Blogs are my latest hobby. This might come as a surprise, judging from this far-from-prolific thing you are reading. What I mean is, I’ve been devouring these delicious bites of other people’s existence with a vengeance. Maybe I’m making up for all the months of blog starvation, being anorexic almost, oblivious to the joys of invading other people’s worlds.
Now, I’m part of a family. I might not be getting the love I deserve on my fellow bloggers’ blogrolls, but that’s okay because most families are dysfunctional these days, anyway.
Recently, I found this gem of a blog at girlsarepretty.com. A different story everyday! The joy! Morbid but hilarious stories that never fail to shock me. I wrote Pretty Girl (the writer) a very embarrassing fan mail, gushing about how she’s God’s gift to bored netizens everywhere, and how I would kill to write like that. She turned out to be a he. Only guys can be that funny, some say.
I do actually have one burning question to ask these great bloggers — if they spend so much time writing about their lives, how do they find time to actually have a life?
24 April 2005
22 April 2005
What we wouldn't do for an idea.
Ideas sell us things we don't need. I am guilty of the crime (they made me do it because I work in advertising).
I once had the idea that I was in love. For one moment, my mental capacities were reduced to that of a teenager's and I was just lapping up the lies. I don't blame myself - some major media buying was going on, and my inner TiVo was powerless. That 'L' word managed to buy into almost every single film, book, and song on the planet. How do you buck the trend when your local galaxy has been singing sappy love songs at karaoke bars and quoting lines like "you complete me"?
Now, I am one dissatisfied customer.
So I've been thinking up some campaigns of my own to counter the battle for my mind. I shall slogan myself out of this! My tagline for my very first campaign should be long and bizarre enough for everyone to remember.
"All Men Are Bastards No Matter How Nice They Seem At First".
Would it make a good jingle, you think?
I once had the idea that I was in love. For one moment, my mental capacities were reduced to that of a teenager's and I was just lapping up the lies. I don't blame myself - some major media buying was going on, and my inner TiVo was powerless. That 'L' word managed to buy into almost every single film, book, and song on the planet. How do you buck the trend when your local galaxy has been singing sappy love songs at karaoke bars and quoting lines like "you complete me"?
Now, I am one dissatisfied customer.
So I've been thinking up some campaigns of my own to counter the battle for my mind. I shall slogan myself out of this! My tagline for my very first campaign should be long and bizarre enough for everyone to remember.
"All Men Are Bastards No Matter How Nice They Seem At First".
Would it make a good jingle, you think?
04 April 2005
03 April 2005
The Death of Happy Endings
It now seems that poignant goodbyes between characters is a much-favoured movie finale. And you thought you could pull the rose-tinted-glasses over your tear-weary eyes, and let the magic of cinema soothe your romance-starved heart? Ha! Think again!
It was a Scarlett Johannson weekend for me. I caught In Good Company last night (not worth blogging about), and Lost in Translation (2nd viewing) this afternoon. Maybe it's just me, but the "love life" of the characters she plays always seems star-crossed.
Which isn't surprising in Lost in Translation, a flick that dwells more on failure than success, and is more about alienation than making a connection.
In Bob and Charlotte's idealistic youth, the future was a promise. As the years passed, they realised it was a contract, not a promise, and they didn't read the fine print. Bob’s stellar career must eventually decline, just as the thrill of Charlotte’s marriage loses its lustre. Despite Bob and Charlotte's difference in age, they both stumble upon disillusionment equally unprepared. And it is their sharing of this emptiness, not lust, that unites them. (Conditioned by Hollywood, I'm sure I wasn't the only one expecting something as they lay side by side.)
Instead, the hotel bed becomes the backdrop for a heart-to-heart talk into the wee hours of morning. Charlotte asks a question resonant for so many of us, "Does it get any easier?" and we prick our ears with vested interest. Bob is a tiny window into Charlotte's future, as she begins to experience the dull strain in her own marriage, slight but nonetheless troubling suspicions of her husband's possible infidelity, and a loneliness she thought she said goodbye to at the altar.
In spite of its sobering themes, Lost in Translation isn't a film you'd call depressing. Roll-over funny scenes punctuate its masterfully-captured, incessant drone of ennui. And Tokyo, although bizarre and lonely, fascinates with its sights, pleasures and quirks.
It is Charlotte's lone rambling in temples, Bob's goofy mishaps and the couple's casual banter that make this film so subtly charming. And in the true spirit of subtlety, the most hard-hitting conversation is the one we can’t hear.
And maybe saying goodbye is the happiest ending possible — all relationships would eventually degenerate, but theirs is sweetly immortalised by its unexplored potential.
It was a Scarlett Johannson weekend for me. I caught In Good Company last night (not worth blogging about), and Lost in Translation (2nd viewing) this afternoon. Maybe it's just me, but the "love life" of the characters she plays always seems star-crossed.
Which isn't surprising in Lost in Translation, a flick that dwells more on failure than success, and is more about alienation than making a connection.
In Bob and Charlotte's idealistic youth, the future was a promise. As the years passed, they realised it was a contract, not a promise, and they didn't read the fine print. Bob’s stellar career must eventually decline, just as the thrill of Charlotte’s marriage loses its lustre. Despite Bob and Charlotte's difference in age, they both stumble upon disillusionment equally unprepared. And it is their sharing of this emptiness, not lust, that unites them. (Conditioned by Hollywood, I'm sure I wasn't the only one expecting something as they lay side by side.)
Instead, the hotel bed becomes the backdrop for a heart-to-heart talk into the wee hours of morning. Charlotte asks a question resonant for so many of us, "Does it get any easier?" and we prick our ears with vested interest. Bob is a tiny window into Charlotte's future, as she begins to experience the dull strain in her own marriage, slight but nonetheless troubling suspicions of her husband's possible infidelity, and a loneliness she thought she said goodbye to at the altar.
In spite of its sobering themes, Lost in Translation isn't a film you'd call depressing. Roll-over funny scenes punctuate its masterfully-captured, incessant drone of ennui. And Tokyo, although bizarre and lonely, fascinates with its sights, pleasures and quirks.
It is Charlotte's lone rambling in temples, Bob's goofy mishaps and the couple's casual banter that make this film so subtly charming. And in the true spirit of subtlety, the most hard-hitting conversation is the one we can’t hear.
And maybe saying goodbye is the happiest ending possible — all relationships would eventually degenerate, but theirs is sweetly immortalised by its unexplored potential.
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