forgotten how funny this movie is), School of Rock, To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar, Red Riding Hood, Blues Brothers 2000, The Specialist, The Pelican Brief, Minority Report, Justice League: War, Godzilla: King of The Monsters, Pacific Rim, The Guilt Trip, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Assault on Precinct 13, Mean Girls, The Italian Job, Scooby-Doo, Along Came a Spider, and Snakes on a Plane. Aside from Zack Snyder's Justice League and Wonder Woman 1984, I only got to watch one other movie - The Enchanting Phantom - for the first time.

The Enchanting Phantom

This is a Chinese Movie about a scholar Ning Cai Chen who falls in love with a woman who turns out to be a ghost. This "enchanting phantom" named Nie Xiao Qian seduces men so she can steal their life essence. Somehow, Nie Xiao Qian ends up falling in love with Ning Cai Chen as well. It's an easy enough film to watch with a few interesting twists and events but I realized that recently, I find it difficult to stay focused on watching new movies, moreso if I have to read subtitles.

I know that Godzilla vs Kong was released on HBO Max recently - last month I think - so I'm hoping that it becomes available on HBO Go soon.

Quarantine Stories Part 10

I've been hearing about Lola Nena's donuts for a while now. Many of my friends tried it during the quarantine and many of them were raving about it. I hadn't gotten around to trying it until recently. I discovered that there's a Lola Nena's near my family's house but whenever I'd pass by, there was a line (given the pandemic, even a really short line meant that I would have to wait with other people and I am trying to avoid being around other people as much as possible). However, last weekend, when I passed by, there was no line at all. I decided to make a quick stop to purchase their triple cheese donuts. A box of 8 costs P216. These donuts are a twist on the traditional Pinoy sugar donuts that we could get from the neighborhood bakeries. The difference of course is that these ones are stuffed with cheese. The verdict? While I don't think I will crave these donuts in the way that many other people do, they are definitely very good value for money (each donut has a good size and costs only P27) and are perfect for merienda. I will surely buy these again in the future.

Lola Nena's Triple Cheese Donuts

One of my recent online purchases was a desk lamp. The lighting in my apartment isn't that great so I realized last year during quarantine that I couldn't really read books comfortably once the sun was down so I would always read next to my window during the day. I did buy a ring light last year but I couldn't really position it next to my bed in a way that the light hit the book properly. I decided to look for an inexpensive desk lamp on Lazada and I found one - a Lumix hanging desk lamp - that can stand on its own but can also be clipped onto a side table. I didn't properly check the product details so I ended up getting a lamp with white light (I wanted to get one with yellow light) but it is definitely serving its purpose. The neck is flexible so I can position the light right behind me when I read. I even use it when I'm checking my phone while in bed. I'm really happy with this purchase.

Lumix Hanging Desk Lamp

Another recent Lazada purchase was Cheeza. A friend told me she absolutely loves these crackers so I searched it on Lazada, found it, and decided to order a few so I could try it. There seem to be three variants but the one that was available at the time that I ordered was the blue one. While my friend was raving about them, I thought they were just okay. That said, because the crackers have a very strong cheese flavor, they actual partner very well with wine. 

Glico Cheeza

A big problem I had recently at home was that both sinks in my apartment ended up getting clogged at the same time. In fact, the kitchen sink was so clogged that if I washed even just 3-4 items, the water level would go up in my sink and it would take about 1-2 hours for the water to drain. I wasn't sure if I should use a drain declogger such as Liquid Sosa so I asked the engineering team in our building and they said that it's better to clear the clog mechanically rather than chemically. I had to take a personal leave from work because the machine that would be used declog my drain was apparently very noisy which meant it couldn't be operated during weekends or in the evenings (building rules indicate that noisy house work have to be done between 8am and 5pm from Mondays to Fridays). I did a lot of cleaning and disinfecting after the plumbers left but thankfully, my drains are no longer clogged.

Nadal wins Rome Masters Title #10

Rafa Nadal just won his 10th title at the Rome Masters, beating Novak Djokovic 7-5, 1-6, 6-3 in the final. Wow!

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This is now the fourth tournament where Rafa has won at least 10 titles (the three others being the French Ope, Barcelona, and Monte Carlo). It is also his 36th Masters Title, tying him with Novak Djokovic. It's just mind-blowing to think how dominant Nadal has been on clay over such a long period of time.

That this achievement comes a week after Nadal was awarded the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year makes it even most special. 

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Roland Garros is only two weeks away and I'm really hoping that Nadal wins his 14th title there. It's going to be a tall order though, especially since Nadal has had his fair share of losses to the next generation (both Alexander Zverev and Andrey Rublev beat him on clay this year) and world #1 Novak Djokovic is still playing at an exceptionally high level. But if his Rome results are any indication - he beat both Zverev and Djokovic - he still has a fighting chance. Vamos Rafa!

We lost our dog 😞

The last several days haven't been kind. Shortly after I lost a very good friend, my family lost our dog.😞

No one knows exactly what happened but it seems that when my mom went to work late last week, the dog slipped out of the house when our gates were opened. Normally, whenever our dogs go out of the house, they always go back after a short while. Unfortunately, because my mom left very early in the morning, no one else was awake to open the gate for our dog when it came back home. It was only when my nephew was going to feed our dogs for lunch that he noticed that one of them was missing. It's been several days now and he still hasn't come home. I am heartbroken. 

I am hoping that our dog didn't suffer badly if anything did happen to him. Or if someone else captured him and took ownership of him, that they take good care of him. Either way, I will be praying for our lost dog.

Rest in Peace, Karen

I just lost a dear friend.

I met Karen around five years ago through common friends. She was tremendously kind, generous, and supportive. She would read her friends' blogs - I remember sharing links to my Russia posts because she was interested to visit Russia - and watch their vlogs. In our chat group, she would respond to people's questions, even if it was just to say that she didn't know or that she wasn't familiar with whatever was being asked. When I was prepping for my South America trip, there was a Samsonite luggage sale at the Rustan's Department Store but you needed to have a BDO credit card to get the 40% discount. Karen said that she had one and she volunteered to accompany me to Rustan's. When we got there, we found out that it was a specific BDO credit card that was needed so Karen and I ended up just having dinner in A Veneto in Glorietta. While the luggage purchase was a fail, it was still a good evening because we got to hang out and talk about stuff, including things we wanted to do.

What makes this loss even sadder is that it was all so sudden. One minute we were chatting about Smart TVs and the next, I learned that she had passed on. It didn't even register immediately. When my friend told us that Karen was gone, I thought she was referring to another person with the same name. It's really heartbreaking that I wasn't even able to say goodbye or wish her well. But that's how death is most times. Unexpected, like a thief in the night.

Karen said she wanted us to take a crack at the Morbid Morgue room in Mystery Manila - it was the one room we still hadn't tried in the Ayala the 30th Mystery Manila - but now I'm gutted that we won't ever get to do it, at least not with her. Maybe when the pandemic is over, I can gather our friends so we can give this room a go in her honor.

I'd like to end this post by sharing a song that's in Karen's Spotify playlist, Funeral Bell by Phildel. It's a hauntingly beautiful song and, given what has happened, also sadly appropriate.

video uploaded in youtube by Phildel - Topic

*****

 

Eternal rest grant unto Karen, O Lord

And let perpetual light shine upon her

May Karen and all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace

Amen.